Royal Carnage - a CptEasy multiplayer AAR

loki100 said:

could you risk an offensive in the north to take the pressure off?

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No. I tried but only a few dug in Jerrys will stop me quite efficiantly

anweRU said:

A meat grinder! If saving France is not likely, would it be better for the French player stop building units, and concentrate on reinforcements and supplies? Or does he have more than enough IC to cover those requirements?

Could he produce excess supplies and sell them to the UK, thus freeing British industrial capacity for unit production?

And another random thought. What would happen if the French player gave his main units to the British player as expeditionary forces a day or two before the final surrender. Would those forces stay with the British, or be removed?

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1. Well, FRA player reinforced and build neccessary supplies as well. I think this is a quite good strategy but there are planty of variations, I guess. In the end, in a MP-game, France is lost anyway so the battle it's just about a few months and some 10s of thousand casualties extra/less for Germany. Important but not decisive.

2. Possible. If UK have enough funds. And those royal pounds will end up (1/3) in the German stockpile soon enough... so there's several sides to that coin

3. We have a house rule stopping that. Only two division can be shifted between players. But game mechanics supports such a tactic. Those units would become British. However, as France becomes so small after Vichy (almost zero manpower growth) it is tricky to use those units as they will not be reinforced (or at least extreeeemely slow).

Royal Carnage

Chapter IX, The Battle of France - Part V









Human Players: Germany, Italy, Japan, UK, France, Soviet










Recap: It is peaceful in the world - except in the Western Europe where Germany is cutting into Belgium and France. The Allies are desperately scrambling to hold them back. But greater things is stiring...














February 14th-16th, 1940

Authors note: Our House Rules dictates that Soviet must not declare war on minors if their threat on US I higher than any Axis nation. After their attack on Rumania, their threat went above the Axis and they had to take it easy. With the Italian attack on Turkey, I was so surprised the Italian threat on US did not hit the roof. As I was sure their threat at least was the highest within Axis I activated my spies in Italy on “increase threat” missions.

The 14th, Maxyboy (Soviet) saw that Italy’s threat on US had gone over the Soviet threat. That meant they were free to attack a minor should they want. After two days of preparations, Soviet Union declared war on Bulgaria. The plan was to puppet them to get some additional troops before Barbarossa.

Soviet threat now went high enough for the Allies to invite the US. This is, however, not allowed in our House Rules. Axis threat must be high enough to trigger an invitation – and it was obviously not that high.













February 18th, 1940

Italy apparently became very stressed by the fact that Soviet was widening their front against them (former Yugoslavia). Just one or two days after the Soviet declaration of war on Bulgaria, Italy attacked neutral Greece.

This was the third neutral country to be attacked by the aggressive Italians. This led the South Africans to join the Allies – probably to safeguard against further Italian aggressions.
But the South Africans were not the only one to be fed up with Axis constant warring…













February 19th, 1940

Authors note: The Italian DoW on Greece not only brought their threat on USA higher than Soviet – it was high enough for US to be invited to the Allies – and they agreed to the invite.

The Italian attack on Greece seemed not to be worth this. From my perspective, it is bound to be a miscalculation from the Axis side. Any way – this game have taken a very interesting turn within a few days.

At this moment, Germany is alone against the might of the entire Allies, including the US. Neither Japan nor Italy is in war with Allies. While Japan is at peace, Italy is, as you now, in war with Greece. Soviet is in war with Bulgaria.













March 2nd, 1940

Two weeks after USA joining the war, and 6 month after the German declaration of war on Belgium, Wehrmacht is closing in on Paris. Half of the Maginot Line has been captured (mainly those with VPs). In the south, the Germans have found a soft spot in the defensive line, but their own hostile border is getting more and more stretched – tying down free units. Their offensive is continuously slow and grinding.

Authors note: Note how French player have been putting garrisons (4 brigades in most cases) on all VPs. Germany will not be able to quickly blitz through France like we so often see after the fall of Paris. There are garrisons on all remaining provinces on the Maginot. Except a mountain division, all regular forces were retreated from Maginot before it was surrounded. This means that the French army is still fully operational and they have not lost more divisions than Germany has. A praise to the French player.


