EA Heldenkaiser (Allies) vs. Telumar (Axis)

Heldenkaiser

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Re: Allied Turn 137 / 8th February 1942

Frankly, Dierk, this info was in the scenario doc. It's worth making a folder on your desktop to keep a copy of it, eh? Read it!
Of course it was there. I have read the bloody thing five times already. But when I play I simply don't remember everything. Must come from trying to squeeze in half an hour at the computer between a demanding job and two crying kids. :(
 

L`zard

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Re: Allied Turn 137 / 8th February 1942

Of course it was there. I have read the bloody thing five times already. But when I play I simply don't remember everything. Must come from trying to squeeze in half an hour at the computer between a demanding job and two crying kids. :(
LOL!!!

Well, Bubba, when I do it, I make it in rtf mode and change the colors of the important stuff....granted that I've not two crying kids, but professionals tend to work thier games in the middle of the night under that condition, eh?

Good luck with it, and remember that now you've got lots of invasion opportunities!
 

ogar

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Re: Allied Turn 137 / 8th February 1942

Damn. I'll never learn how to play this game.
Actually, you've turned into one helluva player during this ordeal. To this ex-rookie, you seemed a fair-to-good player a couple years ago; now, you're making Stefan really work at his game -- something, I think, that was above your play grade at the beginning. And you've been doing this with two small kids around ! Even more impressive. And I will remind you that knowledgeable players of EA -- L'zard, Seca, Mark & others - continue to remind you of the things you've done right. All ya gotta do now is not make any more screw-ups. Simple, ain't it ?
 

Heldenkaiser

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Allied Turn 138 / 15th February 1942

- Alright, my stupid mistake regarding the Portuguese seems to be reversible. They're all back in their capital, dug in and defending it. Since I had nobody else to ship last turn or this, I didn't even unnecessarily sacrifice sea transport, so all I may have lost is one entrenchment level, if even that. I also brought the Porto division over to Lisbon to use it where it counts.
- The bad news is that Spain-based German bombers sank practically all my fleet in the Straits of Gibraltar, including the KGV group and the Portuguese destroyers. Only Ark Royal managed to limp back to Plymouth. We tried to fight back with our own bombers this turn and sank some capital ships, but we're not even close to even. A strong SS corps with artillery support has begun to storm Gibraltar, where all my amphibious operations force for the western Med is trapped now. Fortunately their stacking is in the green.
- Vichy troops are being chased all over northern Africa and southern France. I am surprised so many are still alive. Still trying to wreck RRs as they move.
- In the east I am reinforcing the Kuban and the Don fronts with 8 new Guards infantry corps. I have an ambitious plan to cut off the narrow basis of the Axis Kuban bridgehead, but I'll need a lot more troops for that. Maybe when the new tank corps come in in spring.
- Stefan showed himself rather annoyed by my bridge-blowing in the West. Nothing can move through France on rails right now. I am again offering a bridge-blowing ceasefire. Is that rather stupid?
Here are some maps for a change ... this is what remains of Vichy & of Portugal, plus an update on the Kuban front. It hasn't changed much, only my own lines are thickening.
View attachment 34577View attachment 34576View attachment 34575
 

Heldenkaiser

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Re: Allied Turn 137 / 8th February 1942

Actually, you've turned into one helluva player during this ordeal. To this ex-rookie, you seemed a fair-to-good player a couple years ago; now, you're making Stefan really work at his game -- something, I think, that was above your play grade at the beginning. And you've been doing this with two small kids around ! Even more impressive. And I will remind you that knowledgeable players of EA -- L'zard, Seca, Mark & others - continue to remind you of the things you've done right. All ya gotta do now is not make any more screw-ups. Simple, ain't it ?
Thanks! At the moment I feel I am at the receiving end of a rather bad whipping. I'll try to follow your advice though and avoid screwing up further. A year ago or so somebody said in this thread the only thing that counted was keeping the Red Army alive. I suppose it still is, so there's hope. Still, I'm quite sure I'll continue to do rather stupid things here and there. The reality simply IS that when I can find 20 minutes of time in the evening the preference is to actually play the turn and get it back to Stefan, rather than ponder what is to be done. I have him waiting for the file long enough as it is.
 

L`zard

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Re: Allied Turn 138 / 15th February 1942

-
- Stefan showed himself rather annoyed by my bridge-blowing in the West. Nothing can move through France on rails right now. I am again offering a bridge-blowing ceasefire. Is that rather stupid?
I think so, Dierk! Blowing rail lines is something I'd not expect Stefan to agree to anyway, but it's something you really want to keep, eh?

