Put the wAAR in wAARlord: 1936 Guangxi Clique

[eqqman]

It is a wonderful action from Italians

I've noticed that in general the Italian AI seems far more likely to launch amphibious attacks than the German... I don't know if it is an inherent difference in programming, or if the initial fleet composition for Italy makes that AI view that type of attack as more of an option.

[sprites]

maybe you should answer the CTA from Germany , and grab India for yourself ...

[eqqman]

1940, first half – The Balloon Goes Up

As promised, this update comes with plenty of action, adventure, and romance (the latter only happens behind the scenes with my wife – sorry!)

”…although, I could have used a little more cowbell” – Bruce Dickinson

Sorry, Bruce!

”Never question Bruce Dickinson!” – Bruce Dickinson

This game has gone totally wild. Germany has declared war on the Allies before causing any further ruckus over Czechoslovakia or Poland. I’m curious if there is any time delay on those events, so the AI fuehrer can pick them up later. I think the issue on how this came up though is that Germany may need to be at peace in order to fire those events, which will now never happen with the Allies fully engaged. But this could work out well… if the AI Germans fail to get a border with Soviet Russia, then maybe they won’t ever go to war and I won’t have to worry about losing my last decent trading partner. With all this wackiness going on I would be surprised that anybody else could try to replicate this game.

The main reason I spent an uneventful 1939 is that I am waiting for some very time-intensive items to come out of my production queue. I think this waiting causes me to make a bad strategic error down the road. Most games might be won or lost by things like this, and not your actual battles- what you build and when, and when and whom you attack, seems to be far more important than any individual battle.

3 January: I get a Call to Arms from Germany. Since I’m not ready for war yet against so many powerful nations, I have to decline. My relations with the Germans are now at -35, I don’t know if this is because I declined their request or it was bad from the beginning.

16 January: Republican Spain joins the Allies. Odd, since I thought my declaration of war on them would have placed them in the Allies already. Not answering the call to arms is definitely a hit to relations, a second one from Germany comes up and refusing it knocks me down to -85.

26 January: Belgium surrenders to Germany and is annexed.

27 January: Australia joins the Allies. This time, I’m sure!

1 February: There is a hitch in our battle plan, Il Duce failed to take Gibraltar as he passed by it and now Allied troops are advancing out of it.

The Germans are advancing on Paris, so I need to position my troops for war with the Allies. I will be forced to attack France or forfeit Indochina to Japan. Since I am desperately short on ICs, I don’t think missing out on this area is a good idea.

7 March: Paris is surrounded. I don’t want to gamble on a French surrender, so I’m going to DoW the Allies. I don’t consider myself ready for this, but my street cred doesn’t rely on me playing it safe. It’s time to take the plunge.

”Time, time, time, to see what’s become of me…” – Simon & Garfunkel

So before we start officially joining the Second World War, here’s the position of my forces…

Two corps have been positioned around Hong Kong. This is a bit excessive, but I need to guarantee that I sack this city immediately, otherwise I’m in extreme danger of Allied troops pouring in.

One corps is directly facing off with the French on the Indochina border.

Two corps are at the junction of India, Siam, and Indochina. One will push into India and the other to Indochina.

One Militia corps and one Infantry corps are covering the Tibetan border. The Infantry is heading for Lhasa but will not be in place before hostilities begin. Note that the British have a Medium Armor division up here; I don’t know how successful they will be in those mountains. With that, the Asian empires declare war on the Allies.

”Cry, havoc! And let slip the dogs of war!” – William Shakespeare

8 March: Something odd happens, the border provinces near two of my corps flip to my side before I even move into them (and as it turns out, I can’t due to infrastructure problems).

I discover that my two corps here are stuck, since the areas I planned to move into don’t have sufficient infrastructure. So I will send one up to north India and the other will go over to support my troops attacking the French. This was very annoying since before war starts, I have no way of verifying if I would be able to move into those provinces or not.

