Slitherine

1944 started, I got my free reinforcements - 2 mechs and 2 inf. (By the way why Finland and Bulgaria never spawn mech? Is it intended to be, or sort of a bug? What other countries can spawn mech?)

AGN will take a stand at Vilna - Riga line. It needed both to get PPs from this cities for couple more turns, and to keep retreat organised. (I am trying to avoid having weak units in soviet's range. This time I saved 1 step corps, for example. Also next turn fair/mud weather may happen, and I will not need to retreat at all.



AGS now evacuated its valuable XIX Panzer Koprs away from southern Romania. Infantry and mech reinforcing defences of Bucharest considered expendable, but only if this sacrifice will be worthy. Other way they will be evacuated. My armour fully upgraded - look, I have 3 superior armour units, while Zechi have only 1 obsolete one here. Looks like he finally switched from tank builds to mechs, realised that tanks are easy targets for my air and armour. If so, partly he is right, but mech units simple can inflict less damage per attack, which can be problem attacking cross-river. Well, we will see, its all just suggestions for now.



In Italy I retreat further, allies expected to slowly advance without much problems. Only valueable part of Italy now is Milan-Venice region, and it will take time for allies to get there.



My front collapsed in Britain, since I lost my corps near Cardiff again. I will still try to delay allies as much as possible, and to evacuate some troops.

By the way I have 3 battered UFs in french ports and I have no idea, what to do with them. Allies have plenty of DDs and very high ASW tech, meaning that I will probably waste PPs, if I repair this subs.

Subs are useful for spotting invasion forces - however I think that at some point they will still be usefull to attack convoys near the Canadian coast - I don't think he will keep his strays there forever.

afk_nero wrote:Subs are useful for spotting invasion forces - however I think that at some point they will still be usefull to attack convoys near the Canadian coast - I don't think he will keep his strays there forever.

Sure, but I think I don't have PPs and oil to repair this subs and send them into sea. But maybe I will do in spring.

This turn I got MUD weather, so quiet everywhere.

Actually I forgot, that my northern front is still in SW weather zone, but well, we are entrenched and at full strength. More reinforcements from Finland arrive.



In the south all quiet, axis forces entrench further. Varna may fall, leading to loss of my DD, but what is it needed for, oil burning?
In Italy I lost Ancona, but it was predictable. My oil fields are bombed into 0 and I can't do much about changing it. Still oil pull slowly increase,hopefully I will have something like 200 for summer campaign (which is not enough indeed).



In the west loss of London is a matter of time. More then 10 turns passed after allied landing, several mechs were destroyed, so I think my delaying action was not complete failure. Sad that I lost 2 mechs and armour myself there.

Mud weather again.

In the north all quiet, only some skirmishes.



In the south Zechi finally started to attack my air directly, so I had to rebase bulk of my airforce. They are still fine within Model's command range.
I lost Varna and romanian DD fleet. Garrison from France railed to Bulgaria for home defence. I don't see why I should even try to hold Bulgaria with german units. This turn I purchased 3 fresh-upgraded mech units to have some fresh reserves. Bad thing is that they started to consume 2 oil/turn with recent upgrades.

Slow retreat in Italy. I am happy to see, that allies still have only 3 supply, despite having Rome.



In Britain I launched counterattack against exposed HQ mech and destroyed it pretty easily (left 1 step only after 1st corps attack, so 2nd had no problems to finish unit off). Commander is now away for 13 turns and I decided, that its better, then holding London for one more turn maybe - both my corps will anyway be destroyed instantly at fair weather.

A potentially usefull job for a sub or two is to destroy the Russian battleship group - this is constantly preventing your Finnish troops from fortifying itself.

That said this could also be done a little faster by some a air unit. One strike should be enough to drive it away.

Plaid wrote:Slow retreat in Italy. I am happy to see, that allies still have only 3 supply, despite having Rome.

The Allies won't get full supply when they take Paris either, at least not without London. The reason the Allies usually get supply when they retake Paris was explained to me as follows: Paris does not become a capitol supply source when reconquered but it does allow the Allies to trace supply from London. I'm not sure whether the Allies get full supply if they retake London as I'm not sure a capitol regains its supply center status when reconquered.

