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EUBanana -> RE: This is War King 'Nana! (9/15/2007 8:07:53 PM)
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On the Western Front I kept a pretty solid line between your forces and Paris at all times.
Casualties were acceptable in the French Army in my northern force (the guys who got cut off around Dijon had a rough time) - there were a lot of shattered units behind the front but I didn't feel like the front was seriously threatened at any point.
Needless to say all those shattered units were digging trenches, so my defensive line was 2 or 3 hexes deep at all times.
When we reached stalemate after the BEF had stabilised the line, I had three choices on the Western Front really.
a) Drive down from Verdun towards the Swiss border and cut you off
b) Sit tight, conduct attritional warfare with artillery barrages but few attacks
c) recapture the lost ground and drive the Germans back to the border by main force.
a) would have required a major redeployment of my forces, as the BEF alone had the offensive power to accomplish such a move. That would've taken a few turns and likely told you what was going on. Given I figured it would be a high risk, high casualty option, I discarded that.
b) was tempting, but Entente food and raw material supplies at this point were bad indeed. This was about the same time the Uboats were ripping me apart, and French industry was down to 7 or 8 points a turn. So not an option.
In the end I went for c), on the grounds that no redeployment was necessary and only limited gains were required to recapture the resource hexes that I'd lost. Turned out it was a harder slog than I expected, so it was likely the best choice.
On the Eastern Front my initial plan was to secure Poland by taking Danzig and Konigsberg, and soon as that was done, drive SW from Poland towards Vienna. Vienna is only 4 hexes from the border, after all. The securing Poland bit was fine, the drive to Vienna was stopped 2 hexes away. But it proved to be such a serious threat to the CPs that I saw German troops defending around Vienna very early in the game, like Jan 1915 ish. I considered that pretty good going.
Russia had serious HQ issues pretty much throughout the game, but I had no spare industry to deal with them. Their arms reserves were actually pretty adequate, I had some smashed up A corps behind the lines but not very many, and almost all the Russian attacks were conducted with full strength or nearly full strength A corps. I guess that just showed where my industrial priorities were.
The naval war I managed to screw up horrifically. You should have continued the sub offensive as at the time I had no counter to it. I noticed one sub got 2 hits from a French DD, was it that that put you off? In any case two more rounds of that and Britain woulda been toast.
The opportunity soon passed you by though as when I realised the error of my ways I bought ~100 naval assets as Britain and kept them well topped up despite a major transport building program. I went from a low point of 5 British transports to at the end having about 15 as a result (thats kinda why the BEF paused when they reached Metz). Progress would have continued on the western front anyway though IMO as the BEF was mostly entirely fresh, so the lack of an arms stockpile wouldnt have mattered.
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