Super WWI!

[grumbler]

Man. If only Raz had been in charge in 1914 France might still be great 

Are you saying France is no longer great?

[Valmy]

Man. If only Raz had been in charge in 1914 France might still be great 

Are you saying France is no longer great?

It is just not in the same way as before.

[Razgovory]

With the snow and bad weather I should stop, but there is so little opposition I keep moving forward.  We don't want the enemy to dig in.  The US forces in Italy are barely affected by the weather, but their movement is slow.  They advance on Milan and take it easily.  However, I there is quite a few Austrian-Italian units to my rear in the French Alps.  I need to deal with them before I can conquer Italy.  I raise quite a few more French divisions and artillery brigades.  Enough for three corps.  I also raise a number of British units.  Do to some bizarre rule, units must be in the same theater as the Commander-in-Chief to be given an army command, so Jan Smuts makes a pilgrimage to Belgium so he can be granted army rank by Kirchner.



The Americans use tanks and heavy artillery to break the defenses at Genoa.  The city falls in early January.



While trying to move into position near Besancon, France, French forces are ambushed.  They suffer casualties.



Attacking in winter proves to be a mistake for the British in Belgium.



The weather improves in March.  We are ready for an all out advance.



The American advance in Italy



The Germans and the Swiss attack Belfort.  The French hold them off but are exhausted.



Finally, a victory near Besancon.  Galleni delivers a major blow to the Germans at Jura.



Bad News in the East.  The Czar takes command.



The British win a bloody battle in the Netherlands.



My Niece counter-punches!



The American attack on Torrino is delayed several times because of inept commanders.  We finally get the tanks rolling and deliver a major blow to the Austria-Hungarians.  Torrino is the main supply hub for the troops in Alps.  Taking it out should isolate the Austrians and Italians left defending the frontier.



The French finally push the Germans out of Besancon.



The French emerge from the Ardennes and push to the Rhine.  Like everything else, the casualties are high.



The French employ armor near the Swiss border.



The situation on the central front in June of 1916.  The Germans have been driven back and French forces are about to surround and destroy them.  When army is destroyed we can easily conquer Switzerland.  Switzerland will make a good spring board to conquer southern Germany and Austria.  A little further north, the French have reduced the German fortress at Thionville.  Ardenne-Lorraine will soon be recovered.



The British push north hopping to knock the Netherlands out of the war.  At the same time the French have advanced to the Rhine.  The Germans don't have much left to oppose them.



In the South the Americans threaten to isolate and destroy the frontier fortresses.  Once they are destroyed there won't be many Italian or Austrian soldiers left in the fight.  Already Pavia is undefended.  Conquering Italy will soon become a matter of marching, not fighting.

[Valmy]

Your niece looks fierce

[LaCroix]

enjoying this. if you care to repeat afterward, please do eastern front -- enemies with everyone you border. that could be fun.

[Razgovory]

I discovered that after 2 years Americans just stop coming.  So no more American reinforcements.   At the moment I have the Americans digging the Italian-Austrian armies out of the mountain forts.  They are bloody fights, but I pretty much have them trapped.  Once I destroy those armies Italy is done.  Actually Italy is already done.  I have a clear path toward Rome and Central Power morale is extremely low.  I think it's at 31.  It starts at 100 and if it falls below 5 they lose automatically.  My morale is over 100.  The Russians have a morale of 75. 

Nobody has used poison gas.  I won't use it because it's handled badly.  Each time you use poison gas it lowers your own morale 1 point.  Gas effects are heavily mitigated if your enemy has the same gas tech as you do.  Since each side increases their tech at about the same speed you never really have tech advantage.  Tech climbs slowly as the war goes on, but you can invest in a tech every few months for small price.  After the first six months of the game money ceases to be an issue.

There is a similar problem with "shells".  You have a set number of shells that can be used.  You can build factories for more shells, but here's the thing.  Light artillery (the type that every Infantry division uses), don't eat up your shells.  Only medium and heavy artillery and even those don't use much of it.  So you never run out of shells.

On the other hand, I often run out of supplies and manpower, but you can't use money to help that situation.  So money and shells are essentially infinite.  But don't really help much.  I also have "engagement points" which I think are used to trigger events, but I never run out of them either.

All that aside, this the only AGEOD game I've actually liked.  I don't think it simulates WWI very well, but it's still fun.  It is harder throwing all the nations in at the beginning (though I should have kept Bulgaria Central Powers), but it's neat having a front line that goes from Frisia to Genoa.

[Norgy]

Should've brought in Scandinavia too. 

[Razgovory]

June 1916 to January 1917.

Entente forces advance all along the front.  The enemy lacks the formations and manpower to create a defensive line.  Instead, they mostly guard forts or cities.  The fortress are the most difficult.  They take a long time to invest and destroy.  The Americans spent most of this time attacking into the Alpes and reducing the fortresses here.

My most immediate concern is the surrounded enemy force around Besancon.



Heavy fighting around the city.  The enemy is surrounded and seemingly doomed.  This turns out not to be the case.



In the North the British attack Amsterdam.



The French under Joffre capture the fort at Thionville.  The forts in the Alsace region prove difficult to take and require time and super-heavy artillery.



The city of Trier falls.





Three events fire.  Fortunately, I have a large army in Ireland and am not affected by the Easter revolt (which occurs in June for some reason).



A little later the Emperor gives up the ghost.  10 national morale points are huge for them.  The CP is teetering on the brink at this point.  The advance into Germany isn't helping things.




The Central power army breaks out of my trap, pushing aside French soldiers at Belfort make it back to their own lines.  Very frustrating.



