Muddling Through the Darkest Hour - Learning How to Play the UK

[TheExecuter]

2. Problem is if they try to trap us in Wilhelmshaven, we would have to win there, just like we did now, in order to have an opportunity to escape. I don't know if we can do a retreat while being attacked in Wilhelmshaven. Maybe we get a Miracle of Dunkirk event where the AI German player misclicked and stopped attack Dunkirk and suddenly the human UK player could load all his troops on Transports and escape.

Thats why you want space so you advance until you can't.

Unless you are facing enemy motorized or light armor, you can retreat into Wilhelmshaven, and then load and transport away instantaneously.

Don't fight battles you won't win. Sometimes, I'll fight a battle to win it and send the enemy retreating, but then stop my advance. The enemy has to fall back to wherever I forced them to retreat to, then recover org and move into position to attack me again.

There is a LOT you can do to get the AI off balance and not concentrating his forces on you. Human players won't let you get away with such shenanigans...but the AI is dumb.

 

[Riel Hamard]

Muddling Through the Darkest Hour Session 23

Okay. We're going in without any cover. Hopefully we manage to pull out in time. We have one Division that will arrive November 21.11 and we started to move some Divisions back to Denmark in case we need reinforcements. We are leaving 7 Divisions to freeze in Germany. It is shocking just how many troops we are losing to attrition.

November 18, 1939 - We marched into Bremen. Nobody is home.
November 21, 1939 - We marched into Bielefeld and made the German reinforcements en route back off with a single division.
November 22, 1939 - Germany annexed Poland. Poland managed to survive for two months against Germany and the Soviet Union. We are sure those 140 Infantry Divisions are coming after Greater Denmark with a vengeance.

Spoiler

The Germans, meanwhile, organized their counterattack to drive us out of Bielefeld.
November 23, 1939 - We marched into Munster. It will be December 6 by the time we can pull back to safety. The German Naval Bombers somehow managed to find our Submarines.
November 24, 1939 - Germany honored the MR Pact and handed Eastern Poland over to the Soviets.
November 25, 1939 - They managed to kill over 900 in a single air raid?! We responded with Strategic Redeployments. Based on this, we should be able to exit by December 2, if that is enough time.
November 26, 1939 - The British Raj joined the war. Meanwhile, USSR declared war on Finland and there is nothing we can do. We lost another 1000 to air raids.
November 27, 1939 - Sweden will send volunteers and material to help Finland.
November 28, 1939 - The Germans recaptured Bielefeld.
November 29, 1939 - Bolivia had a Militarist Coup d'Etat. They are Social Consrvative.

Production:
November 14, 1939 - Surface Radar deployed to HMS Malaya. Vicky deployed to 46th South Midland. Today I learned we can deploy Brigades right on the front lines.
November 16, 1939 - Vicky deployed to 45th Division.
November 25, 1939 - Vickey deployed to 1st Infantry Division.
December 2, 1939 - Fire Control deployed to HMS Despatch.

Completed Research Projects:
39-18 Mass Assault Doctrine completed November 20, 1939
39R Hawker Hurricane Mark 2A started November 20, 1939 by you guessed it.

Sunk Ships:
November 26, 1939 - TBF 4 Destroyer sunk by 1/5th Submarine Flotilla at Pomeranian Bay. We will retreat for repairs.

December 2, 1939 - Well we are still intact on the German Front. We took some nasty air raids. There are lots of German Divisions nearby ready to counter, but we can slip out right now if we want to.

Spoiler

Our losses so far sit at 32404. Germans appear to up up to 159 Infantry Divisions and down to 5 Cruisers and Destroyers.

 

[TheExecuter]

Can you hit Bielifeld to fix those troops in place? When they are in combat, they won't move other places and if you are attacking they cant attack.

Only do this though if you can favorably trade...i.e., you would be winning.

Otherwise, hit the enemy forces entering Munster and Bremen as they come in piecemeal...the AI often doesn't time their arrivals to be all at the same time so you can defeat the enemy in detail. Win the fight and force the enemy to retreat, and then immediately stop your movement forward. Leaves the province under your control but your forces still concentrated.

