900 yeAARs of AARs (part 4)

[Kuipy]

900 yeAARs of AARs

A CKDV-EU3:IN-Ricky-HoI2:DD multiplayer megacampaign
Episode 4 : Hearts of Iron 2 Armageddon
(previous episode)
(game thread)

Here comes the fourth and last episode of the collaborative AAR of our ongoing Megacampaign.

[Kuipy]

TABLE OF CONTENTS

The game at a glance

First session : January '36 - May '37

• ccbasin (Malacca) : Malacca AAR January 1st 1936 to Febuary 2, 1937
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Enters Lovell Grant
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The partition of Russia, part 1
• Kuipy (Normandy) : January 15th, 1998

Second session : May '37 - July '38

• Blackmist (France) : France's Neighbors Go To War
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The partition of Russia, part 2
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Secret Messages
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The Crazy War, onset
• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : (maps)
• Blackmist (France) : IC summaries
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The Crazy War, early victories
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The Crazy War, first setbacks
• The World on July 1938
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Pacific Warriors
• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : (maps)
• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : a pic of the Greek Cabinet

Third session : July '38 - May '39

• The World on May 1939
• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : Mupdate
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Desertor
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The Crazy War, blood and toil

Fourth session : May '39 - June '40

• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : Mupdate
• The World on June 1940
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The Crazy War, giving up
• Blackmist (France) : The War of Opportunity
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Diary of Emperor Diomedes II
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Bois-Guilbert was right

Fifth session : June '40 - September '41

• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : Mupdate
• The World on September 1941
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The Crazy War, kicking the tiger in the balls
• Kuipy (Normandy) : General Rollon plots again
• Blackmist (France) : The Asian Campaign

Sixth session : September '41 - March '43

• Kuipy (Normandy) : The Crazy War, wrapping up
• The World on March 1943
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Shooting tigers
• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : IC Update

Seventh session : March '43 - July '44

• The World on July '44
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The wounded man
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Havana, 1944
• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : Byzantium (Yoshi and his awesome titles...)

Eighth session : July '44 - July '45

• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : The months between November 1944 and May 1945
• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : Mupdate
• The World on July '45
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Characters meet

Ninth session : July '45 - May '46

• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : Tidbits from the last session
• The World on May '46
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The Reconquest of North America

Tenth & Eleventh session : May '46 - July '48

• Orange Yoshi (Byzantium) : (no title)
• The World on June 1947
• Kuipy (Normandy) : Exposing the plot
• The World on June 1948 (endgame)
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The War to end all wars
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The last AAR (1/5)
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The last AAR (2/5)
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The last AAR (3/5)
• Kuipy (Normandy) : An interesting point : how many Normandies are there around ?
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The last AAR (4/5)
• Kuipy (Normandy) : The last AAR (5/5)

[Kuipy]

THE GAME AT A GLANCE

A visual summary of this episode, which I'll try to periodically update.

A map of the World in 1936 :




A map of the World in 1948 :

[Kuipy]

reserved just in case.

[OrangeYoshi]

Reserved so I have the first non-Kuipy post.

[KaiserMuffin]

I'm gonna go with... OOOOO

[Enewald]

I'm still on the board.

[Ccbasin]

Good job with the map Kuipy.

For anyone new, I am the Malacca player and a complete HOI newb. I am sure some of my decisions will be interesting.

[Xesan]

can you tell me where to get a blank version of that map?

[ColonelIronboot]

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/....php?p=7912380

There we go! Thanks toCrackdToothGrin.

[Ccbasin]

THis will be a simple AAR for Malacca. Our first HOI MP session was not that action packed.

Some of you may be wondering, What are these guys using for tech teams?? Well, each one of our players drafted a country specific tech team from the Abyss scenario. Malacca got the Japanese Tech Teams.

The best part of the session was watching the Malaccan Army triple in size. We also saw rapid Industrial Growth due to the Kawasaki Heavy Industries. Our first ships of our expanded navy have also been started.

Next weeks session will have the first screen shots.

Edit:Ok, a little effort will show Malacca's northern border. Both I and the Mughals have critical provinces in China so there is plenty of strength for both of us there.

[keanucange]

oh man with the netherlands holding the best regions of Europe and able to conquer japan you are all going to have a bitching time
is this up until 1960?

I think this is the strength imo

Normans, Dutch, French, mughals, Bzyantine empire (africa and middle east are virtually useless in hoi2) Indonesia (or well malacca) the most manpowerless regions. unless some regions are edited. not sure if you did that

[Kuipy]

No the actual order is :

France

Mughals






Byzantium
Normandy
Netherlands, Indonesia

the minors



with the provision that although Mughalistan is a monster some other nations (yours truly included) are holding it by the particulars. If the ressource influx from abroad ever stops its industrial collapse will be ugly to behold. Wether he can or not make up for that by conquering good enough targets fast enough is an interesting quetsion, left, for the moment, to the imagination of readers.

[Narmon]

oh man with the netherlands holding the best regions of Europe and able to conquer japan you are all going to have a bitching time
is this up until 1960?

I think this is the strength imo

Best regions in Vanilla. This is a conversed game from a megacampaign, and I have the second lowest IC in the World and shitty manpower.

Also The Dutch have been renamed to Germany

[Ccbasin]

oh man with the netherlands holding the best regions of Europe and able to conquer japan you are all going to have a bitching time
is this up until 1960?

