Hi everybody, and thanks to Rocoteh for this scenario.
I am half way(end of 41) through the scenario, and doing quite well als Germany. A few things that I have observed during my game.
The US constantly attacks Hiroshima, takes it for a few rounds, then loses it again to the Japanese. Japanese are doing quite well, constantly battling in China and on the various islands, mainly with the CW and whats left of NEI. So Pacific AI seems quite OK, besides the Hiroshima thing (landing on the Japanese Islands should be much harder). Besides in the Pacific, the US is no threat, well at least not for the Axis(I must add here, that I have reached Sea superiority with the KM very early (about mid 1940) . They are sending to few warships to Europe and transports alone are sunk very easily.
At some point(early in 1940), when I was ending my French campaign, the Soviets declared war on Japan, forcing me to go after them aswell. Until they started producing T34/76 they were no match, even to my very few Panzer IIIe and IIs, and my Infantry simply outclassed them. After that, the story got a little more difficult, but maybe not difficult enough (one might consider to give even the early T34 more edge). Kiew, Sewastopol and Odessa were very hard to conquer, and I am not talking about Stalingrad(Occupied in late 1941) or Moskwa. Without the HQs and heavy artillery, I wouldn't have come far in my wild Barbarossa. Its a little like in my last WiF Game, ...
The UK is a tough nut to crack, and I hesitated a long time to start Sea Lion. I bombed London and all southern UK cities for nearly a year and waited for Graf Zeppelin to be unleashed, until I dared to land and take London. The conquest of the Isles is still not complete in the end 1941(Scotland and Ireland are still controlled by the CW). Reaching air superiority over the UK was very tough and it cost me dearly. Same is true for reaching Sea superiority in the North Sea and North Atlantic.
Spain and later Gibraltar were taken out easily, North Africa took a while, but is finally secured including Egypt and Suez. But Italy is more then weak, and a bad partner. It actually didn't partake in any campaign, and was utterly useless(a sitting duck). Romania, Bulgaria and Hungaria were doing little but being anoyingly in the way. Worst thing happened, when Bulgaria took Zagreb just after I had it cleared for my own troops. Now I always have to pass a corridor on my way down to Athens. The Fins are good partners and doing well on all fronts. Argentina is friendly but not willing to join in the war (here the diplomatic possibility to drag Argentina and or another power e.g. Spain, Turkey or Brazil into the war is really missing).
Some suggestions if you don't mind:
- Slightly strenghten the T34/76, to be tougher then the Panzer III types at last.
- Change Grosny to Tiflis.
- Add some plane variants e.g. Stuka 87D and 87R.
- Make more Tanks/Planes/Ships available for the partners of either the Axis and Allies, by using the Germany and Britain, maybe also an US and Japan resource. That way some techtransfer and landlease is possible. I got mainly CW and US planes in Mind to be used by the Soviets at some point in the war. Such trade conditions might even reduce the war possibiltis between the Soviet and the other Allies. Of course, we shouldn't see Tiger tanks being used by Siam or Argentina, but to the various possible allies of one side there could be different levels of techtransfer. I could imagine seeing Finnish Panzer V Divisions, or Italian 88 Brigades etc. Some minor countries could even benefit of both sides of the War, ...
- Whats it about the Flamethrower unit? Its a little bit to weak on both sides (attack and defense) to be of real use.
- Same goes for the german artillery unit. Its nothing special, just a weaker/cheaper artillery. what about giving it the ability to be towed up on mountains, so it can be used as a Mountain artillery unit.
- I was thinking about the HQ units, and thought about giving them the ability to work as armies/corps, though with the ability to exchange the Divisions within. Every Power should have some of them prebuild, the others could be either very expensive to build, or be build by wonders. e.g. Mannerheim (Finnish HQ) could make up a corps with 3 Ski-Divisions, which could later be replaced partly or entirely by Mechanized Infantry and/or Tanks. Some Soviet Armies could contain up to 4 Divisions -> Zhukov HQ.
- Mountaineers?
- Ski-Divisions?
- Engineers? Could be a small HP(1-2) addition for Divisions (load one Divison) to easier attack/break a Fortress.
- Where is the Persian Oil? The Austrian/Hungarian Oilfields?
- No coal mines in the Ukraine?
