WW2-Global

[Emerentius]

Germany/sid/1941 week 44
researching air 2 / 1940, 8 turns left.
70% research / 30% / money down 24 / turn
Hi, just to tell you how my last game is going.
My plans are to try not to attack the SU soon but to take Africa and Asia first.
After taking Europe, I gave Yugo to the Italiens to boost their economy. They retook La Coruna from the British when I attacked Spain.
I gave Norway to Finland but kept Sweden to station a strong army there cause the SU with a massive amfib. landing captured Lulea.
I send my armies to Africa from the south coast of Spain and my troops are now around the Great Lakes and fighting in central Africa.
Another army went east and after conquering British Egypt moved to the Middle East.
Then I moved a fresh army to attack Turkey and now my soldiers are in control of Karachi and are fighting near Lahore. The last Persian city Kabul is about to fall next turn.
The Japonese have Manila, Hanoi, Honkong and except for Urumtsi / Tiau Shou and Chendy / Khotan the Chinese are out of the game.
I still have no war with the SU, sometimes they asked for horses, wich I gave to them. I will attack them somewhere in 1942 from the south and the west...
Britain still holds malta / Nicosia.

Something I noticed is that the ai is hardly using workers. In enemy terrain I find a lot of polluted tiles wich hampers their economy.

My latest army count is:
52 workers building roads int Africa and the Middle East.
29 Pz111H, 104 Pz111G, 80 Pz111E, 264 inf, 101 mot. inf, 77 Me 109 F, 15 G-88, 26 Army Corps

Btw, did I tell you I'm really enjoing it?

 

[Rocoteh]

Emerentius,

Thank you for the report.

"Germany/sid/1941 week 44
researching air 2 / 1940, 8 turns left.
70% research / 30% / money down 24 / turn
Hi, just to tell you how my last game is going.
My plans are to try not to attack the SU soon but to take Africa and Asia first.
After taking Europe, I gave Yugo to the Italiens to boost their economy. They retook La Coruna from the British when I attacked Spain.
I gave Norway to Finland but kept Sweden to station a strong army there cause the SU with a massive amfib. landing captured Lulea."
Emerentius

It will be interesting to see how long you can avoid war with Soviet.

"I send my armies to Africa from the south coast of Spain and my troops are now around the Great Lakes and fighting in central Africa.
Another army went east and after conquering British Egypt moved to the Middle East.
Then I moved a fresh army to attack Turkey and now my soldiers are in control of Karachi and are fighting near Lahore. The last Persian city Kabul is about to fall next turn.
The Japonese have Manila, Hanoi, Honkong and except for Urumtsi / Tiau Shou and Chendy / Khotan the Chinese are out of the game.
I still have no war with the SU, sometimes they asked for horses, wich I gave to them. I will attack them somewhere in 1942 from the south and the west...
Britain still holds malta / Nicosia."
Emerentius

Really looking forward to hear how this strategy will turn out.

"Something I noticed is that the ai is hardly using workers. In enemy terrain I find a lot of polluted tiles wich hampers their economy."
Emerentius

I will look over this problem

"My latest army count is:
52 workers building roads int Africa and the Middle East.
29 Pz111H, 104 Pz111G, 80 Pz111E, 264 inf, 101 mot. inf, 77 Me 109 F, 15 G-88, 26 Army Corps"
Emerentius

A very strong force at this point in the scenario.

"Btw, did I tell you I'm really enjoing it?"
Emerentius

I am glad to hear that.

Thank you and welcome back.

Rocoteh

 

[leonidas 1982]

finland demigod week 5 1942

Finally got round to my game as the finns. For over a year I built up industry and armed forces attacked sweden in early 41 and captured all their cities after a war lasting about 20 weeks. As soon as my forces were repositioned I attacked the soviets drawing my allies into the war with me. I fought A quick war, only lasted 7 weeks before I sued for peace when a massive soviet stack showed up on my territory in this time however I was able to capture kem and murmansk. My allies made no gains or losses

Standard tank and finnish infantry as my basic units is quite interesting. I find myself building very few tanks and lots of infantry as the tanks defence is so poor and infantry is so much cheaper. It forces me to use a more historically accurate ratio of infantry to armour divisions.

