Burns vs. Flaviusx

[Jim D Burns]

France can go the mobile route and perhaps have a few chances to counter-attack (if your opponent makes a mistake, otherwise it won't matter), but you lose at least two extra inf Corps that can arrive in time to help defend by not putting most of your stuff into garrison on turn one and recovering all that production. That means you have to bring in the British to occupy those empty hexes and that risks their ultimate destruction.

No matter what strategy the allies use, they are going to lose and Britain will have to fight alone for a year. Against a human opponent who knows how to identify weak spots and exploit them, every single British unit counts, so I prefer a more stagnant yet reliable France only defense.

Jim

[AlvaroSousa]

I'll take a look at this production bug I see.

[Michael T]

Couldn't agree any less with what you guys think about the French campaign. But there you go, that's what makes playing other players fascinating.

[Jim D Burns]

24 May 1940

I tentatively took another turn and the production issue in Yugoslavia persists. The noose also tightens around Belgrade but rain is my friend for now.

France is poised to fall, I sent everything I had in air strikes against his lead panzer unit and only managed 1 hit, so this turn should be the final one before surrender terms are offered.

I'll tally total losses next turn to compare to the earlier tally to see what kind of price France managed to exact from Germany.

The only bright spot in game so far is I've manged to keep Germany from declaring on Norway. But with the loss of the French fleet I doubt I can keep that up anymore. Far too many naval assets are needed in the Mediterranean for the upcoming naval campaign against Italy.

[Chocolino]

Great AAR - hope you keep reporting on this game.

I hear that there are balance issues (though I have not yet learned in who's favor they are supposed to be). So far everything seems more or less on track, though.

I will follow this with much interest. Thanks for sharing!

[Jim D Burns]

7 June 1940 and Paris falls, time for the tally before the mass surrender skews the numbers next turn.

Germany has lost 172 land factors, 46 air factors and 17 Naval factors. Compare this from earlier and Germany lost 120 land, 26 air and 9 naval factors during the fighting in France.

Most of the naval factors can be chalked up to this turn as Germany moved his subs to sea again and I charged them with the entire French fleet. The subs intercepted and took a pretty good hit. Had he waited just one more turn the French navy would have ended on a whimper, instead they go out with a bang and France gets to add some sub points to its tally numbers.

I would say at first glance it seems like Germany took a good hit, but when you compare it to French losses I'd say Germany did very well indeed inflicting an almost 2-1 loss tally on the French.

The French lost 245 land, 36 air and 7 naval. Compared to the 6 land, 17 air and 7 naval from before and France got hammered, losing 239 land, 19 air and 0 naval.

So Germany lost the equivalent of 4 full corps while destroying 7.96 corp in return and conquered France in the process. Granted they lost more air power, but that is to be expected of an attacker due to his airforce constantly flying missions.

After this I'm absolutely certain I should have set my units to hold at all cost from the very start. Germany simply does not need to destroy a lot of French land power to win, so holding the hexes is far more important than trying to preserve manpower.

France ended up with only 27 manpower left in its pools, but look at all the units on map. It would have been better to sacrifice units and not allow my units to retreat for the first 2/3rds of the fight. I probably could have lasted 2 more turns, perhaps more in the end.

Sorry about the image size and quality, the 200kb limit really forces me to reduce things too much, 500kb would be a better limit I'd say.

[Manstein63]

Has France actually fallen? As I played a game (against the AI) where I took Paris & Lille and France still carried on fighting into the next turn. I had to take some extra towns to complete the surrender.
Manstein63

[Flaviusx]

It will fall a week later, I had to take Rouen in order to trigger the surrender condition.

[Flaviusx]

I'm really wondering if the sub war is worth the bother at this point. Even in solo play I've never gotten much out of it. Subs feel weak to me. Too easy to shut down in too many ways and they aren't that great at knocking out convoys, either.

Surface fleets do a much better job trashing convoys.

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx
Too easy to shut down in too many ways and they aren't that great at knocking out convoys, either.

Was going to ask if you put them in raider mode before going to sea? They shouldn't intercept unless they are in fleet mode I think.

Jim

[Flaviusx]

I did, but there is something weird going on with that. I notice a lot of times when I go back to a saved game my subs are not in raiding mode, and I have to go back and put them in raiding mode despite being sure that I already did this.

But even setting that aside, when they raid, they just don't do a whole lot of damage. I know how big the allied convoys are and I don't see how subs by themselves are ever going to stress it.

Maybe at later techs they do better, but at that point ASW tech is up to.

[Flaviusx]

Maybe with 8-10 subs it adds up.

Do I really want to drop 1000+ production on subs? It doesn't seem cost effective to me, there's other things to do with that production.

[Jim D Burns]

21 June 1940

France lasted one more turn as my opponent mentioned. He probably could have taken Rouen last turn or even sooner had he wanted to, so I don't count this as to be expected normally. The French navy did charge another sub fleet near Iceland and was again intercepted and sank some sub points. A last gasp of defiance.

Belgrade is now surrounded on 5 sides so I expect Yugoslavia to fall this coming turn.

Today's screenshot shows Africa. As you can see both Italy and Britain are sitting on their lines in anticipation of the upcoming fighting. I don't want to venture into Lybia just yet. Verse the AI I'd already be pushing on Tobruk. Against a human opponent I fully expect large scale invasions behind my lines, so until my rear area is secured or I win a large decisive naval action I'll be cautious in Africa for now.

[Flaviusx]

Those subs were on raid mode dammit.

This keeps happening.

I don't know why it keeps dropping off the raid mode.

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx
and I have to go back and put them in raiding mode despite being sure that I already did this.

All my sub kills have been due to you intercepting me. So if this is a bug it needs fixing ASAP. The sub war would be a completely different animal in our game had you never intercepted me once. I was assuming you left them in fleet mode by oversight.

Jim

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx
This keeps happening.

Until this is fixed I propose the following, you send 1 sub to sea at a time and I will not attack it. So you get to raid convoys unopposed and take no sub losses unless a convoy escort gets you. I will not charge your subs anymore with DD/CA fleets and when a patch comes out that addresses it then game on again.

Land based air can attack them but carriers will leave them alone too. So stay away from land bases and you're good to go.

Thoughts?

Jim

[AlbertN]

I believe the Fleet mode resets each turn or so. Which from my perspective is a problem.
It needs to be 'refreshed' each turn I suspect - whereas it should be a switch on / off before to sail out of port and remain that way til the naval units do not return to port once their mission is done. (And should not cost 1 action point to switch - just read it as 'These are your orders, sail out now'.

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: Cohen_slith

I believe the Fleet mode resets each turn or so.

He just reset his subs and they intercepted the French fleet anyway, so something is not right.

Jim

[Flaviusx]

I just opened up a solo save I've been playing and, sure enough, my subs were on fleet mode and I *know* I had set them on raid mode the turn before.

This only happens on saves. When I play through a turn the raid mode persists, but if you save a game and go back to it, the raid mode is deselected.

Anybody can confirm this bug for themselves by loading a saved game with subs, putting them on raid, save it, and then go back and open it up and you will find them set on fleet mode. No wonder my subs keep getting blown up.

[Flaviusx]

That seems fair enough for now, Jim.