Skillful play == play that bores your opponent into making a mistake.  :evil:

Thanks for the advice.

She is as OK as can be expected.  Chiropractor visits daily, muscle relaxants, heat and cold.  It is all soft tissue damage on the back, shoulder and spine.  Thankfully today MRIs can actually see that kind of stuff so the debate of whether it is “real” or not is gone.

She will get better but the car will be “as good as new” long before she is.

@ncscswitch:

… but if can AVOID the 8 in 10 risk and the possibility of the 1 in 10 result and till achieve your goals toward victory, would that not be superior play?

Quite possiblly but very boring…

Switch - Thanks for those tips.  We will definitely be looking into those points.  One of the pissers in this is my wife is currently on summer vacation so she is not officially losing time from work.  Never mind that this is essentially her vacation time that is being chewed up.

Jennifer - We considered having our insurance get involved but in discussion with our claims agent, if we get our insurance involved it will increase the odds of an increase in our premium.

No one expects the Spanish Inquisition…

My wife was rear ended by another driver.  He is entirely at fault.  His insurance is covering our costs.

But….

They are treating us as a “third party claim”.  This means we get a lump sum payment when we finalize all the bills and costs.  We get nothing until then.

So, here we are with a rental car, medical bills, lost wages, etc and we get to eat the interest cost of the money it takes to cover all of those expenses until the mess is cleaned up enough that we can actually settle a lump sum.  There is no provision for them to pay the interest on that money nor is there any provision for partial pay outs during the course of the treatment or vehicle repairs.

Anyone know a good lawyer and is there a legal leg to stand on with expecting the insurance company to either do partial payments or cover the cost of the interest?

That would be why I joined the Navy instead.

Of course, I still got to visit Baghdad for a short few months.  I did enjoy the confusion on the faces of the Army and Air Force guys when they figured out a submarine qualified Navy Chief was in Baghdad…

Take care and come home safe.

Hey, I have a bug report…

Well kind of a bug report…

The autosave file does not include dicerolls as they are happening.  I don’t know how often it saves but it if it saved during dicerolls it would be nicer…

@mjkusn01:

In the games I have played, the Allies either attack Africa on turn one or attack Norway by turn two (depending on German AC build).

So my question is: Is there a safe way to keep Norway for more than one or two turns? It starts with 3 inf, and you can transport at least two more over… you could even blitz a tank through (if Karelia is unoccupied) to Norway. However, if you spend too mucn resources on keeping Norway, then you become too weak to counterattack against the Russian.

Is there a way to keep Norway? Or is it doomed to fall?

In World War II, France was retaken before Norway. I think German troops were still in Norway when Berlin fell (correct me if Im wrong). This hasnt happened in any of the games Ive played so far (not even close).

Stepping away from the discussions about playability vs real world…

Follow the CSUB Baltic Fleet paper recommendations and build 2 or 3 transports in the Baltic on G1.
(http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/Caspian_Sub/)
Then gather all otherwise unassigned ground forces into Eastern Europe.  Norway, Karelia, Belorussia and Ukraine have now all become a Dead Zone for the stack of forces you are using to face the Russians.  Additionally Germany no longer needs to be garrisoned because your Baltic fleet (with 1 DD and 2 SS) is not an easy push over for the Allies anymore and you will get to see that fleet coming one turn before it comes in.  Additionally those Transports now put your G2 infantry build in Karelia on G3, shortening your invasion pipeline to Moscow by one turn.  If you have a pipeline that is 5 to 8 infantry units per turn (Infantry Push Mechanic), by G3, the Transports are “paid for” in terms of a faster pipeline and a larger deadzone.  Add in the “gotcha” threat of 4 transports pulling an Operation Sea Lion and you have a decent way to keep the Allied player honest.  The UK player now has to keep 8 ground units plus air cover in the UK to prevent SeaLion from ruining his day.

You should still put enough ground units in WEU to allow the FTRs you are going to base there make the Allies pay dearly for D-Day.  BTW, the FTRs in WEU in conjunction with a fleet in CMD or WMD make the African Landings a lot more difficult for the Allies.  Those WEU FTRs can also hit all the land areas adjacent to the Baltic and still return to WEU.

So, the “Atlantic Wall” is:

Norway

• 1 Inf

Baltic Fleet

• 1 DD, 2 SS and 3-4 Transports
  Check the CSUB paper and see the logic on this.  It is not aimed at invading England but at making sure the UK/US airforce pays dearly for any attempt to sink the Baltic Fleet.  A CV is also effective but it does not add the benefit of extending the Dead Zone by virtue of transports.  If the Allies are building up a force that can threaten the Baltic Fleet, contemplate adding a CV.  For 16 IPC you can base two FTRs and now the threat of Sea Lion really gets ugly while all you are doing is making sure you can keep Karelia in your Victory City count.  You may find yourself “trading” Norway/Karelia but with a little planning you can make this a very expensive proposition for the Allies.  A sortie of subs into the invasion fleet can change the economics of the situation pretty rapidly.  There are players who don’t keep the Baltic Fleet strong enough as time goes by, accepting that eventually it will be sunk.  Personally, I think it should be kept strong enough to defend itself successfully.  By default this tends to mean that it will also keep the Allies focused on defending London and the “shuck-shuck” convoys will not have an easy trip.

WEU

• An infantry unit in WEU for every ground unit the allies can transport into it (ie, every transport that can hit WEU -> add 2 inf)
• Half of the Luftwaffe fighters, this should be at least three fighters.
• An AA gun

Med Fleet.

• 1 BB, 1 SS and 1 Transport is what you have available to begin with.  Keeping them alive and using them to fend off the British at the Suez, the Americans at the Straits of Gibraltar and still putting enough ground units into Africa to earn those IPC is the challenge but that is beyond the scope of how to keep Norway…

There are, of course, counters to all of this but they require different builds and tactics than the typical “shuck-shuck beat Germany to death with Allied units landing in Norway/Karelia” game.  Different builds and tactics open up more options for victory.

The most obvious counter is a more agressive Russian player but that then makes it easier for Japan since IPCs being sent to Berlin are not standing between Japanese forces and Moscow…

The submarine submerge happens at the same time as the attacker is deciding to retreat or not, after all combat for that round.

Thus, the defending submarine always gets to fire, even if the opponent is a submarine sank it.

The crucial difference is a defending submarine can submerge instead of dying.

An attacking submarine can submerge after the attack, thereby forcing the other player to treat that seazone as hostile in his next move.  Think about that in the context of preventing a two seazone move by a convoy…