Solitaire game starting late '42

[EUBanana]

Essen and Cologne are bombed by the Americans. No damage at Cologne, but Essen is hit pretty hard. There is a German engineer present though so the damaged factory is neither here nor there really.

[EUBanana]

Chiang tries to assist Mao (he does have the decent army after all) again but the Japanese are no slouches in the air, having invested in long range fighters which dispatch the only decent tactical bomber the Allies have in China despite the Flying Tigers.

[EUBanana]

Similarly not a lot of luck bombing Naples, which is the only hex the Allies might advance in southern Italy I think.

[EUBanana]

After rearranging their forces more to be on the eastern side of the Dnieper, there's one attacks thats just too obvious even without the O chit. But look at all that German air power. There are a few decent Russian FTRs there as all they do is build FTRs and infantry more or less. I suppose given the time of year its a decent enough risk to attritt the Germans on land and air.

[EUBanana]

It seems to me that defensive ground support is one of the most effective uses of air power at least at this stage of the game, so Germany responds naturally. There are casualties.

[EUBanana]

The USSR is fairly lucky for once in stopping one of the bombers and then getting a decent roll, so that was definitely a good counterattack, cutting off the tip of the spear.

[EUBanana]

And that's it for the Allies.

As the Allies got their navies in position the land action for Germany is a no brainer. Italy does a combined as they dont have a lot to do really, and so does Japan, to attempt to disrupt supply in the Bay of Bengal at the same time as attacking ground forces in Malaya.

4 CVs and 3 cruisers go to the 2 box of Bay of Bengal, a Nell to the 4, and the one sub that wasnt damaged last turn to the 3. The Italian navy death rides into the 3 box of the Italian coast to see what happens. Predictably they get caught by British carrier air and bombed, and lacking the naval factors to do anything even if they break through they call it quits.

It's just the only way for Italy to try and throw a spanner in the works is to hope they can catch a TRN or something, but its slim odds.

[EUBanana]

With the Nell in the 4 box the Bay of Bengal is a dangerous place, and sure enough the IJN catches the CW. But the same is true in reverse, so it's not actually the convoy point in the line of fire, yet.

Manchester and Sussex are sunk while Dorsetshire is aborted.

[EUBanana]

In the end its the Nell that breaks through the convoy point.

CA Birmingham is sunk, Gloucester is aborted, and the convoy point is sunk.

Japanese naval air is bad news. Nice try CW. They abort, no reason to stay and be bombed to scrap any more.

So do the Japanese, as I clicked the wrong button! I'll just not be cheeky and send another convoy point to the Bay of Bengal this turn to take advantage of that error.

[EUBanana]

This is why the Luftwaffe has just been dominating on the eastern front... Terrible luck. The Russians have about the same number of fighters (1 bomber versus that German horde though), but a slight quality advantage. It avails them not, as they keep getting waxed in the air.

Kharkov and the hex NE of Rostov are heavily bombed, 2 disorged units in each. The Japanese bomb the South Africans at Singapore, who are not yet disrupted (though out of supply), but do not disrupt them.

German ground forces attack Rostov, which is a swamp but only has a GARR in it, Kharkov which is heavily defended but badly disrupted, and the clear hexes SW of Novgorod where their tanks give them an advantage. An escorted Il-2 manages to help the defenders at Rostov while it's I-15 buddy keep the Heinkels at bay.

[EUBanana]

Rostov falls, though it was a pretty good roll required thanks to the Il-2 changing the odds quite heavily.

The Germans power through Kharkov on a 15, losing nothing while the 11 factors of defenders are wiped out. But the assault near Novgorod fails completely, all attackers disrupted, so that front will remain a backwater for a while it seems.

[EUBanana]

The Japanese aren't so lucky, being bogged down in Malaya against the elite Indians. They win but it's a fairly pyrrhic one. Still, made use of the good weather to push forward while they can. There's been fighting in Malaya since early summer '42 I think, it's certainly not going easy.