 

[Riel Hamard]

Muddling Through the Darkest Hour Session 24 - January 4, 1940 - One Door Closes and Another Door Opens

Answer to first question is unlikely but possible. We have 12/15 Divisions available and might be able to attack with 6 of them and we have 8 Divisions across the river. So we are going with the otherwise scenario. Either the plan works or we are taking another mulligan.

Another thing that scares me is that air force. With 30 Bomber Squadrons, they can annihilate quite a lot. With 4 Naval Bomber Squadrons, we should not have been able to get close to any coastline, let alone run that carnage in the Baltic Sea.

I also want to see what happens when our full mobilization expires. I never did find out what partial mobilization means. Based on what happened so far in this run, I am planning a second run at the same level to apply some lessons learned. One will be about manipulating the government. Another thing to figure out is how to manipulate our manpower in the peace years.

December 3, 1939 - 6 hour air raid and 4 hour naval battle. One of the things we will fix in our next game is figuring out how to get more air power.
December 5, 1939 - A night air raid left HMS Argus crippled. We will be limping back to port and have little left in defense. Our theory on groups is either they single out a group or a single ship. We might try building bigger groups. 6 hours is quite a bit, too.
December 8, 1939 - Germans recaptured Munster.
December 9, 1939 - Germans recaptured Bremen. We are now isolated in Wilhelmshaven.

December 11, 1939 - Finland had an election in spite of a war for their national survival and elected to keep their current government and voted to kick the Soviets out of their sovereign territory. They are Social Conservative.
December 13, 1939 - Here is when we decided to pull out of Wilhelmshaven. We are still 24 Divisions attacking across a river into Bremen against 4 Divisions, but we are starting to doubt our odds. The big question is if we can make the gauntlet into Denmark.

Spoiler

December 15, 1939 - We made it to Denmark. We should be able to send some of our ships back for shore leave. Or maybe we look for another opportunity.
December 16, 1939 - Germans recaptured Wilhelmshaven. That was pretty quick.
December 18, 1939 - This might present another target if we are looking for another adventure. It is quite a bit more dangerous than the previous one, because it is a longer run to safety.
December 22, 1939 - We captured Rostock and destroyed a German Air Division. However, it might cost us a Division and we must take a decision on what to do. Can we save them? We probably should have send much more of an invasion force.

Spoiler

We cheated a little bit and looked ahead. The brave 46th Division is doomed, but not necessarily the soldiers. So we disbanded the 46th Infantry Division. Somehow all the soldiers made it back into our pool. It is a very long distance to swim, especially in December. We also cheated a little bit and took a look at what we took out. We believe we took our all 4 Naval Bombers and 1 Tactical Bomber. Our normal Intelligence says they have 17 Fighter and 22 Bomber Squadrons.

Upgrade Parade:
December 9, 1939 - Seafox upgrade on HMS Penelope
December 10, 1939 - Surface Radar upgraded on HMS Ramilies
December 10, 1939 - Light Armor upgraded

Production:
December 10, 1939 - Level 4 Rocket Testing Site, another colossal waste of IC that could have gone to the RAF.
December 11, 1939 - London and Oxford are both Level 4 Radar. We are almost finished.
December 13, 1939 - Lincoln Radar Station upgraded to Level 4. We finally finished this journey.
December 17, 1939 - Improved Hull installed on HMS Hawkins.
December 21, 1939 - Seafox deployed to HMS Dauntless.
December 22, 1939 - Artillery deployed to 48th South Midlands Division
December 25, 1939 - ASW installed on Destroyer Division 1

Completed and New Research Projects:
39-19 Motorized Infantry Division completed December 4, 1939
39S First Strike Doctrine started December 4, 1939 by Hugh Dowding
39-20 Early Static Anti Aircraft Artillery completed December 14, 1939
39T Combat Engineer Brigade started December 14, 1939 by Enfield Arsenal
39-21 Basic Medium Tank completed December 15, 1939
39U Multirole Fighter started December 15, 1939 by Supermarine

Spy v Spy:
December 13, 1939 - Germany tried to delay our research.
December 22, 1939 - Italy tried to delay our production.

