View Full Version : Europe Aflame 1.8(h) Mantis (Axis) vs. Kraut (Allies)
Now that we have the AAR forum, I decided to post the AAR that I've been working on for 88 turns, and lo and behold, Stefan has started a Barbarossa AAR from our game. Good! Both sides of the fence will provide a better overall perspective! Here we go!
Houserules:
We have agreed to allow unlimited 'supply drain style' attacks. Fortifying only allowed in logical areas (ie: no turning the UK into a giant fortresss). Amphibious Invasions of Malta must block the sea road, so there is no retreat for the defenders. This is best accomplished with either a ship, or a small unit (like a garrison) that doesn’t take part in the attack, so it won’t get ‘stuck at sea on a searoad’, or rather, that you can move it off the searoad after battle. No amphibious landings anywhere but at anchorages. No moving minor reinforcements until that country is active. (ie: Norway gets some small reinforcements, etc). No dropping paras into locations strictly to raise hell with map weaknesses, etc. For example, the very east map edge in Russia, the rail line connecting Ethiopia and Egypt, etc. If it's not a 'valid' drop, don't do it. Bridge bombing - The Allies aren't allowed to go on bridge campaigns until the US air arrives as long as the Axis player keeps either 1 German fighter, or three Italian fighters, in each region to 'patrol'. Regions are France, Germany, Balkans, N. Africa, ME/Caucasus, Scandanavia, etc.
Here we go!
I took the prewar builds. Setup for Norway and Poland at the same time - no problems with either. I planned to take the Canal from the Brits, so I started shipping Italian reinforcements to Tobruk right from the start. I'd decided to save France til after the Sitz. After Poland was complete, I lined up for Yugo and rested. The Balkan Axis minor's all joined with the DoW on Yugo, so it fell very quickly.
The French started shipping everything home from her colonies, preparing for the onslaught of my Axis hordes. I captured a port early in the Yugo campaign to begin shipping Germans to Africa and Middle East. As we agreed to allow limited attack/min loss-arty supported attacks, I started pounding on the Maginot line proper, more to see what would happen than out of any desire to start things with the French. Using 3 korps (all I had on the front), I started evapping the Maginot forts. We lined up for Greece during this period, as well.
I started shipping most German units out of Yugo towards France to take advantage of open areas created by destruction of the Maginot line forts. The French were still lined up for a Low Countries invasion. In the Med, I landed in a port SW of Beruit, in conjunction with a paradrop completely surrounding (and capturing) Damascus, ensuring supply for the housekeeping phase of next turn. Kraut's Brits moved back from Sidi Baranni somewhat to better deal with the German incursion to the east. I had a brilliant/insane idea, and managed to do a combined para/amphibiuos invasion into Athens, and took it, despite stiff defences. The Greek counterattack evaps 3 'split' paras. (POed!! I invaded with the thought that if I was forced out of Athens, the units would retreat into the airfield. They did, but the paras evapped instead of retreating with the infantry corp. GRRR!)
The French stick a few corps into Greece to stiffen the lines. Greece dies in good order, but was much tougher than anticipated. Italy had intended to stay neutral for some time, but the temptation of all that empty Brit terrain proved too much, and I activated them. They advanced on Brit positions in Africa. I ate some very good distance, and cutoff the Brits LRDG Special Forces unit. Kraut's Brits attack the Italians to free this unit, and are successful beyond what I thought they were capable of (damned useless Italians!) They beat the hell out of several fresh Italian corps with smaller numbers.
In Ethiopia, the rout begins, and Italian positions are quickly pushed back. My Ethiopian Italians came out to make the advance as difficult as possible. The Brits are driving forward in this region with no supplies, but continually evapping the odd split unit, and making constant progress. A little further into this campaign, I notice a stack of Brits 1 hex directly south of Addis Ababa. The Italians could manage a partial surround, but the hex directly south of the Brit's position would remain open... I Para'ed in to complete the surround, and added a German HQ for support measures. I managed a few rounds of supply drain attacks on Brits that are already glowing cherry red. TOTAL surprise! I evapped the Allied stack, and the Italians are now mildly on the offensive in Ethiopia. (In over two dozen games, this is a first!) I begin having dreams of adequacy in thinking I might just hold this region. :D
The Brits also in the red around Matrula where they're beating the hell out of the Italians. I have several fresh corps pouring in from recent reinforcements to this theatre, so I start an offensive here as well, and beat the exhausted Brits back to El Alamein. The Brits had also rushed east to contain the German threat in Middle East, establishing a line in the vicinity of Haifa Acre. I put a motorized Italian infantry here, and with a paradrop or two, started flanking around the Sea of Galilee.
