Is there a use for Super Heavy Armor? - MP AAR from Axis perspective

[JDNIGHT]

Chapter #6: May 1 1939 to Late June 1939

Human Players: *UK, USSR, USA, *Germany, Italy, Japan, France, Romania, Canada, Venezuela, Finland, Nat Spain, Australia
* = co-op

From The Author: I know I promised a chapter named "How Wrong We Can Be". However, this chapter is already fairly long and doesn't quite make it to that point. The next chapter will have that name. Also, it should be mentioned that there was a game save just after Danzig went off and we stopped that session. This now begins a new session. During the break, I realized that my entire fleet was now outside of the Baltic, in Kiel. If Copenhagen could not be taken, this would be very bad for the Germans.


Situation: The Danzig event went off and the Germans are now at war with the allies. Denmark is the priority, but France must fall quickly after.


The first step was to select the option 'Blitzkrieg'.





Troops were immediately set into motion on the Polish front to begin encirclement maneuvers. A Corps of mixed Infantry and CA divisions moved north into Denmark. The Paratroopers were sent out to attack Copenhagen. However, there must have been a mis-communication between the paratroopers and high command. They were not ready (low org) and would not be able to attack for several days.

Immediately our subs went into action. It took less than a day for the air war to begin. Furious battles erupted with many casualties.






From the Author: Enter the anxiety! I never knew how stressful a MP game was. My hat is off to everyone that can run a major in a MP game and still remember to take screen shots!

Finally on May 6th the air drop went off:






On the same date, news came that we were already losing the air war. How did this happen?





As you can see the air war over France quickly turned sour for us. Despite many efforts, this never came back to our favor.


However, the land war was going better than expected. The Swedish Army did not interfere with our conquest of Denmark in the slightest. Denmark was defeated by May 10th. There was a major naval battle fought here, but more on that later.





We had considerable success in Poland as well. Poland May 11th:





Our plans to invade Gibraltar were scrapped when a very large allied force showed up. Besides, Spain was not in the war yet, and would not be asked to join until after the Fall of France.





By May 25th we had encircled and nearly destroyed multiple pockets of Polish troops. All told, they accounted for over half of the Polish Army. After this, troops were then sent back to prepare for the invasion of the Netherlands.











More bad news concerning the air war:





After preparing an expeditionary force of 4 Divs (1 Corps), Finland was asked to join the Axis. On June 8th they accepted. The Corps was sent to them as soon as was possible.





June 12th:







You can see that I have considerable ground and air assets here and that the Swedish have assets opposed to me as well.


At this time, I decided that we would attack the Netherlands. However, the entire war was becoming very stressful. In an effort to support the attack on the Netherlands, I decided to finish off Poland.





On June 21st, the Polish army was crushed. Warsaw capitulated. All of the mobile divisions in Poland were immediately turned toward the West. However, several of the infantry divisions remained behind, to prepare for the surprise assault on the USSR. In order to gain land and start closer to Moscow, we decided to 'decline' the pact. The Fuhrer never dishonors anything! We were not so concerned about the effects it might have on the USA, as the Japanese would be attacking them soon anyway.







Next: War at Sea, May 1939

[JDNIGHT]

Chapter 6: War at Sea, May 1939


During the first month of the war, Germany sent out 10 submarine flotilla to harass British convoys. They worked off the Spanish coast as well as the west of Africa. I primarily set them up in their own fleets, to make the more difficult to spot.

We sank a fair number of convoys, but were quickly attacked by sub hunters. May 7th:





May 16th:





Despite our successes sinking convoys, the operations were cancelled when 3 sub groups had been destroyed in just 3 weeks. I thought it best to hold them back until the other Axis members were in the naval war as well.


Early on May 10th, our interceptors engaged a CAG off the coast of Denmark. After damaging it significantly, we sent out our fleet to see how it would do against a British carrier group (minus its CAGs).












The result:





Not bad! That will teach the Brits to mess around in Gerry's back yard.