11 March: Hong Kong crumbles. It was a UK Garrison division I defeated, while historically, the port was defended by Canadian troops. The troops had to fight without their heavy equipment, since it was still on the boats en route when war broke out. When the attack commenced on the Philippines, the cargo ships were redirected. I want to leave one corps there to guard my ports, and I’m not sure where to send the other. Indochina isn’t presenting me with enough frontage to make it practical to flood the area with troops just yet.

12 March: I see that my command structure is getting too spread out trying to fight along such a huge front, so I make some new high-level HQs (not that I even have the leaders to staff them).

14 March: Britain’s stooges (I mean “allies”) go on the attack.

”Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk” – Curly Howard

29 March: I lose my first province in combat. The men that I thought would be a spearhead in south India are slowly coming up by rail to beef up my forces in north India. I am also still slowly wearing down the French at the Indochina border (or are they wearing me down?)

I’m starting to take a national unity hit, so I shut down every convoy that isn’t going to Russia.

3 April: France is defeated, and Vichy formed, mere days before I would finally have broken through their lines at Tien Yen. I immediately declare war on Vichy France in a last desperate bid to secure Indochina ahead of Japan. Or, I don’t, since I’m forced into a non-aggression pact for the next six months! Words fail to express how annoyed I am.

4 April: Indochina is surrendered to the Japanese. On the plus side, German troops are now pouring into Spain. There is a rump of French territory in between Indochina and Siam, but I’m worried that if I attack it from Indochina, the Japanese will claim it. I don’t have my first warship commissioned yet, so I am planning an attack on Siam with Transports alone.

7 April: The Brits are having a field day up here bombing me, and with no air bases of my own in the region I can't even attempt to send my single Interceptor over to retaliate. The first of my two corps that are trudging up to the Indian front are finally arriving though.

12 April: My men load up for the attack on Siam.

However, at the same time I am departing to set sail, British warships appear to launch an invasion of Hainan, and my ships are bloodied and forced home.

19 April: Major naval battle going on in the Hainan Strait. My little Interceptor is trying to do its part. The Japanese win shortly thereafter, and Hainan is saved.

”Come back and we shall taunt you a second time!” – French soldier

26 April: The Ethiopian puppet government surrenders to the British, now they get to be a British puppet! Canada joins the Allies.

9 May: My second corps finally arrives in northern India. The lone British TAC up here bombed an isolated HQ and shattered it. I’m trying to get the airport at Imphal so I can put a stop to this kind of behavior; however, since there is also an airfield in Bhutan it will be tricky. With Imphal in my hands though I can transfer my own Interceptor up here and give my men some relief. I don’t think their existing AA defense is quite adequate. As an aside, I had asked in the main forum what sort of support brigades people attach to their HQs, and the wiseacre answer was “just keep your HQs out of the fight”. However, as I can see here, when the enemy has superior air power no area is out of the fight.

German troops are closing on Gibraltar…

Germany is also at war with Norway but that attack has gone nowhere. Pretty much a sitzkrieg.

10 May: I have Imphal, the British attempt a relief operation.

12 May: Siam accepts pressure from Japan. Maybe I should have just given Siam a declaration of war even though I wasn’t going to attack them any time soon? Would that have kept them out of the Axis? Or allowed me to conquer them after they joined the Axis? The Thai people have no idea how some British Marines sacrificed in the Hainan Strait saved their nation. Anyway, since that axis (pun intended) of attack is now completely closed off to me, I will send one of my corps meant for Siam up to join the Indian front, and the second corps will move through Siam to make a thrust at Singapore. If I see that attacking from a puppet allows me to keep the territory for myself and doesn’t hand it over to Japan, then I will keep going south. I’m very bummed that I missed two of my main short-term war goals. I could have attacked Siam, but I wanted to wait until my remaining Transports had repaired all their damage from the Hainan Strait battle, as I know the Thais have warships to defend themselves with.

18 May: My first warship rolls off the assembly line. I must give her a suitable name…

And with this, I conclude this update.

[Henry v. Keiper]

How does your overall struggle against Britain look? Do you feel confident about it?