Kraut saw my maneuvers, and pulled back. A stalemate began around Tel Aviv until a couple more korps were added, and the Brits drew back further.
Here is the situation around El Alamein on turn 24.
Ethiopia, after the Italians reclaim a bit of terrain! Still in some sad shape here!
France was a very unique situation. I had decided to continue pasting into the French with broken down elements of small units (ants), and to continue this course of action as long as there was no cost in losses associated with it. Success beyond my dreams! I was able to destroy pretty much the entire northern portion of the Maginot line, and continually push back or destroy the French defenders. Most of the French were still stubbornly lined up for a Low Countries invasion, and I shipped units back from the completion of the Yugo conquest to the Belgium/Netherlands border areas to keep this idea firmly in my opponent's mind. Truthfully, I *did* intend to launch my assault through here come spring. I was doing everything in the Maginot line area with only a few korps, and some supporting arty. As the successes mounted, however, I started to garrison the new areas in France with other tired vets of the Balkan wars, and used the same few korps to keep pushing westwards.
Kraut would continually contain me, but with so much arty support, and shock bonuses working in my favor, it was easy to make short work of the defenders, and keep playing a maneuver game with the French. I continually resisted the option of pressing the advantage, preferring to see what I could accomplish 'on the cheap', by simply exploiting openings in some strength, to watch the French reform a little further back next round. I wanted to get through France with as few losses as possible, and this was all just a grand experiment to see what I could get away with.
By the time the Balkans campaign was completed, I had been shoving every motorized and armor formation I could through the gap, attempting to exploit the open terrain to the maximum possible. I managed to eventually flank the French line to a degree, and the race northwards began. Here's a shot of how France sat on turn 24.
Winter hit the next turn, and so began the sitz!
During winter, there was a constant shipping of German infantry korps into Tel Aviv. Kraut wisely abandons Egypt and the Canal, pulling all his Brits into Ethiopia. Damn, I was hoping he'd stay to contest it! Oh well, maybe we'll catch the cagey Brits somewhere further down the road!
The French pulled back from the front with the Germans to establish better defence in depth around Paris proper. As I am unable to see into this French ‘pocket’, I limit my troop redeployments to creating two large staging areas on his west flank, and southwest flank.
Awating the thaw...
The first turn of spring (35) saw troops advance to contact with the new French line, and prepare for the offensive next turn. I then punched into the line from the two angles, pocketing and destroying a few French corps and some armor. I also selected the TO for Case Yellow this turn (36). Turn 37 saw far better progress than anticipated. Here is the starting positions.
Combat rounds were good, but the results of these assaults exceeded my hopes! The French were kicked around all up and down the line. There were many evaporations on the French side due to routing and the lack of ‘room’ to retreat into friendly hexes. (They were filled with routed 1/3s of units). Paris was captured, but expected to return to French hands. Hopefully this beating will reorg his forces next turn, allowing for an easy cleanup!
The French retake Paris, and screw me out of Vichy. The bastards! Well, I’ve been lucky on the USEV level so far (no LL yet!) so I’ll activate Spain very shortly. I played with the stacks of French fodder, and stuffed them all close together to mass kill them at the end of the turn. Paris and all surrounding hexes are now under control, so I'll not be hearing any more from them! All remaining Brit garrison units in the canal region are also destroyed this turn.
Here's a shot of the canal prior to the assaults.
HRS losses stand at 24.5K, 35.6K assigned, and 3.7K on hand. Not too bad, as we control Norway, France, Poland, Yugo, Greece, all of North Africa, and the entire ME region! (I preempted the Brit unit in Iraq by being solidly in control of the area before the option to active Iraq came up). I can live with losses like that!