Sunk Ships:
December 3, 1939 - 39 USBF sunk at Frisian Islands by DD22
December 3, 1939 - 1 USBF sunk at Frisian Islands by DD21
December 4, 1939 - 23 USBF sunk at Frisian Islands by DD5
December 4, 1939 - 3 USBF sunk at Frisian Islands by DD42

RIP List:
December 3, 1939 - DD21 sunk at Frisian Islands by German Naval Bombers
December 22, 1939 - 46th Infantry Division disbanded rather than risk an impossible fight.

Confirmed German Bomber Squadrons:
10 CAS - 5, 3, 210, 1, 1, 2, 51, 76, 77, 10
10 TB - 28, 3, 27, 55, 51, 54, 53, 30, 26, 2
They still did a number on our fleet and one of our Destroyers limped out of there with 5 health. I don't know about repair costs. Is this a writeoff or should I move them to escort duty?
Our Intelligence now says 22 Fighter Squadrons and 26 Bomber Squadrons. We have 6 Bomber Squadrons left to identify.

We made it to 1940. Here is a map.

Spoiler

We have been collecting dividends from Rostock. We might do well to look for another opportunity target. However given that at least 12 Bombers patrol the Baltic Sea, that might be pretty dangerous. We will try to gather up numbers shortly.

 

[TheExecuter]

I also want to see what happens when our full mobilization expires.

It won't expire...until the war ends.

How is France doing?

 

[Riel Hamard]

It won't expire...until the war ends.

How is France doing?

I was having trouble sleeping, so have time to deal with a question.
What is France doing? You guessed it. Nothing. But you asked how France is doing. Most likely, they are doing better than we are.

107 Land - 77 Infantry 5 Cavalry 7 Mountain 6 Garrison 3 HQ 9 Militia
This is less than Germany's 160 Land

76 Navy - 8 BB 2 CL 1 BC 9 CA 10 CL 19 DD 18 SS 9 TT
This is more than Germany's 68 Navy. The next rival to check is Italy.

10 Air - 6 Interceptor 1 Naval 3 Tactical Bombers
This is less than Germany's 48 Air.

Germany likes to run regular patrols across the Baltic. A lot of their Fighters are used for Air Superiority Missions there. Our ship that venture there get smashed.

Spoiler

We are showing 437 km from Copenhagen. This is a 30 hour gauntlet if we want to send Transports. Since Air patrols only run during the day, we can run a night patrol to see what is sitting on the coast and if there are more rich targets. When I checked again, the distance might be a bit longer. It's an 88 hour journey from the naval base we are borrowing from Denmark.

We actually managed to find a use for Militia units. Unfortunately, we upgraded all of them. Our mission might be another couple of plain Infantry units.

 

[Grahe]

December 22, 1939 - We captured Rostock and destroyed a German Air Division. However, it might cost us a Division and we must take a decision on what to do. Can we save them?

We cheated a little bit and looked ahead. The brave 46th Division is doomed, but not necessarily the soldiers. So we disbanded the 46th Infantry Division. Somehow all the soldiers made it back into our pool. It is a very long distance to swim, especially in December.

You can retreat divisions on TPs if the province has sea acces. Just park the TP in the adjanced sea tile and once the division is under atack click the retreat on to the transports. Same goes for regular movement.

 

[Riel Hamard]

You can retreat divisions on TPs if the province has sea acces. Just park the TP in the adjanced sea tile and once the division is under atack click the retreat on to the transports. Same goes for regular movement.

I checked and it appears you are correct.

I will take tonight off. I tried multiple starts and I am having trouble making an amphibious invasion work. I would like to choose my target when I arrive in the seazone. So I arrive at 16h on January 7. I start an amphibious assault on Konigsberg and Danzig. Both my transports go home without conducting amphibious assault.

Why did I just risk my transports?

Do I have to plan my amphibious assault from the start? I tried planning two from the start and one of them started and the other one went home.

Also. If the submarines come to find me as soon as I send my Transports, then I feel completely justified in loading saves and looking for enemy positions.

 

[TheExecuter]

Do I have to plan my amphibious assault from the start? I tried planning two from the start and one of them started and the other one went home.

Yes, you have to plan it in port.

Pay attention to the mission settings too. You want to do the mission both in daylight and nighttime. If any of the ships sustains damage to HP or org greater than the limits in the mission setup, the fleet will return to base.

 

[Riel Hamard]

Yes, you have to plan it in port.