The fortress at Torino falls.  Italian and Austrian soldiers from nearby provinces try to come to the fort's aid but are thwarted.  Still it's a very costly battle.  Pretty much all the battles in the Alpes are like this.  Still we make progress.



The French seize the industrial city of Cologne.



French General Lanrezac quickly moves on Essen, the site of major German steelworks.



The Netherlands are all but overrun. Already British forces have begun to invade Germany.



Only the German forts keep the French from conquering southern Germany (I move through the provinces with forts, but I can't get supply through them).  Conquering them is long and painful.



Switzerland on the hand is rapidly falling to French forces.



The Americans push further into the Alpes.  This is just one of many bloody battles around Fort de Susa.



Indian troops push into Dortmund.



German and Swiss soldiers attempt to relieve the fortress at Metz.  They are cut down by heavy artillery.



Turkish troops cross the Sinai and attempt to take the Suez Canal.  They are easily beaten, but I can't seem to drive them off.



American troops push into Aosta, with French Support.



In late October the garrison at Essen surrenders.



Woodrow Wilson is reelected.



The French assault Metz but fail to take it.  The fort will not fall this year. 

Winter begins to set in and armies begin to slow down. 



In the south, the bulk of the Italian army is based around a fort they took from the French last year.  The fight through the mountains has been extremely bloody and has to pause till the snow melts.  Both CP forces and Americans occupy that area so there is a lot of small-scale fighting.  Since I no longer get American units, I try to preserve the ones I have.  Elsewhere American forces have spread out across northern Italy.



A little further north, Switzerland has all but fallen.  The only areas not occupied have not strategic value.



The German forts still prevent much progress in Alsace.  The French who attacked through the Ardennes have occupied Germany up to the Rhine (and sometimes past it).



In the North the British have subjugated all of the Netherlands now lay siege to naval forts on the German Bight. Elsewhere Anglo-French have taken much of Germany's industrial heartland.

1917 may very well be the last year for CP.  The only thing slowing me down are forts and snow.  When the snow melts I can take more forts and drive on Rome, Berlin and Vienna.

[Norgy]

Out of curiousity, what is the rationale behind the Dutch siding with the German Empire?

[Valmy]

Out of curiousity, what is the rationale behind the Dutch siding with the German Empire?

Raz had the Allies declare war on them just to make it more super.

[Razgovory]

January 1917 to late July 1917.

Just like last year, there's not much I can do during the winter.  Instead of raising new units I toss most of my manpower into replacements.  At this point in the war, manpower is starting to dry up. 





In March, we restart our offensives.  At this point, there is a numerical parity between the W. Entente and the CP.  In fact as continue to destroy CP armies numbers really start to move in my favor.



British tanks crush the fortifications at Wilhelmshaven.



In late March, the snow melts enough that I can start attacking the Italians again.  Fighting continues until summer ending with the destruction of the Italian army.  Victory results in the last enemy occupation of French territory and rapid advance into Italy.



French tanks conquer the fortress of Saarbourg.  I was besieging the German fortress at Metz during the winter, but they surrendered.



Outnumbered Germans make a desperate charge at Koblenz.  Most of them end up as casualties.



Not all the Americans are fighting in the Alpes!  A few large units are conquering Italy.  There's not much resistance.  Here the Americans destroy some militia and capture a field hospital.



Outnumbered Americans cross a river and inflict a terrible blow on two divisions of Austrians and some Italian militia units.



Ravenna falls to the Americans and Italy is cut in half.



French tanks capture the fort at Strasbourg.  All the territory lost in 1871 is liberated.



A rare naval battle.  For some reason, the commander is Admiral Horthy.  While naval units are depicted in the game, actually getting them to fight one another is extremely difficult.  I have often watched as German ships slipped right through the English channel without my naval units stationed there intervening.  Sometimes German ships go off and do weird things like blockade Scotland or Canada for a short period of time.



Enemy morale is about 20 before this event triggers.  Their NM is cut in half.  Austria also loses some authority in the area around Prague, but I don't know what that actually does.



Armor proves really good at taking forts.



A desperate battle fought between the French and a motley collection of Swiss, Germans, Dutch, Austrians and Italians.  Half of them are wiped out.  Oddly some of the commanders appear to be naval officers.



The Americans capture the strategic city of Florence, which apparently has coal mines nearby.



And that is it!  CP morale has fallen to 5 points which cause them surrender.  I knew victory was coming soon, but I thought I would have to capture Rome to win the war.



Casualties and victory points.  I don't know why the CP starts off with so many VPs.  It doesn't matter I suppose, they still lost.



When the war ends the US was racing toward Rome.  It would have fallen within a month or two.  There is only local militia defending the cities.  The army was destroyed at Modane.



With the capture of the forts in Alsace-Lorraine, the French are able to break out.  The few remaining German units are very well fortified, but would have been easily surrounded and destroyed.



In the north, the British have captured most of the naval facilities.  There is about a corps worth of Germans defending Hamburg, but otherwise, there is no opposition.  The road to Berlin is clear.

So ends the war, which began almost 3 years prior.

[Sophie Scholl]

So... the best you can hope for is a Versailles level treaty as the Entente?  Also, what happened in Russia/Eastern Europe?  I see they weren't listed at the end.  It was fun to follow along.  Thanks for the thread, Raz! 

[Norgy]

Yes, good AAR, Raz. I enjoyed it.

[Razgovory]

So... the best you can hope for is a Versailles level treaty as the Entente?  Also, what happened in Russia/Eastern Europe?  I see they weren't listed at the end.  It was fun to follow along.  Thanks for the thread, Raz! 

The Russians were still in the war, I guess "treaty of Versailles is just the default message.  I imagine Russia would want Memel and a good part of German Poland.

[PDH]

The Czar's military prowess showed he could last until early 1917...oh right....