Thoughts through early 1942

[Fintilgin]

Just some observations so far. Started as Axis in 1939. I'm playing on normal/normal as an intro to the game. Germany has gone through it's normal route. Took Poland, France, & Scandinavia on the historical schedule. Invaded Russia in spring 1941 and reached roughly historical lines with the bonus of taking Leningrad in the early winter.

The biggest thing I noticed as the Germans is that the AI seems to have given up on trying to stop my subs and I've gotten a LOT of subs for free. I don't know where the British navy is or what it's doing, but it's not protecting its convoy lines. I have the Bismark and a couple subs parked on the line from Canada, four subs parked on the Murmansk line, one sub in the Indian ocean parked on the convoy line near the Maldives, and a couple cruisers and subs around South Africa, cutting off it's convoy line and Australia as well.

Except for a single destroyer near South Africa I haven't seen any allied response to my subs/raiders for nearly a year. I'm not even moving my guys any more, they just sit on the convoy lines and rack up kills. I've lost a couple subs, haven't bought any, and haven't sunk any British ships. Odd.

Despite my taking a bunch of damage from the Russian winter, being a bit overextended, and having some badly damaged units on the front line (a 4 tank, some 5 infantry) the Russian AI didn't counterattack, and instead was pulling back along the line. I also noticed the AI had built two forts in front of Moscow, but hadn't bothered to garrison them, with their forces in and behind Moscow. I didn't have the strength to attack Moscow itself, but I did dash some units forward into the unguarded forts to destroy them before pulling back to my defensive lines for the winter. I could see they had enough units to garrison those forts, but they had their units behind the city instead of in front of it. Like the Brits, the Russian AI just doesn't seem very aggressive.

Speaking of that, as Japan I decided to largely pull out of China. I figured it was a huge grind and sink of production points, though I thought I'd fight defensively there to let me advance further in the Pacific. The Chinese AI doesn't seem to be able to handle this strategy. My forces had abandoned most of China by the spring of 1940 and established a strong defensive line near Peking. I figured this would be an area of heavy conflict and was ready to hold off the Chinese there. No Chinese unit has approached Peking or advanced next to any of my defending units for two years. In fact, the Chinese AI seemed almost scared to advance into the cities I left empty. They parked units next to a few of them for several turns before finally taking them. In fact, Tsingtao is STILL empty two years later. I still control it despite pulling all units out of China south of Peking. I guess the Chinese and I have an unofficial cease fire.

My army from China has redeployed across the Pacific. I chose not to attack Indochina, so as not to open another front with China and instead invaded Thailand and Singpore by sea. I should have brought a bit more force to that area, though. As of March 1942, the Dutch East Indies surrendered, but I'm not making much progress against Singapore, and my invasion of the Philipenes is going poorly. But, on the bright side, I've conquered New Guinea, Hawaii, and Alaska! Engineers are moving into Fairbanks now to fortify against the inevitable American counterattack, and my six high-tech carriers are heading back from Hawaii and Alaska to assist in the Phillipenes.

Other then that I thought the base Strategic Command map of Europe was a bit small, so the Global Conflict micro-Europe is a bit painful. But the game still has that 'one more turn' feeling and for the last two or three hours each turn was going to be my last for the evening, so I'm having fun.

[Hubert Cater]

For the subs there might be a bug there and I'll take a look at that. Can you send me a saved turn so I could see what is going on? Send to support@furysoftware.com

For the situation in China, part of the problem is the tight spaces and limited AP. Often the AI might not have the range you would expect it to have to capture cities until the following turn but you are also right that this is likely a situation the AI was not entirely prepared for as it is mostly scripted to be on the expected defensive. I can look to make an adjustment here as well.

Otherwise glad to hear you are enjoying the game

Hubert

[bowenw]

I cant answer for China attacking you but I pulled back a hex or two to concentrate on the upcoming war with the USA and England. The AI was pretty aggresive with its destroyers in the sub war in W&W but not so much in the Global, one thing I did as the allies against the german subs AI in WAW was never to go after them until I researched a 2 or 3 for my destroyers my cruisers and my carriers, it is aggravating to watch your mps go down to the ocean bottom but I came to an caculating decision, it is better to lose 10, 15 or even 30 mps a turn than to have to rebuild points for a carrier, battleship, cruiser or destroyer and it seems to work out very well as the game progresses.

Bo

[Fintilgin]

I sent the wrong save game at first, the correct one is the 1942-2-15.sav file which I sent second. Sorry for the confusion!

[Hubert Cater]

Thanks and I will take a look this week

[Fintilgin]

They finally came out in massive force and knocked me off the Canada/US line around September of 1942. No sign of activity near India or South America, though.

[Hubert Cater]

Ok good to hear there was at least some response

[krrpt]

Just to chime on here on subs: I'm noticing the same issue. Subs and cruisers can sit on convey routes totally unmolested. I moved a few subs toward port to upgrade them and ran into destroyers that were apparently just sitting idle a few squares away for multiple turns not bothering to attack the subs.

[Bill101]

They finally came out in massive force and knocked me off the Canada/US line around September of 1942. No sign of activity near India or South America, though.

Funnily enough some of this matches my multiplayer experience, where the Allies have had to grin and bear it for a while because if they were to send in their fleets against massed U-Boats it would be a real mistake. The period 1940 through to the USA entering the war is the worst, just as in real life when Britain stood alone, and only then can the UK and USA launch a major campaign to deal with all the raiders and U-Boats interdicting their convoy lanes.

While some AI adjustments may be necessary, the good thing in this game is that we really do get a Battle of the Atlantic, just as in real life, whereas in previous SC games it didn't always happen. That's the reason why Germany now receives a number of U-Boats throughout the early years of the war, so that she can afford to be a major pain in the UK's neck while also preparing for Barbarossa.

[Fintilgin]

Yeah, I admit I do like the free uboats. I never, ever built any against the AI because my attitude is that the war is won or lost in Russia and I focus all my resources there. It's nice to be able to harass England now.

[Hubert Cater]

Just to chime on here on subs: I'm noticing the same issue. Subs and cruisers can sit on convey routes totally unmolested. I moved a few subs toward port to upgrade them and ran into destroyers that were apparently just sitting idle a few squares away for multiple turns not bothering to attack the subs.

I think this is part of the partial bug I've noticed looking at Fintilgin's turn and I will correct this for the first patch. Additionally the AI receives a few bonus Destroyers at the higher difficulty levels so if playing at anything less than Intermediate the Axis are likely to have a better time in the Atlantic than they would when playing with more difficulty.

Thanks,

Hubert

[Hubert Cater]

Yeah, I admit I do like the free uboats. I never, ever built any against the AI because my attitude is that the war is won or lost in Russia and I focus all my resources there. It's nice to be able to harass England now.

We debated this one and the final reasoning was that since the first SC2 release we hoped Axis players would make the choice between playing for the Battle of the Atlantic or a Victory in Russia. Seems as though hardly anyone ever made this choice, i.e. pretty much everyone plays for Russia so we felt it was finally time to add a few extra U-Boats to make the game interesting in the Atlantic once and for all.

Glad to hear you like the change as well

Hubert