[King50000]

The nation's pride rests on a Light Cruiser

[eqqman]

How does your overall struggle against Britain look? Do you feel confident about it?

I was confident to start, but as you will see in a future update, things took a turn for the worse.

[eqqman]

The nation's pride rests on a Light Cruiser

In future updates you will see she more than earns the title!

[Thandros]

you could have found out that only had 10% infrastructure as the infrastructure map shows you the infrastructure of all you can see which would have told you.

[eqqman]

you could have found out that only had 10% infrastructure as the infrastructure map shows you the infrastructure of all you can see which would have told you.

Yes, I hadn't checked because I thought the Infrastructure map didn't show the values for neutral countries, but it does in the border provinces.

[eqqman]

1940, second half – Hard Times at Ridgemont High

The second half of 1940 has well begun. As I alluded in the previous update, I made a strategic error in not attacking France earlier to try and get my hands on Indochina. I seem to be having a problem in general with timing my attacks. Either I attack too early and have no chance, or I attack too late because I’m worried about having no chance and I miss any opportunities I might have been able to get. In this case, because I was waiting for time-intensive ships to complete construction, nothing was going to change the situation on the ground for quite some time. Therefore, I didn’t need to bother with waiting since nothing further was going to be gained by it.

I have three corps of Infantry down in south China. One is essentially on guard duty to cover my trio of ports at Guangzhou, Macau, and Hong Kong. The other two will be used to make a play for Singapore. I also have a Militia corps in the area to handle partisan duty.

Three additional corps are way up north fighting in India, with a fourth on the way from Indochina... they won’t arrive any time soon. Two of the corps up there are facing off with Nepalese, Bhutan, and British troops, while the third has broken the British lines and is getting ready to race to the sea to pinch off Burma.

” You most likely know it as Myanmar, but it will always be Burma to me” – J Peterman

The corps arriving from Indochina will be sent to help expand that breakthrough. I had expected this area to be nothing but a minor front, but since I failed to get Indochina it is now my main point of attack.

The British are nailing me with strategic bombing. Notice that I am down to 43 ICs when I was at 53 before the bombings. For a country of my size, that is a pretty big loss. I can’t afford planes, really, so the best I can do is to keep trying to get territory so that these bombers are out of range of my vital industrial centers.

I finally have a warship, but now that I don’t need to attack Siam, it is less useful. I am debating making landings near Singapore just to speed things up and avoid having to march everybody down the Malay Peninsula. The Japanese are doing a port attack at Kota Bharu that is bottling up at least one British carrier, so I might make a play for either this port or an area near it. I assume that even if I fail to get the port right away, merely linking up with the Siamese border will allow my men to resupply. But we all know how dangerous assumptions are…

Did I mention how irritated I was that I didn’t get Siam? It still sticks in my craw.

”Don’t irritate me sir, I haven’t got all day” – Judge Judy

I guess I will have to be satisfied with off-off-off-Broadway productions of “The King and I”.

Axis powers have nearly finished off Spain, so I may force them to attack the Balkan states, as they are all still unaligned, even Hungary. In the Far East, the United States has taken Okinawa. I can only hope they stop there.

So, my short-term goals now are to keep pushing hard in India and make an advance down the Malay Peninsula.

25 May: Republican Spain surrenders and is annexed by Italy. I’ll let things cool off a bit over there before I force more conflict in the Balkans, assuming those guys don’t find new opponents on their own. The Italians are getting punk’d by a single Medium Armor division in Libya, so waiting to see what happens might be a wise course.

27 May: My invasion force for the Malay Peninsula sets sail. There is still a British fleet bottled up at Kota Bharu that the Japanese are attacking intermittently. Will they sortie? I hope not.

30 May: They don’t sortie; I take the undefended port, so now it is off to Singapore! I also quickly discover that Mandalay was also undefended, along with just about everything else in the immediate region. Up north, I’ve been trying to get into Bhutan, but the combo of mountain and river is tough to crack.

9 July: The British foolishly tried to launch a counterattack on the Malay Peninsula with HQs; since Singapore is undefended, I should be able to snatch it up.

