Shannon versus Z

[AllenK]

Oh for the supply unit in Eritrea to have been transported to Libya and accompanying Balbo in case of just such an eventuality.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Moving on toe Manchuria, ..

The USSR has two HQ coming in from the west and a couple good Siberian units joining them The Russian reserve units have arrived in cities bordering Manchuria. Still in the Reserve Pool are units which only appear when the USSR goes to war with Germany. So far I have only railed in an engineer to shore up the defenses. Note the Mongolian Cav trying to justify its existence in the game.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Did you wonder what happened to the USSR subs in Vladivostok?

I had worried about them journeying the the China Sea and sent out some defenses. I never thought about the Japanese Coast.[>:]

Mercifully, the subs search roll failed. Next Axis impulse, those convoys got some protection.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Northern China. Here is why the USSR is in Manchuria.

I messed up with taking out the partisan unit. I thought I could land a second Inf on the coast, but that required an AMPH, which I thoughtlessly used for something else.

The weather is stopping land operations here. That's the main reason the Chinese are not being harassed more.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Southern China is quiet.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Here is the Destroyed Pool for the second turn.

The 3 dead Chinese plus the 4 dead from the first turn means the Chinese are really hurting.
To partially balance that, the Japanese lost a couple of divisions.

The Commonwealth lost the Mech in Denmark, the CL in Cape St. Vincent, the fighter, Inf, and Spitfire in Amsterdam.

The two German losses were in taking Amsterdam.

The Italian CL must have died in the Eastern Med, but I don't remember that.[&:] Oh, maybe a later the British search roll there succeeded with them having some surprise points.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Note that the second turn ended on the 15th impulse.

===

Here is the production for the second turn. This doesn't add up. The Japanese had 10 BPs but only spent 7 on the units shown here. I have to investigate to see what happened. I may have built 3 convoys.[&:] The Italian numbers are wrong too. They had 3 BPs and only spent 1 according to the Production Pool unit lists. Maybe I build 2 more convoys for them? Arrrg.[:@]

[Shannon V. OKeets]

By the way, Z and I played 5 hours and 40 minutes on Sunday past without any major problems. A few glitches arose but me were able to work around them. So we are into the third turn (Jan/Feb 1040) and stuff just keeps on happening, ...

More on that some time later.

Now I need to spend a week or two just working on bugs. While playing the game is a lot of fun, I have to set that aside for the nonce and tend to business.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

So, at the start of the third turn, Jan/Feb 1940, the Allies won the initiative die roll - and I declined the opportunity to reroll.

The Allies moved first and the Brits rushed a couple of divisions into Alexandria to save the day. The Italian sub in the Western Med thought it was a parade and waved as all the Allied transports and a slew of cruisers sailed past. Those boys need a severe talking to.

But the French moved a transport into the Western Med and picked up a Inf from Tunisia. I don't know if Z was just goading me or not, but I rose to the bait and had Italy declare war in France. Yeah, they missed the loaded transport - again. But almost the entire Italian fleet was then in the Western Med, so I attacked Nice with a modest number of die modifications (+7 if I recall correctly). Z chose Blitz to save his 3-4 Cav and the result was a half disorganized, no losses for either side, and Retreat. If he had chosen Assault, the dreaded 14 would have been hard on the Italians (3 dead). All in all, a fairly mundane episode for the Italian DOW on France. The French do have to hold an extra hex in the front line along the Italian Alps, which will help the Germans in the Lowlands.

On the other hand, the British suffered at sea from the Italian subs. This time it was in Cape Verde, where a bunch of convoy points were either destroyed or aborted before the Italian sub was sent home. However, Cape St. Vincent escaped unscathed. Regardless, the Commonwealth convoy pipeline is messed up again. The constricted part of the pipeline is going through Cape Verde + the North Atlantic.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

Here is the Destroyed Pool for the second turn.

The 3 dead Chinese plus the 4 dead from the first turn means the Chinese are really hurting.
To partially balance that, the Japanese lost a couple of divisions.

The Commonwealth lost the Mech in Denmark, the CL in Cape St. Vincent, the fighter, Inf, and Spitfire in Amsterdam.

The two German losses were in taking Amsterdam.

The Italian CL must have died in the Eastern Med, but I don't remember that.[&:] Oh, maybe a later the British search roll there succeeded with them having some surprise points.

