Terif

Sealion was no option against all those bombers - remember: german amphibs have only a range of 4 and bombers are anti-ship units, so they would all have been sunk several turns away from the british coast - besides...there was no empty landing spot for them left anyway...

Sorry, Axis bombers are no game breaker - already tried against me many times (often to bomb Manchester port out or order so England doesn´t get convois)...when Allies notice Axis bombers it regularly only leads to a short war and Axis beeing overrun by the red hordes... Every mpp invested into Axis bombers is missing somewhere else - and bombers are not really useful in a land war which Axis have to wage against Russia...at least ground units or airfleets are much more useful and a better return for the invested ressources than bombers. Axis bombers are in deed ship killers, but this only works against an unexperienced allied player - the ocean is large enough... That doesn´t mean that Axis can´t build bombers or can´t use them to support their plans - they can...but all at its time and place...if the enemy expects you to go for bombers, then Axis will be in trouble with its expensive bombers . [ July 08, 2007, 11:41 AM: Message edited by: Terif ]

All the Red Cats had to walk on their own feet the whole way from Caucasus to Algeria - originally there were a dozen tanks and armies that conquered the desert (as you can see in the screenshots they advanced on a broad front even deep down in the desert to outflank the axis defenders at the coast...). The only operational moves occured when sending them home to mother Russia after finished business in the newly built railways...Transafrican Railway got officially opened after the conquest of the entire northafrican coast to connect the new territories with the russian homeland .

Bombers as all other units need HQ support to be effective. They already start with a strategic attack value of 5 which means they will do 5 damage in average when at proper readiness. Bomber level 3 do 8 damage and with some experience and better HQs easily 10 damage. Which means after a few turns you can level a city from 10 to zero with one strike . But at the beginning you just have to use 2 bombers for each ressource/city to bring it down to zero and after that also its defence installations are pretty much out of order. Bomber defence of ressources depends on their strength points, i.e. a damaged ressource can´t really harm a bomber any more, no matter which Anti-Air level it has. So even if the enemy has high Anti-Air levels, the bombers only take real damage in the first attack when the ressource is still at full strength - after that it is a piece of cake for the bombers and except for a hit here and there by chance they won´t take damage any more. Nevertheless it is very expensive and takes a long time to build all those bombers - so a real bombing campaing usually won´t start till 1943 and logically all those ressources will be missing for other things like ground troops. That´s why my western Allies in the AAR had no land units at all except for their starting units (that died in Norway..) and a few new built corps/Paras . My airfleets were not used to attack ressources as they were all occupied by enemy land units, and with a unit on top a fighter can´t hit the ressources. Here there were heavy airfights over France/Spain as Axis sent all its airfleets there to wage the battle in the skies...which is a big mistake as airfleets are mainly useful to support ground troops: airstrikes demoralize the defenders so ground units can finish them off with low own losses. And western Allies here were clearly superior in the air with 8 airfleets Jets lv 4 in England. Germany also had lv 4 Jets, but not enough mpps to repair them...

First turn after Barbarossa began – Battle of Scandinavia still in progress, Middle East about to see its first large ground battles: May 1943 – Axis at its largest expansion, approaching Ural: December 1943 - Airbattle over Gibraltar – initializing the downfall of Axis: May 1944 -The last naval battle of this era starts at Bilbao: July 1944 – quick intermezzo in Spain...russian invasion, shortly after repulsed by half a dozen Axis ground units: Exemplary combat losses from bombing...each turn with different cities...so whole Europe is rotationaly bombed to rubble: September 1944 – the whole might of the Allies combined on one little island...all UK combat ground troops can be seen on the map (Brussel and Brest) ...Western Allies built a flying machine for every citizen...in the end Germany and Italy researched Anti-Air level 3, but it didn´t help them any more, all ressources were already destroyed by bombers:

Once Axis ruled over most of the known world, from Trondheim in the icy north till Gorky near Ural mountains...France, Spain, Portugal...Cassablanca through the untamed desert...up to Tehran the old persian city...not even the ancient Greece and the much younger state of Yugoslavia were able to avoid the axis tyranny.... ...until tens of thousands of allied bombers from a tiny island in the ocean...called England...soar into the air...bringing havoc to the enemy and burning down all axis cities to the ground....after the firestorms ceased, only ruins and dust remained of the once mighty evil empire... Lots of games vs Rambo lately – this one deserves an AAR as it was among the longest games I ever played and demonstrates the possible longterm power of british and american bombers even if the whole continent is under Axis control and german level 4 subs rule the ocean . This game my Allies decided to use a full bomber strategy – also a result of very busy german scientists researching sub technology – western Allies built nearly no ground units except for a few corps and paratroopers that were sent on sabotage missions into France and Germany, but eventually every UK and US citizen had its own personal aircraft... . Axis started the war with a fast western approach, conquering LowCountries and Denmark in turn 2...german diplomats boosted by the early successes were driven to contribute their part...so they delivered a christmas present to the axis leader: 2 hits in Spain, one of them a mega-hit – and in January 1940 Spain was already at 81% readiness...therefore UK didn´t bother any more to send own diplomats as blocking was not possible any more and so Spain joined Axis not much later. France fell in May 1940 as usual – one french battleship decided to continue the fight. After the experiences during the last war where Axis was not able to conquer Egypt, Germany this time sent a massive task force to Africa: 3 italian armies, 2 corps and a HQ conquered Syria (which resulted in Iraq joining Axis 1941) and supported by italian air approached Egypt from the east...while strong german forces – after taking Tunis and Vichy Algeria - attacked from the western side the allied stronghold of Alexandria. Facing such superior firepower, UK forces evacuated the country, but brave egyptian soldiers were still able to hold out quite some time till they finally had to surrender in spring 1941. At sea the first major encounter took place in August-October 1940: The axis navy was divided into 3 task forces and all of them started a simultaneous assault against Royal Navy. While at Portugal Graf Spee and a spanish cruiser after assaulting and damaging a tank transport could be sunk without much hassle, sinking Bismarck east of Gibraltar took a heavy toll on the british fleet and Royal Navy had to retreat...especially as the combined italian-german navy there had airsupport from Spain. In the LowCountries/Denmark battle the german subs were unfortunately able to dive away from 8 attacks, so only 1 hit could be scored before they retreated back into Baltic. The next round took place in April 1941 when the last 2 german cruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau and a sub sunk at Denmark in a heroic but fruitless battle. 2 months later italian cruiser and 2 battleshipgroups get lost in the english channel, Tirpitz finds its last resting place near Bergen in August 1941. Meanwhile german forces ambushed their former ally Sweden in July 1941 – resulting in heavy battles in the norwegian mountains with the british expeditionary forces that had originally been placed there for the same reason....and so the first major land battle of this war took place in Scandinavia. German HQ, tanks and multiple armies + corps, supported by 3 airfleets against strong UK forces in the mountains with also several armies and corps, UK bomber and air flying support missions from Bergen. Until winter 41/42 both sides exchanged units in front of the mountain chain in Norway – Germany with much more firepower, but forced to attack from the plain fields against the UK forces entrenched in their mountains...however, lastly UK run out of recruits as it was not able to send additional units into the battle...when spring 1942 arrived and with it better weather so the german air could fly again, O´Connor HQ the last survivor of the british expeditonary forces finally set sail back to England. Tales of the mountain fight of the brave but hopelessly outnumbered british army, holding out nearly a year against far superior enemy forces are beeing told the children and grandchildren of the survivors till the present day...during the rest of the war never again such a formidable british force were ever built...all british armies went down in glory, remembered and never to be rebuilt . In the meantime Barbarossa started August 1941 – German forces entering Russias northern part to secure Finland and establish a connection with Scandinavia. Yugoslavia and Greece get conquered and in Middle East Iran occupied by Axis via the previously joined Iraq. When USA enters the war in November 41, Axis also annexes Portugal and Vichy France. Russias main forces were sent into Caucasus to free Iran and punish Iraq for joining the enemy...fighting against a dozen axis troops there...so northwest-Russia was undefended. Nevertheless the lonely Leningrad garrison managed to resist till May 1942 – also due to most of the german forces and all air still beeing busy in Norway at that time, battling against the heroic british defenders... Following the fall of Leningrad and with clear summer turns, russian city after russian city fell in the northern part of the country, including Moskow...but not without a fight and sending home countless axis body bags... Elsewhere...: The battle of the Atlantic seemed to be more or less over end of 1941 with most of the axis navy at the bottom of the sea...the remaining ships had been sent into Baltic to destroy the 2 russian cruisers there... After completion of this task, Western Allies suspected the axis naval commander to order his usual breakout into the Atlantic via the street between Iceland and Scotland...so