:smoke:
 

ogar

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Re: Allied Turn 138 / 15th February 1942

Thanks! At the moment I feel I am at the receiving end of a rather bad whipping.
You've earned my thanks for making it this far, and for the AAR. As for the bad whipping -- Stefan's beaten me silly in other scenarios before, and I still get the sense of complete incompetence when I open his pbl's. And so far, I am winning ! (Neva - Soviets just launched a prepped counter-offensive, it's only turn 6.)
the preference is to actually play the turn and get it back to Stefan, rather than ponder what is to be done. I have him waiting for the file long enough as it is.
Same feeling on my side, but he deserves to receive the best I can get to him -- besides you, and me, I know Pio is keeping him hopping (FitE).

A year ago or so somebody said in this thread the only thing that counted was keeping the Red Army alive. I suppose it still is, so there's hope.
Just my two cents, but I see it that you (Allies) have got 2 big bulldozers -- one's the Red Army and the other will be the USArmy/AAF. You've stopped him in the East, and now can get that machine going forward. The trick with the BR and others is to not lose too much while keeping him occupied (and losing forces) AND somehow get ready for a foothold, so when the US comes in, you can move that bulldozer forward to meet up in Berlin. [It's very very easy to type this -- much more difficult to even make the basic strategy work.] Good luck !
 

Mark Stevens

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Re: Allied Turn 138 / 15th February 1942

I know it doesn't seem like it overall, but I reckon that you're going to win, maybe not by taking Berlin but certainly driving the Axis back into Germany. A lot depends on what he does once spring comes and the Axis winter shock penalty ends.

It may sound odd, but his mobilising Spain and attacking Vichy is actually a defensive move from an overall strategic perspective.
 

Heldenkaiser

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Re: Allied Turn 138 / 15th February 1942

A lot depends on what he does once spring comes and the Axis winter shock penalty ends.
Actually it ended the turn before this one without any serious Axis offensive in the east. I am wondering about that.
 

L`zard

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Re: Allied Turn 138 / 15th February 1942

Dierk!

About time for another 'full show' pic, eh? Something that will show were ALL your troops are so the rest of us remain in the loop.....

Danke!

:clown:
 

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Allied Turn 139 / 22th February 1942

- Stefan says "naturally we won't forego bridge bombardments". So be it. Let this turn serve to show him that we can play this game at least as well as they do. RR bridges are cut from the Rhine to the Pyrenees and all over the Balkans.
- Lisbon still holds. So does Gibraltar. Of course it will fall eventually, and I'd love to withdraw most of the garrison. However, a KM task force is still blocking the straits. I am sorely tempted to go down there with whatever's still afloat and fight it out, but I suppose one shouldn't send one's surface fleet so close to a defended shore with such an amount of airpower in the hinterland. There are at least 5 German fighter wings in southern Spain, and I can't get a single land-based one even near, and I don't believe carrier aircraft will be a match for those Me-109's. So I suppose those valiant defenders of Gibraltar will have to fend for themselves ...
View attachment 34642
- Some Vichy troops are still alive, Lyon still holds.
- In the East I am further reinforcing the main trouble spots, i.e. the Kuban and the lower Don, where I see Axis reinforcements arriving. Can't afford to let them break through there and cut off the Caucasus entirely.
- Getting the bombers and the carrier group from the Persian Gulf closer to where the action is. They are of precious little use down there at the moment. That means British bombers in Maikop, fairly funny. Though I believe British troops happened to come at least close to the general area at the end of the previous World War.
 

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Allied Turn 140 / 1st March 1942

- Lisbon and Gibraltar are still holding, the former by a single Portuguese infantry division, less than 100 LRS with a dozen guns hanging on by their fingernails. Gibraltar's garrison remains undamaged this turn, but I'd still prefer to have them out because they're the equivalent of three infantry divisions in good shape and they will succumb eventually. With that in mind, this turn the Home Fleet, no less, tried to pry open the Straits and managed to sink the greater part of the KM task force, but they're still sitting there, and I know the Bismarck group is lurking somewhere off the coast of the peninsula. So HF is hiding on the open seas right now, hoping to finish the task later.
- German 41 Armoured Corps breaks through in the Caucasus and is about to cut off the Makhach Kala balcony from the rear. I have five corps and an HQ in there and have some hope of getting them back over the Terek. There is also a local German attack, as expected, on the extreme southern end of the mainland frontline, north of Melitopol. I have 2nd Guards Army (2,000 rifle squads) and VI Guards Tank Corps (200 tanks) as reinforcements behind that line, so the Germans are welcome to try to get through here. :)
View attachment 34806
- Bridge bombing continues; we are doing much better than them. Why didn't I think of this before? Incidentally, this turn my British bomber wings received their first Lancasters, bringing their range to 84 from 69. I can bomb Malta from Leeds now. Or Bucharest. Or indeed, if I wanted, Dnepropetrov on the lower Don front, and my Soviet infantry could watch and cheer. :laugh: Just to show I can do it, I destroyed the bridge between Tunis and Bizerte last thing this turn.
 

