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brian brian -> RE: MWiF Global War Hot-Seat (AAR) (11/24/2011 8:04:14 PM)
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hey there, Happy Thanksgiving! It sure is nice watching my football team looking so good after so many years of futility......half-time now, I wish they would have canned Nickelback. Yuck.
going back to the USE situation in this game, I thought you had already played N/D 39 and most of the DOWs, including on Belgium, had happened then. I can only check in here every few days, and frequently on a dial-up too poor to wait for all the pictures. So as for how to play or not play with the USE system, there are several things I would do differently. I would never DOW anyone in N/D 39 as the Axis most likely.....just too much risk of a high USE chit, a risk that lowers substantially just one turn later. So two DOW and two alignments on that turn would not be a good idea. Similarly, I don't think I would ever issue two Italian DOWs on the West.....either way, you are handing things to the Allies, either a 2nd USE chit, or letting the CW do their own declaration and surprise impulse during the Italian war with France, at a somewhat lower cost, USE wise.
A small thing that contributed to the USE mess the Axis are facing now, is the Japanese alignment of Siam. A small chance of a chit, but chit values are huge in 1939, and of course magnified greatly in MWiF as we see in this game once again with the US holding 4 four chits and 1 five chit.....nearly astronomically impossible with cardboard chits, substantially less so with unlimited chits....so this is yet another MWiF game with a probability spike in this key game system. But anyway, that decision was the same as the decision to reinforce Gibraltar rather than France......you are responding to future threats far too early. For Siam, unless the CW infantry division is in range to land, there is no need at all to align Siam in 1939. Late 1940 is a far better choice. For that matter, I would probably let a silly Allied player take a 50% shot of a USE hit and do the Declaration and then sail any odd Peacekeeper available into Bangkok....a good Japanese always has troops in port waiting for the Russians to hand them the free oil in Persia, and a single 1-4 INF division can't land in Bangkok on it's own, and I believe it is no longer a land-able hex on the MWiF map anyway. There is little chance the CW can spare the troops to actually take Siam with any unit in Bangkok, and even if they do....so what? They can hardly defend the place either as it has no overland supply links, and the Japanese will soon become the absolute masters of the South China Sea for years to come. On the Japanese surprise impulse they can land anywhere on the Malayan peninsula they choose. So in World in Flames, while you do have to keep your enemy's potential moves in your plans, responding to them too early costs too much at the current front.
Also, for your Med strategy involving aligning Yugoslavia ... what happens if the Russians don't demand Bessarabia? This is part of the question of playing solitaire each side as best as possible, or playing a test game to see what happens when you combine certain decisions on each side. I see you doing much more of the latter, making decisions for one side based on already knowing what the other side is going to do. An educational way to learn the game, to be sure, but not something you can use in a real game. One small example of that was setting up the CW pipelines knowing the Netherlands would be in the game on the first turn. What if the Germans hadn't attacked the Netherlands until late 41/early 42?
Moving the Pacific Fleet to Pearl Habor was a very good choice for the long run....however that is a tricky option to learn. You can't manipulate tension until all of the 10 ships are actually in Pearl Harbor. And it takes four impulses just to get them out to sea, and at least one end-of-turn Return to base phase to get the Fleet into port. And the US Entry phase comes before the Return to Base phase. So the best way to play this option is to decide it mentally the turn before, and then slowly send the US BBs out to sea before you play it. Oil cost is irrelevant to a neutral US not yet loaning out resources to the West, so you might as well make the Japanese sweat with any naval moves not needed for reinforcements.... but unless it is a very long summer turn of 7 impulses for the Allies, it is impossible to get the whole Fleet to Pearl all in one turn on time to manipulate Tension the turn after you play this option.
I do think France First is a valid Axis strategy choice. But you makes your choices and you take your chances. A 1st US Gear-up in J/F 1940 is a heavy, heavy price to pay and by 1943 the Axis will be experiencing Shock & Awe. On the Allied side, they have to prepare for it during set-up before the Germans. To just ignore it once the Germans pull the trigger, well, the Allies will be living in interesting times in this game. A key Allied response is to use their surprise impulse bonus die on each ground strike to flip any German HQs in the West. My French bomber once got one of the dice to ring up the lucky "1" on Rundstedt in the woods on the second impulse. The German player eventually blamed his loss of the game on that. It is a very high risk strategy.
Someone mentioned learning to select ships when putting together a task force. One of the more annoying types of opponents I have played is the one who puts all their sea-box forces together based on maximizing their factors on the combat charts. That's OK on your own time in an email game. In person, factor counters drive me nuts and my favorite rule in wargaming ever I think has been fractional odds for land combat in WiF. Just throw in a unit and it helps. The naval system doesn't have that. There are two easy things to learn....always send out 2, 4, 7, or 11 ships to a box. 3, 5, or 8 are bad choices. Also, when selecting ships, send the ones with more AA factors to the sea zones where they will face air attack. So the USN and RN need to keep their low AA ships in the Atlantic, their high AA ships in the Med. The Japanese need the high AA ships in the Central Pacific or wherever they expect to face the main American CV fleet, and the low AA ships escorting things in interior areas.
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