I begin setting up for Spain, and the arrival of the damned French all over Africa. Mr. Reynaud is going to have a rude welcome… :freak: Going to take them out quickly. I don’t know how, but Kraut has been shitkicking the Luftwaffe like I’ve never seen. Aside from constant evaps here and there, he just pulled a single move (bombing run?) that evapped *5* fighters. I have overlapping fields of patrol, had almost all my air in the area, and he managed to pull this off with only the Brits, and half their air was back home in the UK when he pulled this on me in Africa. WTF? (edit: This turns out to be caused by gaps in the air ranges of the differing fighter types comprising each unit, and has been corrected!) Playing chicken **** now. ALL air (except that required to maintain the ‘no bridge bombing’ zones) is going to base together in France, until all units are at 100%, and all dead units have returned.
Spain joined in painlessly, and all partisans were cleaned up with no difficulties. They were all destroyed in the same turn they entered. Portugal was occupied, Gibraltar garrisoned, and we began setting up for Russia. This began by shipping all mountain infantry to the ME, and increasing the commitment to the Scandinavian front.
I'm planning to use reconstituted paratroopers for a future assault on Malta, as they've permanently 'lost their wings'. When the navies are at 100%, and the troops prepared, I will soften up Malta with the paras via heavily supported sea invasions, and will smash the island with 2 infantry corps to complete the job.
Malta was a total success! The paras got caught at sea and remained embarked, but there is no Brit presence in the Med to threaten them, and they make it home safely the next turn. This is why I used them for this role; even if there was any Brits left to threaten them, they reconstitute, and can't go airborne again regardless, so no loss!
A slight shuffling of forces is in order following the securing of the ‘Great Axis Lake’. With 6000 sea transport points after taking Gibraltar, I feel I can skip the BoB TO. Besides, going after a Med port so early in the game has allowed me to basically have completed shipping units to the ME theatre at a very early juncture. This is a refreshing change!
Most of the following turns are quite quiet, with one little sideshow. With the new rail line leading into Ethiopia from the canal, a year of quiet time on my hands, and HRS losses around 10K lower than I had dared hope for, I figure that I can afford a diversion at this time. I already have 2 panzers in Africa, and there’s one coming as a reinforcement in a few turns also destined for this theatre…
Let’s try to oust the Brits!
The rail line is all on dunes, and most unit types cannot walk across this terrain. I had hoped to speed through it with engineers and my German RR unit, but only the Italian engineer can navigate this area (damned heavy equipment!) It was a slow process, inching forward a hex at a time with the engineer and an HQ to assist… Unused air transport points kept the Arab Cavalry division in minimal supply (10) as he kept pushing the border forward. We eventually encountered a Brit Guards unit, which was to be our escort into Ethiopia (he’s hiding 2 hexes ahead of the cavalry).
Turn 56.
Kraut had chosen that particular hex to make his defence in, which turned out to be a lucky break for me. (Further forward and i would be exposed for a greater period of time; see below). I had to call in some infantry korps to get this business going, and they would have to come by rail. This would leave me dangerously exposed to the RN, and Kraut’s already shown such a love for nailing any little unit I expose that I was dreading this part of the campaign. As it turns out, however, I was able to show up in strength, take one round of abuse from the RN, then push the Brit back enough that I could get out of range of the RN’s guns.
Turn 62 (the delay was in repairing the rail).
I got to give Kraut a taste of aerial payback, as I caught him with a stack of eight or nine units in Ethiopia. I had nothing else to do, so the Luftwaffe gave him all we had. I managed to evap one of the main Brit fleets, which later had the bad fortune to reconstitute adjacent to the Canal, so I could sink her again. (We came to an agreement after this, and the subsequent reconstitution of this naval unit was allowed safe passage back to Scapa Floe for a couple months of internment prior to release). The next few turns saw infantry slogging slowly forward in this terrain as the Brit was overrun once or twice a turn to herald the Axis advance into Ethiopia. Port Sudan was taken in a joint operation, with FJ troops airdropping to cut retreats and provide flanking opportunites, and the DAK desert division supported by Italians assaulting the beaches. This operation would’ve been too risky to attempt had the defence been higher, but Kraut is wisely conserving his strength until I tip my hand in this region.
The situation a turn later (70).
Disaster!
I had a nasty surpise waiting for me… The Brit Indian division had reappeared somewhere, and snuck into Cairo just as I was disorganized. Some backed up Brit reinforcements came in, and created this situation.
