Slitherine

quote:

ORIGINAL: Orm
Many Allied players attack Portugal. With this logic it should be a hefty cost for the Allies to do this. And Italy must DOW Greece or they should be punished. And USSR should not be allowed to DOW Japan until 1945...

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla

quote:

ORIGINAL: Orm
Many Allied players attack Portugal. With this logic it should be a hefty cost for the Allies to do this. And Italy must DOW Greece or they should be punished. And USSR should not be allowed to DOW Japan until 1945...

Well yes, I think there should be a larger cost for DOWing Portugal, and I'm hardly alone in that. Italy is punished if it doesn't attack Greece. Greece is strategically valuable for protecting convoys into North Africa, just as it was in real life. With Greece, the game does model the cost/benefits of war with Greece nicely. And why should Russia be not allowed to attack Japan until 45? Nobody, certainly not me, is saying that Germany should be required to attack Norway. There are in game reasons for Russia to not attack Japan early. If you choose to (as I'm trying in a solo game, or was until Partisans crashed the game again) go to war with Japan early, there are multiple costs. In other words, once again the game models the real life pressures that kept Russia from attacking Japan until the war was virtually over. But those pressures are lacking in Scandinavia. Germany shouldn't be required to attack Norway, but there should be an incentive to do so that mirrors the reasons Germany did in real life.

England expects that every man will do his duty. Horatio Nelson October 1805

quote:

ORIGINAL: warspite1

But what are the historic pressures? The pressure came from what Hitler thought the British would do. The British wanted to stop the Iron Ore traffic.

Neither of those possibilities disappear in MWIF. The British can chose to invade Norway (and Sweden) to stop German access to the Iron Ore. That is no different to Churchill's thinking. If the German player sees that happening he may try and stop it. Same as real life. If the German player sees no threat to Norway he will likely leave well alone.

quote:

ORIGINAL: warspite1

You are obviously ignoring my posts for a reason but cannot think why.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla

quote:

ORIGINAL: Orm
Many Allied players attack Portugal. With this logic it should be a hefty cost for the Allies to do this. And Italy must DOW Greece or they should be punished. And USSR should not be allowed to DOW Japan until 1945...

Well yes, I think there should be a larger cost for DOWing Portugal, and I'm hardly alone in that. Italy is punished if it doesn't attack Greece. Greece is strategically valuable for protecting convoys into North Africa, just as it was in real life. With Greece, the game does model the cost/benefits of war with Greece nicely. And why should Russia be not allowed to attack Japan until 45? Nobody, certainly not me, is saying that Germany should be required to attack Norway. There are in game reasons for Russia to not attack Japan early. If you choose to (as I'm trying in a solo game, or was until Partisans crashed the game again) go to war with Japan early, there are multiple costs. In other words, once again the game models the real life pressures that kept Russia from attacking Japan until the war was virtually over. But those pressures are lacking in Scandinavia. Germany shouldn't be required to attack Norway, but there should be an incentive to do so that mirrors the reasons Germany did in real life.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla

quote:

ORIGINAL: warspite1

But what are the historic pressures? The pressure came from what Hitler thought the British would do. The British wanted to stop the Iron Ore traffic.

Neither of those possibilities disappear in MWIF. The British can chose to invade Norway (and Sweden) to stop German access to the Iron Ore. That is no different to Churchill's thinking. If the German player sees that happening he may try and stop it. Same as real life. If the German player sees no threat to Norway he will likely leave well alone.

The difference is that the game rules tell us that a British invasion of Norway won't stop the resource deliveries most of the time. The game also deemphasizes the importance of Norway in Germany's nuclear weapons program. Certainly the Norwegian heavy water plant factored into both the CW and German invasion plans.

We can argue all day long about how serious the ramifications would have been to the German war effort if the allies had held Narvik - but the decision to go to war, as is true with most decisions of that nature, was based on perception.

England expects that every man will do his duty. Horatio Nelson October 1805

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla
There are in game reasons for Russia to not attack Japan early. If you choose to (as I'm trying in a solo game, or was until Partisans crashed the game again) go to war with Japan early, there are multiple costs.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Orm

quote:

ORIGINAL: warspite1

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla

quote:

ORIGINAL: warspite1

But what are the historic pressures? The pressure came from what Hitler thought the British would do. The British wanted to stop the Iron Ore traffic.

Neither of those possibilities disappear in MWIF. The British can chose to invade Norway (and Sweden) to stop German access to the Iron Ore. That is no different to Churchill's thinking. If the German player sees that happening he may try and stop it. Same as real life. If the German player sees no threat to Norway he will likely leave well alone.

The difference is that the game rules tell us that a British invasion of Norway won't stop the resource deliveries most of the time. The game also deemphasizes the importance of Norway in Germany's nuclear weapons program. Certainly the Norwegian heavy water plant factored into both the CW and German invasion plans.

We can argue all day long about how serious the ramifications would have been to the German war effort if the allies had held Narvik - but the decision to go to war, as is true with most decisions of that nature, was based on perception.

warspite1

And a British invasion of Norway would not have stopped delivery most of the time in real life. The plan required British troops to move into Sweden (on the way to helping the Finns of course) and occupy the Iron Ore fields.

quote:

ORIGINAL: paulderynck

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla
There are in game reasons for Russia to not attack Japan early. If you choose to (as I'm trying in a solo game, or was until Partisans crashed the game again) go to war with Japan early, there are multiple costs.

Could you please post something in Tech Support on your partisan crashes. There are a couple threads there about partisans but I don't know the details on yours. They're likely in the AAR but I collect the issues for Steve from the Tech Support forum and unfortunately don't have enough time to catch items in the other sub-forums.

