Fall Grau

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

!!!?

I refer you to the first post:

"This scenario is not a true hypothetical in that it does not attempt to deal with the immense logistical problem of mounting an invasion across the Atlantic onto a hostile shore."

Naval warfare is not really present in this scenarios. Apart from anything else, the combination of scales (25km/hex and full week turns) which is suitable for land warfare is not suitable to naval warfare. However the coast guns provided a useful mechanism to make a particular strategy less of a "gimme" for the Axis player. If he wants to do it, he either has to go the long way from south of Norfolk, or use airborne troops to neutralise the coast guns.

[Curtis Lemay]

Alright. Fair enough.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

Alright. Fair enough.

I know this goes in the opposite direction to what I normally say about TOAW, but I took on this project based on being a fanboy for Jeremy's original scenario and radically changing the design philosophy would have defeated the point.

I do occasionally toy with the idea of doing this properly: under what circumstances could Germany have invaded North America and what would that have looked like? There are two problems:
1) it's a massive and very complicated project- and I keep on thinking "hey this would be great at 10km/hex" and then realising I don't want to map the whole southeast at that scale
2) one has to build in a large number of assumptions just to prevent the Germans being wiped out before they show up. Basically the United States has to be totally disarmed and to stay that way while the Germans build up substantial bases in the Caribbean.

[rhinobones]

ORIGINAL: golden delicious
. . . one has to build in a large number of assumptions just to prevent the Germans being wiped out before they show up. Basically the United States has to be totally disarmed and to stay that way while the Germans build up substantial bases in the Caribbean.

Push the invasion date up to 1939-1940 before the US rearmed and Germany became involved in France and Russia. Think this would tend to make the assumptions a bit more palatable.

Regards

[Jeremy Mac Donald]

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay

ORIGINAL: golden delicious

ORIGINAL: Curtis Lemay


With the NAD at 10, each shore gun gets to fire 10 rounds before the ships can respond. At 100, each will fire 1 round before the ships get to fire back.

They won't fire back at all as in game terms there are no ships, only embarked units.

!!!?

The entire landing element is pretty abstract. I have always assumed that the Axis fleets are certainly on the scene and playing some vital part of this insanely large invasion of North America from Europe but that they are not necessarily free to do whatever the Player wants with them. They are tied up in the planning and logistics end essentially.

While making the Chesapeake a death trap for a major German landing was fundamentally done for balance reasons it was a pretty easy call - it is easy to imagine that it would be a death trap due to the confined space and that it is such an obviousness starting location for what American naval defense preparations have gotten underway.

[Jeremy Mac Donald]

I think most people would find this even harder to swallow then the 1943 invasion. I am not sure how obviously impossible this idea is to the average gamer. The starting assumptions are that Britain was knocked out in 1941 and Russia early in 1942 and Germany has won it all.

When I first sat down to make this I assumed that this would have made this feasible - look closely and it still is not but if one does not look to closely well then maybe...

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: rhinobones


Push the invasion date up to 1939-1940 before the US rearmed and Germany became involved in France and Russia. Think this would tend to make the assumptions a bit more palatable.

This sort of assumes that Britain and France just wave the German invasion fleet past- and that Russia happily sits on her hands while Europe invades America.

I don't think it works. Frankly I don't think any timeline works for Fall Grau as it has all sorts of impossible things happening. If you wanted to make a remotely realistic scenario then you have to assume that Germany simply crushes all her European opponents by the end of 1941, which isn't all that far fetched and many at the time expected exactly this to happen. Then one has 18 months of build up where Germany for whatever reason decides to go off and crush the United States as well, establishing various bases in the Caribbean which can then be used to advance up through Cuba and Florida, and possibly via Mexico. Any other landings would be totally unsupportable due to the need to get land-based fighter cover over the invasion area, so this gives us a very different scenario where the Axis player has to more or less follow the script and fight his way from port to port and airbase to airbase, trying to get out of the Florida bottleneck before the US can mobilise.

For now, Fall Grau sits broadly in the same category as your War of the Ring scenario: something that's entertaining even if it's not exactly simulation. Actually, if you assume Hitler has found the Ring of Power...

[rhinobones]

ORIGINAL: golden delicious

This sort of assumes . . .

Of course it makes assumptions. The entire premise is a farfetched no matter which time period is used as alternative history. That's why it’s called a game.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: rhinobones


Of course it makes assumptions. The entire premise is a farfetched no matter which time period is used as alternative history. That's why it’s called a game.

