Terif

March 16, 1941: UK starts a kamikaze attack at the german AFs in Sicily. One German air destroyed, but 2 UK carriers killed in the counterattack. Spain surrenders. Italian transports try to prevent an escape of the last survivors of the british fleet... Allied surrender expected after this obvious suicide mission...

February 2, 1941: The heaviest battles since the war started. 2 italian battleships lost in the battle near Algier/Sicily. All 3 carriers were intercepted by german airfleets, unfortunately all 3 survived even the counterattack from Sicily with up to 3 hits per carrier - but they should be heavily damaged...now 5 german airfleets in the battle, Madrid taken but Spain refuses to surrender with 2 damaged corps left. Light airfights near Brest, transport attacked. French HQ + Army in Gibraltar. [ July 25, 2004, 05:59 PM: Message edited by: Terif ]

December 8, 1940: A large british task force consisting of 3 carriers, 6+ battleships/cruisers enter the Med, several transports take positions along the algerian cost. German air and half of the italian navy is defending - one corps transport nearly sunk (str 1), italian sub heavily damaged. Romania + Hungary joined Axis. German forces enter Spain, 2 spanish armies + 1 corps destroyed. Alexandria conquered, Bergen reocupied.

September 15, 1940: Sweden surrenders - Beirut under ship bombardement. New italian naval training site established . US readiness already at 50%, Russia 60% (5% above average)

August 11, 1940: UK forces retreat from the coasts. Sweden DOW, german task force (HQ, tank, 2 armies, 2 corps) enters the country from Norway.

July 28, 1940: Vichy conquered. Several UK ships and transports appear near Brest and Brussel - heavy airbattles, one transport sunk.

July 14, 1940: Norway conquered, Malta and Suez taken without resistance

May 26, 1940: France surrenders, Italy enters the war. 2 tank divisions follow 6 fleeing UK corps to the evacuation ports and take them under fire.

Turn 6: Allied attacks make a new breakthrough possible: 2 allied units destroyed, french army survives at 1. Paris only 2 hexes away.

yep, french army + corps killed in the counterattack. Slowly advancing towards Paris.

Turn 4: Denmark surrenders...only minor battles in France (air busy in Denmark)...reinforcing...operating units west...

Axis turn 3: Poland surrenders after most units were hunted down. Denmark under attack. France bought a HQ and went aggressive: attacking with all front units - but a german tank is a very good defender, so french army in the ardennes got heavily damaged and then killed in the german counterattack. First french hex taken, HQ under attack. An english corps transport moved to the coast near Kiel and survived 2 air attacks - landing expected. Battle in the atlantic: 1 UK battleship sunk by german subs, 2 french/UK cruiser slightly damaged.

When using a standard strategy: Long term Kuni and Curry are right, England needs to stay competitive in jets and long range with Germany. As long as Germany is more advanced in these fields it will be difficult and dangerous for England to attack and they have no choice than to attack Germany sooner or later and at that point it is good to have catched up in jets/LR or even be ahead. (Germany in contrary can also move its air to the east and can choose against who they want to fight in the air, so tech is not really important for them. In fact, normally jets + LR are only vital for England cause they have no alternative than to reach air superiority over France sooner or later. For every other nation it is not decissive if they are behind in tech) In general : UK and USA should share the work and not research the same things as the other one (no need to research things twice, except if they have to break enemy air superiority, then it can be useful for USA to also research and buy jets): - usually England concentrates on air superiority (jets, LR) + eventually naval superiority (GLR, sonar). Never research anti-tank, it only makes its raiders/defenders more expensive and England has no real advantage from it. At the time of invasion its nice to have 5 AFs + HQ. - USA provides the necessary ground forces (Armies, corps, HQs) and researches mainly Anti-tank BTW: it is not possible to win a war only with air, except the enemy thinks it too and makes the same mistake - then chances are even again . Air has to support the ground units, finish off damaged units and to clear a beachhead during invasions - but to kill units only with air is very cost ineffective. Here´s a copy of a part of my strategy thread and the "early war shopping list" for Allies: It all depends on your strategy and where you see the opportunities and threats (highly dependant on your opponent). Allies can choose between dozens (or hundreds, depends on the definition ) of strategies and you need different forces/units for each of them. Therefore this is a very complex topic. But for the "early war" there are some guidelines. First for France: - make sure you can defend/ delay the conquest of France. Never retreat your forces to Paris (except you open a hex to set a trap, kill an enemy unit and close the gap...) or France will fall much too early without losses for Germany. - There are two main defence strategies for France: 1st: corps defence = France buys corps for every hex between LC and Paris. Then Germany usually needs until June/July 1940 until Paris falls (1-2 corps killed/turn). Low casualties for both sides, some armies will become free french, sometimes even a Hq. UK can save mpps and invest in all the nice things it needs later in the war, but Germany will also be strong. At the start they only need to send 2-3 corps to prevent early breakthroughs of Germany in France. The rest of the corps will be french ones. 2nd: fighting with a french Hq. There UK has to buy a lot of corps to build the first defence line. The french mpps will be used to reinforce/replace the 5 french armies that will kill any enemy unit that breaks through the british corps (no mpps left for french corps ). If possible UK should buy Montgomery to support the airfleets. BTW: to buy the french Hq: you can disband the AF + 2 battleships to build it in turn 1 (or wait until turn 2 + AF). Never leave your Med positions or even disband Med corps(=italian readiness increases). Then Italy will only join when Germany reaches the outskirts of Paris. Guidelines in general: - when airfleets have to fight, they need support by a Hq. Without a Hq it is very expensive and the enemy doesnt loose much. So buy Montgomery before you send your airfleets in a battle (if you dont fight with your air, Monti can wait ). - make sure you can defend England against an early Sealion (e.g. placing your fleet near the homeland, buying some corps/holding mpps back in cash...). - buy some chits in Jets and LR to stay competitive with german air, but dont neglect your Island defence. If the enemy is more advanced, then move your air out of interception range until your tech catches up. - everything else ("shopping list") totally depends on your strategy: 2nd Hq for Egypt, armies/tanks/corps for Egypt or Spain or Skandinavia or Africa... airfleets + tech... Gun laying radar + anti-sub...carriers...corps for raids at Brest, Brussel, Denmark, Med...and so on... [ July 24, 2004, 05:33 AM: Message edited by: Terif ]

