1939 Diplomacy

[xwormwood]

Shouldn't there be some diplomatic activities between France, the UK and at least Belgium once the Axis attack on Poland had started?

My suggestion would be to add some Allied influence into Belgium, maybe even the Netherlands.

In my current 1.0008 game against the Axis AI (xpert level) i played aggressivly, once the AI kind of ignored some of polish units. I nearly conquered Slovakia with them, forcing the AI to move units out of poland to stop me. Poland only fell in November 1939.

But when it fell, France suffered a morale penalty, while the Germans celebrated that Danzig came home into the Reich. No word about the loss of the most important german industrial center in western Germany, taking place at the very same time.

Because of this advance, i declared war on Luxembourg and attacked the German soil through this bottle neck.
It is december and i hold Essen, Düsseldorf and Dortmund. This attacked weekend the German campaign in Poland, too.
At least that is what I guess.

I think it is a pitty that the game offers NOTHING to players who take an early, aggressive stand against the Axis.
No "yay, we took the Ruhr". No pop National Morale gains for Poland (our Allies come to our help, horray!). No reaction from other neutrals (Stalin notices with interest the German weakness).

If you want to add a bit something to surprise your wargame-experienced customers about how far you have thought, you might want to think about this (see above) and comparabel situations, while taking a new, different point of view on the overall situtation.

Please don't get me wrong. This wasn't written to tell the world how great my genius is, but to bolster my other point in a different discussion about following a too narrow path (scripted invasions, single sided point of view because "it happened like this in history").

I know that you're doing the very best, take this as a simple encouragement to keep up the good work, and as a hint where to maybe look next.

[Hubert Cater]

Thanks for the feedback and I don't think it will be a problem to add something here, including for the AI. Generally speaking, it can be a challenge to anticipate every possible Axis and Allied player move and this is why feedback like this can only be helpful, especially if we haven't covered the possibility already. Essentially it is not something purposefully ignored, it just hasn't come up as an issue before [:)]

[Hubert Cater]

Also, please let me know how the AI responds to your aggressive actions into Germany as I'd be curious how it eventually handled itself under the circumstances. In theory it should attempt to rebalance itself to handle the situation, but I know it is also scripted to prepare for an invasion of the Low Countries at the same time, so I'm genuinely interested in the long term results here and if it was still able to eventually work its way back and towards Paris.

[xwormwood]

Just found out about what you did with the pictures when they don't fill out the entire box - flaggs on both sides. IT - LOOKS - AWESOME! Well done!
[&o]

The AI declared war on the Netherland in May 1940, which brought in Belgium at the End of the AI turn.
May 1940 was the first turn where I've lost a french unit.

[xwormwood]

Reinforced with Netherland & Belgium the French have at least no supply problems anymore.
2 more HQs, lots of roads, morale unbroken.

[xwormwood]

I've advanced a bit a took a recon flight near Wilhelmshaven to get a better picture about the general situation.

[xwormwood]

Southern part follows below. Belgium and Netherland are tied to France, so they won't become strong anytime soon.

[xwormwood]

The AI continues to pressure the Netherland (is it right that units are allowed to march over the Lake Ijssle hexes?) and killed another French corps after several swap move-attacks, followed by 2 german tank units.

[xwormwood]

June 1940 brings the Allied advances to a stop.
Mostly because the german untis have much better readiness and morale values.

[xwormwood]

Allied losses are rising, even though there is still a good frontline for the western Powers.

[xwormwood]

In the south the Germans got through (near Metz)

[xwormwood]

The AI identified a weak spot in my line, a strength 5 Garrison in Düsseldorf, threw all its air attacks on the targed (which got intercepted at times), and pushed with a tank unit into the gap.
Well done, AI, good move.

[xwormwood]

.. but open up something to cut through in south (strength 5 corps east of the Metz advance)

[xwormwood]

Will be interesting to see if the AI will make it.
France lost some feathers.

[xwormwood]

August 1940. Silght advantage for Germany, but even though France is not at all in danger while Belgium and Netherland are still unconquered, Italy declares war on the Allies.
At one time a german unit made it at one point through the maginot line. Yet this shouldn't be enough to convice Mussolini that this war has been decided. On the other hand this would be the perfect time for a german military coup d'etat.

The good news is that the AI was able to find the right actions within the last couple of turns.

[xwormwood]

Could get interesting with Italy now in the war.
Best game since ages, even though the Axis will get problems in the long run, without the French plunder and Russia growing stronger.

[xwormwood]

Last report for now, Septermber 1940.

Not sure about the best solution. But it appears as if an aggressive Allied reaction will be for now a very solid approach if you want to spoil the AIs French campaign, if not the entire war.

The AI shouldn't declare war on the Netherlands once the French are holding two ore more german towns or cities.
At a smaler front the AI might have been able to swap-attack the French to death, after all the Germans have the readiness / moral advantage.

In my game i was able to take Narvik too, and the morale gains won there probably did help a bit as well.

[BillRunacre]

Thanks Claus, it's been interesting reading and I've made a couple of changes to the campaign based on it.

[BillRunacre]

I can't find your post now where you mentioned pop ups when France and the UK declare war on Germany happening in the same turn as when France declared war on Luxembourg.

I've just checked the scripts and both France and the UK are due to enter the war in the first Axis turn, so I wonder if you saw these in the report of activities from the first turn, rather than that France joined the Allies in the first Allied turn?

I hope this is indeed the case as France wouldn't have been able to declare war unless she had already joined the Allies.

[xwormwood]

The post you were looking for can be found in the Bugs section.

This happened in my first turn (the AI played the Axis side and played the "real" first turn.

I went to the war room, selected France, marked Luxembourg, and clicked on Declare war.
Then I left the war room menu. When i was back at the game map view, two information pop ups appeared. France declares war on Germany, followed by a second pop up, where the game told me that UK declared war on Germany. The USA was angry because of the declaration of war against Luxembourg, if I remember correctly i got this message within the war room once I've declared war.