Posts made by jim010

End German turn 1. Disastrous counterattack at Caen. Tried to deplete the British forces there, which did happen, but the Allies brought their entire airforce to help defend, enabling the British to survive and the German attack being wiped out.

@FranceNeedsMorePower I agree 100% that French leadership killed the French army. Not sure how far the French could have gone in the Saar offensive, though, as it was not planned as a real invasion force - more of a raid. And the British could not help as they were still organizing the BEF and getting it sent over.

I think they could have occupied the Saar region and dug in, though.

@FranceNeedsMorePower Yes. They show up on or after turn 8 as the French First Army coming up from southern France chasing the Germans after Dragoon.

End of Allied turn. Successful landing with heavy casualties.

In this game, infantry get defensive bonuses from terrain such as forest, mountains, coastlines, or rivers. But Infantry can also entrech themselves to get a defensive bonus. While entrenched, they cannot move, even to retreat.

They also get a bonus for defending in a fortress, but the infantry must be entrenched to get the fortress bonus. While entrenched in a fortress, infantry roll 2d6, instead of 1d6.

When defending from an amphibious landing, the defender fires first and the attacker must remove those units before he gets to fire. This is for the first round only. It makes amphibious landings very dangerous.

The stack limit in the game is 6 ground units to a space. But when amphibiously attacking a land space, only 3 units are allowed to amphibiously attack - unless the land space is a beach, in which case all 6 units can attack.

The grey token with the turret represents a fortification. The brown token represents that the infantry are entrenched.

Here is the 1944 scenario. Allies go first in the scenario followed by Germany. Scenario start on June 6th, 1944. US must land in Cherbourg, and UK/Canadians must land in Caen - unless playing with optional rules.

This game is available through Combat Miniatures:
https://combatminiatures.org/collections/historical-board-games/products/world-war-ii-on-the-western-front

I would also argue that people see the Maginot Line as a waste, but overlook what the line was intended to do. In terms of its purpose, it did exactly what the French wanted it to do.

@FranceNeedsMorePower even beyond the Saar offensive, do you think France could have stopped the Germans?

For my part, the French army was the equal of the Germans and more in terms of numbers and equipment. It was Gamelin stubborness to stick to the Dyle plan that doomed them.

Could France have stopped the Germans? Was the Maginot a waste?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlFmYI_mS7Y&fbclid=IwY2xjawNSIIRleHRuA2FlbQIxMABicmlkETFhdVFQTU9EM2E3emZGZTNVAR5fLht-EsgcuryiF3OvImHxSOUwpJkbbHTmE3umV27hYFz27iMonRlOPsxVQg_aem_NGvspYmXLK94fn5Qb3PzFQ

Here is a look at the rules for the terrain in the game. It usually benefits the defender, and in some cases inhibits the attacker. The effects of terrain are cumulative. So if you are defending behind a river, and are in a fortress in a forest, you get the defensive bonuses for all those features unless otherwise stated.

On page 7 you can see the role that supply has in the game. The supply management in the game is similar to AA Battle of the Bulge.

And the Allies hold the line by bringing in reinforcements from the Commonwealth and Algeria. A fair bit of back and forth in this game. Still hard to say who is going to win this game, even though the Germans are likely to hold Paris, they have lost their tank strength to keep pushing forward. Here they will need to rebuild the tanks and bring them forward, which will take time. The German planes need to be rebased closer to the front as well, and getting supply up to the front is starting to be challenging. And the British are now in France with some real strength.

I’ll leave it here. This should be enough to demonstrate how a game would play out with lots of back and forth. If the Allied player groups his tanks and mech properly, and uses his airforce enmasse, then yes, the Allies do have an even chance to defeat the Germans. Usually best to delay the German advance and wait until German supplies are stretched thin - usually when they are gunning for Paris - , then attack in force with the aim of cutting them off.

End of german turn 4. Opened a lifeline to Paris.

End of allied turn 3. Yup, was a mistake to drive so deep into Allied territory

End of the 3rd German turn. Broke through again and took Paris. Might have been a bad idea …

End of the Allied turn 2. France kicked the Germans out of Reims and decimated the German tanks at great cost.

End of the German second turn.

Breakthrough in Sedan. Now doing an exploit attack on Reims.

Turn 2. Hitting Sedan.

End of the Allied first turn. Tried to counterattack Verdun and Brussels but failed. British are building up a second BEF.

End of the German first turn. Decided to ignore Holland and focus on an all out drive the Brussels.