I then fought a war against the norwegians taking oslo and their far northern city. I had to end this war before I planned to due to a japanese attack on russia in late 41 (about week 40). The japanese made no ground however the germans quickly made gains taking vilnius liepjala minsk brestlitovsk and gomel. When I eventually transferred my forces from the west I was able to capture archangel sosnovka and kotlas After the initial german advance I expected the soviets to collapse especially with me punishing them as well. However they fought back retaking every city the germans had captured apart from vilnius.

I was on the point of capturing jaroslavl when the japanese made peace (no movement at all on their front). I considered attacking again immediately but have decided to give the germans some time to rebuild as there is no way I can handle the soviets if they collapse. I have rarely seen a turnaround in fortunes like this in civ without another nation being involved It seems very positive that the russians can lose a reasonable amount of territory and still fight back.

My empire is finally big enough to research tech faster than every 40 turns ( im currently on light land 40. I cant wait to get land 1942 and a decent tank division however this is still a way off.

I am alittle confused what to do next, Will probably finish of the norwegians but soviets will have to be confronted again preferably before they have chance to build their really powerful tanks. kv1 seems to be their best at the moment. Unfortunately towards the end of the last war it really looked like germany was on its last legs. I think I will have to just go for it as soon as the norwegians are finished

 

[somdnole]

Rocoteh -
I haven't been able to devote a lot of time to my game over the past week or so, but here's an update, playing as Japan, in version 2.4 -
Week 47, 1943 -
since my last report:
I captured Madurai and Colombo, thus clearing the Brits out of India altogether
captured Honolulu
began my assault on Australia, and have taken Darwin, Broome, and Carnavan
in last week's war with the Soviets, I captured Tjita, Komsomolsk, and Kumara
- no Axis cities have been lost to the Soviets, but the Soviets also did not lose any further ground in the latest Axis-Soviet war, other than the three cities I captured (What ARE the Germans doing?)
- in answer to my own question, Germany lost Corsica to the Americans
- Italy lost Naples to the Americans; Germany took it from America; America re-took it, and the Germans currently control it again
- the British re-captured Zaragoza, only to lose it again to Germany

In another head-scratching development, I currently have small bands of Yugoslav, Norway-Denmark, and Greek infantry roaming around in Mongolia (near Ulan Bator); also 4 Spanish light tanks have showed up. I'm a little bit leary of going to war with any of these countries, as I suspect that the Italians might capture some territoty, only to lose it in a counterattack to either England or America, and I don't want to give the Americans any more airbases for their heavy bombers!

My next steps are to continue to prep for the next round of hostilities with the Soviets (coming soon, as they've begun to violate my territory with small stacks of infantry) and to continue my attacks in Australia. Rather than continue with amphibious assaults there, I think my next step will be an overland attack against Alice Springs. My concern there, though, is being caught in the open by a stack of Matilda's and/or ANZAC infantry...

I'll report again in a week or so...

 

[Rocoteh]

leonidas 1982,

Thank you for the report.

"finland demigod week 5 1942

Finally got round to my game as the finns. For over a year I built up industry and armed forces attacked sweden in early 41 and captured all their cities after a war lasting about 20 weeks. As soon as my forces were repositioned I attacked the soviets drawing my allies into the war with me. I fought A quick war, only lasted 7 weeks before I sued for peace when a massive soviet stack showed up on my territory in this time however I was able to capture kem and murmansk. My allies made no gains or losses"
leonidas 1982

Playing as Finland at demigod level must be a real challenge!

"Standard tank and finnish infantry as my basic units is quite interesting. I find myself building very few tanks and lots of infantry as the tanks defence is so poor and infantry is so much cheaper. It forces me to use a more historically accurate ratio of infantry to armour divisions."
leonidas 1982

That is positive.

"I then fought a war against the norwegians taking oslo and their far northern city. I had to end this war before I planned to due to a japanese attack on russia in late 41 (about week 40). The japanese made no ground however the germans quickly made gains taking vilnius liepjala minsk brestlitovsk and gomel. When I eventually transferred my forces from the west I was able to capture archangel sosnovka and kotlas After the initial german advance I expected the soviets to collapse especially with me punishing them as well. However they fought back retaking every city the germans had captured apart from vilnius."
leonidas 1982

Its still unclear how well Germany-AI will play in version 2.5.