[Wallienator]

Well it are only 2 CL's anyway, and they won't hurt the RN that much anyway.

[CptEasy]

Are the British fleet stuck in Öresund or howcome can it be there with Kopenhagen in German hands? The sea zone should be closed to them.

[Wallienator]

British fleet was there at moment of capture, and with enough british luck it retreated the right way.

[JDNIGHT]

Are the British fleet stuck in Öresund or howcome can it be there with Kopenhagen in German hands? The sea zone should be closed to them.

British fleet was there at moment of capture, and with enough british luck it retreated the right way.

I think Wallienator had the right of it here. Denmark fell just shortly before this battle. My guess is the Brits were trying to move out of the Sea zone when they were attacked.

[Hallwood-Ingham]

Right then. War. Good. Italy could not be any better prepared for war.

Well, I could have used more infantry divisions with attached artillery brigades. I would have liked more modern ships. And some aircraft carriers. I needed more planes. Only a fraction of my ports were garrisoned. I still had loads of militia. Tanks would have been nice. I’m used to having better technology. My officer ratio could have been higher.

Well other than these slight issues, Italy was ready.

The first step on the path to greatness was to be the annexation of part of Yugoslavia, with Il Duce generously permitting Romania possession of the bits we didn’t want.

However, mere hours after the Danzig Ultimatum, Soviet troops crossed the border into Turkey, seeking to install a communist regime. This move threatened the Balkans, opening the way for further Soviet invasions into Greece and Bulgaria.

To forestall this eventuality, troops were rushed from the Yugoslav border in Italy to the Greek border in Albania. The 2a Armata was cobbled together, consisting of twelve infantry divisions split into three corps. Added onto the army was our pathetic ‘mobile corps’, consisting of two cavalry divisions and a motorised infantry division.

Only one marine division was finished upgrading from militia by this point, so it was made into a new corps with two new infantry divisions. This corps would land at Athens, and then spread out from there, whilst one of the infantry corps made for Salonica.



The infantry moves are shown in black, mobile corps in yellow and the amphibious invasion in red ^^



Things were very chaotic by this point, so forgive my vagueness, but the invasion was launched in ‘early June’. Um...I suppose Italians aren’t great at record keeping.


The attack caught the Greeks unawares, and defeated them easily, leaving Greece as the latest acquisition of the modern Roman Empire. The Romanians had launched their own invasion of Bulgaria, hence between us securing the Balkans for the Axis.

[Sachaztan]

I think Wallienator had the right of it here. Denmark fell just shortly before this battle. My guess is the Brits were trying to move out of the Sea zone when they were attacked.

Yep, that was pretty much exactly it.

I'm glad I moved as soon as I did, that really was in the nick of time :P.

[Skovbjerg]

INN - > Imperial News Network

His Imperial holyness of the imperial Japanese people, was sighted during this period inspecting the new Tuba's to play music at his next Birthday, tomorrow

The Emperor voiced little satisfaction regarding the tuba's but encouraged the brave and strong Japanese people to continue making presents and bigger and better Tuba's in ever growing numbers.. saying that the only way to force the Americans to celebrate his Imperial birthday is by making sure they can hear the music all the way across the sea!

on other accounts around the mighty Japanese Empire, While the IJN is making increasing number of celebration tours around the pacific, trying to spread the imperial message of the emperors birthday to the Americans meaning alot of ships sailing around Guam, Honolulu and other American outposts in the Pacific, the message will come out Says the Imperial ministry to his Emperor.

However while the Imperial Japanese Navy is working hard to spread the message through peacefull means of playing the Tuba's in the seas neighbouring the American bases, the Japanese army however, busy in China trying to educate the poor Chinese people to value the Emperors birthday as the true miracle that it is.. some mislead Chinese have been lead astray and even taken up arms against his Imperial Holyness.. But the vast majority of the Japanese army is pretty much on leave.. taking a well deserved break from all the spreading the message on foot..