I forgot to mention a major point I wanted to make about the USSR pilots.

Getting the Russian air force over to Manchuria is difficult. It is 120+ hexes away and using rail is only possible if you take an Air Action - something the Communist Chinese would frown on. Rebasing them takes a long time, even for a unit with a range of 11 or 17. So Z has been using a clever ploy: he removed air units from the European map during the reinforcement phase, gaining a pilot and putting the air unit into the Reserve Pool. Then in the subsequent turn, he can assign a pilot to each air unit he wants in the Pacific and have them arrive as a reinforcement in Vladivostok. The unit is off the map for 1 turn, but that is a lot faster than the alternatives.

This trick got him into big trouble though, ...

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Playing World in Flames using MWIF.

I played the board game for 10 years or so: 1985 - 1995. Last month I started two Global War games against different opponents using NetPlay (2 player games), playing the Axis in one game the Allies in another.

Although this is clearly a case of self-interest (what with me being the developer), I am amazed at how much better the actual experience of playing the game is with MWIF. I'm not talking about changes to the map or rules or any of that controversial stuff. Being able to analyze a position is where the biggest improvements lie.

Given a week or so between gaming sessions, you can spend 2 or 3 hours and perform a ton of analysis that simply wasn't possible with the board game - even assuming it remained set up at your house between gaming sessions. I have 3 monitors, but for analysis two work just fine. And one would be enough, using the printed Players Manuals in lieu of a second monitor. I open Adobe Acrobat to have 3 PDF files at my fingertips:
1 - Rules as Coded, used for checking various rules;
2 - Players Manual Volume 2, primarily used for checking optional rules and the 2D10 table;
3 - WIFCharts, used for checking the next Turn's possible Activities Limits, Production Multiples, and Weather. Also good for a terse list of Weather Effects.

My main monitor has the Main form at the top and the Detailed Map below. On my third monitor I keep the Global map omnipresent. If I only had two monitors, I would have the Global Map share a screen with the PDF files.

===

Here is what I can do to analyze a position. Most of this would be very difficult to do over the board.

Detailed Map
- Examine land units' ability to move around the map in bad weather. Having the weather displayed for each hex, especially where desert meets non-desert and at the weather zone borders, is a big plus because you don't have to do mental gymnastics figuring stuff out (e.g., checking what the current weather is in each weather zone against where the transition lines occur).

- Seeing the weather at sea, where only 3 'types' of weather exist: Fine, Bad, & Very Bad.

- Easily seeing the borders and terrain for each hex, without stacks of units covering up the details.

- Cursoring over individual hexes to see (on the Main form) the presence of cities, ports, resources, factories (and whether any are damaged or have lost production points to strategic bombing), and adjacent sea areas, including from which of those sea areas the hex can be invaded. All of these were a hassle in the board game when a player had to move stacks of units to learn about these details.

- Always knowing which major power controls each hex.

Flyouts and Naval Review Details
- Viewing at a glance whether a unit is disorganized and/or out of supply. Also which units are loaded on which transports.

- Reviewing a densely packed frontline, with the added bonus of the Main form showing the total combat factors etc. At sea, the total are shown for both sides. You can also check on individual section boxes at sea.

Global Map
- Worldwide weather.

- Convoys and other naval units at sea for each major power/side.

- Convoy pipelines.

- Changing the focus of the Detailed Map.

Weather form
- Probabilities for each weather type in each weather zone for the next impulse in the turn.

- Impulse advance number and weather die roll modifier for the next weather roll.

Initiative form
- Probability of the turn ending.

- Which side gains an initiative die roll bonus and whether they can reroll.

Trade Agreements form
- List of current trade agreements.

Production Planning
- Seeing how many build points each major power is likely get at the end of the turn.

- Seeing how much oil is available and how much will be needed to reorganized all the major power's units.

- Checking on unused convoys.

Neutrality Pacts form
- An instant count of garrison points for each side and all available information on the likelihood of the pact being broken.

Partisan form
- An instant count of garrison points for each country and the probability of partisans appearing.

Units form
- Filtering to find all the units on the map of a certain type. Especially good for locating HQs, Armor, Mechs, Engineers, Naval Transports, AMPHs, Carriers, Strategic Bombers, Tactical Bombers, Air Transports, and Fighters.

Pools form
- Checking on reinforcements.

- Checking on Reserves, especially air reserves.