Pay attention to the mission settings too. You want to do the mission both in daylight and nighttime. If any of the ships sustains damage to HP or org greater than the limits in the mission setup, the fleet will return to base.

There are about 16 Submarines waiting for me as well.

 

[TheExecuter]

There are about 16 Submarines waiting for me as well.

They might force your invasion to abort...

Yet another reason to send your army to France rather than keep trying to Gallipoli things...

 

[Riel Hamard]

Yes, you have to plan it in port.

Pay attention to the mission settings too. You want to do the mission both in daylight and nighttime. If any of the ships sustains damage to HP or org greater than the limits in the mission setup, the fleet will return to base.

I planned it in port. They arrived at 12h on January 8. Instead of conducting the invasion, they went home.

Here we go again......

 

[TheExecuter]

I planned it in port. They arrived at 12h on January 8. Instead of conducting the invasion, they went home.

Here we go again......

Was the mission allowed to proceed in both daylight and night? If not, once the other time is reached, the ships will go home.

Did any of the ships drop below the allowed strength or organization level for the invasion? If so, the ships will go home.

Did the army units have sufficiently high organization? They may need to be close to fully organized, as paratroopers do...

I think there is a check box that tells the ships to stay no matter what, but in your case...that seems a foolish choice.

Given that the enemy still has strong naval bomber presence...you are likely not going to be able to just park a fleet off the enemy coast for the multiple days it will take to fight an army onto a beachhead.

Far better, IMO, to join your forces with France and force Germany to lose Fall Gelb.

 

[Riel Hamard]

Muddling Through the Darkest Hour Session 25 - February 1, 1940 - A Grand Stunt that Could have Gone Worse

We will try to spring a plan into action.
1. Check Production. We are up to 119. We bumped our production projects up to 68 and slipped in another Hurricane for May 20.
2. Our Naval Bomber now has a job in Copenhagen we should have started months ago.
3. Rally Destroyers to Frisian Islands. It appears we can rally 24.
4. Move the Carrier Group.
5. Move 4 Battleship Groups.

We just noticed we have visibility on our targets. It appears we have 11+3 German Air Divisions stationed on the coast. The visibility difference might be because of a recent minister change. Or it might be a glitch associated with loading the game.

Spoiler

January 5, 1940 - Our Naval Bomber jumped out of there just in time to avoid a group of 8 Fighters. We forgot for a moment to take it off mission.
We engaged 16 Submarines with 13 Destroyers and 30 Transports. The battle was a draw, but another Destroyer Division got mauled. The mission continued.

January 9, 1940 - The Germans recaptured Rostock. We captured Konigsberg and Danzig, but no major victory resulting from that.
January 16, 1940 - The Germans recaptured Konigsberg.
January 17, 1940 - The Germans recaptured Danzig. We accomplished absolutely nothing. It looks like we did some infrastructure damage.

Upgrade Parade:
January 6, 1940 - HMS Malaya Surface Radar upgraded
January 29, 1940 - HMS Valiant AA upgraded
January 30, 1940 - British Army HQ upgraded
We have 15 Attachments and Brigades to upgrade.

Production:
January 7, 1940 - Surface Radar installed on HMS Valiant

Completed and New Research Projects:
40-1 Improved Oil Refining completed January 30, 1940
40A Improved Computing Machine started January 30, 1940 by Alan Turing

Spy v Spy:
January 9, 1940 - USSR tried to delay a tech team.

Sunk Ships:
January 10, 1940 - KM Koln CL sunk by HMS Resolution in Danzig Bay
January 11, 1940 - TTF 16 TP1 sunk by HMS Royal Sovereign in Danzig Bay
January 11, 1940 - TTF 13 TP1 sunk by HMS Resolution in Danzig Bay
January 11, 1940 - TTF 4 TP2 sunk by HMS Queen Elizabeth in Danzig Bay
January 11, 1940 - Handelsmarine TP2 sunk by HMS Warspite in Danzig Bay
January 11, 1940 - TTF 14 TP1 sunk by HMS Hood in Danzig Bay
January 23, 1940 - USBF 11 sunk by DD 8 in the Frisian Islands
USBF 14 sunk by DD 9
USBF 13 sunk by DD 5
USBF 7 sunk by DD6 - It is possible we wiped out a group with this battle.