On the India front, the Japanese are pushing west from Siam, and I am struggling to get enough troops down there to create a line to the sea so that I don’t lose any more land over here to Japanese claims.

I’m running into severe supply issues, and I’m not sure how to address it. My Malay troops are running out of supply, and the stockpile indicator at the top of my screen is red, but the production sliders say I am way overproducing supply.

All military production is now on hold until I get some more infrastructure in place between my capital and a port.

11 July: I take Singapore.

5 August: I’m still desperately trying to get a unit down to the sea so I can block off India proper from Japanese claims. I had thought I was going to get Chittagong up there in the northwest, but the British rushed in troops at the last minute. Japanese puppet troops are pushing hard from the east. Man I wish I had that many men!

15 August: The battle for the Malay Peninsula is almost over. I think I lost a division from lack of supplies: IV Juntuan Corps had four Infantry divisions but now only three are here (later I discovered I was wrong, the 4th division was just assigned to a different corps for some reason).

25 August: A brave Militia division finally gives me the link to the sea that I wanted.

2 September: A pocket of Australian, American, and French troops about to be eliminated.

17 September: I win the battle for the capital of Bhutan, but my arch nemesis, the TAC hanging around up here, attacks my advancing troops and forces them to retreat before I can march in. Frankly I’m a bit puzzled that I haven’t run these tiny countries out of manpower by now. Anyway, my Asian allies are working their way up here, so I will get some relief soon.

The battle for the Malay Peninsula is now over; I think I just ran them out of supply as opposed to an outright defeat, although my battle progress was in the high 80s over there.

25 September: That lone TAC has pretty much singlehandedly saved the entire northern front for the Allies. Notice that my weak Interceptor can’t even each over to the enemy airport to try and keep them grounded. Any time I get a local success, that TAC just comes and wipes away the organization of my men.

11 October: I’d thought these stacks of allied troops were coming to help me, but instead they are going off someplace else… someplace that doesn’t have an enemy to fight, since our foes are all on this side!

13 October: Despite my efforts to reinforce it, I lose Imphal in Northern India. This was the only airfield I had access to up there.

17 October: Persia joins the Axis. Not good, now I have competition for India from the other side!

12 November: I belatedly start an airport in Lhasa so I can get my Interceptor in range of the TAC that is giving me such a hard time. I don’t have enough troops to hold the Lhasa – Chittagong line, so the British can break through wherever they want. I had expected the Japanese to be helping me more at this point- either with their own attacks or by loading me up with Expeditionary forces. The Japanese really burned me here, there were more than enough troops to easily finish sweeping the British out of India, instead, they sent their army off to who-knows-where.

Interesting news from Spain, the Americans have made landings and are facing off against the Germans. Note the highly multinational nature of their forces.

22 November: I’ve abandoned Chittagong, I can’t hold it anyway. This also cancels my plans to get any decent piece of India- I will have to concentrate all my forces up north just keep what I have at the Sino-Indian border. If I am lucky, I will hold Mandalay. Bulgaria has started to align to the Axis.

15 December: Bulgaria joins the Axis.

19 December: Mexico joins the Allies.

And with that bit of excitement, I close this update. Sadly, this stage represents a plateau of my power, as I will fail to make any more real progress, which you will see soon.

[King50000]

You should have just left a strip of land along the coast for Japan and her pupets to take. That way they would have continued their advance across the whole front, rather than abandon it to you now thay they have no interest in it. Maybe they will come back now that they have a shot to keep expanding?

[eqqman]

You should have just left a strip of land along the coast for Japan and her puppets to take.

Perhaps, but I had a problem with that in northern China- since my allies have vastly more divisions than I do, they just spread out so much and get so far ahead of me that I end up with nothing. If I left just a few provinces open at the coast, they would pour out of them and I would get blocked off from further expansion. Maybe I could have focused on holding the Imphal - Mandalay line, but my men down at Mandalay were constantly out of supply.

