Introduction

It's 1943, Germany and her Italian Allies have been kicked off the continent of Africa, and now the Allies have turned their eyes towards the invasion of mainland Europe.

Fortress Europe.

This time, there will not be the bickering of a hundred Generals and multiple nations, this time, there is a unified command.

My Command.

It's time to kick Hitlers teeth in!

What is War in the West.

If you've not followed any of my games before, then this is a hex based, weekly turn game following WWII from the 3rd of June until the fall of Berlin in August 1945. I shall be playing as the Allies, as A, they have the better toys, and B, the AI has less chance to shit the bed on the defensive.

Wait, haven't I seen something like this before?

Yep, I am now running War in the West, War in the East and War In the Pacific. All a the same time.

I am fighting the entire war.

I am the God of Grognard LP's.

Thanks to all goons.

Before I start the LP proper. I'd like to thank everyone who contributed to the Gofundme that allowed me to buy this stupidly overpriced game.
This LP is for you.
Not that anyone else would read it.

Europe. July 1943.
It seems wrong not to start with a grand map, even though we will be focusing much more on theatres to begin with.
Please note that the took the time to model Spain, Sweden and Ireland, even though these area will never be fought over.

All Quiet On the Western front.
This is mainly as I still lack the units and equipment to properly invade France – all of my Amphibious units are now down in Italy ready to hit the soft underbelly. Here there is little else I can do but order a whole load of airfields to expand their capacity for future operations.

Well, that and order my planes to start reducing the country to ruins. This is the automatic air screen. I can manually control all my squadrons in the game, but this screen is what I'm going to be using the most – it seems to do an OK job, and I want to keep what's left of my sanity. I adjust my priorities so we are trying to hit most industries a bit.

And here is the plan for bombing Germany. Green is the RAF and purple is USAF.

Visually the air phase is pretty boring to watch

Here are the results.

You can get more detailed data for each hex. But very little way of gauging overall damage.

This is where most of the action is taking place. The invasion of Sicily is about to take place.

The air force is locked in to provide support.

They plaster the invasion site.

This is the plan for Operation Huskey. While its a good one – taking several major ports in the flatter south of the island, I want to make a small but important change.

One division is tasked to land in the north – they will arrive one week after the main force, as it takes a bit of time to re-plan the invasion, but, supported by paratroopers, this will cut off the main forces in the area and allow me to wipe them out with ease.

Everyone else boards ships and gets ready to hit the beaches. Good luck men!

Finally, I want to talk about plans for invading Italy – I know my men have yet to land in Sicily, but I want the amphibious units back in Africa ASAP and planning for the next op. There are several possible landing zones, and I wanted to get peoples ideas on them.

The obvious, and easy choice, is to hit Messina and the surrounding areas – a short hop, good supply lines, its an easy invasion.
That said, its not that ambitious, and means slogging all the way up Italy.

Further north is my current preferred zone. It would allow a quick cutting off of the enemy, but there would need to be landings further south to take out the ports. This is necessary to both supply my troops and cut off theirs.

The heel has some good landing sites, but is open to counter attack and a long way from my ports – so supply would be hard.

Landing at Salerno and Naples gets us far up the country, but the ports are likely to be well defended.

The “Fuck it, lets take Rome” option – nice beaches, plenty of tourist spots – and of course, lots of Germans and good terrain for rapid panzer counter attacks.

So, what do you guys think?

The Let's Play Archive

War in the West

by Grey Hunter

Introduction

Table of Contents