Slitherine

In some games I played recently I encountered extremely powerful BEF in France (initial British inf and mech aswell as most of garrisons). This troops together with french ones formed double (and somewhere triple) defencive line , using all this rivers in France as position. Also canadians were sent to France. I stuck in this mass of units, and after mid summer french war effort starts to rise, giving them some reasonable PP income. I hardly managed to finish off France at late october '40 with great casualties (around 700.000 inf, 1000+ tanks, ~2000 planes), so I was not in shape to conduct any pre-barbarossa operation and hardly managed to launch some sort of reasonable Barbarossa, in fact all game was ruined for axis with this French campaign.
Anyone encountered this? Also any advance, how to handle this allied behaviour?

I´ve also found a player that mobilized all the british units and even the canadian ones for the french campaign. I noticed of that and I was not able to take Paris until september 1940 if I remember. The strategic result of this allied player behaviour really had influence on the Barbarossa operation I started in 1941: I built less units that I would have wanted to build. But I don´t really think this is a good strategy for the allies: I could see how the british units got an early -1 quality on their units and they were not able to build a decent navy for fighting the uboats. On the other hand, as I built a large Luftwaffe air force for french campaign (5 fighters, 3 tacs and 3 strats) I avoided much land units losses so my manpower did not suffer much. So this could the way to handle this kind of allied strategy: a strong air support.

Plaid wrote:Anyone encountered this? Also any advice, how to handle this allied behaviour?

I would suggest Sea Lion and / or closing the Med (i.e., capturing Gibraltar & Suez Canal). If the allied players commits UK and Canadian forces that heavily to France then I would think that the destruction of those forces would be a priority followed by Sea Lion. In addition to the forces lost the allied player also has to pay 8 PPs per UK transport.

rkr1958 wrote: In addition to the forces lost the allied player also has to pay 8 PPs per UK transport.

The two Canadian corps can be committed at no additional cost so its just the cost of the UK based units, which I think is tolerable (having done it a couple of times myself) as long as you dont go berserk . The threat of landings is what ultimately will limit the british committment but this can only be done if the brits have moved their fleet into the Atlantic (the two french BBs are a problem on their own)

schwerpunkt wrote:

rkr1958 wrote: In addition to the forces lost the allied player also has to pay 8 PPs per UK transport.

The two Canadian corps can be committed at no additional cost so its just the cost of the UK based units, which I think is tolerable (having done it a couple of times myself) as long as you dont go berserk . The threat of landings is what ultimately will limit the british committment but this can only be done if the brits have moved their fleet into the Atlantic (the two french BBs are a problem on their own)

Neil, That's correct. The Canadian fighter, mech and infantry corps cost 24 PPs to transport regardless of where they go. But if they send the Mech and infantry corps to France they will either lose them or pay 8 PPs each to get them back to England after the Fall of France. But, I think the axis player should make their destruction and any other UK corps sent to France a priority. In terms of Sea Lion, I would suggest waiting unit after the Fall of France to launch it. Also, if the axis player sees this kind of commitment then they could have 2 or 3 additional u-boats available, which would give them 5 or 6 flotilla. Combine this with a minimum of 3 German fighters, 3 German tactical bombers, 1 German strategic bomber plus an Italian fighter and bomber would give them a powerful counter to RN and would likely result in their destruction if they did decide to intervene.

I think it's the conclusion of most experienced players is that it's very hard to stop Sea Lion against an experienced and committed axis player. However; against a healthy and experienced allied player so draw out and costly to an axis player as to so delay and weaken them that they will lose against the Russians.

Now I understand that the same sort of argument is being made in this case where the allied player has commitment heavily to France and cause more axis casualties and held France longer. However; the difference is that the allied player has stripped England of all corps, which hopefully they lost in France. Or if they've built more corps, they've done this at the expense of not investing in research. Also, they've have had to spend significant PPs for replacing air losses, which also impact PPs available for research. As Victor points out above UK builds and repairs suffer -1 quality because of their manpower, which weakens new builds or repaired units. In this weaken state, one strategy I think would be for the axis player to conquer England and still be able to launch a reasonably strong Barbarossa by the Summer of 1941. To me the game objective would be to cripple the western allies and then be strong enough against the Russians to hold them off until the end of the game.