[Henry v. Keiper]

I hereby dub the battle of the Malay Peninsula "The Battle of the Officers."

[shenaniganz14]

Can we see a screeny of the Asian theatre? Nice AAR! i'll be watching!

[KyrionMyrthar]

I hereby dub the battle of the Malay Peninsula "The Battle of the Officers."

Duels at twenty paces!

Man, your allies abandoning you like that stinks. I hope you can hold it together.

[mnplastic]

I never thought the game will become so unusual and fascinating. I even think to try Guangxi myself Great action!

[eqqman]

I hereby dub the battle of the Malay Peninsula "The Battle of the Officers."

"Quite..."- Commander McBragg

Can we see a screeny of the Asian theatre? Nice AAR! i'll be watching!

Thanks! I've already gone another 9 months past this point, and I'm not sure if I took any nice political map shots. I'll have to keep it in mind as I progress.

I never thought the game will become so unusual and fascinating. I even think to try Guangxi myself Great action!

There will be more as the next episode covers the fighting for Sumatra. The Dutch put up more of a struggle since they defend their turf with more than just officers!

I did start a parallel game so I could see if it would be much different trying to avoid my mistakes. I did get much more of Nationalist China, but then the Japanese made them a puppet so I ended up with even less than I have now. I plan to do a much better job of handling the Indochina Affair though.

[eqqman]

1941, first half – Bad Day at Black Rock

The start of 1940 held some promise for me, but by the end of the year, my men were in disarray. I would certainly call myself the weakest-performing Axis member at the moment. The big boys are doing much better. If there was only some way to express my frustrations…

Oompa Loompa, do-ba-dee-doo,
I’ve got a perfect puzzle for you.
Oompa Loompa, do-ba-dee-dee,
If you are wise you will listen to me.

What do you get when your ICs are
gone?
Write an amusing Oompa Loompa
song?
Whining in a forum is a crime and a
shame.
When we know who really is… to…
blame.
The play-er of the ga-a-ame.

Oompa Loompa do-ba-dee-da,
Given good planning you will go far.
You will war with happiness too,
Like the Oompa Loompa do-ba-dee-doo.
Do-ba-dee-doo

”Can’t I at least get a Chumba Wumba song?” – Peter Griffin

Basically, I need ICs to build up the countryside to help with my supply shipment issues, ICs to get more of a Navy going since I can’t hide behind the IJN forever…

”Unless…”
“Stop doing that!” – Homer & Lisa Simpson

…ICs to build up more Convoys and Escorts, and last but certainly not least, actual soldiers! With 56 ICs I just don’t have enough to go around (I know, nobody told me to play a Minor).

My own woes aside, let’s travel the world, shall we? In the west, the Germans are holding back US forces that keep trying to make inroads into Spain. That’s fine for me, as those troops are then not causing problems for me and Tojo in Asia. Gibraltar continues to be a sore point, with British troops making sorties out from it at various times.

Due to an early war with the Low Countries, Germany never finished making claims in Czechoslovakia and Poland, so those countries remain independent and haven’t been attacked. Hungary, Romania, and Yugoslavia are unaligned.

Bulgaria joined the Axis right at the end of 1940, and are now busy with the Greeks. Note that the Italians did not even claim Albania.

Persia joined the Axis. In the east, they are trading provinces with the British in Iraq, and are currently unopposed in Pakistan.

My battles with Nepal and Bhutan have been a disaster. Every time I make any headway, British TAC comes up and prevents my troops from advancing. Japanese puppet troops are finally coming to this area, perhaps in response to the objectives I belatedly assigned them. This area has been very frustrating as after nearly a year of fighting up here I have nothing at all to show for it. I hadn’t thought of trying to place objectives here since I have heard very mixed results with them and hadn’t thought of it as a viable tool.

