Stunning and simply beautiful!

Please let me know if you ever make it available, I would definitely like to play on it.

The biggest hurdle I’ve found to printing these off and putting them together is getting overlap on the pages. Without this it became difficult to cut off the edges of the paper and get everything aligned nicely.

My solution to this was to use MS Publisher with a .1 to .2 overlap. This gives you some room to align things up nicely.

Additionally, you can resize the map to any dimensions.

Title:  Italian Fleet Looks Great… at the bottom of the Med (take TWO)
Date: 30th of December
Special Rules: NO’s and Tech were both used. 1941 scenario
Victor: AXIS victory, by concession
Game Length: around 10 hours
Bias: Pretty Even

Description: Germany didn’t learn from the 1942 game and left enough UK shipping that the bomber from UK and the FTR from Egpyt sank the Italian fleet AGAIN UK1. This kept Italy as a land force for the entire game. Turned out to be very effective as a can opener. Snuck in with German troops and opened up East Ukraine for a German tank drive to Moscow on G3. Only thing that kept the axis in the game. UK was HUGE. USSR retook Moscow, but the Allies never got the tempo back up and finally surrendered.

Germany built a bomber per turn and that kept the Atlantic empty of any UK fleet for many turns. When they weren’t killing UK fleet they were sent to the front. Very effective toys until the Luftwaffe FTR force was taken down.

Japan had China down to 1 territory, but US snuck in with a bomber and sunk it’s AP fleet. Japan was hamstrung and never recovered. It was marginalized on it’s island for the rest of the game. Once Germany and Italy broke Moscow’s back and headed to the Far East Japan would’ve made a come back.

UK built the Indian factory and was able to push the Japanese off the mainland with help from USSR. US snuck in 2 loaded APs into Fukien and hooked up with UK. Japan found itself fighting 4 tempos between US, Chinese hordes, UK, and USSR. It held a factory in Manchuria for as long as possible with some interesting tactics, however it was finally ovewhelmed.

Observations/Recommendations: Protecting the Italian fleet is key – but it turns out not as bad as it looks.

Title:  Italian Fleet Looks Great… at the bottom of the Med
Date: 30th of December
Special Rules: NO’s and NO Tech. 1942 scenario.
Victor: ALLIED victory, by concession
Game Length: around 2 hours
Bias: Pretty Even

Description: Germany didn’t attempt to sink enough UK shipping. Italian fleet sunk on UK1. Japan failed to kill Chinese FTR. It kind of went downhill from there. Agreed to surrender and re-roll a 1941 game.

Observations/Recommendations: Protecting the Italian fleet is key. sz12 is a must clear on G1, or at least leave the German DD there to block the UK fleet.

@Emperor_Taiki:

Title: British Capture Berlin, Twice (1942)
Date: December 27th, 2008
Special Rules: Tech + NO
Victor: Axis by Concession playing to 13 victory cities
Game length: 5 turns/ 6 hours
Bias: 1 expeirenced Axis player aganist 1 new Allies player
Discription: Japan focused on China while holding off US and sending six aircraft too Eastern Ukraine on J2.

Nice to know the “Unbeatable Strategy” isn’t – and this vs. a new Allied player. Guess it just takes seeing things from a different perspective.

Though I’m still having a hard time getting the 6th FTR to Eastern Ukraine. Can someone walk me through the logistics behind this without Long Range Aircraft tech. The one in Japan just keeps running out of gas for me. :?

Thanks for the AAR!

@templeton:

… but there were nearly 100 players. (http://www.jimwallman.org.uk/tlw/index.htm) That way you simulate the reality of missinterpreted orders, bad briefings…

This looked like an amazing simulation. I can’t imagine having conflicting political and military objectives along with poor communication. What wonderful chaos that must have created. Were any of the German Generals shot for not following orders?

