Destroying Will952: An AAR

[operating]

When I look at your Belfort breakthrough (which would be a dream to me) I just think it's criminal to not to have more reserves there to wrap up Eastern France in either a pincer movement, or just slug it out. It's beautiful to see an enemies' flank "up in the air", it'd be like Happy Hour at a local bar.[:D]

[KorutZelva]

Yeah... that success down south was unexpected! (Forgot to reinforce it? HQ too far to attach?) At the time, I did wish I had some of the troops I had ferried to Italy on hand to exploit it. I guess I could have operated them back but reinforcing them, operating them back it's winter time. Ugh. I did put two newly deployable units in the area to see if I could take advantage of it... but one of the two I had to ferry to the East to deal with the Russian crisis. But in between lunging at Dijon and bagging Epinal, I settled for the later because I need to keep the length of my line under control too. I didn't get Amiens, Reims and Nancy which were my starting goals but getting Belfort, Epinal and Besancon instead might be even better. Just can't do everything I want! With trench 1 active and a river line, you have to budget like 4 corps to take down a single unit, and they might have to stop a turn to refit before attacking again. It's just a terrible grind. German guns will be upgraded and ready by spring... Austrians following in summer. More efficient offensive will be possible.

[KorutZelva]

'WHERE IS TASK FORCE WILL952 THE WORLD WONDERS'

[KorutZelva]

France puts a corp in striking range of Luxemburg forcing me to rejig my lines. Morale goes back up soooooooo slowly... I might have a couple of units that have morale in the 60% range when its go time.

[KorutZelva]

April 1915

Tech-Diplo breakdown by country

UK: 550-150
France: 800-50
Italy: 60
Serbia: 375
Russia: 1275 (Russia managed to catch up after I made my claim Austria was outspending them... but they only managed to because the Austrians hit their max budget )

Germany: 1595
Austria: 1115
Ottoman Empire: 240

Delaying Italy attack due to bad weather. France creeping toward Metz. Russia attack toward Erzurum is foiled when the Ottoman corp holds at str 1. UK making moves in the Sinai. Germany subs sneaking through the blockade in direction to Canada.

[KorutZelva]

CP attack into italy is underwhelming... manage to cut the northern town to secondary supplies, so at least there's that?

On more positive news, Verdun falls. This is timely as the French were really stretching the german line. I need to shorten them back. Noose is tigthning around Konigsberg, Russia using its manpower to power through the units defending there... taking huge lost without stopping.

[operating]

I'm interested in seeing if you get the best of the French, or if the French get the best of you? Regardless, it's stalemate imo. How many OE units do the OE receive free once they DOW? It looks like you have a lot? Italy looks like it's going to be tough to conquer, will have to wait and see.. Good luck..

Did Italy DOW you, or Did you DOW Italy?

[KorutZelva]

I struck first vs Italy. With upgraded artillery I'll be able to grind french units every other turn while the French are some times away from having their own. I should be able to contract the Metz bulge. More worried about Russia, I don't think I'll be able to save Konigsberg. With Austria and Germany I maxed tech and artillery... next I max diplo and then I can finally rebuild those corps... For the OE, it's a mix of the starting stuff and the spawned stuff. What they get is scattered all over the place so the starting corps were ferried to the frontier and replaced by detachment. For the most part. I still have a few cities I want to garrison with detachment but I don't have the mpp to do just now.

[KorutZelva]

First battle of Isonzo is over, Germany capture Udine. I lost the corp that was cutting the rail line but it reduced the supply in the area should be able to push and take Padua this summer. An german artillery reveal itself on the eastern front, however the lack of corps limits the size of the offensive in the sector.

I divided up diplo effot, Austria 2 to norway (to try to flip it back to CP), 1 to denmark, 1 to sweden (preventive). Germany chits all went to Amsterdam, to protect its precious 65 mp per turn. Ottoman chits are in reserve if a country start swining towards the entente.

[KorutZelva]

Bad times at sea for the CP. Two destroyer that were trying to sneak the blockade for mine laying were detected off the coast of Norway. In the Adriatic, the austrian fleet has been mostly culled except 3 ships

German takes Padua. One new artillery has been penned to support the offensive there. So far it's 2 arty vs France, 1 vs Russia, 1 vs Italy, 2 vs Serbia. Last Austria arty will either be used in Serbia or Russia. Might be too crowded in Serbia...

