More Adventures In Italy With Ian

[devoncop]

Hi Mike

Unfortunately they are still arriving over the next few turns so aren't quite ready to drop.

To be honest I don't think there will be too much for Larry to withdraw to the mainland...I have plans for the Airborne forces anyway...and not on Sicily ☺

I will need a bit of time to mop up the West of the island and reorganize and rest...the rails also need sorting.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: devoncop
Hi Mike

Unfortunately they are still arriving over the next few turns so aren't quite ready to drop.

To be honest I don't think there will be too much for Larry to withdraw to the mainland...I have plans for the Airborne forces anyway...and not on Sicily ?

I will need a bit of time to mop up the West of the island and reorganize and rest...the rails also need sorting.

Hey Mike and Ian:
I think you'll find it advantageous to keep up the pressure without letup. I'm demonstrating that in my game with Brian. I've got paratroopers north of Rome already. Taranto is invested and the rails are being repaired leading away from there; I invaded near Salerno with the US 1st Armored Div recently and the Axis troops are being constantly found out of position. The idea is to keep up the pressure all over the map so that the Axis forces will feel the need to defend almost everywhere. Drop whatever bridges will help stiffle the flow of the Axis supply. Things like that.

[MikeJ19]

Ian,

I was thinking that you might use them on the mainland if the withdrawing German units were going across the straits. I like the pressure that Larry is using in his battle with Brian. From his posts, it looks like Brian is going to have a lot of poor choices...

[devoncop]

Ah...I get you.

That is certainly a valid option.

It depends how long it takes me to clean up Sicily.

Thanks for the suggestion.....always good to have more cunning plans in the locker [&o][&o]

[devoncop]

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

ORIGINAL: devoncop
Hi Mike

Unfortunately they are still arriving over the next few turns so aren't quite ready to drop.

To be honest I don't think there will be too much for Larry to withdraw to the mainland...I have plans for the Airborne forces anyway...and not on Sicily ?

I will need a bit of time to mop up the West of the island and reorganize and rest...the rails also need sorting.

Hey Mike and Ian:
I think you'll find it advantageous to keep up the pressure without letup. I'm demonstrating that in my game with Brian. I've got paratroopers north of Rome already. Taranto is invested and the rails are being repaired leading away from there; I invaded near Salerno with the US 1st Armored Div recently and the Axis troops are being constantly found out of position. The idea is to keep up the pressure all over the map so that the Axis forces will feel the need to defend almost everywhere. Drop whatever bridges will help stiffle the flow of the Axis supply. Things like that.

Cheers Larry

Good point...

I have a few ideas but they all need Messina taken first so that is front and centre at the moment !

[devoncop]

21st August 1943

The German/Italian forces on Sicily are being eliminated one by one and the central pocket has just about gone.

In the west it is being reduced considerably and 15th Panzer Gren Divn is down to its last few tanks.

More progress towards Messina which Intelligence shows has a large garrison still. It will be interesting to see if Larry chooses to evacuate or fight for the city.

I have changed the designation of many of the air assets to take this into account and all planes available are now on Sicily.

There appears to be severe coastal battalion congestion to the east of mount Etna which is slowing things down a touch but the British continue to force their way up the coast road.

A failed proficiency check hampered me a bit this turn [:(]

[larryfulkerson]

I'm checking out my planes to see if they are ready to committ to combat yet and
some of them are but lots of them are still understaffed and need replacements yet.
I've discovered that I don't have any D0-217's on hand even though I'm building
them still and that means that the squadrons are sucking down the replacements as
fast as they are being built and they need to stand down for a while to build up
some small cushion for the on hand numbers. I also don't have any G.50 Freccia's on
hand but I'm not building any and I'll probably not get any more of them so I need
to husband those bad boys....put them in some quiet area out of most of the combat.

[hingram]

It makes sense to save some bombers for Sea Interdiction after Messina falls. Sardinia and Corsica have to be taken because French and Italian units arrive there

[devoncop]

28th August 1943

The forward British units are now 10Km from Messina and with luck it may fall next turn.

In anticipation of this bombing raids have begun in southern Italy aimed at Italian communications.

The HQ of 15th Panzer Grenadiers was appropriately the last element of that unit to be overrun this turn by the Americans in the west and units are now advancing on Palermo. The railhead has only reached Primasole bridge however and I can see why Larry had so many issues with rail connectivity.

My air assets are understandably in excellent health as Larry chose not to contest Sicily in the air. I now need to look at how best to nullify the Luftwaffe and Regia Aeronutica on the mainland (and, as hingram points out over the seas!)

[larryfulkerson]

Here's what it looks like just before I ended my turn. For the past 12 or 15 turns I haven't had anything
to do and just check the planes and recent reinforcements and just hit end turn. Which is fine it's still
a good game.

