VIRTUAL Summer 2020 Battle of Britain on 14th June

With continuing Covid 19 restrictions some of us decided to play via Zoom using triple a. Of course this was not as much fun as playing face to face, but the four of us who joined in very much enjoyed the day.

Mark (@Credulous) kindly hosted the Zoom session.

We decided to play Anniversary (1942 set up). Mark played Japan and Adam (@Private-Panic) Germany / Italy. Leo (@Wittmann) took USA & Russia and Andrew (@h0lym0nk) GB. The Allies had a bid of 12 which they placed as a GB destroyer off Canada and a R artillery.

The opening moves on the R front favoured R, as G counter attacks all suffered more casualties than they inflicted. GB attempted its Taranto moment and lost heavily, leaving Italy able to capture Egypt. Japan suffered no mishaps, killing the GB fleet of India, the US flotilla at Pearl Harbour and the Chinese fighter.

GB considered its choice of factory locations and decided to opt for South Africa. Fortunately Hirohito spotted the possibility of capturing this and under Japanese orders the Italian navy navigated the Suez Canal and dropped 2 ground units in south east Africa, and these were able to capture the factory the following turn.

The US landed in north Africa, but then lost its 2 transports, defended by a single destroyer, to a G Luftwaffe attack. The US decided to allocate a considerable proportion of its resources towards an Atlantic navy sufficient to allow further landings in north Africa. These pushed towards Egypt.

This allowed J some freedom in the Pacific. J captured India and built a factory there. Briefly this appeared threatened by US pressure on Egypt and a R threat south from the Caucasus, but the prudent deployment of J fighters to India and Egypt stymied any Allied ambitions. Later Australia also had the honour of joining the J empire!

Meanwhile G managed to keep R in check while also combining with I units to deny the Allies the opportunity of gaining the French national objective. As a result the Axis were gaining most of their national objectives, but the Allies few of theirs. This and the collapse of the British Empire gave the Axis an income advantage of around 30 ipcs per turn.

The Allies surrendered, with a G stack before the walls of Moscow and a growing J threat on Caucasus. The US Pacific fleet had captured a couple of islands (while J replaced the naval fighters it had sent to India) but had no opportunity to effect further advances. The US Atlantic fleet had sailed south to defend Brazil from Italy’s South African fleet, robbing north Africa of reinforcements. Perhaps the only bright point for the Allies was GB’s capture of Norway.

The four of us had a chat and decided that the autumn and winter BoB dates should be arranged with the intention of falling back on a virtual event should Coronavirus continue to preclude face to face play.