- Checking on available pilots and Offensive chits.

- Viewing Force Pools for possible builds at the end of the turn.

- Using the filter and check box to view additions to the force pool next year.

- Viewing the Construction Pool.

US Entry Pools
- Quick summary including calculations for effective totals.

US Entry Options
- Quick summary of what have and have not been selected and some insight (for the Axis) into how high the US Entry Pool values are.

===
So, I can figure what is likely to occur in terms of enemy unit movements and combats. And what I should build at the end of the turn. With a little guesswork I can 'see' what new units are likely to arrive on the map next turn and subsequent turns. All this lets me plan what Action Choices to make, where to send my forces to defend and attack, and how fervently I need to pray for good die rolls.[:D]

[Grotius]

Great AAR, Steve. I'm learning a lot from following along. I even pulled out the 2D10 table to follow your comments about your attack on Nice.

I was particularly interested in your comparison between MWIF and WIF the boardgame. In recent years I've actually been playing board wargames more, computer wargames less. With smaller board games, I sometimes find I miss the physicality of the board version: rolling actual dice, moving actual chits, gazing around the board in 3D space. Also, sometimes I find it easier to grasp the strategic situation with the boardgame in front of me. But even I have to admit that it's tough to manage a monster game. I had an OCS game ("Case Blue") set up here but had to give up; easier to play on Vassal. Ditto with "War in the Pacific" from Decision Games. Still and all, I think I will have to buy the new Deluxe edition of WIF when it appears later this year.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

I have to run errands this morning. Here is something to chew on. I'll add comments later (today or tomorrow).

That's the USSR Reserve Pool on the far right.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Notes on Breaking the Nazi-Soviet Pact.

What had happened in the above post was that Germany was able to break the Nazi-Soviet Pact, and did so.

Although the USSR had several units along the border with Germany, many of them were disorganized. Which meant they did not count towards the garrison level. Only the 4-1 in Lvov and the Div counted for a total of 1.5 raw garrison points. Germany had 6 garrison points, with the SS Inf and the Mountain Inf counting 2 each. The USSR had 3 points available from defensive markers and German had 8 from offensive markers.

The formula for determining whether the pact can be broken in the first year after it was signed is:

G + O >= 2 * (2G + D), when O and D cannot be more than their respective G values.

In this case it was 12 > 9, and the program popped the question to Germany in the DOW on Majors subphase of the DOW phase. I said yes. I also had Germany declare war on the USSR. The US got two more chits for those actions.

In general, when there are enough markers for both sides, the formula simplifies to:
offensive garrison >= 3 * defensive garrison.

So the USSR had to maintain more than 2 garrison points to hold off the 6 German garrison points. By moving both of his air units to Minsk, [in order to remove them at the start of the next turn and then have them reappear in the following turn in the Pacific theater], Z gave me the opportunity to be super aggressive. If he had kept just one air unit closer to the border with Germany, he would have had 2.5 garrison points.

Now I was moving a couple more German corps up the the border, and have another arrive as a reinforcement the next turn, for a total of 9. Any old chit draw (Germany gets 2 per turn) would have given me more than 9 marker points. To keep the Huns at bay, the USSR would have needed 5 garrison points. Even with all the units on the border organized, and assuming the air units departed, he would have had only 4.5. I had been planning on being able to break the pact in the first Axis impulse of the next turn.

There were several more tricky moves available to Germany for increasing the garrison level. First off, rebasing air units to the border would have been easy. A couple of other corps could have been moved by sea! The TRS and AMPH move out to the Baltic, pick up a couple of corps on the coast line, and unload them in East Prussia. If there are matching offensive markers available, it would have been possible to have taken a Combined and jumped the German garrison count by 6. Aligning minor countries might have worked too. In some cases the USSR would have had the opportunity to respond during their impulse, but railing in troops wouldn't work because they would have arrived disorganized.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

So Z had to decide where to place the 10 USSR reserve units. 3 had to go into their designated cities. 7 were free placements, but only in USSR cities. Where would you place them?

Z's choices in the next post.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

First, Z chose Odessa, and the two cities in Rumania. That makes good sense since Germany can align Rumania and put 19 combat factors on the Rumanian border, easily cleaning up Bessarabia if no units go there.

He also put 2 units in Minsk, one in Vitebsk, and one in Dnepropetrovsk. Oops!