In the north I retreat further - don't want to engage refited red army at this clear terrain in SW zone. Also some AGN units were railed straight for Italy, since they are useless for now - no fighting anyway. Fresh units will be deployed directly near Koenigsberg-Danzig etc.



In the south I also did a step back. I had an opportunity to counterattack soviet mech near Bucharest, and probably to destroy it, making Romanian capital safe for a while. But I decided not to risk, because holding Bucharest for 1-2 additional turns can trap good part of AGS in Romania out of supply, and 1 PP city don't worth it. If Bucharest survives this turn I will take german corps away and rail romanian one instead.

In Italy good front line finally established. Don't want to have allies walking in southern germany in summer 1944... Probably I will be able even to defeat allied expedition force with my superiour armour units, thanks to clear terrain and poor AT of this allied mechs (2 only, against 11 surv of my tanks), I am going to rail here 1-2 more armour. If so, basically I can retake Italy, since there are no more allied forces...I think at least.

Note Von Bock's new HQ in Strasbourgh - italian army group is just in range.



I started to evacuate germans from Britain. This time I shipped one corps and removed Reichenau HQ from London.

My positions in France are rather weak (taken one armour from here for Italy), bud D-Day can happen during nearest 2-3 turns.



Next turn I will place lots of units - 3 corps and 3 mechs. I hope it will be enough to plug some holes. Now I have more spare PPs, since I don't have to repair my airpower continiously - it is grounded because of oil problems. I can build enough infantry (3-4 per turn) but it consumes great deal of MP. Already at 29%, 3rd penalty is closer than I thought.

More then a year to hold left...

As supposed, I lost Romania. But I was surprised to see couple of my units pocketed aswell, since Zechi was able to destroy german infantry in mountain hex, cutting the line.

Supply lines restored, also I blocked hex with finnish fighter. Its weak point of this GS version - this fighter is pretty safe from ground attacks at this mountain hex.



Soviet armour was damaged with air attacks again, though results are not so great anymore - soviet fighters now are almost just good, as germans.
Mostly we retreat - don't want to engage soviets at winter hexes.

In the north retreats aswell.



In Italy additional forces gathered for incoming battle. I hope Zechi will attack my lines here.



Ah, yes, we have allied landing in southern France. I don't want (and can't -don't have spare troops for it ) defend either southern or northern France now - we will go straight for Holland and Zigfried line.

3 more infantry drafted, leaving me with 26% manpower - why the hell it goes down so fast?

I predict this game will end with something marginal - allied or axis minor victory, or draw. If Zechi will do something really impressive, he may have major one, but I see no way how allies can get ultimate or strategic victory.

Well, we retreat mostly for now.



In the north defencive line almost formed, but in the south I still have to evacuate some troops from Romania (try to keep them in good order, so speed suffers). Also noteable - finnish fighter was attacked by soviet corps and lost no single step.



In Italy I launched counteroffencive - can't see any more how allies grind down my corps one by one, using their air superiority. Superiour armour suffered no casualties at all, but supporting luftwaffe got damaged heavily. Good deal of oil burned aswell, but well. Now major defeat for allies in Italy is real, or at least this direction is secured for a while.



I see no more point to use luftwaffe on defence - they score at best even results, engaging allied fighters, which have slightly worse tech level, but no any MP penalty aswell. Not it creates PP delta for my opponent, not for me. All luftwaffe units grounded until the end of the game and will be used only to support my attacks, as Borger adviced some posts above. Also they are good fortress defenders with this flawed 1.07 mechanics.

P.S. Allies in Italy now have full supply. They had not later because they were further then 40 hexes from closest allied capital, despite having Rome (London was axis one). Now they are fine.

You've done well to reteat in the north without losing any units. This will make it even harder for the Russians to get to Berlin. Once they get close you can dump all your labs and buy some more troops to defend Berlin and Hamburg.

That recent success in Italy I think has guaranteed you a marginal victory IMHO.

I've being siding with you given how dififcult you found Sealion. It's took some real skill to hold the Allies at bay for so long.

Played right (lots of TACs), the russians should be able to secure Berlin and Hamburg by May 45, so you've got quite a challenge ahead of you given your low manpower. Best of luck though!

schwerpunkt wrote:Played right (lots of TACs), the russians should be able to secure Berlin and Hamburg by May 45, so you've got quite a challenge ahead of you given your low manpower. Best of luck though!