Soldiers from the Imperial Extremely mobile Division on leave in Tokyo, clearly so exhausted from their efforts in china that they just cant be bothered to stand up anymore..


In other news, new statements from the Emperor and his Ministry has announced that they inted to spread the Imperial influence into India and Indonesia.. desirering to root out the European influence on Asian culture.. that all of Asia in reality belongs under the Emperor of Japan, who is truly hurt by the lack of appriciation from the Indian people and the rest of Asia for that matter.

This new Poster shows the Japanese intent to liberate the Asian world from european dominance!


This is Imperial News Network Signing off and saying ->
- Long Live the Dear Emperor -



________________
Basicly nothing happend for japan..^^

[JDNIGHT]

Chapter #7: Late June 1939 to Early Aug 1939

Human Players: *UK, USSR, USA, *Germany, Italy, Japan, France, Romania, Canada, Venezuela, Finland, Nat Spain, Australia, Sweden
* = co-op

From The Author: The action is heating up. All of the players are feeling stressed. You can see it in the way everyone is communicating in chat. Despite this, every major victory is certainly well advertised. Perhaps so that one side or the other can gain a psychological advantage.


Situation: Poland has fallen. Germany elected to not honor the pact. The Wehrmacht has turned its troops West towards France. The sub war is going so poorly that all operations have been cancelled. The air war is lost for the time being. However, our limited SAG engagements were successful in that British screens were sunk for no losses of our own.


As troops were moving toward France, the USSR decided to declare war on the Axis! According to reports, Stalin was outraged at the fact that Finland had joined the axis and that we had 'dishonored' the pact. It was just too much for him.





This took us all completely by surprise. Most of my troops in Poland were heading to France. They were needed there. Although we were able to push up to the French border, we were starting to be pushed back. All of the other Axis nations were stunned by this more than anything else. They were not in position for this war in the slightest. Romania had just started a war with Turkey and Italy and Japan were also out of position for this war.

In 1939 the USSR had a large army. It may have been technologically backward, but it was large all the same. They were immediately able to gain much ground in Poland and Romania.

To combat this, Italy (Hall) jumped to the rescue. Thanks to Romania's war with Turkey Italy was immediately able to ship troops into Romania. The Italians were even able to capture Russian territory. Romania (Firefox) quickly finished off Turkey and moved its troops back toward the Russian Front.

August 15th:











To aid the Romanians, I decided to send them an expeditionary force consisting of one Armored division.





The Russian player (Pirro) came at us very aggressively. Most likely he was encouraged by the allies to 'win this quickly'. Over the chat channel the allies were all convinced that inviting Finland to the Axis was a terrible move and that it 'forced' Pirro to attack me. They were certain that this would doom the axis. There were even some in the axis that had doubts about our chances. Despite doubts of my own, I (The Fuhrer) kept up a very confident, optimistic front when dealing with my allies and enemies alike.

As mentioned previously, the Soviets gained ground quickly. But as soon as they ran into the troops that I sent East, the Russians were easily and immediately beaten in combat after combat. Their aggressive behavior allowed my troops to trap multiple stacks of divisions. By August 5th, over a dozen Soviet divisions had already been destroyed, including tank divisions.

Still, the Russians had been able to push us back into Poland and quite deep into Romania before help arrived. It was a long struggle to push them back. Even with the loss of divisions, the Bear seemed to have many more to throw at us. In fact they had so many spare divisions, that they were able to send a force into Romanias puppet, Turkey. We estimated that they had close to an Army there.

However, there was more good news. The Japanese had arrived in the Black Sea with close to an Army as well as a CAG and a SAG. The soviets would certainly be put to the test. The Japanese were also trapping multiple Russian divisions in the Far East. Go Darky!


July 25th:





August 1st:











In late June, Finland was attacked by the Russians and was also somehow brought into the war against the allies with myself. True to form, the Bear sent in numerous divisions in a very aggressive manor. The Fins put up a very good fight, but were being overwhelmed by the Bear.





