googabooga

one intresting point i never noticed before (because i usually dont commit forces to africa): taking gibraltar and spain brings those axis cities in north africa, provided that you have overland route through vichy france, up to 8 (or was it 10, i have to check when i get my pbem turn file back). you cant however build units in north africa... -antti

its the end of -43 and now i (axis) control only 3 cities in russia. russia is starting to cave in because allies lost the ball in mediterranean. i probably could have made better gains in russia if i didnt have to divert some forces to protect norway from his little excursion. iam yet to see a single US unit since my control of the atlantic with my fleet of 9 level5 subs is unquestionable. my opponent seems to be (or so i think) researching sonar with the amaricans so i put 4 level5 italian battleships to patrol the oceans... the only drawback of "soviets buy only corps" strategy is that he cant make any effective counterattacks since the hittinpower/hex is limited due to the low attack values of corp units. this would really change if you could stack units (no iam not implying that i would want that, iam just making an observation). now my whole plan (building subs like hell) could have backfired if my opponent would have been more agressive in the eastern front. that would have meant that he should have also built some tanks and armies not just corps to allow him to make those counterattacks. in the first turns of russian campaign he had apparently no idea that i had only minimal forces there and maybe expected me to field some air fleets and tanks in couple of turns so he had committed in the beginning to build those corps. IF i had sailed those subs out in to the ocean before russias entry and engaged the royal navy he would have most certainly guessed that i dont have enough ground units in east. by keepping the subs in hiding before americas entry you keep the allied player guessing if i have some "secret" reserve in the eastern front (preparing for turkish invasion or some other crazy stuff) this pbem has been an eyeopener for me. i (or my opponent) never could appreaciate naval units and we rarely built any (playing as axis or allied) but especially if you lose the control of atlantic you are screwd, allied or axis in that matter... comments? any help? -antti

iolo: iam sorry to drag you back in to this but i really would like to know what is so bad (or not so good) about HOI. ive never played EU I or II so i dont know the drawbacks. i know more proper place to discuss about this subject would be the HOI forum but its full of people who just praise the game. i would like to hear a really really critical opinion about the game. my reasoning being that i dont want to be disapointed. if i take all the negative views as the truth i can only be positively suprised when the game comes out i know you are not out to bash the game but you are the first i just happened to see that is atleast somewhat critical about it. to moderators: dont lock this thread because of me. i promise i wont make any off topic posts about HoI in the future to prove my point iam even willing to contribute something to this thread: i have a lan in my apartment and we are doing fine with my friends without the tcpip. ofcourse iam not against the patch (duh) but when we are playing the other guy who's not doing his turn is just browsing around the net or watching tv or playing some other game. so we maybe still using the pbem play in lan even if the tcpip comes out. we just move the file between the computers and the guy can make his move when he is ready for it and has though about it some time... we dont want the opponent to make any hasty mistakes now do we -antti

svejk: as much as i would like to take credit for that but i think it may have been arby who said that. not me -antti

at this moment iam playing a very interesting pbem game. its quite unusual in the way that we are both using unconventional (at least thats what i believe) strategies. i (as axis) have a monopoly on north atlantic with my 7 level4 adv. subs because allies have lost too many carriers and battleships. i think it takes too long for western allies to get those subs out of there so i think iam safe from the dirty americans it was a gamble in the beginning with the subs but at this point seems to be worth the MPPs.... on the eastern front my opponent is using the "AI strategy" of building hordes of corps. because the subs took too much MPPs from me, when russia declared war on me i had only 5 tanks 5 armies and two hqs there. my "barbarossa" started too slow and now iam totally bogged. after a year of slugging each other ive managed to capture only one city. i always thought that it was stupid for the AI to build just corps. under human control it seems to be working quite well. or iam not any good SC player. (remember that at this point i can throw almost every MPP to the eastern front since i have no threat from the west) am i correct in saying that not too many have tried the sub strategy with axis against a human opponent (and succeeded)? or not too many have played against a human using the "soviets buy only corps" strategy? i thought my sittuation is somewhat unusual so that is why i thought i let you know how it goes... -antti