@templeton:

I like to try and do this for Axis and Allies, and hope to get 12 people playing in the new year. This way you can have Japanese Army and Japanese Navy and make them argue over strategy. Ditto the US are split into ETO and PTO - that way you don’t get such a strong KGF, as the other player wants to follow KJF.

Keep us posted on this one. It has some real interesting potential – I’d like to try and get this working with our local gaming group. We can usually muster 10 people or so once a month and get 2 boards going at once so combining it to one group wouldn’t be too far of a stretch.

What kind of white “control” team do you need to pull this off, and how to you keep the dialectic tension at a high level within the teams?

PanzerPainter, what do you use to seal your paint jobs. The guys I play with are really rough on my toys so I had to resort to sealing the paint with MinWax Polyshades.

Problem is, even the satin is rather glossy though it does a nice job shading and protecting.

@U-505:

For the record, if anyone want’s to try this strategy out I’m willing to take the Allies here. We can play best out of 3, best out of 5, Low luck to eliminate the wild dice swings, or whatever you think it would take to prove or disprove this strategy.

Yeah, I think it is kind of a gimmick – at least it’ll be over quick. If the Allies see this one coming, and start pumping fighters into Russia I don’t think the Axis can pull it off.

Once they blunt the attack the game is over for Japan and Germany will be reeling.

One of the problems with the tactic/strategy is that Italy is wide open. Germany failed to retake France on G2 and UK drove a tank with airplanes into Italy. Stalls them right out.

So, you just can’t ignore the Western Front.

It bears some more analysis but I don’t think the Axis can pull it off if the Allies are wise to the possibility.

Looks great on paper though.

Wow… how do you top that?

It sounds like an AAR game with 9 VC – it sounds like a fast and furious vicious challenge. Going to have to put some skullsweat to this one.

Title:  Splish, Splash, the Japs were taking a Bath… (1942)
Date:  …Long about a Saturday night… 20 December 2008
Special Rules:  Techs and NO’s
  - Attempted to go for LHTR Super Bombers rules but was vetoed down
  - Gang voted 3-2 to play with tech
Victor:  Allied Victory
  - Germany finally croaked “please take your foot off my neck… I can’t breathe…”
Game Length:  6 hours/3 rounds … yeah, we’re slow movers
Bias:  Sides seemed pretty balanced. Japanese had some really cold dice and they never recovered from J1.
Description:

G1: Tech*2. Germany opened by sinking the British navy and digging in on the Eastern Front. Loses the U-Boat fleet.

R1: Tech. Takes Finland and digs in for defense

J1: Tech*2. Transport.

• Japan had a great textbook opening attempting to sink the entire US fleet
• Takes Burma
• Skipped the Philippines
• Takes East Indies
• Takes Borneo
• Destroyed the Chinese ftr

Japan lost 5 of it’s fighters and the US BB survived.

UK1: Tech.

• Strikes German fleet in Baltic
• Builds CV, 2*DD, Transport
• Withdraws from Africa & digs into India
• Surviving Indian fleet sinks Japanese transport & blocks Australia from surface assault
• Australian fleet sets up in Carolina Island in anticipation of US fleet consolidating there

I1: Trans-Jordan & Egypt

Observations/Recommendations: 
Agreed that the next game we’ll attempt without tech. Seems to make it too much of a crap shoot/game breaker.

US/UK/Japan ended up with Long Range Aircraft as tech

Japan never recovered from the loss of it’s Air Force on the first move and failed to see US setting up in the Philippines. Japan was left empty and US walked in on US3 after a brief naval conflict. After Japan fell it was just a matter of time – though there was a brief moment where Germany might have pulled off taking USSR.

Long Range Aircraft really shrinks the Pacific and turns the tide for whoever gets it first. US had fighters and bombers in Australia as defense and the tech advantage gave them global reach. Japan should have gone totally defensive after that tech roll and waited for Germany and Italy to take Russia.

Germany & Italy were doing some amazing work in the Caucasus. That is a pretty scary combo punch down there when they finally get it wired. My hat is off to the coordinated action down there.