During the middle of July there was a major naval engagement just north of Copenhagen. Thanks to our RADAR, our intelligence operatives reported that the British were shipping in boatload after boatload of troops to the Swedes to help them in their war against Finland. We intercepted with a light SAG.





This group was very soon after jumped by a British CAG. We sent our aircraft in to help.





As our small fleet retreated, the Brits followed. But we were waiting for them. Our main Battlecruiser fleet got the jump on them!





However, the results were not as I had hoped. Losses included:

Germany: 1 BC(old), 1 CA, 1 CLs, 1 DD (Original post had 3CLs, it has since been corrected)
Brits: 2 or 3 CLs, 2 TRNs (probably with infantry on board)


As August rolled in, bad news also came in from France... Our attack had been halted. In fact many of our divisions were out of org and the French and British out numbered us. It appeared they were gaining the initiative. This was not a place that I, the Fuhrer, wanted to be in.





At this point, my co-op and I had already started construction on some new interceptors as well as two new subs. It would not be until later that I (we) would realize just how dangerous our situation was.

[Cybvep]

This looks bad for the Axis. The Allies will be able to hold Belgium for a long time and it will be hard to deal with the Soviet onslaught.

[JDNIGHT]

ROFL. I only now noticed that my two fleets had actually ran into two different British taskforces. That is probably why they had such terrible results.

[Mushro0m]

belgium looks very bad indeed, finland too. i would try to encircle the soviet troops in northromania and start "Operation Tannenbaum" (Switzerland). Puppet Switzerland (they will stay neutral for some time after you puppeted them) and invade france together with italy.

[CptEasy]

It will look bad for a while, but if the Germans can hold things together for a while they will pull through. USSR really suck this early on. Similar thing happened in my "Sudden Carnage" (see link below). It is always tempting for USSR to do this attack... but seldom good. Now GER threat against USA will rise slower. UK and USSR will have to do this on their own, and I don't think they can handle that (depending of course on the players ability to tackle this situation).

Looking forwards for next chapters. The outcome is far from decided.

[KLorberau]

Interesting MP game. I never play MP due to my schedule but like the story line so far. You can do it Axis!! Beat back the commie and tommy/frenchie hordes!!

[Hallwood-Ingham]

Well, that was unexpected. The immediate outlook was rather bleak. Soviet troops were pushing on a broad front, with a fairly heavy concentration in Romania. The majority of Romania’s forces were currently attempting to puppet Turkey, still in Bulgaria, or moving to the Yugoslav border. My own forces were still moving to ports for evacuation from Greece, and I had a distinct shortage of transport ships, having sent half of them as an expeditionary force to Romania to support his venture in Turkey.

The Soviets were obviously aiming for a rapid victory over Romania, no doubt with the intention of making them a communist puppet. The Germans were spread thin, most of their forces heading west. Japan was on the other side of the world. So, it fell to the Italians to intervene. Mussolini insisted on leading the rescue himself.





My ad-hoc amphibious corps (2x Marine divisions and 3x Infantry divisions) had already moved back to Athens, so they were loaded onto transports and moved to St. Georg, in two trips. After fighting off a Soviet attack, we began a counter-attack north into Kilia, driving the invaders back, along the coast at least.





Meanwhile, Romanian troops rushed to defend their homes, and managed to stop the enemy in their tracks. Though numerous, it seemed the average Soviet soldier was no match for any Axis trained trooper one on one.

I rushed in more divisions, including my single motorised infantry, as soon as they reached Greek ports. One infantry corps was sent walking north through Bulgaria to reach the front.











With the Soviet push grinding to a halt, and the last of my troops arriving at Greek ports, I decided to make a move that would force the communists to withdraw from Romania entirely. An Italian Battlefleet was ordered to patrol the Black Sea to protect my valuable transports from the lumps of rust the Soviet Union called a navy, whilst I landed a force of infantry and cavalry in and around the port of Odessa.





