[WarInEur] Re: Battle of Britain

[Kent & Sue Haunschild]

In the game when the battle of Britain doesn't occur then the production gets distorted.  For example, if you total the British AP reveived via the reinforcement track between the start of the game and 5/40 or 7/41 and then compare these numbers with those available at the start of the scenarios you will notice that about 1/3 to 1/2 of them are lost (presumeably due to air to air combat).  If there is no Combat then numbers of AP available to both sides get out of hand.  The German Builds in progress numbers are impossible unless they are rebuilding Dead AP.

Therefore, it is evident that the Game designers expected there to be more air combat than is the case.  Since it takes two to tango, the CW avoidance of air battle distorts the simulation almost worse than the failure to commit the BEF.

There needs to be "some" incentive" to force the CW to fight.  There are no strategic targets or bombers available to the Germans as there were in the real conflict and thus no penality for the CW if they don't fly.

The suggestion that we link the suppression of ports to political points is a workable one for two reasons.  One, it is temporary and two it is doable within the current game system.
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: SGMINFO at aol.com 
  To: SGMINFO at aol.com ; WLSTBS4 at aol.com ; cwie at iinet.net.au ; emu at fwi.net.au ; warineur at mailman.halisp.net 
  Sent: Monday, January 14, 2008 4:07 AM
  Subject: Re: [WarInEur] Re: Battle of Britain


  One of the key features in the Battle of Britain was the intention of the Luftwaffe, and our considerable skill in defeating that intention.

  The Luftwaffe wanted, at all times, full battle.
  The RAF, other than at the keenest vital moments,
  wanted to dodge this.

  The unfolding battle was characterised by the Luftwaffe repeatedly groping about looking for something vital that would force the RAF up to get embroiled in a slugging match, where numbers wuld count, and the RAF would be overloaded and broken and scattered.

  Note the simularity with the Allied 1943 conundrum, where they too sought smething as a target that would force the Luftwaffe to come up and fight.

  It was the German failure to find this in 1940 that doomed their offensive, and in 1944 the allied success in this, that reversed the tables.

  Dowding's great genius lay in so disposing and directing his limited resources that opposition appeared as damaging as ever, without exposing the RAF to ruinous losses. It was truly 'float like a butterfly, sting like a bee'. If his opponent could land one solid punch on him, the game might be up.

  The 'great debate' in the summer of 1940 between Leigh-Mallory and Park was precisely down this fault line. 
  If his 'big wing' and battle tactics were followed, he could indeed inflict great losses on the enemy, but what put him at odds with Dowding was the fact that this also exposed large battle formations to great airbattles and potentially great losses, something that the RAF could not survive at this arly stage of operations.

  The nearest his enemy got to guessing his game was the offensive against the airfields and secondary attack against the Radar network.

  Radar was vital, not so much because of the early warning it gave, but more vitally, it allowed us to pick and choose what to engage, and what was feint and what was real. it allowed the 'impression' to be maintained that the RAF was a lot more numerus and potentially effective than it was.

  In contrast the abstract airwar does not simulate this quite so well, it only allows the RAF commander not to commit and keep his airforce in being.

  The various mods/incentives being proposed vis a vis the allied air strength and tactics are all intended , one way or another, to encourage this 'battle' element, the one element that exposes the RAF to a numbers game, which, faced by the German productive ascendency, tends to encourage the allied airforce to its doom. This will be ok, perhaps, with a less lethal system, but unsupportable losses that normally occur, can be expected to have but one outcome, and at these rates, achievable before the onset of winter.

  i.e. under sme of the propsed regimes, If the RAF does not fight, it loses political or economic power, such losses being unnacceptable to the allied player, who thus is encouraged to enter the fray, and play a game in which the German player has all the cards.

  In the game, if the RAF stands back, and does not engage, it risks invasion, but with an intact RAF, the German sealion option cannot be utilised properly, and the supply lines get slowly eroded and cut to ribbons. Either way, the German commander seeks battle, and if you accept, you are playing his game.

  At least, that is my take on the problem...


  -|steve|-


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