In southern India, I had managed to create a 2-province wide corridor from Imphal to Chittagong, expecting to later link up with Japanese troops advancing from the east. However, after clearing out a pocket of Allied troops in south Burma, the Japanese threw away our operational advantage and directed their troops in the opposite direction. Not surprisingly, the British used this opportunity to stage a comeback and now India proper is lost to me. I just don’t have enough troops to maintain an advance on such a long stretch of front by myself. In the short-term I will be focusing on just trying to hang on to the Imphal – Mandalay line while the Japanese, who are now returning to the area, do the active fighting against the British. Future historians will write of this as one of the greatest Japanese blunders of the war, unless of course, the Japanese write the books.

The Japanese kicked the US out of Okinawa and are now advancing into the Philippines. If the bulk of the American forces are in Spain, then I don’t expect them back in this area of operations any time soon.

My only real success was the Malay campaign. I recently discovered that all my supply problems were caused by the line to Singapore having no Convoys assigned to it. With this little problem solved, my next move will be to prepare another Corps for the invasion of Sumatra. This is game is complex enough that I am still feeling my way around all the things I need to be paying attention to.

This concludes the tour.

”Thank you, come again!” – Apu Nahasapeemapetilon

20 January: I land in Medan.

15 February: I win the battle of Sunda Strait after making a landing to take the nearby port there. The battle for Sumatra is weird: poor infrastructure prevents you from walking the length of the island, so I have to keep hopping from port to port just to get down to the end. Oosthaven is the first area where I encounter any Dutch troops on the island. This is the time when the captain of the Pride of Guangzhou earns his (or her, I’m flexible) salary.

Meanwhile, Persian troops have reached Delhi. I see only a lone theatre HQ in the area just waiting to be attacked.

23 February: I lose the second battle of Sunda Strait, and am lucky to escape with my one warship.

5 March: I take Oosthaven. I don’t know where those Dutch troops think they are going, especially since they burned their motor vehicles to keep them from falling into my hands.

10 March: The Philippine government surrenders and goes into exile. The British have abandoned Delhi, but the Persians decide to take a neighboring province instead.

23 March: My men on Sumatra are meeting more Dutch resistance, but it is all HQs. I assume they must have weapons of some kind…

I’m pulling out of Burma; my men are constantly out of supply there so they are better used in other places.

18 April: I make the shocking discovery that while I was up taking Palembang, the Dutch slipped some Infantry into Oosthaven.

9 May: Finally some good news, I get Veteran Army. I hope my troops don’t expect more money.

21 May: The Persians finally move into Delhi, which is just as well since British and French troops have nearly overrun their homeland. I’ve retaken the tip of Sumatra, now it is time to prepare for the invasion of Java. I lose a Transport sending a Mountain division to Padang. In Tibet the British are pounding me with logistical attacks that I am helpless to defend myself against.

15 June: I decide to redirect ICs to getting caught up with my upgrades. I nearly have most of my men out of India, so I may just try to ride out the rest of 1941 just trying to get things built up. The first Air Base has been completed in Lhasa, I hope this means that the Japanese will send something over that way soon to deal with that all-powerful TAC the British have.

As June winds to a close, so does this update. If I can get my Japanese friends to hold the line in India, then I might just spend the rest of 1941 trying to build up.

Oompa Loompa doom-pa-dee-doo
I've got another puzzle for you
Oompa Loompa doom-pa-dee-dee
If you are wise you will listen to me

Who do you blame when your allies are
lame?
Act like they’re playing a diff-er-ent
game?
Blaming the puppets is a lie and a
shame.
You know exactly who's… to… blame:
Tojo and Il Duce!

Oompa Loompa doom-pa-dee-dah
Fight your own battles, then you will go far
You will live in happiness too
Like the Oompa Loompa doom-pa-dee-do

[Evil Sage]

In my games as Guangxi Clique, Persia always falls to the allies almost instantly, and mainland Japan becomes infested with US forces as early as 1942. Then there's a nuke-fest on me and Japan all the way from 1946 to 1950, when basically all of Asia is US-held. The numbers of British troops that somehow arrive to East Asia and flank me from the south are also staggering.

Feels bad man. Really need to lure them yanks to Spain somehow.

[King50000]

So the British arent the only ones still stuck in their ways, Officer Duels