they laid out a trap...bombers both in Iceland and Scotland spotting for the blockade runners, carriers and surface fleet awaiting the enemy in two task forces: One west of Ireland and the second one at Scapa Flow to close the bag when the last enemy ship had been sailed into the mouse trap. And it all went according to plan : when the Iceland bombers spotted italian battleships in the street heading south, the plan got set into motion and the trap closed...resulting in the destruction of the last axis surface vessels: italian battleship + cruiser, another spanish cruiser and also 3 german subs got sunk...only the italian sub escaped the slaughter. Now the naval war could have been expected to be definitely over.... ....but quite the contrary.... fortuna and unbelievably massive investments into shipyards and naval research facilities by Axis changed that situation in 1942...thousands of mpps already poured into repairs of Kriegsmarine and Il Duces navy and now thousands more followed: Germany started a massive sub build up and research program... as revealed after the war, Germany got 3 breakthroughs in a row in sub technology and reached subs level 4 just after the destruction of the axis surface fleet in the battle of Scotland... ...and so end of 1942 the situation completely changed: when the subs from the production queue arrived, the Axis naval Golden Age began...and the at this time unbeatable sub fleet ruled the sea....Royal Navy lost its last cruisers and one of its carriers...2 battleships and 2 carriers the last remainders of the once proud fleet. Axis subs raiding 100 mpps each turn from allied convois... In these dark hours, Western Allies could only put their hope on the just arriving wonder weapons...flying fortresses ...built in the tens of thousands...and now arriving from the production queue...during the building process USA already developed Bomber lv 3 as well as LongRange lv 4 while UK in work division researched also LR but prefered Jets lv 4 for their airfleets instead of Bomber tech (later USA researched Jets 4 too with German beeing at Jets 4 as well). Russia on the other side of the world also invested heavily into its air wing...with US help reaching even Bomber lv 4 and LongRange 3, only in Jets keep beeing stuck at lv 1 – two divisions of flying fortresses delivered via lend-lease to Russia from USA. ....And so the neverending firestorm accross Europe begins...city after city gets wasted and burned down to the ground...Brussel, Paris, Kopenhagen, Madrid, Lisbon, Marseilles, Bordeaux, Hamburg, Essen, Frankfurt, Berlin...wherever the bomb bays open their doors...setting free the horrible cargo...nothing survives... 1943 is in the sign of naval research and building up the allied fleet – so they can regain naval superiority in the Atlantic...Allies also build 4 subs (1 US, 2 UK, 1 russian), using them to raid norwegian and swedish ore convois...USA and UK research Anti-Sub-Warfare...in 1944 finally reaching level 4 each...now they are ready to contest the axis supremacy at sea and the fleet moves into battle.... At the same time Russia fought hard and well in Middle East and Africa...beeing victorious they finally reach the Atlantic at Cassablanca and start bombarding Spain.... Axis just moving forward in Russia, Kazan the last free russian city before the Ural under heavy air attacks ...and now Axis make the crucial and deadly mistake to operate all airfleets from the russian front back to Spain... forcing the offensive in Russia to a full stop...instead starting an expensive airfight at Gibraltar with no goal that can be achieved. German air has Jets 3 (later Jets 4) vs Russian Jet 1 fighters, which makes it pretty expensive for Russia...but having removed the dangerous axis air from the russian main front is worth every price as the main role of airfleets is ground support...and in Spain there are no ground units to support for the axis air...and so the cornerstone for the Axis defeat is laid...without airsupport, the axis forces in Russia are doomed and forced to go into defence positions...unable to conquer further territories... ...and so the economic war can take its toll as Axis ressources dwindle further and further under the allied bombardments.... Different theater... ...in May 1944 the big moment occurs - clash of the titans in the ocean : Axis airfleets are covering the german subs ressuplying at Bilbao, but allied air from England and Ireland now has enough range to force them into airbattles so carriers can launch their sub hunters unharmed...together with the other 8 surface vessels they go in the offensive and wreak havoc amongst the enemy sub fleet...eventually destroying all 7 of them in the gigantic slaughter...only loosing a battleship and a cruiser...at the end of the war there are in total 24 axis vessels at the bottom of the sea, 12 of them subs... ...lastly the economic warfare proves to be a full success...German income gets despite the large expansion and lots of conquered ressources bombed down to first ~270 mpps and eventually less than 150 mpps each turn ! ...and 150 mpps are not enough to sustain the war machinery...troops receive less and less reinforcements, equipment and material...until they finally break in 1944....and the Axis empire begins to crumble faster and faster from the east...russian forces reconquer all the lost territories within a couple of turns, only held up by the lack of supply as the reconquered cities are destroyed by the defenders, following their scorched earth doctrine...finally after bloody battles, russian troops reach the doorstep of Germany...still a powerful german army is standing in the fortifications they built along the border and in russian territory, but Axis have no mpps left after the bombings from western Allies to repair their damaged units or even build new ones....and so they finally surrender unconditionally in October 1944 – still nearly all of continental Europe in axis hands, but the destroyed cities generating no war production any more to support a continuation of the fight....and so after 5 years, the world war was over. [ July 08, 2007, 02:07 AM: Message edited by: Terif ]