It turned out to have a happy ending. I surrounded them, and then forced the Indian division on the south into the pocket. I was intending to get in a few supply drain attacks with massive support, but as it turns out, one round was enough. The Brits all evapped. My losses on this operation – 17 Recon RSs, and 1 He-111. Fuhrer Mantis is a very happy man today!
With the time spent reparing rail lines, the length of time it would take to recapture Ethiopia was prohibitive, and as it turns out, the decision was made to abandon this campaign. Winter is a few turns away, and these units need to be rested, and on the Persian border ready to go with the spring thaw in Europe. As losses were pretty much non-existent, we’re still calling this a success. Pushing the Brits back from this vital rail line should guarantee the safety of the Canal from this direction. I’ve left a single Italian division on the rail line to keep the Brits in Ethiopia, and Stefan is content to sit opposite with the small Brit Gideon force, which suits me fine.
Turn 71, just prior to withdrawing from Ethiopia.
The situation after the withdrawal.
The handful of Italians I have setup to defend the beaches and the rail line in Egypt should be able to hold this area for the remainder of the game. You’ll notice the German fighter left to keep away the Allied bombers and their bridge campaigns. As Kraut has buzzed the coasts here, I have no problems showing the strength of the Italian defence. There will never again be a British presence here!
DoW on the Russians!
(*** I'll fill in from here a little later in the campaign, after the back areas of my invasion force catch up to the front! ***)
Here are some comments from my side, I have no access to my old savegames ATM because my main computer is still broken so everything is from my memory but here we go:
Most of Mantis early action was expected and there wasn't really much I could do there, he captured Poland, Norway and Denmark so fast, once the Brits managed to declare war it was already over.
My main goal in Poland was to cause the germans as many losses as possible by digging in all along the way to Warsaw and than, as defeat was obvious, to get as many polish corps killed as possible. why? well, if a force is withdrawn 100% of its equipment dissapears, if they die during suicide attacks most equipment is lost but some will be send to the replacement pool, bolstering the remaining allies, and as a nice extra some germans will bite the dust, too. As this is an 'anything goes' game I don't feel bad doing it ;)
The quick campaign in the balkan was also expected and all I could do here was to send some french coprs to greece to make the axis going through the mountains as costly as possible.
Mantis breaching of the maginot line came as a bad surprise, I didn't thought he could break through here so easily, damn soak off attacks :skull:
Well, as soon as had widened the gap and began pooring germans through it was obvious that I had to abandon the south and concentrate on my Paris defence. Most units made it so expect of some worthless land I hadn't lost anything important. But this race to build new defences before Mantis could exploit the holes was really stretching me to the limit, at his turn-24 picture I almost ran out of units while the germans just keept coming. Luckily the sitz stroke and I pulled back to build a new strong defence around Paris. Every hex 3 hexes away from Paris had an 100% entrechment and I had build a layered defence with fortifyed units on every hex. Basically this was the entire french army condensed to this small caulderon, I made sure that every infantry unit saw combat at least once so all had veteran status... I feeled pretty secure. I knew that fortified french units can be really stubborn so I counted on some intense combat to come with hopefully heavy losses to the germans. Boy, was I wrong! Mantis sliced through my units as if they were not there, hey, I thought the french army was basically equall in strenght and was only outclassed by german blitzkrieg?? Not here, it was a classicall WW1 fortress I had build yet the germans simply walked all over me *sob* :cry:
Oh well, at least he had to basically kill the entire french army to get to Paris, more rifle squads for the british!
The british had sailed some units to SA but keept some at home, especially against a skilled player as Mantis it was just to risky to completely strip the UK. I was able to hold my position reasonably well (expect for this little incident in Ethiopia! grrrrr) but as Mantis keept shipping germans to NA during the sitz it became quickly obvious that a 2-front war here cant be won and I evacuated them to Ethiopia were I had to finnish of some italians first (this time for real and with no great opposition) and began to dig in for the final battle. I had loved to stuff some heavy units on the railline to Suez once Mantis troops were advancing but raillines can only trace supply from supply points so the entire rail line is out of supply and the only unit that can survive there is the G unit you saw on Mantis screenshots.
My plan was to fight as long as possible in Ethiopia and than evacuate the survivors to the horn. As it turned out that wasn't necessary because when winter was closing in the coward germans quickly ran away :D
So far I made no major mistakes, I preserved my forces as long as possible, I made it as hard as possible for Mantis to KO my minors... there is really not that much the allies can do early in the war, the germans are simply to good.