Green arrows represent the initial landings, with blue as the immediate follow up moves ^^

The Romanians moves troops up to take over the corridor I had made along the coast, freeing my troops to link up with the invading forces near Odessa. My marine divisions fell back to St. Georg, in preparation for another amphibious landing, and the first Japanese divisions arrived in Europe, landing first at the southern Romanian port of Constanta.





The Soviet player was still boasting about his imminent victory. I told him I’d meet him in Moscow.

[Skovbjerg]

Evil soviets...

in the weeks/months leading up the the USSR's decleration of war the Japanese armies and navies alike were all being deployed to designated positions for the coming offensive against the Evil democracies of the west.. Marines getting ready for Island hopping, Infantry ready to march through Indochina to India.. Carriers preparing for engagements all over vital areas in the pacific and the remainder of the fleet just preparing for secret missions across the globe.

But as Japans war preperations was at the best.. the majority of the armies was stationed in Southern China, and the marines on islands... news reached the Imperial goverment, soviet troops had begun to cross the border into Imperial Japanese territory.. Manchuko only garrisoned by its own Puppet army, meant that Japan had to rapidly redeploy troops to the new Front against the Soviet Menace

as divisions across the empire was scrambled and begun redeployment the Imperial officers was quick to meet up around the big table with a cup of tea each (Empires are forged by Tea)

the Japanese army was caught off-guard due to the preperations for a totaly diffrent war, but quick planning begun and it was decided that japan would draw advantage of their naval supremacy in the East.

the Japanese came up with a genius idea, of cutting their supply lines and hence food, surely their army would crumble from within when they have no food?

- Circles = Harbours with Land connection
- Green = Amhpibious landings / with or without marines
- Black = Infantry advance / by land
-Yellow = Extremly Mobile infantry.

the idea was quite simple, stop their supplies through the Siberian Railroad, and cut their supplies from across the sea however futile it would be for them to sail ships through Japanese controlled waters.

the first troops to enter Russian territory was at Vladistok, marines was rushed to attack the area before the Infantry moved up to attack aswell, However it proved a disasterous thing (i somehow missed that they had a Coastal fort..) in the end the Marines was withdrawn from vladistok as the Infantry moved up and dealt with the soviet garrison in Vladistok

shortly after followed the landing in north of Manchuko, since it was a priority to cut the Siberian railroad as fast as possible.

thankfully the Manchuko forces did put up resistance to the evil Soviets, and advanced towards the Japanese forces who landed just north of them.

Following these landings, the two other landings along the coast of Eastern russia went without a hitch.
as did the Cutting of the Siberian Railroad.

however it did appear the soviets was trying to push into Manchuko, hopefully they'd run out of supplies before they'd get too close, or so Imperial high command hoped.

Immense propaganda begun across the empire to illustrate the Imperial japanese Naval supremacy in the East, leading to increased alot of young scientists wanting to give it one extra nodge to secure the Japanese supremacy in the East.

but as Japanese forces took Vladistok it seemed that the Russian forces might actually succed in reaching the Manchuko Capital before running out of supplies.. infantry was rapidly orderd to Strategic redeploy to the city, and hold it no matter the cost.

(oh and the Extremely Mobile Infantry still hadnt advanced one region... on the island in the top right corner of the screenshot)

However while things where going like a charm in the Far East, things looked grim in eruope, Japan had just finished 2 new corps of Infantry and did not desire their allies to fall, so it was orderd that the 10 divisions was to form 2 corps and be redeployed to Romania and fight along side the Romanians and Italians against the Evil Soviet menace

They arrived in Constanta in southern romania on the 1st/2nd of August. shortly after a corps of Imperial marines was sent to Europe aswell.

[CptEasy]

I have never seen in a MP game the value for a Soviet player to try to hold Vladivostock. It is simply wasting your troops with a very short time gain of initially delaying the Jap - a delay they probably quickly will catch up with when the Red Army have lost half of their Eastern Army. On the other hand - I would love to see a Soviet player trying to punish the Jap and get away with it. Trying to puppet Manchuria is an interesting, yet daring, choice. Will continue to follow with great interest.