So, to me, an allied player that heavily commits to France is gambling that the axis player won't exploit the UK weakness after the fall of France and will turn to Russia. I think it was Joe Rock who said that good players adapt to their opponents. While I'm not a big fan of Sea Lion, which is a fact that my opponents know, faced with this situation I think I would go for Sea Lion just to see how good my analysis above was and to keep my opponents honest in the future. Sometimes it's fun just to mix it up like I did one time when I tried the "Close the Med" strategy: viewtopic.php?p=117298#117298

I posted this way back in vanilla days .viewtopic.php?t=5260. But the tactic is valid today as it was then but mechanics are a bit different. The point of the strategy is to weaken the German to the point where Barbarosa is severly affected. It doesn't really matter if you loose England, the key is not loosing Canada and fighting like heck not to loose the canal. If it works its an early win for the allies if not its probably a Major win for the Germans. Like anything in this game its all paper rock scissors and this strategy is as good as anything other, the Germans just have to recognize it.

Yeah, I think a strong BEF in France can be a very effective Allied strategy. The key is to hold France long enough that the Axis are prevented from landing in 1940 in England due to rough weather. If the Axis are doing Sitzkrieg I think this is definitely an option to be considered. In one game I played (although it was in the Vanilla version), an attempted Sea Lion before France falls will entangle the Axis in a very difficult situation so I would welcome that attempt as the Allied player. Even if the Axis can squeeze in a Sea Lion at the end of 1940, if the British can keep the fight going through early-mid 1941 for GB I think any game will end in an ultimate Allied victory with the Red army in Berlin.

I this can sometimes be a good strategy, but I think the only time it will delay the Germans until Fall is if they are unprepared for it. If the Germans build a couple extra air units before Spring of '40, they will still have Paris by summer. I have played as Axis and taken Paris in June of '40, with a heavy BEF commitment. I have also played as Allies with this strategy and lost Paris by June (but not always)!

I've seen this before too, and I always lick my chops when I see British forces in France. I love the chance to eliminate some British units early in the war. It usually means France takes a little longer, but then the British have to build more forces for home defense. If they don't, I can do Sealion.

My advice for people having trouble with this strategy is to just play as if those British forces aren't there. Just keep pounding away at the Allies, taking out 2-3 units per turn. Soon they will run out and you will be in Paris. Don't do anything crazy and your losses will be low and your Fall of France date will be in summer 1940.

joerock22 wrote:I've seen this before too, and I always lick my chops when I see British forces in France. I love the chance to eliminate some British units early in the war. It usually means France takes a little longer, but then the British have to build more forces for home defense. If they don't, I can do Sealion.

My advice for people having trouble with this strategy is to just play as if those British forces aren't there. Just keep pounding away at the Allies, taking out 2-3 units per turn. Soon they will run out and you will be in Paris. Don't do anything crazy and your losses will be low and your Fall of France date will be in summer 1940.

I agree, but want to add, that you will need more airpower to advance through this many units with reasonable casualties. With only 2 starting bombers (i often build labs first, like it is discribed in my AAR) you will have troubles. But if you have something like 3 fighters and 3-4 TACs, things are easy.

Plaid wrote:

joerock22 wrote:I've seen this before too, and I always lick my chops when I see British forces in France. I love the chance to eliminate some British units early in the war. It usually means France takes a little longer, but then the British have to build more forces for home defense. If they don't, I can do Sealion.

My advice for people having trouble with this strategy is to just play as if those British forces aren't there. Just keep pounding away at the Allies, taking out 2-3 units per turn. Soon they will run out and you will be in Paris. Don't do anything crazy and your losses will be low and your Fall of France date will be in summer 1940.

I agree, but want to add, that you will need more airpower to advance through this many units with reasonable casualties. With only 2 starting bombers (i often build labs first, like it is discribed in my AAR) you will have troubles. But if you have something like 3 fighters and 3-4 TACs, things are easy.

My build strategy is to build 1 lab in each area first, then build a fighter and a tactical bomber. I have the 3rd fighter and tactical bomber ready in February.