Best Axis strategy again ;)

[MrWinterbottom]

And oh yea.. The British sending some of their fleets AWAY from britain to the med would actually work to the Axis advantage.

More direct pressure on Britain through the sealanes and all that.. Not to mention an actual invasion of the isles.

[MrWinterbottom]

Originally posted by Straha:

I propose that, for gameplay reasons, even if the British homeland is Axis occupied, the UK should not surrender as long as Egypt is not also gone.

Straha

Actually, that is the way it worked with Clash Of Steel. They didn't surrender untill Egypt was taken as well.

And I happen to agree with that. It makes sense.

[Norse]

Originally posted by MrWinterbottom:

Yea.. I can see what you mean.. but there are a couple of downsides to this.. First off.. I can imagine that the allies declaring war on Italy will postpone the entry of war for both the USSR and the USA. Secondly, that would open a new southern front for the Axis with Italy - Southern France, meaning that the french would have to put some extra troops down there just in case. Thus increasing the pressure on France.

The southern option with iraq - USSR would be a great advantage for the axis.

Therefore I think that any long term thinking Allied player must hold on to Egypt and he also would think twice about actually declaring war on Italy due to the political fallout.

You are right with the politics. But what about this, UK can keep her own on the seas in the north-atlantic for as long as France lives, I mean the Royal Navy is pretty big, Germany can't really knock that out before France is taken (atleast I don't see this happening).

So it is safe for the French player to simply send the 3 battleships down into the med, leaving 4 french battleships in the med. Group thoose 4 French battleships together with the Royal navy (including the 1 battleship from Gibraltar, and maybe 1 from Britain), and put all the ships real close to where the Italian ships will start once Italy joins the war.

When it is apparent that France will fall, then declare war on Italy (unless Italy declares war on the allies, which is better from the allied point of view), and the combined allied fleet can sink most of the Italian fleet and severly cripple Italy from the very beginning!

Even when France surrenders now and the French battleships are removed from game, will you still go for Egypt as the Italians?

Perhaps now you see my point, Italy *needs* a fleet. USA will join shortly, and unless UK is knocked out by Jerry, then Italy will be up for a tough ride with the naval battles.

I still don't think Egypt is where Italy needs to focus and spend MPP's. Perhaps you can convince me otherwise, but I think Italy needs a navy and needs to make it over to Gibraltar to shut the med-sea off for the allies. Then we can talk about Egypt, Irak, and southern-Russia. The Italian fleet can then go into the atlantic and help the German navy there, preventing USA / UK from getting an early shot on the D-Day.

This is what I think, if you disagree then Id like to hear your point of view again (since Im looking for the best axis strategy ya know:P Id like to hear your opinion on the matter).

~Norse~

[Canuck_para]

Originally posted by MrWinterbottom:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Straha:

I propose that, for gameplay reasons, even if the British homeland is Axis occupied, the UK should not surrender as long as Egypt is not also gone.

Straha

Actually, that is the way it worked with Clash Of Steel. They didn't surrender untill Egypt was taken as well.

And I happen to agree with that. It makes sense.</font>

[husky65]

Originally posted by Canuck_para:

The Brits should just move their govt to Canada. Then they can still fight in Egypt as well as other locations, as I think they would have done if The Brtitish Isles fell. I really doubt if the Brit navy would have just packed it in.

[Straha]

I would not support the fight-on-from-Canada solution. Once the UK is overrun, the Brits are done. Of course, one can always nominally "fight on" with a government in exile, but there is a point where this becomes just symbolic.

That I want to include Egypt in the surrender conditions is solely for gameplay reasons: there´s too much in favor of Sealion already anyway (at least against the computer), so I think the Axis player who chooses Sealion should at least not get Egypt and the path to the oilfields as a bonus for free ...

Straha

[Bruce70]

Would it be reasonable for Egypt to revert to being a neutral after the UK falls?

[Silvercloud]

It is difficult enough to take britain to allow them to have canada as a retreat base!

Note that letting Egypt revert to neutral would not be advisable, as realistically speaking the germans could just waltz in there bar for the fact that the English were defending it (which they would prob not do when UK was taken). What I see as feasable would be to conquer the territory, but treat the remaining brits there as partizans?

[Canuck_para]

Originally posted by husky65:

I think you would have to say that the Brits would be almost entirely ineffective after losing the UK, their major source of troops, materiel, repair equipment, docks, ammunition all gone - at best you'd have the Brit cabinet, the royals and the RN in Canada - with almost no ability to maintain the RN (Canada was stretched to service their own rapidly growing fleet).

I suspect that a lot of troops in Egypt would have been withdrawnto India and Australia (who had their own problems looming on the horizion and knew it).

What do you think the Brits would have done if the US was in the war when the UK fell. Surely the Brits would have gone to Canada and been armed by the US and Canada. You talk about the troops going to India and Australia but there were no great arms factories there that could have kept the units supplied for long.

[Canuck_para]

Originally posted by Silvercloud:

It is difficult enough to take britain to allow them to have canada as a retreat base!

Note that letting Egypt revert to neutral would not be advisable, as realistically speaking the germans could just waltz in there bar for the fact that the English were defending it (which they would prob not do when UK was taken). What I see as feasable would be to conquer the territory, but treat the remaining brits there as partizans?

I am not advocating that the Brits are still an independant nation, I think they should be treated like the Free French until the UK is liberated again. Maybe British colonies could either surrender or fight on based on certain factors.

Of course my Brits won't be defeated so this is a moot point.

[Desert Dave]

Have been trying my darndest to come up with a good rationale for taking Egypt/Alexandria, and I wonder...