Congratulations to Colin - sounds like a very interesting game for both sides . Russia is in deed a land power and main priority has to be increasing the strength and numbers of its ground units. Airfleets are offensive weapons with the main purpose to reduce readiness and morale of enemy ground units before an offensive and have only neglectable defensive capabilities as long as they don´t have Jets 3+ (which to research is expensive, needs time and is only worth the research with enough airfleets that Russia doesn´t have at the start). So as long as Russia is in the defensive it doesn´t need air - before it invests into air it has much more urgent things to invest into and before it first achieves a stalemate on the ground or can take a necessary breath by a second front in the west will usually not have the ressources to build other things than ground troops. Same applies for motorization: this is an offensive tool and as long as Russia is fighting for its bare survival a luxury it can´t afford . Question of delayed surrender: Combat units only delay surrender when they are in their own country, which is why Russia usually continues fighting (all remaining units are in Russia and therefore increase the chance to fight on) and Germany or Italy usually surrender as most of their units are out of the country (e.g. in France or Russia) and therefore have no influence on the question of continuing to fight. With Rome in enemy hands, only the italian units that are in Italy give each 3% chance to continue to fight...and Italy can´t build many units in any case, so even if it would operate all units back, it never can reach a significant chance of fighting on.

Intel has already been explained so many times...copy and paste will do it : - intel never decreases the base chance each chit has (5% from lv 0 to 1, 4% from 1 to 2, etc..=5,4,3,2,1 system). Only if there is a tech difference betweeen 2 nations (no matter if neutral or active), then intel either increases the additional research bonus by 1 for each intel level difference, or it reduces this additional bonus by 1 for each intel level difference, but it can´t fall below 0, i.e. your base chance is still there ! - normal research chance = % chance per turn = (5% -> 4% -> 3% -> 2% -> 1%) * applicable points in category - bonus chance = (% + highest enemy level - current level +/- intelligence modifiers) * applicable points in category The normal research chance can only be increased by the bonus chance if a level of difference exists; it can never be reduced. i.e. Intelligence can never block enemy research, it can only eliminate additional bonuses via tech differences and you will still have the normal research chance for each chit invested . So Intelligence is pretty unimportant - doesn´t matter much if you have intel 0 or 5...makes perhaps a difference for getting level 4/5 in a tech since there you have only a normal research chance of 2/1% per chit which can potentially be boosted by intel considerably - but only if the enemy got lucky before you and is ahead in this tech area...otherwise it again doesn´t matter... Most of the important techs are capped at level 3 anyway and there are much more important things to research than Intel, especially since both sides can only invest a limited amount of mpps into research - Intel chits would only block other research and I personally simply sell the intel chits so these chits can be redirected to something more useful .