[EUBanana]

The southern end of the Eastern Front after the German attacks. The Russian defence feels tissue-thin to be honest. The lines of both are being stretched quite a lot but the German units are quite significantly better, and they have a lot more armour. All German armour units in the force pool (not build aheads) are on the board I think, or were at the start of the turn. You can see reinforcements railed in to Berdiansk and also Voronezh for the Russians, but its bad militia vs crack armour.

The disrupted here don't matter so much as I assume the weather will go bad next turn.

[EUBanana]

The northern end is proving much less fruitful though, seems like this stalemate will continue for a while despite German reinforcements trickling in. The Russians are sending most of their stuff to the south, but Gomel is a good spot to drop troops right into the fray of both.

[EUBanana]

Looks like the winter offensives will continue as the weather remains unusually good.

I've had summers worse than this...

This is probably bad for Italy as the CW can take a land action now and get properly stuck in.

The CW is a bit short of ground units, aside from a few in India there was nothing to hand really, short of stripping Italy which doesn't seem that wise given they seem to be winning atm, to send to take Tripoli. There isn't any coming in the future either unless the CW starts building them right now. And of course they pop up all over the world.

[Courtenay]

The US still isn't at war with Japan? Or did I miss something? They should be getting 3 chits a turn, so I am shocked they aren't at war with Japan. What is US entry?

The fact that there are no German fighters in Germany looks like an open invitation to Allied strategic bombing.

[EUBanana]

ORIGINAL: Courtenay

The US still isn't at war with Japan? Or did I miss something? They should be getting 3 chits a turn, so I am shocked they aren't at war with Japan. What is US entry?

They have a 40% chance to declare war on Japan atm. They've been using their actions to move stuff forward in the Pacific in readiness though, they will probably declare war pretty soon so Japan can't surprise their way into the Philippines for free.

The fact that there are no German fighters in Germany looks like an open invitation to Allied strategic bombing.

Yeah, the Germans focused pretty exclusively on the eastern front, but they have quite a few fighters coming in as reinforcements now the strategic bombing is beginning in earnest and the Soviet airforce has been decimated. They will start to challenge all the B17s. The US has been mass producing strategic bombers and pilots for a while now, atm its been costing them about 3 or so points a turn but its clearly going to get worse unless they do something about it.

The Soviets just had yet another bad few impulses in the air so there's not really that many Soviet aircraft to shoot down right now.

[EUBanana]

Impulse #3, nov/dev 1942.

With a naval action coming up anyway the US attempts to declare war on Japan, 40%, succeeds right away.

US takes a naval action, everybody else a land action.

US puts naval air over Central Pacific (Hudson in the 4 box) and Marshalls ( Lightning/Catalina in the 4 box). Submarines deploy from Tarawa, Manila and Dutch Harbor to the Bismarck Sea, China Sea and Marianas. The US pretty much has 1 convoy point everywhere in the Pacific including Japanese territory but also a few spares in Pearl Harbor - none of the convoy points move for now.

The fleet at Suva deploys for a hopefully easy grab of Efate from the New Zealand Sea.

[EUBanana]

The rest of the Pacific Fleet masses around Hawaii.

On the east coast 2 INF, 1 LND-3 and 1 LND-4 are loaded onto transports and witrh an escort end up in the 1 box of Faeroes Gap. A TRN at New York takes an INF to Cape st Vincent.

Only possible engagements are from submarines.

The American sub in the China Sea is sunk by the Kate on patrol there.

But in the Marianas the American subs sink the unguarded convoy point there.

[EUBanana]

The Nationalist Chinese try to night bomb Shanghai, given there's not much else for it to do the Nick in range will try despite it being night. The Nick succeeds in aborting the bomber.

The Commonwealth Wimpey in Palermo ground strikes the Italians at Naples, 1 unit is disrupted. An Indian INF is railed to Bombay, this guy is probably going to go for Tripoli.


The Soviets adjust the southern frontline a bit, to try and shore up the area around Rostov so the Germans have something in the way of just going further east without fatally weakening anywhere else. They have quite a lot of arty in the north but as it's raining they don't use any.