But now the French player will shift to the USA and France will become run by AI...

.............................

loki100 said:

this is becoming very interesting - could a non-faction war between the Soviets and Italy break out in the Balkans?

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I guess the only chance for that is an Italian DoW on Sov as Sov can't, if I recall things right, make a limited DoW on Italy (without DoWing the rest of the Axis). Don't know why they would like to do that, though

Cybvep said:

Early USA entry. That's absolutely perfect. I'm wondering what will be the response of the Japanese player.

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Me too

Baltasar said:

If he can, he could start running through India and the Pacific.

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Aye... that's what I fear. I have made some preparations, but must admit, I'm not very strong in the Pacific. Now, at least, I can expect some American backup should they DoW me.

Profetkaninen said:

interesting, was the US war entry foreseen by the axis (or daphne)? As it stands now would it be feasible for Italy and Japan to only attack either the Allies or the Comintern?

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An Axis player would perhaps answer this better than me, but they have already said a little. No, they did not forsee it. Not having pre-played the scenario, they didn't expect such a high threat-increase on an even (The Greek ultimatum - or whatever its called). Frankly, I have always thought it weird to have an event that gives just as much threat as a regular DoW. You have ta bear in mind that all of us are 30+, hard working and in some case even fathers. Few of us have time for SP games or get a good grip about whatever new stuff a patch has brought. Its learning by doing and in some cases that means a blunder In any case, Daphne said his threat was increasing so fast after his aggressive opening (and my spies) that it would have been a quite early US-entry anyway. Nevertheless - this was not their brightest moment.

Still, the DoW on Greece has some strategic benefits. If Greece can be puppeted, Italy gains som well needed troops. Also, he opens up a link with his puppets in Turkey. We'll see how that turns out.

Profetkaninen said:

With all that land soaked up by Italy and Soviet it looks like its going to be an extremely mobile warfare once the east explodes.. this might give the Germans the advantage they desperately need to finish Barbarossa in haste.

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Yes... this game have gone into a direction unlike the previous. I like. Seems like I wont have to suffer the devestating penelties of my last session as UK - in Jolly Carnage...

theFreeman said:

Has Japan finished China?

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Yes. Unfortunately, that is always an unhistorically quick excersize which Paradox doesn't seem to have succeeded in adjusting in FtM

AUSTERLITZ said:

Absolute idiocy by the italians.GG.

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Plz give criticism in a constructive manner.

Thelamon said:

1.Hm - are you sure you really need the US that urgent? I mean the next two or three months could still really be interesting in france.
But you can be sure the AI will screw france in no time shuffling troops out of important places etc.

2.Can they even grab any allied spoils (Netherlandds asian posessions, french left overs) in Asia without entering war against the US now?

3. Germany is screwed with a serious D'Day looming starting around mid 1941 onwards

4. A lot will depend on how well the Japanese player can keep the US occupied and focussed on the Pacific.

5. Very interesting development of an interesting game - thanks for these AAR-updates!

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1. We discussed this at length with similar arguments as you put forwards, Thelamon. Yes, the French AI would screw our whole idea of putting garrisons on all the VPs and with its usual idiocy shorten the war with a month or two. However, knowing how US-AI normally puts half its production on really stupid things and avoids researching important things - we though that the loss of months in France would be given back with interest later on with USA getting into the saddle a lot quicker. That was, at least, our thinking.

2. No. So the Jap is presented with a sweet problem.

3. In our gaming-history, Axis have won in the face of early US-entries before (Wildfires), and I think Traks have a few similar experiences from his Monday groups - no? But I agree to some extent. Germany will be hard-pressed to kill the Bear quickly. And UK will not stand alone in the sea (like in Jolly Carnage).

4. Yes. Extremely interesting. We have never had a real Pacific clash before. I don't really know what to expect.

5. I agree - and thanks I plan to post new chapter tonight. It will be packed with actions...