"I was on the point of capturing jaroslavl when the japanese made peace (no movement at all on their front). I considered attacking again immediately but have decided to give the germans some time to rebuild as there is no way I can handle the soviets if they collapse. I have rarely seen a turnaround in fortunes like this in civ without another nation being involved It seems very positive that the russians can lose a reasonable amount of territory and still fight back."
leonidas 1982

Agree. Germany will probably not gain more ground in the east.

"My empire is finally big enough to research tech faster than every 40 turns ( im currently on light land 40. I cant wait to get land 1942 and a decent tank division however this is still a way off.

I am alittle confused what to do next, Will probably finish of the norwegians but soviets will have to be confronted again preferably before they have chance to build their really powerful tanks. kv1 seems to be their best at the moment. Unfortunately towards the end of the last war it really looked like germany was on its last legs. I think I will have to just go for it as soon as the norwegians are finished"
leonidas 1982

An interesting playtest. Looking forward to hear how it turns out.

Thank you and welcome back.

Rocoteh

 

[Rocoteh]

somdnole,

Thank you for the report.

"Rocoteh -
I haven't been able to devote a lot of time to my game over the past week or so, but here's an update, playing as Japan, in version 2.4 -
Week 47, 1943 -
since my last report:
I captured Madurai and Colombo, thus clearing the Brits out of India altogether
captured Honolulu
began my assault on Australia, and have taken Darwin, Broome, and Carnavan
in last week's war with the Soviets, I captured Tjita, Komsomolsk, and Kumara
- no Axis cities have been lost to the Soviets, but the Soviets also did not lose any further ground in the latest Axis-Soviet war, other than the three cities I captured (What ARE the Germans doing?)"
somdnole

It seems like Germany-AI plays better in most playtests with version 2.5
so far.

"- in answer to my own question, Germany lost Corsica to the Americans
- Italy lost Naples to the Americans; Germany took it from America; America re-took it, and the Germans currently control it again
- the British re-captured Zaragoza, only to lose it again to Germany"
somdnole

I have never read a playtest-report where US-AI manage to
make a large-scale invasion in Europe.
It seems like AI is not smart enough to conduct huge amphibious operations.

"In another head-scratching development, I currently have small bands of Yugoslav, Norway-Denmark, and Greek infantry roaming around in Mongolia (near Ulan Bator); also 4 Spanish light tanks have showed up. I'm a little bit leary of going to war with any of these countries, as I suspect that the Italians might capture some territoty, only to lose it in a counterattack to either England or America, and I don't want to give the Americans any more airbases for their heavy bombers!"
somdnole

AI-strategy for small Civs sometimes give very strange results!

"My next steps are to continue to prep for the next round of hostilities with the Soviets (coming soon, as they've begun to violate my territory with small stacks of infantry) and to continue my attacks in Australia. Rather than continue with amphibious assaults there, I think my next step will be an overland attack against Alice Springs. My concern there, though, is being caught in the open by a stack of Matilda's and/or ANZAC infantry...

I'll report again in a week or so..."
somdnole

Looking forward to read your next report.
Thank you and welcome back.

Rocoteh

 

[somdnole]

Rocoteh -
Another relatively sparse week, turn-wise, in my 2.4 game as Japan.
Week 8, 1944
since the last update, the Axis have been at war continuously with the Soviets. I captured Kisil Robat, Chagda, and Taluma from the Soviets. The Sov's seem pretty upset about Taluma - they have counterattacked 3 or 4 times already.
In Australia, I captured Alice Springs and Normanton. I have to say, the British are not putting up much of a fight in Australia - the logistics of shuttling troops to Australia is as much of a challenge as the British defense. Maybe this will change once I move against some of the larger production/population centers.
The Americans have counterattacked Honolulu twice, with Iowa-class battleships escorting one convoy, loaded with 2 Marines, each time. And they've started sending the heavy bombers after Honolulu - three turns now, they've bombarded me.

In Europe, things have taken a definite turn for the worse for my Axis partners. Budapest and Iasi have been captured by the Soviets, and Germany has lost Lutsk, Graz, and Pressburg to the Soviets, and have captured nothing else.