[KorutZelva]

An ill fated counter attack by Italy let me capture Venice, which otherwise could have been a pain to take due to the marshes next to it. Upgraded artillery doing their magic in France and Prussia. UK have landed quite a bit of forces in Basra and are moving up to test the OE garrisons. Austria will be able to renew the offensive in Serbia with three guns ready to go. Will be too late to save Konigsberg by a hair. Hopefully it goes down taking many Russians down with it.

[KorutZelva]

Russians develop artillery tech and snipes Przemysl and Erzurum! Luckily the gains in Italy means that Austria can stomach its loss relatively easily. Speaking of which German capture Verona. Further Italian town will be harder to get. Norway moves further away from the CP but not enough to give UK money.

[KorutZelva]

German subs swarm Canadian ports. An UK cav dies of attrition in Irak. So many Russians... I can only destroy one corp a turn, which they can replace without much problem. Really need to wrap up Serbia to have more units to commit to that front. Serbians are sturdy as heck though... and three cannons only got me one corp by the skin of my teeths. If I take Nish maybe the Bulgarians can join to wrap this up... Looking at the spending report, France and UK haven't bought extra artillery yet? Below is what the tech front looks right now.

[KorutZelva]

Austrians bend but do not break in the Carpathians. A Cav is sent sniffing and see the some undefended towns. Lines still pretty static in Prussia but I have enough units to have reserves so I will be able to upgrade to tech 1 quickly as the tech is almost finished. In France a no-mans land is emerging and may remain until I've upgraded my units. French and UK revealed artillery tech 1 last turn but their offensive sort pettered out without any major gains and german units avoiding destruction. I evacuated the Konigsberg corp since it was under supply and replaced it with my fresher marines... probably a mistake but I'm guess the town was going to be his next arty target anyway and I loathe to give up a corp I'd need to build at full strength. A corp crosses the river line in Italy. Their morale is still high (78%) despite losing many cities. The plan was to collapse Italy first to domino France but it seems France may crumble first.

[KorutZelva]

I think Will has started to buy USA chits... So I am doing the same with the one I have available. I got a big diplo hit with Denmark with my single chit I bought from Austria, it rules out investment toward flipping it and frees up its use for elsewhere. With a lot of future fighting planned to be in the mountains of Italy and Austria, I got Germany and Austria to max their Mountain corp. The units will arrive this winter. Inf Tech one is finished, lots of upgrading to do... Russia at 100% morale... this bit is worrisome.

[operating]

Does the ship to the north of Konigsberg somehow keep troops in supply? or, Are they just blocking a port?

[KorutZelva]

If you have two ships or subs next to a port it lower its str by 1 each turn. My plan was to siege all Russian port and when the str of the ports was low enough, have the battleships blow the enemy ship in port. When the port supply is low enough the battleship expected loss drops to 0. Problem is that you have also only a 10% chance of being able to damage the ship in port. I need to keep all Russian ports low so that russian ship don't escape to them... but my plan isn't working so well because I never managed to get a hit on a single ship in 20+ attempts. Worse my battleships and battlecruisers have suffered wear and I have to rotate them back to port and I have zero russian ship to show for it. All I need is one freaking hit to sink a ship because the ships in port are already at str 5.

[operating]

OK, learned something new about ports..!![:)] Yes , did a similar attack on a Russian destroyer in port way up north Baltic, hit it about 10 times successively rotary style, caused it one damage point, many more to my fleet. Had no choice but to head for home a bit dejected.[:(]

[KorutZelva]

I'm a bit distressed by the fact german morale is so low despite the fact they have been doing pretty well (at least compared to historic result) with a commanding position in France and Italy. I mean German morale is in the 60s and at this time I only lost a single big NM town (Thom) and Norway trade. It's 1915, what the crap!!!!! In the trilogy Ashfall-Will952-KZ, three players of equal skill level may very well give three Entente victory.

[operating]

In my 2 matches gave Trento to Italy, found out just how severe the backlash could be, yikes..!! Count 4 artillery in your last screenshots, two you get free, the other 2 cost 300 a pop, I am amazed you can pull that off. Germany in my games gives AH 10% of it's income, buys a tech or two each turn and after repairs is practically broke at the end of each turn. Yes, did lose a couple of East Prussian cities, I'd have to starve myself in order to get more guns, Oh, by the way no diplo chits either. Soon after the Trento Deal Romania DOW, just great..