Svejk: it IS kind of strange if russia gets angry about greece but one can also question the usefulness of greece. i have never taken greece prior to russian entry. i try to avoid unnecessary DoWs in southeastern europe before russia enters the war. after russia has joined the war i let some crazy italians do their job in the mediterranean -antti

arby: you are right about attacking denmark after poland. its my "standard" opening these days and it goes exactly as you described. -antti

btw: what kind of rules people usually use in a pbem game? i _think_ you get a good pbem balance with -all politics random -war in siberia off -soviet partisans on -yugoslavian partisans off -scorched earth off (this is the one i want to hear your opinions about) -disable undo on -free french units on -fog of war on if there are two equally good human players i think there should be some kind of ruleset which is fair enough for both of them. what rules do people use in ladder games? (do we even have a ladder?) -antti

you could be right on this one. iam playing a pbem game and my objective was to try out those level 4 subs. so i didnt concentrate on the russian border at all. in the beginning i took poland, denmark, benelux, france, sweden, norway and yugoslavia. those were my only DoWs. then after couple of turns hungary, romania and bulgaria joined me (1 country per turn). at this point russia had a war entry % at 69. i stationed two german HQs and 6 armies + 4 tanks on the russian border and at the same time concentrated on building my level 4 advanced subs off the french coast. (i dont know if that force is "small" but its smaller than what i usually put on the eastern front) the whole war turned quite passive at this point. i was just building my uboats and i didnt attack anybody. ofcourse some airfleets clashed over the english channel but that was it. during this inactivity i observed that russias entry level got up by a 3-5%/turn. is that normal? or is this the thing you were talking about? -antti

Here's an excellent site describing the fortifications in great detail: http://www.winterwar.com/M-Line/M-Line2.htm#figures Gunslinger</font>

i tend to think about the treaty as being favourable to the finns. i think "continuing to exist" is in itself palpable and favourable enough aspect in the peace treaty. Gunslinger is questioning the moscow peace treaty and rightly so (even though it may only be in the sake of an argument): besides some positive effects on finnish society (which we all are aware of) the treaty in itself didnt contain any positive things for finns. people just tend to overlook the independence part. for clarification: i do not believe gunslinger is overlooking the independence part because he cleary said "..aside from continuing to exist.." i believe you are only challenging Norses point -antti

And? Fatal casualties aren't half the story. Total finnish casualties were up around 140-150,000 don't have the books here with me, but considering the population, that's a good hunk out of the population.</font>

a3: don't kill off the converstaion with comments like that. it's just starting to heat up. our objective is to get this thread locked by noon tomorrow -antti

being finnish myself i'll try to avoid that stupid and uncontributing "religious" zeal that some fin-fans seem to have gunslinger iam *not sure* if you are aware but (about M-line): "And if counting concrete bunkers which had machine guns or cannons (thus excluding passive concrete shelters), a total of 48 bunkers, there was one such bunker for each 3 km of front, i.e. roughly 0,35 armed bunkers / km" but then again: "The Isthmus Gateway, between river Summa and Lake Muolaanjärvi (a sector some 15 km wide), was the most heavily defended, and it had an average of 10 mg bunkers / nests, 7 shelters and 6 km of trenches (including the connection trenches) per kilometer of front" people (not necessarily you gunslinger, i might be wrong about you. iam just using your quote ) often think that the "most (in)famous" part of the M-line was just like any other part of the line and thus say the whole line was exstensive or massive. rest of the gunslingers post pretty much nailed it. finland played an important role in defending its borders and "stopping the communism in scandinavia" as some of you might say but finland had no chance in hell to do *anything* outside its borders. (did i go too far by saying *anything*?) innocent question: whats with your name CvM? IF you modeled your nick by Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim you should know that there was absolutely, positively _no_ "von" in his name. here is a good site for you www.mannerheim.fi

ran some tests: there is no effect on finnish supply/city strength if you take denmark, sweden and norway. (army in karelia still had suply of 1 and the corps in helsinki still had a suply of 5 etc.) that is the only universal and absolute fact disclaimer: could be proved wrong i think gunslinger had an axis hq in finland to help in the suply of finnish troops... -antti