PBEM - HOF 'Blitz'

[TechGuy]

Back at home.

Japan Turn Summary:

- redlined Russian armies outside Minsk
- bombed roads near Moskow
- sunk 2 CW ASW DD near Singapore with planes
- lost 1 sub to USN DD near Singapore
- bombed US paratroopers near Manila with planes
- killed remaining CW tank near Delhi with NI army
- airfields near Delhi captured with NI army. 2 planes destroyed on the ground. 1 worker captured.
- sunk 1 USN DD near Tokyo with sub

 

[Cloner4000]

Tiger bombed

Konigberg defender redline

T-34 lost attacking Konisberg defenders.

fortress div bombed in a airfield near German Border

 

[semental]

Killed T-34 div near Rostov after bombing it.

Shot down fighter at Riga, air and naval bomb troops and Riga.

 

[Luthor_Saxburg]

EUROPE
Air raids over occupied France\Germany continues.
Navy shelled German Infantry North of Oslo.
DD sinks U-boat E of Oslo.
Italian grapes are destroyed by the Australian Navy that is sponsoring the Australian wine.


ASIA
Air Bombardement of Ragoon destroys it's Temple.
The suburbs of Saigon is bombed, with Jap units being injure units and roads destroyed.
Singapore was bombed by the Royal Navy.


.

 

[botman]

GPS

NEWSFLASH: TOYKO CAPTURED!

In what the US hopes marks a new phase of the war, US Marines last night stormed the beaches of Tokyo and captured the city.

The only significant resistance came from a defending infantry corp, which despite heavy naval bombardment, killed an attacking Marine corp before being finished off by a Marine division. The remaining defenders, mostly flak, were all redlined by naval bombardment and killed by Marine divisions.

The American army has landed a significant number of troops outside Osaka. An I-Boat was sunk there by an ASW DD, and a road shelled.

Elsewhere...

- Manilla was captured. Two paratrooper units were reduced from 2/4 to 1/4 in the attack.

- America used its new long range bombers to hit Aluminium and Coal supplies near Budapest.

- Marseille (Edit: I'd written Manilla again) was hit by a heavy bomber, damaging a defender.

- Rome was heavily bombed, killing five citizens and destroying the city's barrack. Several defenders were also damaged.

 

[TechGuy]

With the fall of Tokyo, the Japanese surrender.

Strategically speaking, I predicted this day will come inevitibly. The home islands will fall to the Americans as they transport huge numbers of paratroopers over then bomb mainland Asia into submission. I do not want to drag this game on.

British and American production capacity has excceded both the Germans and I. I think that's it on my side.

 

[eric_A]

So Japan surenders in early '43??? Looks like the time scale is
messed up. I think in HOF V2 I will go with monthly turns, That
would put the Japanese surrender in Oct, '44. Not an unreasonable
date, if the USA had concentrated on Japan.

Of course the change will involve increased naval movement, more
coast tiles, lower production & research costs, faster worker rates,
etc....

 

[semental]

Here I thought Japan was killing everyone. Germany was done for sometime ago without Japan's help.

 

[eric_A]

Can someone post some screen shots from the final turn? I'd like
to see who owned what at the end.

 

[Luthor_Saxburg]

I don't think that the surrender is early in comparison to real life. This would be compared to the Japanese surrendering after the Midway battle.

The Japanese still had a strong force and would put a heck of a fight that would drag on for a long time. Instead of fighting to the last man (as almost did in real life) the Japanese looked at the overall picture and decided they couldn't win - despite being ahead in VP's - so they decided to surrender.

Here is a summary of forces in the end of March of 1943:

JAPAN
Armies: 11
Planes: 50
Navy: 14

USA
Armies: 1
Planes: 54
Navy: 61

CW
Armies: 5
Planes: 27
Navy: 83

VICTORY POINTS
Allies: 121K
Axis: 130K

.

 

[Luthor_Saxburg]

First of all I would like to congratulate TechGuy for his brilliant campaign and his never cessing (bad) suprises!

The conquest of Pearl Harbour, Karachi, Perth, Wellington, Omsk and even of Delhi shows your boldness and ability to continuously suprise the enemies.
And the almost conquest of Panama was a risky move that could have been a major blow.

Botman, congratulations to your ability to adapt and some of your bold moves that suprised the Japanese and turnaround the war in the Pacific. The battle of Panama and the re-conquest of Pearl Harbour were certainly highlights for the Allies. Tokyo was just a detail really compared to those two great victories.

.

 

[botman]

Oh wow. I flew back to NZ from Aus today (work in the morning), so I missed this.

I'll post more in the morning, but I've attached a screenshot for Eric. This is from the last turn.

Thank you very much, everyone, for the game. I think you played the best, TechGuy, and Japan's downfall had more to do with the American economy simply being larger.

You had a massive number of armies rampaging all over the place, incredible stuff.

I really feared your air force as well. The two carriers that escorted my invasion fleet had nothing but fighters on defense. As soon as I captured Tokyo I sent in more fighters I'd been storing on the nearby islands as well. I was expecting a ravaging.