Yep, conquering all capitals is only the necessary precondition so a country can surrender - but the combat units alive then also have some saying : - for minor countries: each unit in home territory gives a chance of 6% to continue the fight - in major countries every unit in home territory increases the chance by 3% i.e. if Russia still has 34 units in its home country when its capitals are conquered, it will continue to fight with 100% certainty - each unit less will increase the chance of capitulation Concerning victory conditions: In order to win, Axis first needs to liberate Rom, or the maximum it can achieve is a draw. To achieve an early major victory it also needs to conquer London and Cairo which could prove to be a problem if I read the AAR correctly... . In any case - this game here could get pretty interesting, depending on how strong western Allies really are at the moment. If they do it right, they still have a good chance to win the war - Axis needs to leave a lot of garrison units in Russia to prevent partisans and the main/combat forces of both sides should be not too far away from each other concerning combat strength... So the outcome is still not decided as long as nobody prematurely surrenders - even if Axis is superior in numbers, that means nothing if Allies fight the right battles and with their naval superiority they can choose when and where to fight...by fighting at the right time and place anybody can easily defeat a 2 or even 3 to 1 superior enemy if necessary... . But here this shouldn´t be necessary anyway - USA and UK with Africa + Italy conquered should get around the same amount of mpps as Germany if not even a bit more and can potentially lead an equal combat force into battle with even superior airsupport... Summary: Should develope into a really interesting game with chances and possibilities for both sides - which one will win, depends on their abilities on the battlefield - at the moment still everything should be open according to the AAR

In game it is simply the rule that if there is no defender you can take a port from any land tile next to it - so that is more a historical question and this rule is IMO even pretty historical : To hold a port a country needs to defend the key spots that allow control of a port and if there are no defenders or they are separated by a river or even ocean from the port they want to defend, they can´t effectively prevent enemy units from gaining control of the harbour installations (and only watch helplessly with their spy glasses from the other side of the water.. ). To gain control on the other side is/was certainly pretty easy if there are no defenders present. Then any enemy unit in the vicinity can send some commando forces - and be it in a few boats - to take over control of a not/unsufficiently defended port . [ June 19, 2007, 08:59 AM: Message edited by: Terif ]

Ok, since we are now back to the question of port ownership and you want to have it exact I will take the time to go more into detail and so here is the long and detailed version of the answer that covers all possibilities and applies all the time : - to hold the port so it doesn´t change ownership in the turn the enemy lands a unit nearby, you need to have a unit in a tile that is connected to it via land (at Kiel e.g. this would be the tiles northwest or southwest of it: 78,13 or 78,14; Leningrad this would be the tiles of Leningrad city or the one north of it = 102,8 or 102,7) - nevertheless the port will change ownership at the beginning of the next turn if the enemy has occupied the city/fortress to which the port belongs (like London or Leningrad – Kiel has no city/fortress so here this can´t happen and if you have a unit in tile 78,13 or 78,14 during the enemy turn you will never loose control of the port, i.e. in this case there can´t be a changing of hands every turn if you really have one unit there that stays there) - for the enemy to gain immediate control (during the same turn) of a port, the tiles with land connections to the port need to be empty (= no defenders in them) – be it by destroying the defenders or cause there were no defenders in these tiles – and when this is the case the enemy can take control of the port with a unit moved close to the port. To gain control any tile adjacent to the port is sufficient, i.e. it doesn´t need to have a land connection, it only needs to be one of the adjacent tiles (For Kiel this e.g. means: if there is no enemy unit in tile 78,13 or 78,14, then it will change ownership if you move a unit into any adjacent tile which are 80,14 or 79,14 or 79,12 or 78,13 or 78,14; for Leningrad e.g. this means: if there is no enemy unit in Leningrad itself or the tile north of it (102,8 or 102,7), then you can capture the port by moving a unit into either one of those 2 tiles or into one of the other 3 adjacent land tiles (100,7 or 101,6 or 101,8). Just test it in hotseat – you won´t find an exception to this rule as far as I know Summary/simplification for the more practical use of the rule : - keep a unit in one of the tiles that have a land connection to the port you don´t want to loose (and have a close look it is really a tile with land connection and not a tile seperated by water from the port !) and you can´t loose it during the enemy turn as long as your unit survives the enemy attacks (a fortification can help with surviving..). If a city/fortress belongs to the port, it is best to keep that, then you also won´t loose port control at the beginning of the next turn. If you have no defender at a port at all, then it is very easy for the enemy to capture it and you will loose it with every landing next to it.