Your strategy in Russia should depend on your opponents strategy and always be coordinated with western Allies (you need a second front very soon after Barbarossa started) But in general: Use natural defence lines behind rivers and swamps, entrench in forests and cities. First defence line is Riga-Minsk-Kiev-Odessa (then Riga-Minsk- Kharkov-Sevastopol). Cheap corps in the first defence line and some hexes back your armies + tanks (HQ supported !) to close enemy breakthroughs - cheap corps fill the gaps again. If you cant hold a defence line any more retreat to your next line. Avoid building defence lines in open terrain - there your units have no chance to survive and will be destroyed easily.

Ah, ok....8000 mpps is not the standard bid for everyone I think... The bid always should depend on the experience of both players and especially the axis one. In the meantime strategies and tactics are highly developed, but you need some time and a lot of games to learn them . More common bids are: -new vs new: no bid necessary (Allies even can be in the advantage here - but when someone has at least read some strategy threads and knows how russian readiness works, a low bid would be appropriate) -intermediate vs intermediate: bid 200 system 1:8 or 1:10 (or ~100 in 1:5:20) -veteran vs veteran: bid 200 system 1:5:20 For some basic informations about how SC works + strategies (including the different bid systems) read e.g. (first post): http://www.battlefront.com/cgi-bin/bbs/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=18;t=002198

I guess you mean a historical/realism explaination... : One turn in SC usually represents 1-2 weeks in real time. An invasion force starts with enough supply for a 1-2 week combat in their beachhead, but after this time they used up their provided supply and they need new supply from their home country. To bring in new supply they need to conquer an enemy city/port or have to bring/build their own supply possibility (HQ). Besides command structures etc. a HQ also represents logistics, supply, support - and mulberrys during landings. So if you have not conquered a port/city to get in supply, you can bring in a HQ and you will get some supply (supply level 5) and therefore reinforcements through your beachheads (mulberrys...), but logically not very much and certainly not that much like the defender of a city (fully funcitonal port/supply via landroute)with his supply depots and intact supply lines. However - in SC its better only to invade when you can conquer a city/port so you will get full supply via HQs for your units. As long as you didnt conquer a supply source in the enemy territory your forces are in danger to be thrown out/killed in their beachs - invasions without preparations/conquering a functional port/city very soon to bring in reinforcements/supply are dangerous and only successful against an unprepared enemy . [ July 09, 2004, 04:04 PM: Message edited by: Terif ]

For land units supply makes ~1/3 of their readiness and therefore = ~1/3 of their combat value/power (the other 2 parts are from strength points and HQ command). Therefore a good supply is important for battles. Supply determines also how much reinforcements a unit can receive: only units with a supply >= 6 can reinforce to full strength (units out of supply cant be reinforced). Additionally the action points (= movement) of a unit depend on supply: full action points (AP) with supply >=6 , minus 1 APs with supply 1-5 and only half APs when out of supply. Your units get supply from cities, fortresses and HQs - in conquered territories (cities there only provide 5 supply without or 8 with a connection to the capital) you need HQs to get higher supply levels - and the HQs themselves need a city/fortress to trace their supply from it (within reach of a city/fortress they provide 8/10 supply, out of reach they also have only 5 supply). Amphibious landings receive full supply in their starting turn. Near ports you also have the possibility to spend 10% of the unit costs to get a new/extra supply shipment for this turn (i.e. you transport and unload your unit, so you have full supply for one turn - disadvantage: it is expensive to order an additional supply delivery and you loose your entrenchment, so its only useful in some rare situations). [ July 09, 2004, 02:23 PM: Message edited by: Terif ]