I'm thinking I need to step up my efforts to secure Australia, so that I can move on to the task of trying to capture the US cities I need to secure a Japanese victory - I think the Germans are on the down-swing, and I can't stand up to the Soviet Union without a strong Germany!

Here's a question: for Japanese victory purposes, is Hobart part of Australia?

I'll be away for about a week, so I'll post more in about 2 weeks.

 

[Michael II]

Hello Rocoteh
After the first year has passed I decided to give a report

Germany / Monarch / normal aggression / Version 2.5.

week 36, 1940

Poland and Denmark were defeated at turn one, thanks to the Luftwaffe. After that I went for the western front and used my special transport to take Malmö, Göteborg and Oslo (the Swedish blocked my transport, so they had to be crushed ). While rushing through the Ardennes I expanded in Norway and Sweden. My "Allies" at the Balcan took Yugoslavia. About end of the year continental France, Norway and Sweden had fallen. I decided to stop until all French resistors were calm.
About the same time the first U.S. transports and carriers arrived near Bordeaux. I brought all bombers to France to defend against them and to attack South England. After some battles with the Home Fleet I managed to take control of the channel. The invasion of Britain started out fine, but the RAF slowed me down quite well. I managed to take over the British Isles.

At the same time my paratroopers landed near Tunis and conquered the city what gave me the chance to defeat the French and British Fleets in the Mediterranean Sea (I love my Ju 88). Actually I'm trying to stronger my position in Northern Africa, to expand to Egypt, cause I want control over Suez.

It's great fun to play the scenario and I find it hard to stop playing. I should have chosen a higher diff lvl but first I wanted to learn the scenario.

I built some railroad construction units although they are expensive and ineffective, but I like it to see a transeuropean railroad being slowly built.

Some interesting things on A.I. behaviour:

-Italy lost all of Lybia except Benghazi to the French and the British
-Japan conquered the coastal cities of China and most of Communist China.They also conquered Guam and Manila from the U.S. and destroyed the Dutch city of Balikpapan and conquered Fakfak
-Britain conquered Manila and Fakfak from the Japanese
-Spain declared war on the British and lost their whole fleet which caused them to make peace again
-Brazil declared war on Argentina and Peru
-The U.S. ordered their Pacific Fleet to Panama, from where they are heading towards Gibraltar. Only their carriers with escorting ships and some transports remained in the pacific. They also brought about 30 tanks and Inf to the northernmost part of Canada. It seems the A.I. still has some problems with the oceans between their homeland and the enemy.

About forests: Why do you make worker actions on forests take so long?

One questions on carriers. I opened the editor several times to look which units have lethal land bombardment, extra hit points and so on. I also looked which planes could be loaded on carriers, but the problem is, I can't load my Heinkel-111 on carriers but they can land on a carrier. The Do-17 can neighter of it. Can you tell me where i see if a plane can land on carriers?

Wow, probably the longest english text I've written since school. Took me some time

Thanks again for your great work and I hope you still enjoy working on civ3.

edit:One more thing: I wondered why the only victory points are all in southeast Asia?

 

[The Loser]

Hello Rocoteh

edit:One more thing: I wondered why the only victory points are all in southeast Asia?

I think it is to see a more active AI in the east.
To try to motivate the AI into island-hopping.

 

[leonidas 1982]

Yes playing as finland on demigod is challenging!
Although I think less so than my italy game in last version

It is now week 16 1942 my deliberations about when to attack the soviets again were rendered pointless as they attacked me at the end of week 6. Really odd coudnt be sub bug as I have no subs, their attack began with an invisible unit attacking archangelsk from the sea.

Anyway whatever the reason I immediately sent 10 infantry divisions 20 artillery and 2 tank divisions against petjora. I have since come to rue this diversionary campaign it has been succesful seiazing pejora and vorkutta and now threatening novvy port. However although the force is small it amounts to 20 percent of my artillery and tanks and 10 percent of my infantry which could probably be better spent at the wars main fronts.

There are two main Fronts a defensive one between leningrad and kem and an offensive one in the moscow region. The soviets have sent a large force around 70 divisions all told against kem however the tearrain it hilly and wooded and I have built many fortresses. So far I am able to hold them and punish them with a smaller force which maintains a position in the hills only attacking when artillery bombardment redlines soviet forces.