Thanks.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla


It's on both. Churchill thought "hey, if we invade Norway, we can stop those iron ore shipments. Let's invade!" Turns out he might have been wrong (although really all we can do is speculate). Germany thought "Hey, if they invade Norway, they're going to stop our iron ore shipments. We better invade first!" In WiF, the British player thinks "Hey, if I invade Norway, I might get lucky enough to stop the occasional iron ore shipment. Seems like a lot of risk for very little reward. I'll pass." and the German player thinks "Hey, if the CW invades Norway, it might cost me an occasional ore shipment, but I'll gain US entry benefits, free naval units, he'll lose some units, and I can still march into Oslo or defend Narvik. Don't let me get in your way, Churchill"

quote:

ORIGINAL: Orm

Churchill thought that "if we invade Norway and Sweden then we can stop those ore shipments."

It is no speculation that Narvik was not needed to ship the ore to Germany. After the invasion almost no ore was shipped through Narvik and the ore shipments increased. It all went through Swedish ports. Narvik was to damaged after the fighting to ship the ore.


Edit: I hope that no offence was taken by my posts. It was not my intention.

quote:

ORIGINAL: brian brian

I think one of the reasons Norway loses significance is the generic nature of the resource hexes in WiF. A lot of those hexes, perhaps a majority of them, are coal mines. Only a few of them are Iron Ore mines. Germany couldn't get Iron Ore in just any hex with a little pick and shovel in it. You need several things to make steel…the Swedish ore was extremely important to Germany - it could not be replaced by taking the coal mine hex in the Ukraine. And in particular it was a high quality ore, superior to many other sources Germany could access.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla

quote:

ORIGINAL: Orm

Churchill thought that "if we invade Norway and Sweden then we can stop those ore shipments."

It is no speculation that Narvik was not needed to ship the ore to Germany. After the invasion almost no ore was shipped through Narvik and the ore shipments increased. It all went through Swedish ports. Narvik was to damaged after the fighting to ship the ore.


Edit: I hope that no offence was taken by my posts. It was not my intention.

No offense taken - we're just arguing about different things. I'm not nearly as well versed on the ins and outs of the Norwegian campaign, or just how effective the allies would have or could have been in shutting down the ore shipments as you or Warspite or any of the others arguing here. It just isn't relevant to my argument (my assertion that it's all speculative is really a tangential comment). My argument is that the strategic thinking in Berlin and London was based on perceptions, and that removing those perceptions from our own British and German commanders takes us out of the realm of world war two and into the realm of fantasy. The difference between that and a variant where England and Germany align to divide up France before the Italian/Russian alliance takes them out is really only a matter of scale.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Klydon

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zartacla

quote:

ORIGINAL: Orm

Churchill thought that "if we invade Norway and Sweden then we can stop those ore shipments."

It is no speculation that Narvik was not needed to ship the ore to Germany. After the invasion almost no ore was shipped through Narvik and the ore shipments increased. It all went through Swedish ports. Narvik was to damaged after the fighting to ship the ore.


Edit: I hope that no offence was taken by my posts. It was not my intention.

No offense taken - we're just arguing about different things. I'm not nearly as well versed on the ins and outs of the Norwegian campaign, or just how effective the allies would have or could have been in shutting down the ore shipments as you or Warspite or any of the others arguing here. It just isn't relevant to my argument (my assertion that it's all speculative is really a tangential comment). My argument is that the strategic thinking in Berlin and London was based on perceptions, and that removing those perceptions from our own British and German commanders takes us out of the realm of world war two and into the realm of fantasy. The difference between that and a variant where England and Germany align to divide up France before the Italian/Russian alliance takes them out is really only a matter of scale.

One of the differences is that Hitler or Churchill didn't know the rules about what would be the result if they occupied Norway or what would happen in terms of shipping the ore. Players playing a game, be it WiF, MWiF or whatever, will know when they do X in terms of something like a invasion of Norway for specific reasons, then Y will likely occur as a result. The rules in WiF/MWiF are such that the impact on Swedish ore getting to Germany will be minimal, even if Norway is occupied by the CW. This appears to be based on the fact that Narvik wasn't used hardly at all after being captured; IE, it turned out not to be as big of a deal as a port for the ore because other ways were found to get it delivered.

It would have taken the CW first invading and occupying Norway and then invading Sweden in the ore fields to effectively stop the ore shipments. What would have happen as a result of all this is very unclear because it would be speculation since it never happen. I have to believe many neutral nations would have looked at the CW in a very harsh light if they ever had tried such a thing.

quote:

ORIGINAL: micheljq

I believe it is worth attacking by the allies because if they occupy Narvik in that game, then Germany lose the swedish resources when turn ends with blizzard or snow weather. That's 3 resources lost, potentially in winter turns.

One resource easy to take and to ship to Great Britain.

Norway is a good base to place NAV airplanes and threaten the german convoys in the baltic, namely those shipping the 3 swedish resources. Also a good base for placing strategic bombers and threaten almost all of Germany.

A good move is to invade Norway just after Germany began Barbarossa and is too busy in USSR. He hardly can afford naval or combined actions at this point to help Norway, that would have an impact on his invasion of USSR.

Historically the british were pressuring Norway a lot. Churchill had plans for an invasion he even had plans for an invasion of the iron ore mines in Sweden but he was not supported in those plans. Churchill sometimes had strange ideas, remember the Dardanelles?

Michel.

England expects that every man will do his duty. Horatio Nelson October 1805