Let's say you by-pass Egypt and take those gushing oil-wells of Iraq, thereby setting up the possibility of slowly, painstakingly climbing that single mountainous hex into southern Russia (... an alert Russian player could keep you bottled up there for quite some time, probably with only one army, but that's another debate... ).

Anyway, would you even receive those MPPs from Iraq unless you controlled an outlet-port to ship them to Germany or Italy? :confused:

There is no port in the vicinity except for Alexandria, and there is no continuous-hex land route (say, to Tobruk, and then overseas) if Egypt hasn't been taken.

I cannot remember the supply rules concerning this issue (and even if I did, it would do me little good since I have this mental-block about how that supply mechanism works :eek: ), but IIRC, you need a viable route to your home country Capital?

Therefore, is it IMPERATIVE to take Alexandria in order to receive those MPPs from Iraq? (though, you do receive the plunder immediately, so that must be different than the usual supply route?)

[MrWinterbottom]

Originally posted by Norse:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by MrWinterbottom:

blah blah

*snip* This is what I think, if you disagree then Id like to hear your point of view again (since Im looking for the best axis strategy ya know:P Id like to hear your opinion on the matter).

~Norse~</font>

[Bruce70]

Let's say you by-pass Egypt and take those gushing oil-wells of Iraq, thereby setting up the possibility of slowly, painstakingly climbing that single mountainous hex into southern Russia (... an alert Russian player could keep you bottled up there for quite some time, probably with only one army, but that's another debate... ).

I have tried this and have found it hard to get very far (within the time-frame of the demo)although the oil-wells are nice, and I am pretty sure you do get there MPPs even without Alexandria.

You can put a lot more pressure of Russia if you attack Turkey (you don't need to take the captial). You can then land troops anywhere along the southern coast of Russia and take all the mines there in a couple of turns. I've only tried this once and used tanks and a HQ when a few corps would have done the job but was very successful anyway. A refined approach would easily see Russia fall in the demo and it is arguably a less gamey approach than the surround Moscow one. Of course since you only need a few corps you could easily combine this with an attack on Moscow.

[ July 10, 2002, 09:08 PM: Message edited by: Bruce70 ]

[Norse]

Originally posted by Bruce70:

As far as I know, Turkey is an axis-minor. Hm, trying to remember which book I read this in (I can find it out if it is neccesary), the German generals argued to attack south and go into Cacasus not only for the oil, but so Turkey would join the war on the axis side. Turkey and Spain are two axis minors that could have joined the axis in the war, if they had done alittle better, and they can join you in this game.

[husky65]

Originally posted by Canuck_para:

"What do you think the Brits would have done if the US was in the war when the UK fell. Surely the Brits would have gone to Canada and been armed by the US and Canada."

How would you move them? all you get is the RN and the US doesn't use the same kit as the RN + Canada is busy building their own navy, so they have little excess to cater for the RN.

"You talk about the troops going to India and Australia but there were no great arms factories there that could have kept the units supplied for long."

Would you like to bet on it?

[Canuck_para]

Originally posted by husky65:

How would I move the Brits from the UK, surely there were transports that could have brought men over, if not the equipment. As for the RN, Canada had some pretty big ports that could have dealt with most ships. As for them using different eqpt from the US, this does not make them useless. Refits could have occured.

As to the arms factoried in Australia and India, maybe you can fill me in on these. I admit to knowing nothing and wonder what the production capacity was, particularly compared to Canada. I would like some facts if you have them.

Cheers

[santek]

Originally posted by Straha:

I propose that, for gameplay reasons, even if the British homeland is Axis occupied, the UK should not surrender as long as Egypt is not also gone.

Straha

Are you joking or English? England would have surrendered after a week of fight if the Germans had decided to go ahead with their invasion plans. And many be all europe would speak German. Just look at what happened in Jersay Guernosey...

[Straha]

Originally posted by santek:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Straha:

I propose that, for gameplay reasons, even if the British homeland is Axis occupied, the UK should not surrender as long as Egypt is not also gone.

Straha

Are you joking or English? England would have surrendered after a week of fight if the Germans had decided to go ahead with their invasion plans. And many be all europe would speak German. Just look at what happened in Jersay Guernosey... </font>

[husky65]

Originally posted by Canuck_para:

"would I move the Brits from the UK, surely there were transports that could have brought men over, if not the equipment."

You seem to forget that the Brits would be under extreme pressure if they were even thinking about surrender, the priority would be to unload transports and get them out of the way, not load troops that were needed at the front line holding back the Germans, you are looking at a dunkirk where the troops don't want out, there are way less ships, little air cover and all the ships are bigger targets for the luftwaffe.

"As for the RN, Canada had some pretty big ports that could have dealt with most ships. As for them using different eqpt from the US, this does not make them useless. Refits could have occured."

The need for massive refits takes them out of the war for years, the need to rely on US supplies means that they go where they are told and do as they are told by the US.

"As to the arms factoried in Australia and India, maybe you can fill me in on these. I admit to knowing nothing and wonder what the production capacity was, particularly compared to Canada. I would like some facts if you have them."

Australia produced Small arms, AT guns, Arty, Mortars (ammunition for all of them), Armoured Carriers, Armoured Recce Veh, Med Tanks, Mines, Bombs, Torpedoes, Depth Charges, aircraft, [oops Corvettes, not Frigates - edit], radars, AA guns - the list is extensive.

I don't have the time to reproduce the quote but Truman, in his post war report on Lend Lease to congress pointed out that Australia supplied the same value of goods to the USA as the USA supplied to Aust.

[ July 12, 2002, 05:23 AM: Message edited by: husky65 ]

[Brian Rock]

Interesting that you had such success with subs. My meagre forays ended up with lots of expensive metal on the bottom of the North Sea - except for the Italians who terrorised British Mediterranean shipping.