OK, gotta grab some sleep.

Cheers.

 

[Cloner4000]

Russian....cough....cough....
I had 2 Armies, actually all you see on the Germany front is about all I have now. I have about 5 T-34 Div in reserve but that's it.

No Airfoce except some 8 bombers....

Russia is really in for it!! Lost whole Siberia and onward...with all major city bombed to ashes...

I think Japan probably sent his forces all toward the west, without really reinforcing the east, thus Japan have no force to counter the USA invasion

The Germany really attack me hard in the beginning...and surprises me when he keep reinforcing the southern Flank...I lost so many Inf. there. In the end I just build mass Tank Div and throw it at the Germany Army!!! My actually defense all along the border are extremely weak!!! Any moderate size army could have broke the line!!!

The Russian front is bascially a slugmatch, we keep hitting each other until both the Allied and Japan bombed our production centers and destroy our abilibty to build anything....sob

 

[semental]

Good game everyone!

 

[TechGuy]

Good game guys. The premise behind helping Germany was that, if Germany fell, it's over for Japan. I can't match the Allied production power without Germany's help. Attacking Russia was Japan's last ditch effort in keeping the Allies' attention divided but I guess it was not to be. Even with a 50 plane airforce, naval movement would have kept the allied invasion forces outside of range and I cannot counterattack with my huge airforce. I thought they were better served if my planes attacked the Russians instead.

With the loss of the IJN at both Panama and Pearl Harbour, I knew it was a race against time... the Germans were getting hammered into little pieces and soon turning into a non-threat.

But nonetheless, bravo to the allies... I knew the invasion of the home islands were going to happen sooner or later... and I was hoping for later.

 

[botman]

Just a couple more things from me:

Eric, I think the paratrooper unit could be removed from the game as they feel too powerful (or just remove their ability to be airlifted so they can only parachute, in which case I'd give them the 6.4 stats of a marine, instead of 4.6, and make them airborne infantry). I didn't need to use marines to island-hop at all (though it was the CW who secured a town to start with, and then handed it to the US). I just flooded in paratroopers via airlifting, which TechGuy hinted at earlier. I like one of the features of the WW2 scenario we're using here http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=187227, which has glider/air-transport units that you can load with almost any type of infantry and then parachute them all in one go (I don't know if you can load a plane and then airlift it, but if you can, I don't like that idea).

The other thing. TechGuy and semental, did you have a spies in the allies? I have to admit that about half of all the gold USA earned went on Investigate City missions. I found it incredibly useful in locating places worth attacking, and of course for knowing when Japan had oil. To a lesser extent I used it against the Germans to spy on Rostov, etc (not that that helped much). But also incredibly useful is it lets you see what units your opponents have (though not where they are). Knowing the state of Japan's navy gave me the confidence to mount a direct invasion of Japan rather than island hopping (which I saw when Sully tried to do against you, TechGuy, in the previous version of TOS, was too slow to have an effect against your rampage across Australia).

Thanks again all of you. I must admit I'm quite keen to try Japan soon, seeing as I keep fighting against it. I have my ideas...

 

[eric_A]

Just a couple more things from me:

Eric, I think the paratrooper unit could be removed from the game as they feel too powerful (or just remove their ability to be airlifted so they can only parachute, in which case I'd give them the 6.4 stats of a marine, instead of 4.6, and make them airborne infantry). I didn't need to use marines to island-hop at all (though it was the CW who secured a town to start with, and then handed it to the US). I just flooded in paratroopers via airlifting, which TechGuy hinted at earlier. I like one of the features of the WW2 scenario we're using here http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=187227, which has glider/air-transport units that you can load with almost any type of infantry and then parachute them all in one go (I don't know if you can load a plane and then airlift it, but if you can, I don't like that idea).

I am considering removing the airlift capability in V2. In the MP games I have
played we use a house rule which says that cities cannot be traded except back
to the original owner. That would have changed the course of this
game quite a lot I suspect.

Thanks to all who have sent me save files or posted screen shots.

 

[semental]

I do not see the city trading as a problem as this version does not allow another method of collaborating resources well. As it was, the game would have ended sooner without it. Although alot of that was my poor play.

 

[Luthor_Saxburg]

Cities are relevant bases. And in CivIII allied units can not enter your cities, so giving cities is a way to allow more interaction between allies (with a cost because you lose culture buildings).

If the Japanese wanted to help in the European front, giving a city to Japan is (I think) the only practical way it can occur. Why limit this possibility once Japan decides it's in his best interest to to so?

If the airwar of CW against Germany was going badly, why couldn't CW give to USA a city in Britain to allow a base for Americans to help in the European front?

Supposse there was a combined CW-USA on Tokyo and Osaka and that USA got both cities. Why couldn't it give one to CW for both of them to have bases in the islands?

.

 

[TechGuy]

I had spies in the CW to keep watch for that Normandy invasion that never came. It also helped me scout out India and to figure what forces I need to bring down the defenses there.