Yep, we wrote at the same time

@Agamemnon: Sorry, there is no "friend and Family network" except perhaps in your mind . Checked your previous posts...I now see you are not really up to seek answers but more to blow of your steam... Since I don´t intend to help you with your rampage tour, please forgive me if I don´t take your "question" too seriously any more ...therefore just one more thing concerning it: Port ownership is NOT random - a german corps in tile 78,13 would have prevented any change of ownership, so it obviously wasn´t really there and for Chatham you forgot to read/quote the second part concering cities - if London is occupied by a german unit, then the port will switch to Germany at the begining of the next turn - just how it happened to you and how I explained above. P.S.: Everything other players know more/better than you has been found out simply by playing the game or testing certain things via hotseat...something everyone can do - including you. Most things are also written in the manual/version notes or you can find it when you have a closer look into the scripts - which takes time and is not everybodies cup of tea.... So instead of acting like a stubborn child , learning by playing is a good alternative. Learning from your battle experiences is the best thing you can do anyway cause all the small things (like port control) nearly never make a real difference - the grand strategy and learning when and where to attack/defend is what decides who wins the battles...and this you can only learn in the war against other human players anyway .

- ports can only change ownership in the turn you move a unit next to it when all enemy units adjacent to it are destroyed, until then it belongs to the side who had its corps there first - the city/fortress belonging to the port is the main owner and the port switches back to it at the start of the next turn. P.S.: not all tiles are connected to a port even if they are next to it - only if there is no water between them (to be sure you can check in the editor, but you also see it on the map if you have a close look ). E.g. Leningrad port has lots of land tiles around, but only Leningrad city and the tile north of it are connected to the port and therefore relevant to the question of ownership .

A short look into the version notes answers all those questions : " - Added a FoW feature for Engineers, now they will remain hidden under FoW while building a FORTIFICATION unless an enemy unit is immediately adjacent - Added a FoW feature for Paratroops, now they will remain hidden under FoW while preparing unless an enemy unit is immediately adjacent - Changed FoW for Land units spotting units at sea. Now all land units, with the exception of Bombers, will spot Naval units at 1/2 their current spotting range, i.e. AF spotting range might already be Reduced due to weather effects etc., all other spotting remains the same... should make the "cat and mouse" (Desert Dave) naval game a bit more interesting." Cities are no units and therefore can not spot engineers/Paras in prepare mode. Ships are units and therefore can . P.S.: spotting range is rounded up (i.e. if you have a spotting range of 2.5 then you can see 3 tiles)

Hmm, what you mean is not a bug, but how soft limits work. In this case it is most likely resulting from forgetfulness of the host who used the wrong setting - soft build limits means you have no build limit and can build more units, so standard is usually to use hard limits. With hard limits activated you can only buy 4 german rockets, no matter if they are in the pipeline or not .

It may be fun the first few times and against the AI or unexperienced players that will have no problems now any more to do an invasion. But longterm and for multiplayer it is IMHO not a good idea, so at least for the standard Fall Weiss campaign they better should be removed. Just play it a few times in multiplayer against an experienced opponent when it is out (or read some of my AARs then if it really comes... ) and you will see that these extra ports and cities WILL certainly cause problems and unbalance it .

Hmm, I hope this is not the final map of the Fall Weiss campaign - all those additional ports and cities in France, Germany and UK would otherwise make amphibious invasions extremely easy and risk free (too many places to start from, defenders can´t man all entry points, supply is no problem for the invader any more and evacuations will also be easy so even if beaten in the interior, the invasion force always can evacuate without problems instead of beeing destroyed). Neither historical nor too good for gameplay I would say, so I hope this will be changed till the final version .