Alright- so why mess up the whole thing by moving it to 1939-40- only to still make ludicrous assumptions. In fact even more ludicrous ones than we were already making.

I'm just going to leave it as it is. Step 1: Germany conquers Europe. Step 2: _______ Step 3: Profit

The briefing doesn't even lay out a timeline. Ok, here we are: the Germans just landed in North America. Don't think too much about it and you'll have a good time.

[rhinobones]

In post #22 you hinted at revising the scenario so I thought I would offer a suggestion. Take it or leave it.

My ludicrous assumptions for 1939-40 would be:

1. Germany and Russia divide Poland.
2. The Allies stay with the appeasement strategy.
3. The Russia/German non-aggression pact remains intact.
4. French Blitzkrieg and Barbarossa don’t happen.
5. Germany does not get involved in North Africa.
6. 2 million German troops available for invasion of US
7. Russia takes the opportunity to seize Alaska.
8. Japan invades Hawaii and blockades Panama.
9. Germany captures the Arsenal of Democracy.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: rhinobones

In post #22 you hinted at revising the scenario so I thought I would offer a suggestion. Take it or leave it.

My ludicrous assumptions for 1939-40 would be:

1. Germany and Russia divide Poland.
2. The Allies stay with the appeasement strategy.
3. The Russia/German non-aggression pact remains intact.
4. French Blitzkrieg and Barbarossa don’t happen.
5. Germany does not get involved in North Africa.
6. 2 million German troops available for invasion of US
7. Russia takes the opportunity to seize Alaska.
8. Japan invades Hawaii and blockades Panama.
9. Germany captures the Arsenal of Democracy.

Hitler essentially a three point program:
1) Unify the German peoples into a single state
2) Humiliate France
3) Destroy Communism

In proposing to replace 2 and 3 with "carry out the most ambitious amphibious campaign in human history from a standing start", you're essentially positing a scenario where Nazism is a completely different movement. Actually, to make this work you'd want to see both France and Germany emerge essentially as Communist states in the 1930s- which was entirely possible. The Spanish Civil War would have been won by the Republic and in the process Italy would have been humiliated and possibly subjected to another Communist revolution.

So then we have a more or less unified Europe under Communism as of 1939. However, this still leaves us with the problem of the world's largest navy just waving this ideologically hostile fleet over the Atlantic to attack the United States. I think it's fundamentally impossible to have Germany launching a land campaign in the Americas unless Britain has already been taken out of the picture in some fashion.

[Lobster]

ORIGINAL: golden delicious

Hitler essentially a three point program:
1) Unify the German peoples into a single state
2) Humiliate France
3) Destroy Communism

This is fairly how Hitler saw it. Bind Germany to the Nazi Party (Hitler), punish those responsible for the Treaty of Versailles, unite Western Europe in a grand alliance (Anti-Comintern Pact) to defeat Communism (Russia).

He succeeded in 1 and 2. He did get his pact. He failed in 3.

Regarding the U.K. He initially deluded himself into thinking the British would acquiesce to German dominance of Continental Europe and satisfy themselves with going about their business with their global colonies thus ending the War in Europe. Leaving Hitler...er...Germany and Western Europe to handle an isolated Communist Russia. I don't immediately recall what delusions he convinced himself of regarding the U.K. after the defeat of Russia but he did realize that sooner or later he...er...United Europe, would have to face off against the U.S.A.

Consider what would have happened if he had better trusted Japan and had included them in his Grand Scheme of Things. Perhaps the Soviet Union would have indeed been defeated and Japan would have attacked the U.S.A. at a later date instead of pissing them off so they did their own thing.

Germany and the Second World War
Edited by Research Institute for Military History, Potsdam, Germany

[rhinobones]

France and Germany emerge essentially as Communist states in the 1930s- which was entirely possible

Good. Glad to see you fully support the alternative proposal.

[Lobster]

ORIGINAL: rhinobones

In post #22 you hinted at revising the scenario so I thought I would offer a suggestion. Take it or leave it.

My ludicrous assumptions for 1939-40 would be:

1. Germany and Russia divide Poland.
2. The Allies stay with the appeasement strategy.
3. The Russia/German non-aggression pact remains intact.
4. French Blitzkrieg and Barbarossa don’t happen.
5. Germany does not get involved in North Africa.
6. 2 million German troops available for invasion of US
7. Russia takes the opportunity to seize Alaska.
8. Japan invades Hawaii and blockades Panama.
9. Germany captures the Arsenal of Democracy.