I think this is the strength imo

Normans, Dutch, French, mughals, Bzyantine empire (africa and middle east are virtually useless in hoi2) Indonesia (or well malacca) the most manpowerless regions. unless some regions are edited. not sure if you did that

The Mughals let slip that he was getting five manpower per day. Whether that is true or propaganda who knows. It does underscore why most of my attention is on our border.

[Kuipy]

Enters Lovell Grant

Kuipy (Normandy)

There was no understanding Lovell's presence here. Sure, the job we tringlos did in Bhopal was important, "holding the tiger by his leash" as Bois-Guilbert put it, or, as we rank and file would rather say, "by the balls". Coal, steel, rubber, nickel,copper, military-grade optics, cotton, even wood transited from us by the thousand of tons daily by road and rail, from the ports of Cuttack and Calicut, and onward to the heart of the Mughal Empire. We ceaselessly pumped its lifeblood into Asian industries, ensuring the sultans' compliance with our policy, and making a handy profit out of it.

But Lovell Brown, despite his uncanny efficiency at managing stocks and shipments (as would later transpire, he had a flair for success, a knack for mastering things at his first try, often by instinct and sheer luck rather than calculation, never mind work) had no place among us. The man was a big blue-eyed, red-bearded rascal, with the strength of a bull and a temper to match, and he made no mystery of the fact that he would have preferred being in a combat unit to counting beans with us. Yet his demands of transfer were turned down one after an other, for perplexing reasons ; his bad luck in the matter had become a byword.

A hundred such petitions could not get him out of Bhopal, but five years of service eventually made him a sergent, an the closest thing a brute like him could become to an expert in logistics. Despite his notorious impatience, it was to him the new blood turned for advice ; even some officers relied on him to assist them in their duties, to his considerable concern, as he feared being too useful to them would lead the staff to consider less favorably his departure from the base (although he largely made up for that by wanton drunkenness, picking up fights and sleeping with their wives).

The news of war with Russia filled him with excitement, and he followed with almost boyish rapture the small-scale Norman offensive in Karelia, even as the strain on our infrastructure became higher than ever with the Mughals' limited success in Siberia. But once again he was rebuked with no further comments. So once he'd torn the letter in shreds and had a few drinks, he took a big resolution and asked for a personal interview with colonel Bois-Guilbert, the highest-ranked man on Bhopal. Surprisingly enough he obtained it. None of us witnessed their talk of course, but we eventually pieced enough of it together.

" I know what this is about," Bois-Guilbert said, wiping his spectacles as he often did at the beginning of a conversation. "You want me to provide you with a personal recommendation for transfer in a combat regiment. Karelia, is that it ?"
He browsed pensively though files, without actually looking at them. "Even if I were to, though, you stand little chance. Understand that we have only nine divisions there, all fully reinforced, and those have not seen regular fighting in months. Vacancies are few, which is why your previous demands were not granted."
His voice dropped at that, which ordinarily would have set Lovell mad, but somehow,that day, he knew better. Mind you, Lovell was no diplomat, but he still had a way with people,as if he could read through them, and by looking at the small, balding man in front of him what he could guess that he was not done. So he just stood there and kept mum, waiting for the rest.

" Do you know what I would do, if I were you, soldier ?"
" No, sir."
" I would apply for an officer's commission."

Lovell briefly considered. The proposition was realistic ; about two thirds of the officer commissions were given to former rankers, mostly veterans, but for him to apply on the basis of his earlier service was not as preposterous as it would have been in, say, the Greek stiff-necked army. The country was at war and new regiments drafted every day, so the brass needed new subaltern officers and fast, which meant a decreased emphasis on academics (hardly the staple of a Norman officer to begin with) and a shorter training period. So yes, it was conceivable. Still he only understood were the colonel was going with what he said next.

" As you may not know, the first assignment of an subaltern officer during his probative year is to a combat unit, by tradition. One actually deployed to an operation zone. To weed out any officer who could not hold on pressure."
" I see."
" So if you want to see action, and with my recommendation, that would be your chance." Bois-Guilbert hesitated, read (not for the first time, it seemed) a particular letter in Lovell's file and added : " Of course, most officers are then commissioned to garrison duty, so if you like trouble you should give the brass a good reason to keep you at the frontlines. Do something crazy."

He looked up from the file.
"I think I can trust you on that."

[Enewald]

I would have thought that by this time after a millennia of very bloody warfare, where the nations throw all of their resources and endless amounts of human lives against each other, everyone would be tired of war and none would see glory in fighting.
Humans never learn?

[Kuipy]

If anyone does it probably won't be Normans .

The partition of Russia, part 1

Kuipy (Normandy)

On June 10th 1936, at the urging of its Byzantine allies, Normandy declares war on Russia. About 100,000 men deploy and take control of Karelia, virtually unopposed.


The fighting in the South happens on a larger scale but is no more equal.


In a few days Normans reach the "Varègues line", future border agreed on with the Byzantine Empire. They stop their advance and dig in. It only takes the Greeks three weeks to close the gap and reach their own objectives.


Meanwhile in the East Mughal progress is stalled by poor infrastructure, despite the welcome help of its diminutive (and AI) puppet. Go Japan !

[Enewald]

How shall Russia be divided?

[OrangeYoshi]

How shall Russia be divided?

Mughalistan gets the capital and all land to the east, Normandy gets what you see in the last pic, I get the rest.

I'm going to post my last Vicky AAR and my first HOI AAR today.