Yes, to have fun playing SC is the most important thing. Therefore there is no reason to cheat and nothing to gain from it - a cheater can only loose his reputation and honour. And I think when playing some games against veteran players it will be obvious very soon if someone is cheating or really knows what he is doing - in SC there is not much luck involved in the long term...however, for everyone it doesnt hurt to check during the first turns the report screen and mpp values to be sure that the correct scenario has been started . Fortunately I have not encountered many cheaters in SC (only 2 in total now, i.e. 1 cheater per year - the first one was a new player who also obviously incresed his research chits, when I asked him he more or less admitted it and I have never seen him again since this time...). In contrary I am glad to say cheaters seem to be extremely seldom in SC especially compared to other games .

@b00ch: Thats the point, here we have the PBEM turn i.e. proof . The conquests are already included in the mpps as written above. In short: Germany is 9x120= 1080 Conquests are ~250 mpp (during the last turns) + Plunder from conquests: max 1050 mpp So Germany can have collected a total of max. ~2380 mpp (with maximum luck, but in average it should be closer to 2200mpp...) But here Germany owns newly bought assets that can be directly seen of 2725 mpp (+ report screen shows at least another new unknown unit). Additionally it reinforced (alone last turn 13 army strength points = ~156mpp) and surely operated units (usually this is again around 200-300 mpp). So in this aspect there is no doubt .

In principle he is right, but here there is a proof: the PBEM turn. In my eyes the only defence could have been that he never played this game and/or that it would not be his PBEM turn. Cause when looking at the presented turn, there is not the smallest doubt that the axis player in this game increased his mpps/research chits.

Yes, and I think the most important one is to prevent the ´poor mans´ cheating method by simply using the editor and increasing his starting values. Here the solution is pretty easy I think - like others proposed earlier: if both sides can check all values before the starting turn (i.e. no fog of war, research/starting mpps can be seen = like in the editor, but without the possibility to change the values now). Then cheating (except for reloading, thats a different problem) would only be possible during gameplay and this would require a lot more effort and knowlegde than using the editor - which can be done by everyone at the moment - and for most players cheating would be not possible any more.

Since Axis hosted, my guess is Germany simply started with 10 research points - this is here pretty much exactly the difference to a normal game and would also explain the fast research advances. But I agree with Curry that he should first have a chance for self defence and an explaination before we start hanging him - until now we have only heared one side .

I just checked the PBEM turn: It is May 12, 1940. Germany in fact has 6 AFs, 3 tanks, >700mpp on the bank reinforced alone in this turn 13 army strength points and researched jets + heavy tank. It has 16 ground units so it didnt disband any of them. It has 4 ships (2 subs lost)i.e. he even bought another one (or transport). This is impossible in the Fall Weiss scenario without additional mpp/research chits. Mistakes can happen (e.g. wrong scenario started), but if he claims everything was correct then he cheated. When someone obviously (and here it even seems repetedly) cheats, this is the best reason to remove him from any league. [ July 04, 2004, 05:58 PM: Message edited by: Terif ]

Hmm...If he is in the PBEM League I would propose you send Curry (League administrator)the PBEM turn (+ password) and the name of your opponent so Curry can verify it and remove him from the league (after a last chance to prove that he is innocent).

@Curry: No, I never invest in tech as Axis before the fall of France. It slows down the fall enourmously and even if you are lucky this doesnt even out the disadvantage. But I have seen some players doing it - usually new players in their first games vs human players until they learned this is not a good idea . Experienced players perhaps invest in tech when they see they will break through in France, but even then only in rare cases (see Comrade Trapp´s post)... @Aztecace: The others are right. At that time investing in tech is not wise and costly. At the start there are no "useless" german units. Perhaps he has disbanded his ships, but this brings only ~ 130 mpp. You can check the report screen for the number of his land units. Germany starts with 15 of them - maybe he is crazy and disbanded his corps/armies... (then he should have much less units now) but I dont think so... Sometimes it can be that someone starts by mistake the wrong scenario. But if Germany starts with additional mpp/research points he should have noticed it very soon and told it to you - here he says that everything is correct. According to your description this can not be true. If you want you can send me the PBEM file(s) (+ password) and I will check it for you. My e-mail is in my profile. [ July 04, 2004, 05:02 AM: Message edited by: Terif ]