Yep, Russia built a lot of strong fortifications in front of Rostov-Stalingrad, but a few scouting german units provoced the russian commanders, which were longing for fame, fortune and glorious battles...so the russians were lured into open terrain at the beginning of the clear summer weather turns of 1942 and attacked the german forces east of Voronezh, starting a full frontal assault without protection from their mighty fortification line...in the open terrain beeing at the mercy of the german Lufwaffe...and so the few soldiers left behind had to watch powerless the complete annihilation of the russian main forces in the first large encirclement battle of the russian war...5 german volounteer corps had to give their lives when they got killed with the first allied strike, but their sacrifice was not for nothing and made the great victory possible...therefore receiving the highest decorations postum . Soon after, Axis made a swing southwards...cutting through the now weakened fortifications near Stalingrad in the back of the main russian defence line which was positioned at Rostov, destroying 5 of the fortifications defended by tanks and armies...also including a HQ in one of them...fast german units surge ahead to build the 2nd and largest encirclement area ever seen around Rostov...italian and german paratroopers jumped behind the enemy lines to close the last escape routes, reducing one of the 2 russian airfleets standing there to str 1 in the process...now nearly all of the remaining russian forces had been cut off at Rostov and their now useless fortifications west of the city...in panic they try to flee...few manage to escape...the rest is slaughtered or brought into PoW camps...endless rows of millions of captured russian soldiers marching west after this last huge battle... After this decissive battle it was only clearing up the remnants in quick order...no noteworthy resistance left, speed only limited by motorization...2 task forces operated west to crush the allied invasion in France and Denmark.... Now in January 1943 Brest had been reconquered by Germany, the last british survivors in Denmark hunted down by german tanks...the battle of Britain begun with the intervention of the Axis fleets by sinking the battleshipgroups Strasbourg and Royal Oak – Italian navy attacking the allied fleet at Bordeaux and german Kriegsmarine sinking the enemy blockade fleet at Denmark...after this first beats of the drum, having lost all expeditionary forces on the continent, Russia with the back to the wall in Ural - Allies surrendered unconditionally .

2 ideas : - if you don´t have the same version of SC2 you get a file read error. So make sure you both have patched to the same version. Latest one is 1.06 - you can see the version number in the start screen. - if that´s not the problem check in your windows explorer the save file if it is set on read only and if that´s the case disable the write protection so it is read/write enabled.

Thanks – I loved SC1 when I stumbled accross it after it was already out half a year for its ease of playing and yet depth if you had a closer look. Same for its successor...SC2 is a bit more complex, with different/improved graphic – but when you get used to it, SC2 is even much better than SC1 as it gives the player many more choices and freedom without getting unbalanced. In fact its balance and beeing astonishingly robust in this aspect is what I like most about SC2 in combination with its characteristic of having random elements but still luck having no influence on the outcome of the game – it only changes the course of war and which strategies are preferable. Each random element either evens out in the long run or like the strategic decissions of the players have their advantages and disadvantages – and if it is wise to choose a certain path only depends on the situation and your opponent . I look into different games from time to time, but since I met SC don´t really play other games – not only cause I still find SC2 the best strategy game so far, but also cause I simply have no time left to play something else besides SC . Beeing good at the game is certainly also enjoyment in itself and motivates to invest more time then you would do otherwise, but more important when you know how to play SC2 it gives the opportunity to explore the possibilities of SC2 with each new game in many different ways by trying lots of different strategies. When both players know the basics, SC2 becomes much, much more fun to play as then it is pure strategy, trying to find the weak spots, surprising the enemy there and using the right counterstrategies fitting to the situation . In SC1 I played more than a thousand games and lost exactly 12 of them – and these belong to the best and most interesting games I played, most of them going into 1945-47 – a challenge is always the most fun . In SC2 I lost not a single game so far - with its larger map and many more places to attack you have much more possibilities to compensate for mistakes or a good enemy assault that caused you heavy losses and severe damage. If you have an equal opponent you will have to be willing to sacrifice a lot of territories and units sometimes to achieve victory and the game will go back and forth – so you never should surrender as long as your forces are intact or you have space to trade for time to rebuild . Fortunately more and more players are starting to recognize that you can turn the tide till nearly the end of the game which results in an increasing amount of really exciting games .