The situation looks much the same as it did a month ago. Troops are staring at each other waiting for better weather. Tomorrow is Groundhog day. The groundhog will look for his shadow. If the groundhog sees his shadow, then it is 6 more weeks of winter. If the groundhog does not see his shadow, then spring will arrive early, in 6 more weeks. In the Soviet Union, this early spring is still 13 weeks away.

Spoiler

Here is a look at our ship hospital. Maybe it is not too bad if we can see 100 strength sitting at the bottom of our list.

Spoiler

Our Intelligence says we are still up against:
154 Divisions
1 Armored Division
9 Headquarters

22 Fighters - Our Fighter production is still months away.
26 Bombers

3 Cruisers and Destroyers - We are sure we have confirmed more than that.
Yeah, they are way off. Specifically we have spotted:
CA5 KM Admiral Scheer
CL4 KM Karlsruhe
DD6 ZGW 2
DD4 TBF 5 and 6 - 6 ships total and not 3

24 Submarines - We believe we can name and number all 24.
32 Transports - Same. We believe we can name and number all 32..

We have not made the effort to name and number all the German Air flying over us.

 

[Riel Hamard]

Muddling Through the Darkest Hour Session 26 - March 1, 1940 - The Phony War

We mustered 19 Destroyers and 3 Transports to move to Denmark. We also sent 6 Submarines to patrol the Baltic. A night scan of the Baltic Sea indicated no obvious targets. Our Transport situation is we have 24 Transports in Denmark to move 36 Divisions and 3 more en route.

We are also getting closer to an Italian entrance to the war. We will use a declaration of war on the Low Countries as a trigger to start moving forces to the Mediterranean.

February 8, 1940 - Another battle with 18 Submarine Squadrons and we are not sure if we got the better part of it.
February 9, 1940 - We managed to take out 1 Submarine Squadron, with quite a few Destroyers damaged.

February 23, 1940 - End of the Finnish Winter War. The Soviets eventually got what they asked for.

Upgrade Parade:
February 6, 1940 - HMS Renown AA upgraded. We have 14 attachments to upgrade.
February 10, 1940 - HMS Furious AA upgraded. This is unlikely to do us any good in the upcoming Battle of Britain.
February 12, 1940 - HMS Barham and HMS Ramillies AA upgraded.
February 13, 1940 - HMS Royal Oak and HMS Queen Elizabeth AA upgraded.
February 14, 1940 - HMS Valiant Radar upgraded
February 21, 1940 - HMS Ark Royal AA upgraded
February 23, 1940 - Light Armor Brigade upgrade
February 26, 1940 - Light Armor Brigade upgrade. We are not sure how far behind this was.

Production:
February 16, 1940 - Improved Hull installed on HMS Barham
February 28, 1940 - Radar installed on HMS Devonshire. It probably still needs upgrade.

Technology:
40-2 Combat Engineer Brigade completed February 16, 1940
40B Basic Field Artillery started February 16, 1940 by Royal Small Arms Factory

Spy v Spy:
February 3, 1940 - Ireland tried to steal a blueprint.
February 17, 1940 - Germany tried to steal a blueprint.
February 24, 1940 - Italy tried to delay production
February 27, 1940 - Japan tried to steal a blueprint

Sunk Ships:
February 9, 1940 - USBF 41 sunk by DD 41 in Heligoland Bay
February 13, 1940 - DD6 ZGW 2 sunk in port at Kiel by HMS Ark Royal
February 23, 1940 - TP1 31 TTF sunk in port at Kiel by HMS Courageous
TP1 29 TTF sunk by HMS Furious
CA5 Admiral Scheer sunk by HMS Courageous
DD4 6 TBF sunk by HMS Ark Royal
CL4 KM Karlsruhe sunk by HMS Furious
TP2 6 TTF sunk by HMS Ark Royal - This was a very successful port raid. Our follow up bombing raid got butchered, however. The port is in the center of a corridor of a continuous stream of Interceptors claiming air superiority over Denmark.

There was an entire month of not much going on.

