So for a bit of background, in 1939, irl, during the Tripartite negotiations between the USSR, the UK, and France, a third plan was proposed whereby the Soviets would bypass Poland (who was unwilling to allow Red Army personnel into Poland regardless of alliance status) via a naval invasion of Germany proper. Nobody took it seriously, but it was thought out at least somewhat.
I've dabbled with this project a bit, but this may be an interesting question for folks who peruse the forums and like thinking about the game.
So I've got a few options in so far as the game is concerned. A. I could use the historical 1939 Red Banner Baltic fleet, in so far as its big ships are concerned (since Subs and Destroyers are abstracted and smaller ships aren't considered at all). I assume the German AI Navy in 1939 would be sufficient to cause serious damage. Or B. I could cheat a bit and utilize some foreknowledge in 1936 to construct a more robust navy in the Baltic to better protect my landings.
So far I've attempted two separate landings. One primarily focused on Koenigsburg/Memel/Danzig on day 1 of the war (Danzig came after but it's a port city so I couldn't say no). My objective here was to aid Poland and try to keep it afloat by way of eliminating the Prussia pocket and cutting off any units that moved into Poland proper by moving my invasion force South (pinching them between Polish forces and my own thus eliminating their supply lines). At first things went pretty well, but eventually my INF, Marine, and Light tank forces got bogged down and couldn't move deeper into Germany proper, and Poland eventually collapsed completely, which basically ended the game since the majority of the Red army was sitting in Prussia with a fairly lightly defended Polish Frontier. Poland in so far as the game is concerned *will* allow your soldiers to move into Poland, but I worry that they won't be able to provide any big force with sufficient supplies. Since I assume I would be drawing from their supply pool the moment I enter Polish territory right?
I should note I accomplish this arrangement with Poland by way of Guaranteeing their Independence prior to the German invasion and also rejecting the M-R pact.
I constructed a fairly large navy to accomplish this. Something like 25 transports, in total broken into groups of 5 (each assigned to its own province to invade) escorted by 2 1934/1936 Heavy Cruisers and several destroyers of varying quality (36/38), and several runs of convoys. My navy was attacked and I lost 1 heavy cruiser, but all of the transports got through. Is this fleet too much? Will maybe LCs or DDs alone be enough to prevent massive transport losses? I think perhaps I overdid it a bit lol. I also sent out a group of unescorted empty transports (an additional 5) as a test run and 3 of them were lost
so clearly they need *something* to catch bullets for them in the Baltic.
The second go around I tried moving more troops into Poland when war broke out (I remember in an older game I tried moving my troops into Poland early and they took a massive ORG hit for some reason when war was declared so I didn't move them ahead of time). I attempted to land further to the West this time and make a cheese run on Berlin (Rostock being the port of choice). The landing force made it to Berlin with similar losses to game 1, but failed to capture it before it got completely swarmed by all manner of divisions, and Poland collapsed anyways. Ironically, my army was completely screwed, but the French AI had bulldozed Italy lol.
So my questions:
What sort of escort force do you think would be appropriate, but also allow for a sufficient army to *perhaps* save Poland? I'm not concerned if the ships survive the initial invasion or not, simply that the transports unload their cargo - once we take a port, a transport run is fairly simple. I feel like building 10 Heavy Cruisers and 10+ DDs may've been a bit of overkill.
When you do a large naval invasion is it better to b-line to important objectives or to spread out over as wide an area as possible? The actual Landing part is simple, it's getting any sort of traction after it given how far superior the specialist 140% officer ratio having German units are to mine.
Where do you think an appropriate landing site would be? Prussia to help the Poles from the North, or further West to draw the Germans et al to a wonky location (since most of the German troops will be on the French and Polish borders).
Do you think it's possible for this to work at all lol?
The ideal scenario is one whereby my naval invasion is so spectacularly threatening to the Germans that they fail to knock Poland out of the war (thus I don't have to defend my frontier from the Axis).
I've dabbled with this project a bit, but this may be an interesting question for folks who peruse the forums and like thinking about the game.
So I've got a few options in so far as the game is concerned. A. I could use the historical 1939 Red Banner Baltic fleet, in so far as its big ships are concerned (since Subs and Destroyers are abstracted and smaller ships aren't considered at all). I assume the German AI Navy in 1939 would be sufficient to cause serious damage. Or B. I could cheat a bit and utilize some foreknowledge in 1936 to construct a more robust navy in the Baltic to better protect my landings.
So far I've attempted two separate landings. One primarily focused on Koenigsburg/Memel/Danzig on day 1 of the war (Danzig came after but it's a port city so I couldn't say no). My objective here was to aid Poland and try to keep it afloat by way of eliminating the Prussia pocket and cutting off any units that moved into Poland proper by moving my invasion force South (pinching them between Polish forces and my own thus eliminating their supply lines). At first things went pretty well, but eventually my INF, Marine, and Light tank forces got bogged down and couldn't move deeper into Germany proper, and Poland eventually collapsed completely, which basically ended the game since the majority of the Red army was sitting in Prussia with a fairly lightly defended Polish Frontier. Poland in so far as the game is concerned *will* allow your soldiers to move into Poland, but I worry that they won't be able to provide any big force with sufficient supplies. Since I assume I would be drawing from their supply pool the moment I enter Polish territory right?
I should note I accomplish this arrangement with Poland by way of Guaranteeing their Independence prior to the German invasion and also rejecting the M-R pact.
I constructed a fairly large navy to accomplish this. Something like 25 transports, in total broken into groups of 5 (each assigned to its own province to invade) escorted by 2 1934/1936 Heavy Cruisers and several destroyers of varying quality (36/38), and several runs of convoys. My navy was attacked and I lost 1 heavy cruiser, but all of the transports got through. Is this fleet too much? Will maybe LCs or DDs alone be enough to prevent massive transport losses? I think perhaps I overdid it a bit lol. I also sent out a group of unescorted empty transports (an additional 5) as a test run and 3 of them were lost
so clearly they need *something* to catch bullets for them in the Baltic. The second go around I tried moving more troops into Poland when war broke out (I remember in an older game I tried moving my troops into Poland early and they took a massive ORG hit for some reason when war was declared so I didn't move them ahead of time). I attempted to land further to the West this time and make a cheese run on Berlin (Rostock being the port of choice). The landing force made it to Berlin with similar losses to game 1, but failed to capture it before it got completely swarmed by all manner of divisions, and Poland collapsed anyways. Ironically, my army was completely screwed, but the French AI had bulldozed Italy lol.
So my questions:
What sort of escort force do you think would be appropriate, but also allow for a sufficient army to *perhaps* save Poland? I'm not concerned if the ships survive the initial invasion or not, simply that the transports unload their cargo - once we take a port, a transport run is fairly simple. I feel like building 10 Heavy Cruisers and 10+ DDs may've been a bit of overkill.
When you do a large naval invasion is it better to b-line to important objectives or to spread out over as wide an area as possible? The actual Landing part is simple, it's getting any sort of traction after it given how far superior the specialist 140% officer ratio having German units are to mine.
Where do you think an appropriate landing site would be? Prussia to help the Poles from the North, or further West to draw the Germans et al to a wonky location (since most of the German troops will be on the French and Polish borders).
Do you think it's possible for this to work at all lol?
The ideal scenario is one whereby my naval invasion is so spectacularly threatening to the Germans that they fail to knock Poland out of the war (thus I don't have to defend my frontier from the Axis).