@Liam: Yep, too much operating/transporting costs you a lot of mpps. But main mistake is not to recognize where/when to attack and where/when to defend : - you usually try to go with the head through the wall, meaning attacking my fortress near Sevastopol behind the river and the mines. This is the perfect defence position and you can only get a bloody nose there...better to attack the weak spots of an enemy defence line and not the hardest and best defended point - Iraq is a good example for the defence part...my russians were approaching with 6 tanks, air and lots of smaller stuff. Nevertheless you operated your HQ with a few armies and corps to Baghdad just to get half of them killed by the 4:1 superior russians and having to operate the survivors away again... Better to not defend it at all as there were no chance to hold it and every try was destined to fail with high casualties as it is a pretty bad terrain for defence in the open desert. Choose the right spots for defence. Alexandria was a much better place, nevertheless never place your air in the second defence row as the first one will always be killed by an enemy attack and then the air will be overrun. Especially as you had seen my 2 Paratroopers near Amman before they prepared for jump. In any case always be ready to give up a defence position that is about to fall. Loosing Egypt (or a few units) is not the end of the game, in contrary...Axis have lots of more desert to give up if necessary and can even get over loosing Africa if you use your forces somewhere else (e.g. Russia) to conquer other territories as compensation. Axis will never be able to hold everything against an able Allied player, so don´t expect them to and don´t be afraid to sacrifice expendable terrain. Be ready to retreat from positions you can not hold or where the enemy achieved a breakthrough and to build up a new defence position at a better place.

1) No - readiness/morale reductions are NOT the same : they depend on the strength points of the attacking air unit. Effect is multiplied, so a str 1 AF only reduces the readiness/morale by 1/10th compared to an AF with str 10 and a str 15 airfleet reduces it 1.5 times the amount. Only supply and HQ support have no influence on the readiness/morale loss - but they will determine how many str points your AF and the enemy target will loose, so they should be as high as possible too . 2) If you liberate a minor nation, then its force pool is reactivated and you can buy additional units for them via the build option where they appear below your home country. So e.g. Germany can build norwegian units if they liberate Norway or Russia can build iraqi/iranian units, UK tunisian units with Tunisia etc if they liberate those countries...for Allies usually not that important as they seldomly reach their build limit, but for Axis pretty valuable and increases the incentive to liberate countries conquered by warmongering Allies... 3) See the thread 2 lines below this at the moment ("Iraq convoy") : Only UK gets mpps via convoi from Iraq, Russia gets no mpps (only indirectly via Archangelsk convoi from UK) - so Allies only get the mpps once and they can be interdicted by subs.

Concerning 1): Originally an allied Norway DoW had political effects. But this has been explicitly removed via patch as it had a bad influence on gameplay (= there simply were no battles in this region). With the removal this area now became a battlefield - before the change it was dead – and that made the games much more interesting :cool: - removed ACTIVATION#1 events for Axis DoW on Denmark and Norway with a subsequent bump in initial US activation from 15-22% - removed ACTIVATION#1 event for an increase in USA % when Allies DoW Norway - lowered ACTIVATION#1 event for an increase in Swedish % when Allies DoW Norway. #TRIGGER was also lowered to 25% 2): Same as for Iraq - only UK gets the mpps via convoi, USA and Russia don´t get them. 2 reasons for this: - with the current game engine / scripts otherwise it could in certain situations happen that Allies would get double mpps - and the intention was when the convois got introduced via patch to allow Axis to raid these convois (players complained Allies did get the mpps magically transfered while historically they had to be transported via ships and could / would have been interdicted by subs). Sub note 1): Same as point 1 – how it is, Allies have an incentive to go for Vichy Algeria and there will often be battles in this region (the incentive is not that high as the amphibious costs nearly offset the advantage, but in perhaps 20-30% of the games you see battles for Vichy Algeria right now ). If you would introduce negative diplomatic effects Allies will simply ignore it like it was earlier with Scandinavia and it is a free be for Axis so they don´t need to hurry any more and can take it with Barbarossa = dead for Mid game battles = bad for the game. Sub note 2): Nice to have, problematic to introduce as Sweden has no Atlantic port (would require to change the map) and no real effect in the game anyway as if Allies conquer Sweden, they need to have naval supremacy which means axis subs couldn´t raid the convois anyway...so only a cosmetical change...if Hubert wants to change it, why not (but then the disadvantage of less mpps for Allies need to be compensated too...convois can´t transfer 100% or player would again complain why Sweden 100% and Norway 60%...opens a new can of worms ) ... in any case: wouldn´t be too high on my priority list . Summary: You can always argue about a lot of things if they are historical or that they should be changed to this or that - but in the end SC2 is a game and you should also always check the consequences for gameplay if you want to actually change something. Lastly the important thing is that both sides have lots of different possibilities where they have to weigh the advantages and disadvantages and the freedom to make their own choices depending on the combat situation so it will be as much fun as possible .