Over the Reich Playtest - McMonkey v. JPetroski

[McMonkey]

The new Radar stations prove their worth. The Luftwaffe is no longer flying into the unknown. The massive air armada is detected and the Luftwaffe intercepts.

8 B17, 2 B-24 and 2 Spitfires shot down around Bordeaux, Brest, St. Nazaire and Paris as well as the main formation over the Channel Islands and Brittany. No Luftwaffe losses.

 

[AGRICOLA]

Looks like:

1. The initial sparring is over and the serious business has begun.
2. John, you have developed some completely new concepts in CIV scenarios.
3. This could be very, very interesting indeed.

 

[JPetroski]

Spitfires dash across the channel to intercept the Luftwaffe! The Me110 quickly shows its inability to deal with the nimble Spitfire, and four are shot down. Though much more capable, two 190s are also destroyed.



Though the 10 bomber squadrons lost on the Sub Base raids is a steep price, Allied leaders cannot help but feel vindicated in the news that the loss of the U-Boat bases will bring in an extra $500 per turn, enabling a profit. Further, ten 8-shield-row units lost for six 80-shield-row units is a trade we will take every single day It is uncertain how long the Luftwaffe will be able to keep this up, but attrition is on our side! Now if we just need to figure out a way to inflict that attrition now that all of our targets are outside of escort range

In other news, and in light of the recent enemy RADAR activity, a painful decision is made: A brave B-26 squadron is sent deep into Belgium with no hope of return to destroy a facility near Brussels. It is hoped that the crew will be found by the Resistance before the SS!

USAAF CASUALTIES
1x sacrificed B-26

LUFTWAFFE CASUALTIES
4x Me110
2x Fw190
1x Radar Facility

@Agricola - thank you Yes, I think the initial sparring is over. We should finally start seeing more massed formations. Unfortunately, I couldn't get "random turn" to work as I wanted with killing units, so there is no need for massed formations to hang out close to targets (it checks and qualifies it once per turn, not per attack).

 

[Civinator]

These are very interesting reports.

May be there will be a way to set the radar itself to be a target, too (a target to be destroyed and a target to be tricked out).

 

[McMonkey]

Insulted by the slur on their aircraft's ability the Me110 crews based in France launch a brave, though quite possibly unnecessary, retaliatory strike against the RAF Spitfire Squadrons. Six are shot down. Was this a wise move seeing as the Spitfires don't have the range needed to escort allied Bombers deep into Germany? Possibly not. At least they won't be able to prey on my railroad network and Luftwaffe pride is restored.

 

[JPetroski]

1000 RAF bombers lift off into the night, their target: Hamburg. The city is almost completely destroyed as a reprisal for earlier Luftwaffe raids over Coventry. Air Marshall Arthur Harris beams at the success of the operation, and has immediately ordered preparation for a strike at another German city!



In other news, Spitfires race across the channel and shoot down two more 110's and one 190.

Meanwhile, the USAAF prepares for the next big push... But where, and when, will it come?

LUFTWAFFE CASUALTIES
2x Me110
1x Fw190

 

[JPetroski]

These are very interesting reports.

May be there will be a way to set the radar itself to be a target, too (a target to be destroyed and a target to be tricked out).

I don't think there is enough unit space to trick it out, unfortunately, but it can be destroyed (or at least suppressed) by frequent attacks on the installations.

 

[McMonkey]

I'm afraid I don't have time to play now. Have to drive to London to attend a funeral tomorrow. Hopefully I will be back in time to play tomorrow evening.

 

[JPetroski]

I'm sorry to hear of your loss. Don't worry about the game -- take as much time as you need! I hope all goes as well as possible.

 

[JPetroski]

I was working on the release version and realized I goofed up... This rules file will now allow your TENO brigades to actually accomplish something when trying to clean up rubble and firestorms!

 

[McMonkey]

Got back home too late to play last night. Will have a go after my dinner now

Might I suggest the TENO units get a higher movement rate. They will be a pretty rare commodity and getting them from A to B will take for ever as it is. Giving them the Alpine flag makes sense as it prevents them blocking the Raw Materials and other Locos on the RR network.

 

[JPetroski]

Got back home too late to play last night. Will have a go after my dinner now

Might I suggest the TENO units get a higher movement rate. They will be a pretty rare commodity and getting them from A to B will take for ever as it is. Giving them the Alpine flag makes sense as it prevents them blocking the Raw Materials and other Locos on the RR network.