The offensive campaign has captured tver and jaroslavl and is at the gates of moscow. However I dont beleive I have the force to capture it as I beleive it has a fortress defence and my supply lines are stretched and most new build is going to the defensive war around kem. This is a galling situation as I am so close to breaking into the soviet heartland and ripping the heart out of their production. I also cant move on gorki as the soviets would then counterattck jaroslavl and cut off my armies. I simply cant leave moscow in my rear. This is why I wished I had not begun my diversionary northern campaign those extra divisions could be extremely useful now.

Japan continues to hold her front although no advances have been made. Germany was holding out well but recently has lost warsaw and radom. I think perhaps some of the soviet preplaced fortresses should be removed as I am sure this is what blunts the initial german advance. After which they never seem to recover. Perhaps also place a few fortreses in german border cities so the soviets counterattack is also slowed. At the moment the soviets wont make peace but Im not sure If I should take it if they offer it. My forces could do with regrouping and bringing everything together for a moscow assault but if I give the soviets time I can only see the balance of forces moving further in their favour. I really dread some of their later tanks.

The western allies are still pretty much an irrelevance for finland as I have never completed the conquest of norway. I have some divisions trapped in northern now german denmark which are regularly bombed but apart from that they do not bother me. I am still waiting for my 1942 tank division, currently about to finish light land 1940. I really cant wait!

 

[leonidas 1982]

Here should be some screenshots of my fronts

 

[The Loser]

Wow, nice game you've ghot going there, Leonidas!

Looking forward to hear how it goes next.

But i find playing as Italy better then Finland. I think the Finnish game is the most challeging.

 

[Sasebo]

Agreed. Leonidas that is most impressive! I notice you are going broke though; you are cutting things mighty thin on that research front. For a second I couldn't figure out what was the problem...

Sorry about that "lost" Japan report Rocoteh, but I got sidetracked into other things. I have the attention span of a butterfly sometimes. I have been puttering around with a couple weird variants using your 2.5 biq. just for giggles,though. I am not sure if I ever fixed this before, but I tracked down that G-50 Frecchia bug, that causes the game to crash when you right click on it and try to see the civilopedia entry for it. If you go into the Text folder, and then into the PediaIcons text file, there is an extra symbol( an 'I' I think) between the director command for the "G-50Freccia" and "Large" in the command to open the large pcx. file in the Art/Civilopedia/units folder. It was confusing the hell out of me because it kept saying the file causing the crash was in the Art/Civilopdia/etc. file; I didn't notice the typo in the error message right away. Still took me a while to find it after that, I really have not played with the text entries before, I didn't know where to look. But I found it. It works fine once you delete that symbol...so easy.

Does anyone else get as annoyed as I do when my fighters on air superiority missions just sit there on the ground while wave after wave of bombers flies overhead unchallenged? I know it is part of the system, but I wish they would increase the intercept rate based on the distance of the attempt. Have you ever considered giving fighters some AA ability to simulate their ability to scramble when their own base gets attacked? Is that even possible? If Hollywood has taught me anything, fighters ALWAYS have a chance to get into the air when being bombed!!! You probably would not shoot down many that way, but just knowing it COULD happen would make me feel loads better about the whole situation. I'm talking about a factor of '1', just for dedicated fighters, for example.

Playing with the scenario biq. makes me realize what a huge amount of effort went into this scenario. Once again, great work Rocoteh, this scenario is like Escape from Zombie Island 2, it just keeps on giving!

 

[The Loser]

Okey, i skipped two years till 1944.

What happened?

Offence Offence Offence!!!

We had southern Europe, Turkey and our North-African holdings.

We gained the middle east, North India, North Africa, the Nile region, our lost East-African holdings..
and are pushing further in India and South Africa.

I can say that the Italian dream has come true. We have restored the Roman Empire: Maré Nostrum!

Germans have been active and have taken Persia, and some Indian citys. They have also razed many French African holdings.

Japan is a very big player in Asia, the chinese have only 1 city left. They have taken east India and are pushing south.
Australia has been under attack, and almost all the islands are under Japanese control.

But this doesn't make the game less interesting. The British are a pain in my ass and have been in the modern age since two years, the Americans followed them quickly. And the Axis are way behind on technology.
After securing Africa and Asia we'll take on the Russians who are still a big power! But combined Axis attacks will change that.

