From: Daniel Duldig <dduldig@WERPLE.MIRA.NET.AU>
Subject:      Re: TGWIE after the battle

Finished a solo game of TGWIE on my new vertical gaming board
(eat your heart out) last night and thought the list might be
interested in a short report.

The game started with a spectacular first turn by the Germans who
managed to destroy the entire Belgian army and folllowed it up
by complete occupation of Belgium in the second turn knocking
Belgium out of the war. In the east, figuring the AH were the
weak link,the Russsians began a slow methodical hunt of weak AH
units ,whilst in Serbia there were a few minor exchanges.

The western front quickly stablised by turn 4-5 with the CP flank
resting one hex from Dunkirk but without the historical central
bulge in the line towards Paris. The Serbs and the Austraians
continued to trade punches without much joy whilst I made a
serious playing error in the east by trying to defend to forward
with the AH's again the Russians.In hindsight they should have
pulled back to the carpathains and better defensive terrain,but
instead tried to hold the original setup line around the border
fortresses.

Chit pulls were uneventful until early Bulgarian entry outflanked
the Serbs forcing them to beat a hasty retreat south from which
they never recovered.Second lesson,as soon as the Bu chit is
ready to go into the cup,pull back the Serbs to the 3 hex wide
neck of land in the south of the country as this is eminently
defesible. The Gallipoli chit was pulled but the Allies saw no
benefit in using it and it lay as a not so hidden threat. The
serbs were ground to dust by Oct 1915 and exited the game for the
time being. Unfortunately the AH victory was not celebrated for
long as the Italians entered the turn of Serbian destruction and
needles to say this caused frantic movement of AH units to the
Italian front. Lesson 3.same as 2 but this time for the Italian
chit.

The Italians launched an offensive against the AH and made
signifciant early gains,but were beaten back by reinforcements
because they are vulnerable to concentric attack being fairly
much unable to enter alpine hexes(they only have 2 mountain
units) whilst the AH had plenty of mountain units to infiltrate
through the aalp hexes.Also the italians really miss not having
an HQ early on as this restricts their advance and makes
attacking in difficult terrain fairly costly.Their army is
brittle..actually weak..so lesson 4 be very prudent with Italian
attacks until they either have an HQ or the Allies can assist in
1917.

The CP were,despite their peripheral successes having some
difficulties,since they had failed to touch the British army and
had not inflicted significant losses on the French early
on,although the Germans had taken some pretty heavy
exchanges.This was aggravated by the AH being spread thin by the
Serbs,then the italians and being slowly pulverised by the
Russians.Althought the Germans could demolish russians stacks at
will,they were becoming too spread out to launch offensives in
the east as the AH line contracted and got pushed back,whilst all
the time the British with monster stacks were grinding up 6+
german units a turn whilst the French picked off a couple
more.Things became more and ore serious in the middle of 1916 as
the Western front consisted of Allied stacks varying from 3-6high
against German stacks of 2 high.The Germans were so busy plugging
holes on the western front they were unable to divert further
troops to assist the AH who were finally pushed back to one hex
from budapest in Sept 1916.Then the Allies landed in Salonika and
the writing was on the wall. The axis conceded in Oct 1916....

Great game,would play considerably differently next time as I
learnt some hard  lessons on proper tactics. I thoroughly
recommend it .Might try one of the scenarios next,once I finish
with Proud Monster/D&D..should be ready about this time next
year..

Daniel
dduldig@werple.mira.net.au

PS Does Serbia accumulate resource points if it is completely
axis controlled and there are no serbian units on the map,not
even the HQ?