They don't have alpine in our version? They are supposed to (and do in the "final").

I agree that they're very short-legged. Perhaps doubling the base movement to 4 would work better?

 

[McMonkey]

The TENO Brigades do have the Alpine flag in the current version. What I was getting at was that they should retain that even if the movement is increased as it is best for them to travel cross country rather than on the RR.

 

[McMonkey]

Hamburg is a right old mess! Would it be possible to scale down the destruction in the final version but have multiple RAF raids on cities. Its a bit demoralizing as I have no defence against these attacks in this version, but I guess that's how the Germans felt back then so I guess it is accurate to flatten the place!

The Luftwaffe is trying to learn the lessons of the past few months and adapt its tactics to cope with the Allied mass Bomber waves. I suspect I will not have long to wait to see if they work.

Might I suggest you include a terrain type to pinpoint target squares on the high altitude map. It is fine on the Army map as you can swap between the maps to locate targets, but on the Luftwaffe turn they are much more difficult to pinpoint (using co-ordinates)!
*I think you mentioned this in a previous post but at the time I didn't really get what you meant!

EDIT: Just realised I forgot to add the new rules text. Done now.

 

[JPetroski]

The USAAF decides to recuperate and plot its next move.

-------------

- As for Hamburg, well, I can attack it "every other tech" with the flag setup I'm using. In tests I ran where I didn't bother repairing the cities at all, they tended to lose approximately half their population over time. If you invest in TeNo brigades it should be possible to reduce the impact. It's also something that will only happen perhaps 10-15 times per scenario, so the destruction won't be outrageous.

- I have a few spare techs, so I might try and hex edit (kind of having fun learning how to do this) the @LEADERS2 to allow a few techs to the Luftwaffe to retaliate against British cities, but of course this would come at the expense of your production runs. It would be a choice: Do I want the extra units, or do I want to slow down Bomber Command? I'd have to figure out a way to make this a more painful decision than a 2-turn tech turnaround, though... I'm not sure I'll end up doing this.

- It wouldn't be a problem to add a special terrain to the high alt map, though I was planning on just having Luftwaffe units "realize" where the units are in the finished version. I've been working on each tribe's map lately, as I do like a bit of Fog of War in my scenarios.

 

[McMonkey]

No news

 

[JPetroski]

No news... Edit- force of habit!

Yes, there is news, but it is minor:

B-26 raids across the Channel. Two locomotives carrying raw materials destroyed, as is one German Army unit. One B-26 is lost.

 

[McMonkey]

Three huge USAAF Bomber formations intercepted north of Holland. Having been expecting a raid on wither the Hamburg/Bremen or Ruhr areas Luftwaffe Fighter strength is fairly concentrated. The southern formation is almost totally annihilated while the other two are severely depleted. Next on the menu: Heavy Flak!

SCORES:

18 x B17, 3 x B24 for 1 X Me109G

 

[JPetroski]

Arrival of Escorts



With the arrival of the P-38 lightning en masse, the USAAF finally has a fighter capable of escorting bombers to just inside the German border and back. If the Luftwaffe wishes to defend the industrial heart of the Ruhr, they will have to do so at the risk of their fighters!

The losses among the bomber squadrons were tragic, but they did prompt a massive response from the Luftwaffe, which was in due course greeted by a massive wave of P-38 lightnings. We wholeheartedly encourage the Luftwaffe to stay and fight

LUFTWAFFE CASUALTIES
6x Fw190A
2x Me109G

USAAF CASUALTIES
2x P-38

(During this raid, Germany seems to have so far lost 9 fighters for 23 allied aircraft. 2.55 to 1... We will have to see who breaks from this pace first, but I'm afraid if I don't go after your industry soon, it will be me! At any rate, it will be about four turns before I have much of a bomber force left, leading me to think the release version would be better served with a slightly reduced cost).

I had to use cheat mode. There was a major mistake in the events whereby Hamburg would continuously be attacked every single turn instead of just the once or twice it takes for the flag to be checked and tech removed. I had to manually take the tech from the British. If you had units cleaning Hamburg, please feel free to recreate them via cheat mode, because they would have been erroneously wiped by events.

 

[McMonkey]

John. I you have to make use of 'Cheat Mode' remember to add back in the other players afterwards (Control + J). I just loaded your save, hit return and the game played as the AI before going back to the USAAF where I got an unexpected eyeful of your Bomber raids location. Remember, carelessness costs lives!

Playing turn now.