I aligned Finland and put a ski division next to Leningrad. Then I moved it past Leningrad and on into Novgorod. A 5-4 Inf circled around Leningrad to get next to Novgorod. Both of those units are OOS, which is key.

If there is an enemy unit in Russia at the end of the turn, the USSR gains 0.25 to its production multiple. Should a USSR unit be attacked in Russia, then they get another 0.25. Combined, that would double their production multiple from 0.5 to 1.0. Given they have 29 factories and 29 resource points, we are talking about a difference of 15 BPs versus 29 BPs, PER TURN!

Walking around in Russia is okay, but doing so in supply has to be carefully considered.

===

So, the question looms. Was it a good idea to DOW the USSR? I had both Germany and Italy DOW in the same impulse (just 1 US chit draw). As a reward, I got to take Brest-Litovsk in an automatic land attack. And the 3-4 Cav next door will suffer the same fate if the Axis get another impulse this turn. The Baltic States are there for the taking, which means Germany can get across the Dvina in March/April 1940.

Any Axis commitment against the USSR subtracts from its forces against France. Was it stupid to willingly start the two front war?

I'll show the position against France in more detail later.

[Shannon V. OKeets]

Here is the situation around Belgium.

The French are looking pretty good, supported by the BEF. There is another British 4-1 Inf at sea in the North Sea and ready to unload in France.

The Germans are prepared to invade Belgium on the next Fine weather turn in the Northern Temperate Zone. Note that it is the Axis impulse, so the Germans can rearrange their units better for the attack on Belgium.

Whether to DOW Belgium is still a decision to be made by the Germans. They could take all those armor and air units and send them over to Russia.

In the end, I railed von Leeb, a 5-4 Inf, and the Panzer Jag. Div to East Prussia. The Bf 110 C fighter rebased to East Prussia. But the armor units advanced towards Belgium.

The body count:

Commonwealth (not including carrier air units in the North Sea)
Armor: 5 HQ
Infantry: 5 HQ, 7, 4 (in North Sea)
AA/AT: 2
Fighters: 5
Tactical Air: 3, 3, 2, 2, 1

France
Motorized: 5, 1
Infantry: 6, 5 HQ, 5, 5, 5, 4 HQ, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 3, 1
AA/AT: 2, 2
Artillery: 3
Fighters: 4, 3
Tactical Air: 3

Allies Total
Armor: 5 HQ = 1 corps = 5 factors
Motorized: 1 corps, 1 div, = 6 factors
Infantry: 3 HQ, 13 corps, 1 div = 74 factors
AA/AT: 3 div = 6 factors
Artillery: 3 = 1 div = 3 factors
Fighters: 3 units = 12 factors
Tactical Air: 6 units = 14 factors

Germany (less the units which moved to East Prussia)
Armor: 7 HQ, 8, 7, 2 = 1 HQ + 2 corps, 1 div = 14 factors
Mechanized: 8, 6 = 2 corps = 14 factors
Motorized: 8, 1 = 1 corps, 1 div = 9 factors
Infantry: 9, 7 HQ, 7, 7, 6, 6, 6, 6, 5, 5, 4, 4, 4, 3, 1 = 1 HQ + 13 corps, 1 div = 80 factors
Engineer: 1 = 1 factor.
AA/AT: 3, 2 = 2 div = 5 factors
Art: 4, 3 = 2 div, 7 factors
Fighters: 5, 5, 5, 4 = 4 units = 19 factors
Tactical Air: 5, 5, 4, 4, 3, 3 = 6 units = 24 factors

You can draw your own conclusions about the relative strength of these forces.

[rkr1958]

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets
Any Axis commitment against the USSR subtracts from its forces against France. Was it stupid to willingly start the two front war?

Wow ... if you pull it off then I'd say it was brilliant. Either way, it's going to be interesting to watch.

[Orm]

Interesting development.

[Centuur]

I've seen this happening once. As the Soviet player, I deliberately put Germany into this position, to try to put pressure off France. Now, I had Germany on the ropes within two turns, due to one good and one very good die roll during strategic bombardment of Ploesti. He made the mistake of not aligning Rumania after he DoW'ed the USSR with the whole Soviet air force within range of the precious oil fields...

So the Soviet DoW'ed the Rumanians and took a combined impulse to fly 5 bombers and flattened one oil field. Next turn, they did it again and I got a very lucky 10 rolled, destroying a second oil resource...