Tokyo, '45, An Australian AAR

[El Pip]

This is the only way to play BlackICE. Fight madness with madness.

Now the Naval Treaty is dead I can only hope Australia shows more wisdom in their warship choices than they did for their tanks. Export grade Char B1s. *shudder*

 

[37th Armoured div]

Next update will be in a while, exam season is acting up.

Spoiler: Something to expect:

Rebellions are annoying.
Black ice naval landings are annoying, because they require either auxiliary vessels or landing craft.
A rebel uprising on an island with no port, supply, or access is very annoying.
“Never another Gallipoli” will be a very annoying and important quote next chapter

 

[37th Armoured div]

…and due to a massive mess up in a back up, I have lost all data after the 25th of September (March, ‘37 ingame).
Luckily for me, it isn’t too far back, but well, yeah.
Though I already have ways to explain it.
The fedora man has been notably absent for a while, hasn’t he?

 

[Wraith11B]

Shit happens, suffice it to say. We'll be eagerly waiting!

 

[Bullfilter]

Was it the saved game as well, or just the screenshots etc? Either way, good luck sorting it out: something like this or similar usually happens to every AAR that goes for a while. So long as it’s salvageable, we’ll be here waiting. In our fedoras.

 

[37th Armoured div]

Fun with Time Travel
Sometime in 1937

---

Alexander Gore Arkwright woke to the sound of a storm. But something was odd about this one. It took him some time to put his finger on it, but he eventually realised that it was in reverse. First, he would hear the thunder, and only after that would he would see the lightning crashing into the land. He looked around and saw nothing. He was about to try to go back to sleep, when he heard the loudest crack yet, and, an instant later, his house exploded into light, and a man in a dashing hat suddenly appeared in front of his bed.

“Hello. I believe that this is the first time that we have encountered each other. I am the governor of OMG Island, and I wish to tender my apologies for this incident. A penguin of mine was building a time machine, in order to take advantage of our proximity to the date line, and it seems he accidentally forced you, and similarly important people backwards in time.”

“So you’re traveling to everyone he “time warped” and apologizing because of a subordinates mistake? I feel your pain.”

“Yes, I have to apologize to everyone he- You seem to be taking this very well?”

“Not the oddest thing I’ve heard about this week, you see. Next time we meet, I’ll buy you a drink.”

“Very well. I shall take my leave then, as I must apologise to others”

Petty Officer Clip was swimming in his favorite spot in the Indian Ocean, when he noticed something odd. The fish were swimming backwards. After marveling at this spectacle, he noticed a very soaked man in a black hat that was seemingly falling to pieces in front of him.

The Man opened his mouth. “Blub Blub Blub Blub Blub?”

Clip swam away.

 

[37th Armoured div]

My exam season has ended, so I can once again return to the joy!

 

[roverS3]

There is only one viable response: OMG!

Glad to have you back, I look forward to OMG's shenanigans. And of course, the Emu's, Kangaroos, and Cassowary's.

 

[nuclearslurpee]

Once again, the war in Spain fell apart for the republicans, but this time with a teachable moment for the rest of the world.

While this teachable moment assuredly existed, I note that it was not exposited anywhere in the text. Which is of course the height of historical accuracy, as while a teachable moment may have occurred we can rest assured that no one actually learned from it, such is the way of the world.

“No, you fool! Australians speak English (Australian), not English (UK)! Hear their Australian lilt!”

The businessman whispered into the two Australians’ ears, who then looked at each other, and began to talk.
,,˙sǝdʎʇoǝɹǝʇs ʇǝƃ ǝʍ ʎɥʍ sᴉ sᴉɥʇ ǝʞᴉl ɟɟnʇs 'ʍouʞ no⅄,,
The second one looked at the first Australian, and replied with: ,,˙sᴉ sᴉɥʇ ʇuɐʇɹodɯᴉ ʍoɥ ʍouʞ noʎ 'ʇᴉ ɥʇᴉʍ lɐǝp ʇsnſ,,

An old joke in a new setting makes for a brilliant espionage ploy!

To anyone who may be having trouble with what the Australian spies are saying, it’s considered bad form to spoil the joke, but turn it upside down

If it is bad form, no wonder the Australian does it so readily.

Shit happens, suffice it to say. We'll be eagerly waiting!

Sometimes shit even happens twice. SpoooOOOoooOOOky...

Fun with Time Travel

I am not sure time travel is even possible in BICE. In fairness, his is because I have not even managed to reach the point of traveling forward in time in any of my attempts to play BICE, let alone backward.

My exam season has ended, so I can once again return to the joy!

Once more my terrible sense of timing remains impeccable in spite of myself. Huzzah!

 

[El Pip]

Terrible priorities from OMG Island. Surely they should have started with the most senior and important person in Australia (Petty Officer Clip) and only then got to Arkwright.

That said, pleased to see this back and I wish you great success against your most fearsome enemy - the BlackICE events system.

 

[Bullfilter]

a man in a dashing hat suddenly appeared in front of his bed.

That gave me a bit of a 1930s vintage (not so) Slenderman vibe. Solidlyproportionedman?

Welcome back. Hope all the study and exams have gone well.

 

[RustyHunter]

Thanks for the update! It got some laughs out of me, which I really appreciate.