Well, for now russian airforce is rather weak - only 3 tacks and all at half-strength at the moment. It deffinetely will be more, but I don't think that Zechi will have total air support. Together with the fact, that it seems he switched from amrour to mech production (probably after his armour being harassed by luftwaffe) he will have some troubles to break through river lines, hopefully.

In Italy Zechi focused his air support on my infantry, wiping out 2 of them. But armour left almost untouched, so I killed 2 more mechs (including HQ one, which actually captured Venice during allied turn and restored supply for a while). Another american HQ destroyed for 13 turns.

Free French transports spotted in MED, heading for Italy/southern France - last transmittion from Vichy MED BB, which was finished off by SUB in his port (I didn't even move any of my Vichy BB and both are destroyed now)

Also in Romania my attempt of "safe retreat" led to additional casualties, as mech failed to hold its position. Anyway, we are now ready to defend Budapest for a while.



In the North positions are ready to face soviet attack. They have no air superiority, and we have trenches...I hope they will stuck here.



Still no D-Day in France by the way. Its very good, since I don't have any real forces there.

In Italy my armour was destroyed finally. It was unlucky to retreat, so Zechi used 2 more air support and finished unit off.

Now german troops are on defence, and soon may resume retreat. They delayed allies well anyway, this direction is more or less safe.



Eastern front holds for now, everything under control.



In the west I see D-Day finally. Looks like allies will land easily near Cherbourgh, but I will not allow them to take Hague area at all costs.
My damaged bombers and subs did quite good damage to allied invasion transports, which are becoming really fragile this late.

Plaid wrote:My damaged bombers and subs did quite good damage to allied invasion transports, which are becoming really fragile this late.

With oil at 44 you're effectively out of oil. An with manpower in the orange my experience in such a situation is that the axis collapses amazingly fast. It'll be interesting to see how you play this game out as I would like to learn how to keep the axis from collapsing in such dire circumstances.

Please notice that when you drop down to below 25% manpower then garrisons get so poor quality that they will be almost useless. Allied units can attack them and inflict about 10 steps. So you better build corps units from now on despite having big holes in your line. These Volksturm units might only be useful in cities since they can't retreat. There the Allies will need to use 2 ground units to capture the city.

The bad weather will come sooner than the Allied player would appreciate so if you can keep him out of the Alps then you can hold the line in the Alps through the winter and you won't have to worry about Overlord.

Your main threat is in the east because the Russians can continue the offensive during the winter while the Allies will just try to keep your production down without advancing much.

So you need to try to get a double defense line behind the rivers in the east so the Russians can make a bridgehead by causing units to retreat. Then you can swap weak units at the front with fresh units from the second line to keep the line.

When mobility is back to normal again in 1945 then the Russians will rush towards Berlin. Remember that they won't win with just Berlin, they need Hamburg as well. So you might get a minor victory or a draw if you can keep the Allies from getting to Hamburg before May 1945.


Lack of oil will be your biggest problem since you can't move your armor etc. You can't afford air attacks either. Make sure you rail your armor from exposed positions before they have to move to be saved. I think keeping an armor reserve is vital. You can afford maybe 2 armor attacks per turn since you always get a small oil each turn. Using armor to e. g. kill beachheads near Wilhelmshaven in 1945 can be the difference between victory and defeat.

In the east axis lines hold for now.



In Italy, Milan lost, but I destroyed another allied mech. Free French troops will arrive soon.



In the west allies succesfully landed near Cherbourgh. I am not going to really fight them before they reach Holland - simple don't have troops for it.



Russian forces are rather weak, then strong. They have few armour, few air support, quite poor tech. Their only advantage is relatively unlimited reinforcements.

In France, though, I don't know what to do with this allies. Soon enough they will reach western wall, and I have troubles even to men this forts...

I still have 12 labs ready for sale at critical moment, my manpower is around 23-24%.

You'll be surprised how resilient air units are in the west wall hexes. Especially in poor weather.

massina_nz wrote:You'll be surprised how resilient air units are in the west wall hexes. Especially in poor weather.

Neil used them against me, so I know

Problem is that it will be costly to repair them and that they can't damage allied troops.

But as a temporary solution...