Spoiler

We are up against:
144 Divisions, 1 Armor, 9 Headquarters
26 Fighters, 27 Bombers - Does this make us outnumbered 10 to 1? We are kind of grounded in Denmark.
1 Destroyer, 22 Submarines, 25 Transports

With our air raid getting butchered, we are surprised our CAG was able to get such a nice hit on Kiel.

 

[TheExecuter]

Am I right in assuming most of your expeditionary force army is in Denmark now?

That should slow the Germans down...but France will fold to the Germans unless you actively defend it...the French AI is gimped to pretty much always lose (one of my irritations with Darkest Hour...)

If you let France fall, then you basically doom Europe to be 'liberated' by the Soviets. The US AI is unable to take the fight to Germany in any meaningful way.

 

[Riel Hamard]

Am I right in assuming most of your expeditionary force army is in Denmark now?

That should slow the Germans down...but France will fold to the Germans unless you actively defend it...the French AI is gimped to pretty much always lose (one of my irritations with Darkest Hour...)

If you let France fall, then you basically doom Europe to be 'liberated' by the Soviets. The US AI is unable to take the fight to Germany in any meaningful way.

We have 36 Divisions in Denmark right now. We will have to move some of them to Africa before Italy joins. We believe there is a window between Germany declaring on the Low Countries and France joining in.

You are irritated at DH because the French AI is gimped to lose? Maybe I go into the save file and change the French AI. I think you were trying to get me to attack far enough into Germany that the French AI changes.

I am going to guess the US AI is unable to do much of anything except send naval units and attack random islands. Meanwhile I had a game where NZ AI was MVP.

 

[Riel Hamard]

Muddling Through the Darkest Hour Session 27 - March 17, 1940

It looks like we have 15 Destroyers available for the upcoming missions. There are 15 Italian Divisions lined up at the Libya border and 3 more in Italian East Africa.

March 3, 1940 - Our Destroyer and Transport group made it into Denmark.
March 4, 1940 - We sent 12 Divisions towards Egypt and have 36 Divisions remaining in Denmark.
March 11 1940 - Canada elected right. They are Social Conservative.
March 13, 1940 - We moved 5 Task Forces to Egypt.

Upgrade Parade:
March 9, 1940 - It's our Medium Armor that is getting upgraded. We have 4 Brigades to go.

Production:
March 13, 1940 - Spitfire 2 No 14 RAF FG
March 14, 1940 - Spitfire 3 No 13 RAF FG

Technology:
40-3 First Strike Doctrine completed March 11, 1940
40C Carrier Air Group started March 11, 1940 by de Havilland

Sunk Ships:
March 6, 1940 - Carrier Strike on Kiel
TBF 5 sunk by HMS Furious - This should be it for the entire KM Surface Fleet. We have a bunch of U-Boats to worry about now.
TTF 20 sunk by HMS Courageous
TTF 30 sunk by HMS Furious
March 14, 1940 - Contact with U-Boats at Frisian Islands
USBF 2 sunk by DD 14
USBF 36 sunk by DD 14
USBF 37 sunk by DD 36

We have to pause here. Here is a map.

Spoiler

We have 24 Divisions in Denmark and 12 en route to Egypt. They have made it to Malta so far. We plan to move more units that direction and we might be in a better position to give a more detailed count in a few hours.

 

[TheExecuter]

This should be it for the entire KM Surface Fleet.

Nice!

That should make moving transport fleets around easier...so long as the enemy naval bombers don't find you, or the subs...

 

[Riel Hamard]

Nice!

That should make moving transport fleets around easier...so long as the enemy naval bombers don't find you, or the subs...

What Naval Bombers? We got all 4 in a raid. It is a bunch of Dive Bombers and Tactical Bombers they have. In a different notebook, I made a list of all their U-Boats and Tactical Bombers and Dive Bombers. Then I ran out of paper and changed notebooks and misplaced the notes.

I forgot to take a Groundhog day screenshot to prove it, but the groundhog was right. Yesterday was March 16 and spring arrived. We should be looking at some kind of invasion of Denmark, along with the Low Countries. The war is going to become a lot more awkward to manage by then.

The Italians will become involved again. So once again, we will have to win at sea. Then we have to win in the air and this will be awkward when we are currently outnumbered 4 to 1 in Fighter count.

Somewhere when war is declared on the Low Countries, we will have to move our forces out of Denmark and into France.