 

[37th Armoured div]

The grand return
March - 15 September 1937

---

The cancellation of the 2nd London naval treaty, which was used to allow Australian researchers at the university of Sydney to once again contemplate how they would design a new class of heavy and light cruisers. (Due to game constraints, production of vessels cannot be constrained, so research into better classes of ship are blocked instead). However, there was an unforeseen consequence to this, as it seems that Japanese researchers, who were focusing on other areas, now had freedom to theorize about uses of their navy to gain resources.

It seems that one of these uses for their navy was the invasion of a country with practically no reason for war.

Because Australia had in a way enabled this, Colvin and Paterson felt obligated to provide support to China

While this would later be debated in Parliament, this decision had the tacit support of most of the government.
The Japanese Navy meanwhile, Forced a massive landing at Shanghai, as well as an assault through the north, overrunning Beijing and most of the territory of the northern warlord of Yan Xishan.

Colvin could only hope that the volunteers dispatched to china would fare better than the ill fated Spanish expedition.

 

[37th Armoured div]

While this was a short update, i hope i can make up for it with this.

Charles Burnett, currently leading the RAAF stationed at Laverton, was shaken out of bed at 2 in the morning. "We need you to do some night bombing precision practice" said the officer waking him up. "Precise Night bombing? On what?" "Well... We have a mild problem with Papaun nationalists"

At this, Burnett started "A Nationalist problem? You want me to attack Australian citizens with bombs?!" "Technically speaking, Papua and New Guinea are more of australian territories, and-" "Ahh, I see, only AUSTRALIAN CITIZENS HAVE THE RIGHT TO NOT BE ATTACKED BY AIRCRAFT AT 2 IN THE MORNING, APPARENTLY-" "MR BURNETT, WILL YOU LET ME FINISH! As I was saying, You do not need to attack them, but you must drop maps on them." "A map?! What good would that do?" The officer then handed Burnett a map.

Pictured: Lost Papuan Nationalists, next to Canberra

Yes, Those rebels are indeed Papuan nationalists. No, I did not really attack them with aircraft, but they did pop up right next to most of my army.

 

[nuclearslurpee]

(Due to game constraints, production of vessels cannot be constrained, so research into better classes of ship are blocked instead).

HPP just prohibits construction of anything larger than a CL until the treaty is scrapped. Which...works, I guess. It's not perfect and requires a bit of metagaming if you want to play historically, but it does prevent big ship construction which is largely the point I suppose.

But yeah, there's no way to have the game limit the number of a ship type which can be built, at least not effectively.

Pictured: Lost Papuan Nationalists, next to Canberra

Paradoxican gold!

 

[Wraith11B]

HPP just prohibits construction of anything larger than a CL until the treaty is scrapped. Which...works, I guess. It's not perfect and requires a bit of metagaming if you want to play historically, but it does prevent big ship construction which is largely the point I suppose.

But yeah, there's no way to have the game limit the number of a ship type which can be built, at least not effectively.

I'm going to try it for my mod, but I'll be role playing a lot too, so it might not matter.

Paradoxican gold! [BGCOLOR=rgb(33, 36, 55)][/BGCOLOR]

I'd imagine this is more BICE gold...

 

[El Pip]

I'd imagine this is more BICE gold...

I'd lean towards that as well, another consequence of no-one on the BICE team ever play testing Australia. Though in fairness I doubt anyone on the core Paradox team ever play tested Australia either - as above, so below.

That said it could be a genius bit of strategy from the Papuan Nationalists, a revolt in PNG would be easily ignored and put down by the local garrison. But a revolt next to the Australian capital, just after the cabinet has very foolishly sent far too many troops to be lost in China, that could actually topple the government. That's just a HQ in Canberra, pretty easy for even a rebel unit to take out, and after that they will have the capital and government at their mercy.

Of course they wont actually achieve anything because the game mechanics don't work that way, but in reality it would be a major crisis and scandal with consequences for decades to come.

 

[RustyHunter]

The Japanese Navy meanwhile, Forced a massive landing at Shanghai, as well as an assault through the north, overrunning Beijing and most of the territory of the northern warlord of Yan Xishan.

Nice to see a more historical invasion of China. Does anyone know if this is event driven, or did BICE really find a way for Japan to invade Shanghai without falling apart in the north?

 

[nuclearslurpee]

Nice to see a more historical invasion of China. Does anyone know if this is event driven, or did BICE really find a way for Japan to invade Shanghai without falling apart in the north?

IIRC it is event driven, or at least it used to be.

In the past BICE has had a controversial habit of using event-spawned OOBs to mimic overseas invasions rather than trusting in the AI to do that, with Sealion probably being the best-known or at least the most infamous of these. However I know that as of the 10.x versions they had been trying to move away from this pattern but I don't know if they have kept certain event-spawned invasions or if they have actually taken them all out and just left the game up to the AI.

 

[RustyHunter]

In the past BICE has had a controversial habit of using event-spawned OOBs to mimic overseas invasions rather than trusting in the AI to do that, with Sealion probably being the best-known or at least the most infamous of these. However I know that as of the 10.x versions they had been trying to move away from this pattern but I don't know if they have kept certain event-spawned invasions or if they have actually taken them all out and just left the game up to the AI.

That's what I was concerned of. I can see the appeal in some ways since a lot of WWII was driven by naval invasions and the AI isn't particularly good at them. However, I can see the extreme annoyance of troops suddenly teleporting into existence and bypassing any defensive naval efforts. I guess it's just a matter of what people want out of HOI3.