A little annoying is that the US is still far away from entering the war, I got LL only after Mantis has done basically everything he could to annoy the US, now with the -20 to the US EEV after he DoW'd Russia it wouldn't surprise me to hear that the EEV is down to 0 :nuts: :cry:
My situation so far: Hmm, at the moment there is not much I can do to annoy the germans or turn their attention away from the soviets, the only positive thing is that my Rifle pool is nicely filled so I can use the brits aggressive but I don't know how ATM. My sea transport points are so low, I can hardly move a split corps a turn. What to do, what to do....
What happened? Love to hear the back half of this AAR...:D
Can't recall the details, but basically, I lined up a couple Panzer Korps in the ME, supported by the entire formation of mountain troops and several additional Infantry korps, and slammed into Russia from the two angles. Kraut gave very stiff resistance in the mountains of the ME area, but after grinding my way through this mess, I was able to exploit some great breakthroughs here and on the EF proper, and capture the victory cities.
I know we didn't finish the game; I think the Allies surrendered sometime that fall or winter.
Can't recall the details, but basically, I lined up a couple Panzer Korps in the ME, supported by the entire formation of mountain troops and several additional Infantry korps, and slammed into Russia from the two angles. Kraut gave very stiff resistance in the mountains of the ME area, but after grinding my way through this mess, I was able to exploit some great breakthroughs here and on the EF proper, and capture the victory cities.
I know we didn't finish the game; I think the Allies surrendered sometime that fall or winter.
Yeah, there isn't much point in playing after the USSR has surrendered, so I hear.
Well, I imagine that that would be situational. If Russia were to fall late in the war, the Axis could still have a tremendous fight on their hands. Also, the scenario (at this point in it's development) cannot properly represent the shift in political/industrial strategy that would occur with the fall of Russia.
What was the quote from the US if D-Day failed? "Then we'll raise another hundred divisions"... Looking at the industrial might and manpower pool at the American's disposal, this might not be just bluster...
Imagine Russia collapsing in late '43 or early '44, with the Allies already having a secure beachhead in the West - perhaps as far liberating France. The German's would be screaming for the west to hold on for "just another couple of weeks" as they put the nail in the Russian coffin. Then the game would really get interesting!
Well, I imagine that that would be situational. If Russia were to fall late in the war, the Axis could still have a tremendous fight on their hands. Also, the scenario (at this point in it's development) cannot properly represent the shift in political/industrial strategy that would occur with the fall of Russia.
What was the quote from the US if D-Day failed? "Then we'll raise another hundred divisions"... Looking at the industrial might and manpower pool at the American's disposal, this might not be just bluster...
Imagine Russia collapsing in late '43 or early '44, with the Allies already having a secure beachhead in the West - perhaps as far liberating France. The German's would be screaming for the west to hold on for "just another couple of weeks" as they put the nail in the Russian coffin. Then the game would really get interesting!
I kind of went with the assumption that it would be hard to knock out the Soviets after '42, and, therefore, it would be pointless to continue playing after they had been wiped out (in '42 or earlier).
Interesting results.
However I would have to say there must be a serious problem with the scenario design to permit such ahistorical outcomes.
The logistics situation of the mid-east as well as those of the axis powers in the early 1940's made supplying anything larger than a few light divisions impossible.
Mark Stevens
02 Mar 07, 21:36
A lot of players made this point, and in later versions of the scenario there are built-in restrictions on how many German units can be shipped to the Middle East theatre, increasing as (if!) Gibraltar, Malta, Crete, Cyprus, and Alexandria are captured.
And it's working, too. It is a real pain in the butt to try and get the level of German manpower in Africa to a height where you can start kicking UK butt all over the place, and not have to worry about 14 Italian divisions surrendering to an MP squad, or something...
Bdr.Mallette
17 Jul 07, 19:12
who's We? .......
who's We? .......
??????????
Bdr.Mallette
18 Jul 07, 10:56
HRS losses stand at 24.5K, 35.6K assigned, and 3.7K on hand. Not too bad, as we control Norway, France, Poland, Yugo, Greece, all of North Africa, and the entire ME region! (I preempted the Brit unit in Iraq by being solidly in control of the area before the option to active Iraq came up). I can live with losses like that!
the example...sry...didnt quote it last time.
bdr.
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