[devoncop]

28th August 1943

As we enter September Messina holds on despite repeated bombardment.

The US Bombers are much better than the Brits it seems at downing bridges so strategic ones start to go down South of Cantanzaro and also the river crossings around the supply points of Salerno.

As time goes on I will need to hit the northern most bridges hard to hinder the flow of reinforcements from Brenner Pass but for now the fighter cover cannot reach there so sending bombers up there would be suicide.

Most US units are now making there way to a port ready for the second and more difficult phase of this scenario...the naval invasions...

[larryfulkerson]

Hey you guys something strange just happened. I was looking at a formation report
and saw a row that listed a BRITISH unit that enters the game based on an event and
as the Axis player I wasn't expecting any Allied units and I made the mistake of
clicking on that unit because I was immediately taken to the Allied side to where
on the map that unit would spawn and I had partial control over the Allied side.

So I did an end turn immediately, it presented the Diplomatic Pouch, which I fill
ed out and then moved it so I could take this picture and then the program closed
out. I'm wondering what kind of problems Ian is going to have now, if any.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: devoncop
28th August 1943

As we enter September Messina holds on despite repeated bombardment.

The US Bombers are much better than the Brits it seems at downing bridges so strategic ones start to go down South of Cantanzaro and also the river crossings around the supply points of Salerno.

As time goes on I will need to hit the northern most bridges hard to hinder the flow of reinforcements from Brenner Pass but for now the fighter cover cannot reach there so sending bombers up there would be suicide.

Most US units are now making there way to a port ready for the second and more difficult phase of this scenario...the naval invasions...

I've got my R&D department hard at work on some mines, and midget submarines, and harbor netting, and some YP boats with a torpedo tube, or maybe a full-fledged DD can be gotten from somewhere although I'm not hopeful.

I'm going to have to go through the inventory and find the Ju-87's and escorts for them to go on Sea INT and harrass the Allied convoys, although given the strength of the Allied Aerial Armada I doubt that any of my bombers will get through to the ships and I doubt that the escort will survive either.

The planes have been resting since the beginning of the game and they've been soaking up replacements and they are as strong as they are going to get, most of them, so to protect the mainland I think I should give them combat missions and have them give the old technical school try.

[devoncop]

Houston we have a problem.

After Larry's little glitch I am now given the German side to play so something has been corrupted I think.

I didnt make any moves but just sent the turn back...Think this game is going to have to be scrapped [:(]

Great shame. Hey that's life though. Worst things happen.

[larryfulkerson]

Hey you guys: I just got an email that the turn was ready again and I don't think
that's possible because it was less than two minutes ago that I sent my moves to Ian
so this is coming from the Matrix Server. I loaded it up and it presented me with
the playback of the Allied turn and when I start it up the status line said "1 event"
and then "end of playback" and now it wants to present me with the Axis side I
presume. I'm going to just hit the end-turn button and send the turn to Ian and THEN
hopefully we'll be back on track.

EDIT: It showed me the Allied playback and then gave me ALLIED control. Weird. So
I guess this game is scrapped and we'll do a restart shortly I'm thinking. Depends
on how Ian feels about it.

[hingram]

Is it possible to go back to a previous turn?

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: hingram
Is it possible to go back to a previous turn?

We were using the PBEM++ system and I have all the files that it wrote but I don't know how to make the system use one of them for the source of the turn. I have just received an email from Ian and he says that his family is here to visit him and he's going be ready for a full-time game again on the 16th of the month so we're going to restart then. Stay tuned.

[hingram]

Since Sicily is a loss anyway, I wonder if it would be better to hold the air assets away from it. Keep the bombers far from the Allies and the fighters far back and on AS. By the time the allies reach Italy, you have an air campaign at least for a while.

I'll probably try out the game as Axis on a laptop and see what it looks like. It would be interesting to see what would happen if the Axis made the Allies come to them since there is no supply on those rails.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: hingram
Since Sicily is a loss anyway, I wonder if it would be better to hold the air assets away from it. Keep the bombers far from the Allies and the fighters far back and on AS. By the time the allies reach Italy, you have an air campaign at least for a while.

Yeah, that's what I was doing. I flew all the aircraft to the Rome area and put them on rest and set them for one-dot. Before I could get them off the island some of them had some losses. The on hand numbers for a lot of the different types is very low and resting them is what I would have had to do anyway.

ORIGINAL: hingram
I'll probably try out the game on a laptop and see what it looks like. It would be interesting to see what would happen if the Axis made the Allies come to them since there is no supply on those rails.

That's an interesting what-if and I'll like to see that game. What you need to do Hank my friend, is to get a human opponent for your games. It's a LOT more fun that way.

[hingram]

I'll have a week on the island this month. I may have to try it. One of the other guys in the house also does gaming. I'm trying to convince him to buy the game.