[sprites]

There is a lot of players in that one ... a lot of axis players!

[JDNIGHT]

Chapter #8: Early Aug 1939 to Early Sept 1939

Human Players: *UK, USSR, USA, *Germany, Italy, Japan, France, Romania, Canada, Finland, Nat Spain, Australia, Sweden
* = co-op

From The Author: At this point the action is so intense that I forgot to take any screen shots this month. However I was able to dig up a few from saved game files.


Situation: We are starting to push the Bear back. We have encircled multiple Russian divisions but there seems to be an unending supply of them. The Fins are fighting a desperate battle against both the Russians and the Allies. And in France, the Wehrmacht is losing the... no, has lost the initiative. Our naval engagements have been less than stellar and we have decided to hold off on further deep sea operations. Our fleet will remain in the Baltic.


Our newest ally, Finland has been under siege. It is only a mater of time before the Fins fall.





Somehow a few of the divisions that I had sent as an expeditionary force to Finland had been destroyed. The situation was so dire that I decided to pull back the remaining division and its attached HQ.

By mid August the Russians had defeated the Fins and a peace was brokered.

Finland was still at war with the allies. The UK had decided to pull most of their force from Sweden. Our intelligence indicated that those divisions went to France. After the Russians had left, the Finish people (Evanissimo) put their rag-tag army back together and fought the Swedes. The Swedes found that 'finishing off the Fins' was not a chore to be taken lightly.





Along the Russian front, the Axis moved forward at a slow pace. The Russians continued in their aggressive play, which resulted in the loss of a few more divisions. One lone Russian tank division made for Warsaw. It almost made it!

The Italians were able to expand their position around Odessa. Upon seeing this, we (Kora and I) sent some extra divisions to the area between Romania and Hungary in an attempt to set up an encirclement. As soon as this was completed, this corps of troops would be immediately sent to the French front.

In the North, we were able to push the Bear all the way back into Lithuania. Resistance that far north was light. There were more enemy troops in the center, but they caused little harm.

The end of the Russian-Finish war must have freed up a lot of troops for the Bear (Pirro). By early September, close to an army had been moved into Lithuania. We were beaten there and pushed back.











Meanwhile, the French front did not go well at all. Here you can see the large number of allied troops that we were up against. Also, note how our troops are in a very aggressive stance.





The Brits kept pouring in more and more troops. They used their naval supremacy to the maximum and launched a vicious attack along the coast. After one or two staggering losses, I decided it was not worth fighting anywhere the Brits would have the support of their naval guns.

The French were also counter attacking. They pushed us back in some weak areas and pinned troops down in others. It was all I could do to keep the front from completely collapsing. We were heavily out numbered. The French and British units were decent troops, as opposed to the Polish and Russian troops we had fought thus far.








The British then pulled a surprise amphibious landing, taking Den Helder. German troops were rushed from the North to stop any attack the Brits might attempt. With more troops arriving from various places in the East, German High Command decided to attack. The thought was that if we could cut off the British troops in Den Helder, we could possibly destroy them.

Infantry, armor and paratroopers attacked Amsterdam and Rotterdam. The goal was to take and secure the coast and then to push north to Den Helder. A paratrooper division was dropped into Den Helder to prevent any troops from escaping. However the Brits responded with force. They shipped in another marine division into Den Helder and pushed north into us at Amsterdam. Again, the guns from the battleships tore us to pieces.





We were pushed back, and the paratrooper division never made it. The British marines moved north and cut our brave soldiers off from any possible retreat.

In Turkey the Russians proceed nearly unopposed.





The Far East:





The outlook is grim. Although we have destroyed many Russian divisions, there seems to be an unending supply of them. Only in the south, where my allies are fighting do the lines appear to be thinning. We are being pushed back in Lithuania. Finland is slowly collapsing. And worst of all is that the British and French are gaining ground in the Netherlands. The only good news is that I put 6 ARM divisions into production in the early part of '39 and they will start to roll out of the factories in October. Is October good news?