I'm not looking forward on a attack against the Americans, that will be very hard....

 

[Uncle_Ted]

Agreed. Leonidas that is most impressive! I notice you are going broke though; you are cutting things mighty thin on that research front. For a second I couldn't figure out what was the problem...

Sorry about that "lost" Japan report Rocoteh, but I got sidetracked into other things. I have the attention span of a butterfly sometimes. I have been puttering around with a couple weird variants using your 2.5 biq. just for giggles,though. I am not sure if I ever fixed this before, but I tracked down that G-50 Frecchia bug, that causes the game to crash when you right click on it and try to see the civilopedia entry for it. If you go into the Text folder, and then into the PediaIcons text file, there is an extra symbol( an 'I' I think) between the director command for the "G-50Freccia" and "Large" in the command to open the large pcx. file in the Art/Civilopedia/units folder. It was confusing the hell out of me because it kept saying the file causing the crash was in the Art/Civilopdia/etc. file; I didn't notice the typo in the error message right away. Still took me a while to find it after that, I really have not played with the text entries before, I didn't know where to look. But I found it. It works fine once you delete that symbol...so easy.

Does anyone else get as annoyed as I do when my fighters on air superiority missions just sit there on the ground while wave after wave of bombers flies overhead unchallenged? I know it is part of the system, but I wish they would increase the intercept rate based on the distance of the attempt. Have you ever considered giving fighters some AA ability to simulate their ability to scramble when their own base gets attacked? Is that even possible? If Hollywood has taught me anything, fighters ALWAYS have a chance to get into the air when being bombed!!! You probably would not shoot down many that way, but just knowing it COULD happen would make me feel loads better about the whole situation. I'm talking about a factor of '1', just for dedicated fighters, for example.

Playing with the scenario biq. makes me realize what a huge amount of effort went into this scenario. Once again, great work Rocoteh, this scenario is like Escape from Zombie Island 2, it just keeps on giving!

I still think it has to do with where your civ is positioned in the "game turn". Playing an earlier version as Japan, my fighters would never intercept on the "first" enemy turn after I give them the air superiority order. But on the "second" enemy turn they will intercept about 95% of the time.

 

[Bob1475]

v.2.5 Germany Demigod
1941 report and observations

I will skip the week to week report.
The year ended with Germany clearly dominant -

War with Russia ended mid-year and Germany holds a line from Perm to Omsk down to Samarkland. Persia was invaded and we took the Middle East up to Suez. Also went from Gibraltar and took French North Africa up to Tripoli which will fall soon.

Britain was taken except for Scapa Flow.

A few observations -

Higher cost of workers appears to result in AI not building any radar as opposesd to past versions. Only took two slave workers in all these conquests.

AI seems to prefer carriers over battleships working to AI detriment.

AI cannot build railroads.

Game moves slower which might be better.

Finland appears overpowered vs other small countries.

Italy does better than past versions.

Extra ships for Great Britain no help.

Japanese ineffective in Pacific.

If I play another game I would play as Japanese to see Pacific situation.

Rocoteh - Suggest you review worker and carrier/BB situation for next version.

 

[Sasebo]

Rocoteh: I noticed something else, that I cannot for the life of me figure out how to fix. I noticed both the Baltic wonder and the Croatia wonder are being built in Balikpapan. Looking at the biq. file they SHOULD be in Riga and Zagreb, respectively, but they never show up there! WTH is going on????

 

[Adler17]

These wonders are most likely also oreolaced in Balikpatan. The simplest solution is to delete them there in the editor.

Adler

 

[Rocoteh]

Rocoteh: I noticed something else, that I cannot for the life of me figure out how to fix. I noticed both the Baltic wonder and the Croatia wonder are being built in Balikpapan. Looking at the biq. file they SHOULD be in Riga and Zagreb, respectively, but they never show up there! WTH is going on????

Sasebo,

I just checked the editor.
AI should not be able to build these wonders since they require the
Tech: Tech Holder.
Have you made any changes to the biq-file?

Rocoteh

 

[Rocoteh]

This is Excel-file with stats for all units was made by Andreas68.
A real great work!

Rocoteh