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Re: Allied Turn 140 / 1st March 1942

Interesting development of the battle. Looking forward to the US troops, they may turn the tide. I personally don't like bridge bombing that much. Can you really harm german supply by that? I mean: there are a lot of railroads, aren't they? And, bombing in the rear of german (occupied) territory: Aren't air losses climbing... well... sky high?
 

Heldenkaiser

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Re: Allied Turn 140 / 1st March 1942

Interesting development of the battle. Looking forward to the US troops, they may turn the tide. I personally don't like bridge bombing that much. Can you really harm german supply by that? I mean: there are a lot of railroads, aren't they? And, bombing in the rear of german (occupied) territory: Aren't air losses climbing... well... sky high?
Actually I don't know. I am probably doing it because he's doing it. Not so much to interdict supply maybe but to impede troop movements. He is moving all across the board right now and as of this turn there's not a Rhine, Meuse, or Loire bridge left from Switzerland to the sea. It must be bloody annoying. I hope! As for air losses, no, not really. Mostly I am doing the 100% success chance attacks with the long range bombers. They always get through without losses. His air defence is concentrated along the southern end of the eastern front and in the western Med. I don't get good success chances there, so I hardly bother to bomb. But a wing of Lancasters can fly to Germany and back and bring down the Rhine bridge at Cologne without any opposition.
 

ogar

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Re: Allied Turn 140 / 1st March 1942

FWIW, I think Heldenkaiser is doing it right

Mostly I am doing the 100% success chance attacks with the long range bombers.
You are, slowly, cutting down supply and transport, and every mission, your air units slowly increase in profiiciency. Eventually you'll have to attack more defended targets, but doing that with higher prof. units, and soon better fighters, will increase chances of success.

@ Cfant,
As for does it work ? Look back at how often Heldenkaiser was tearing out his hair because he could not move reinforcements or supplies to a critical area. Even though those are rear area bridges, Telumar will be diverting RR repair units to fix the damage. And means they are not repairing damage to hexes closer in to the front (see the lines above about 'eventually'.)

Plus, I think it improves Allied morale every time Heldenkaiser blows a bridge.
 

Mark Stevens

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This is the nearest we can get to simulating the Strategic Bombing Campaign which was a major feature of the later stages of War in the West. We did try with those Civ units crammed with replacements in the German industrial cities which disband over the course of the war, but bombing them is only really effective against the soft reinforcements in them: after you've killed the Rifle Squads and Artillery, attacking a mighty pool of five hundred stationary Panzer IVs and disabling three of them doesn't have much effect. On the other hand, bridge bombing can bugger strategic movement, and supply, and will force the defender to deploy fighter, flak, engineer and rail repair units to the bridges and away from the front lines in order to keep open communications, which was one effect of the SBC.
 

medck

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Re: Allied Turn 140 / 1st March 1942

- Gibraltar's garrison remains undamaged this turn, but I'd still prefer to have them out because they're the equivalent of three infantry divisions in good shape and they will succumb eventually. With that in mind, this turn the Home Fleet, no less, tried to pry open the Straits and managed to sink the greater part of the KM task force, but they're still sitting there, and I know the Bismarck group is lurking somewhere off the coast of the peninsula. So HF is hiding on the open seas right now, hoping to finish the task later.
Dug-in troops in a dense-urban mountain being attacked across a narrow front over a SuperRiver are hard to defeat. Especially since they have no where to retreat to. Are you sure you want to pull them back? You're not going to get much better defensive positions than that. I'd think that should tie down a good number of his troops for awhile trying to reduce it. As I understand it, they'll reconstitute since Gibraltar is a supply point. You might
as well make him bleed...

And if you blow the bridges on the Ebro, Guadalquivir and elsewhere in Spain, that should slow his ability to put forces opposite Gibraltar.
 
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