You left out Bizarro Superman. When does he come in? [:D]

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: Lobster


Regarding the U.K. He initially deluded himself into thinking the British would acquiesce to German dominance of Continental Europe and satisfy themselves with going about their business with their global colonies thus ending the War in Europe. Leaving Hitler...er...Germany and Western Europe to handle an isolated Communist Russia. I don't immediately recall what delusions he convinced himself of regarding the U.K. after the defeat of Russia but he did realize that sooner or later he...er...United Europe, would have to face off against the U.S.A.

Well, the thing is Hitler expected Britain to act on the basis of realpolitik. In theory, a major war between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia would have been a gift to Britain as whoever was victorious would emerge exhausted. This was a factor in the policy of the Western Allies until 1939: to avoid confronting Hitler before he had a chance to get into a war with Russia. Of course the Nazi-Soviet pact put an end to this fantasy as it became apparent that Hitler would fight in the West first. However once France was beaten Hitler didn't understand why Britain would want to fight on rather than standing aside and letting him get on with his cataclysmic war in Russia.

If one looks at the condition Britain and the Empire were in after the war it's easy to see why this was Hitler's perception: the war ultimately was more damaging to Britain in the long term than it was to Germany.

Consider what would have happened if he had better trusted Japan and had included them in his Grand Scheme of Things. Perhaps the Soviet Union would have indeed been defeated and Japan would have attacked the U.S.A. at a later date instead of pissing them off so they did their own thing.

My understanding is that Japan turning against the United States instead of the Soviet Union was a result of an internal power struggle in Japan between the Navy and the Army, which the Navy won. In any case Japan's economy would have started to fall apart in 1942 in the absence of a source of oil, which meant the Dutch East Indies one way or another.

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: rhinobones

Good. Glad to see you fully support the alternative proposal.

Well- not really. You still have the problem of the Royal Navy. It's easy to knock of most of continental Europe for Communism but this still doesn't put Comintern in a position to cross the Atlantic.

[cathar1244]

Actually, to make this work you'd want to see both France and Germany emerge essentially as Communist states in the 1930s- which was entirely possible.

Except a stubborn fellow named Pilsudski thrashed the Bolsheviks like red-headed stepchildren on the banks of the Vistula in 1920. [:D]

Cheers

[golden delicious]

ORIGINAL: cathar1244


Except a stubborn fellow named Pilsudski thrashed the Bolsheviks like red-headed stepchildren on the banks of the Vistula in 1920. [:D]

Cheers

I take it you're Polish then...

Irrespective of the results of the Russo-Polish war, there's no particular reason that the strongman who emerged from the wreckage of the Weimar Republic had to be a Fascist instead of a Communist.

[cathar1244]

I take it you're Polish then...

Hmm, I don't recall anyone using me to polish anything lately. [;)]

No, just one of the episodes of history I've heard about.

Cheers

[Jeremy Mac Donald]

ORIGINAL: rhinobones

In post #22 you hinted at revising the scenario so I thought I would offer a suggestion. Take it or leave it.

My ludicrous assumptions for 1939-40 would be:

1. Germany and Russia divide Poland.
2. The Allies stay with the appeasement strategy.
3. The Russia/German non-aggression pact remains intact.
4. French Blitzkrieg and Barbarossa don’t happen.
5. Germany does not get involved in North Africa.
6. 2 million German troops available for invasion of US
7. Russia takes the opportunity to seize Alaska.
8. Japan invades Hawaii and blockades Panama.
9. Germany captures the Arsenal of Democracy.

OK fair enough - I think the point is you have traded one set of unlikely propositions and events for another set.

Given that I have already shown a penchant for 'very' alternative history I can see how your suggestions could make a fun and fine scenario with a German/Russo/Japanese alliance getting stuck up in America and using the engine to simulate political events in Europe as well as a deteriorating alliance between Russia and Germany who actually want to be enemies. I see a fun scenario there.

However what I see is another scenario. This one is about a Europe dominated by Axis Germany invading North America with Europe already under their thumb and dragging many of their allies into the maelstrom of of a flat footed but rapidly expanding United States.

Plus there is already 20 years of playtests on this one. We hope the vast majority of bugs have been worked out.