How Things Might Happen
Initial Landing:
6 vs
12, Victoria wins.
One month passes since the raid. Of the vaunted Commonwealth navy, there is no trace. Burns holds them back, always constantly looking to the heavens for God's judgement. There is no resistance as the Victorians rebuild their navy with mortars on fishing boats, no resistance when the Victorians push onto the Lake Erie islands and Toledo, and no resistance when the Victorians draw up their ships to land on the beaches.
There is no follow-up; how could there be, when Burns lived in constant fear of the sky overhead? There is only the waiting, and the static defense lines, dug in without possibility of manuever.
At 0800 hours, the Victorian army finally obliged the waiting armies of the Chicagoans. Slamming into the beachead with far more than the numbers advantage than Rumford recommended. Landing without the worthless baggage that Chicken Burns naturally fretted about, the lightly-burdened Victorian military slammed into the beaches, under the fire support of the quickly-assembled navy.
That was another mistake the Chicagoans had made: prioritizing the navy when the most important battles on the mainland. Fundamentally, the navy wasn't important, and even if it was, any fishing trawler with a mortar would be perfectly adequate. Even then, the deficiencies of the Chicagoans compounded: their stupid decision to prioritize the overpriced yachts dovetailed with their cowardice, allowing the trained and patriotic Victorian army to simply roll onto the beach with effective naval supremacy.
From there, it was a simple matter. Even in the three dimensions that the backward thinker in charge of their military held as gospel, one could understand that when one side was superior in land, sea, and air, then what happend in the battle was ultimately an execution rather than a defeat. Sure, the Chicagoans had some good units which managed to deal heavy damage to their divisions in the landing, but the Chicagoans couldn't have had many; no New American force truly did.
That would make the upcoming fight quite simple; the enemies were scurrying out of sight, as was typical.
And it's at about this time that the architect of the Buffalo Raid decides it's easier to ask for forgiveness than permission.
Sea Battle:
6 v
9, Chicago wins
"Honestly, I understand the concern about their air force. I respect the idea of a vehicle that can strike foes in a way where they cannot reasonably strike back just as much as the next guy. But to hear Burns talk, you'd think the
sky itself was our enemy!" Admiral Remus mused, watching the battle unfold through a pair of binoculars.
Less than a mile away, gunboat converted from a fishing trawler capsized and went under with a pathetic glub, consigning it's weapon to the depths before it could even fire a single shot in anger.
"Air power this, air power that, air power air power air power. What, did his bandit days leave him with Avio-Phobia or something?"
Less than a thousand yards away, an unarmed troop transport was holed below the waterline and began rapidly flooding, the Victorian soldiers aboard helpless as the world around them started heaving to one side.
"Why weren't there any follow-up raids? So our fleet wouldn't be damaged by their airplanes. Why did we bombard the airport
during the raid? To weaken and delay any airborne retaliation, dovetailing nicely with the previously established objective. Why am I out here now?"
Less than 500 yards away, the ship carrying the mortars that would have menaced Communist Convoys moving across Lake Saint Clair, as well as the ammo for said mortars, was itself struck by a mortar shell. The resultant fireball could be seen from the shore, and Admiral Remus basked in the glow.
"Because if I waited, the moment would be lost."
Right on schedule, another troop transport capsizes from howitzer fire. This one was carrying one of the Victorian T-34s, something Burns had assured him was one of their top threats. Not much threat at the bottom of Lake Erie, Remus scoffs.
He lowers his binoculars to see a speedboat approaching, it's spar torpedo lowered like a horseman's lance, aiming for the belly of a dragon.
He counts one, the machine guns open up, and the boat's crew is shredded. He counts two, the machine guns keep firing, and the boat's rapid advance slows to a crawl. He counts three, and the machine guns fall silent, the tiny boat nosing down into the depths.
Admiral Remus grinned a wicked grin. "Like clockwork. Now, about those land forces..." He said, turning in time with the guns of his fleet to face the distant shore, where the figures of advancing Victorian infantry could just barely be made out against the backdrop of the sand.
What do you do with the Navy?
eagleTrump said:
We should pull our navy back. They're at risk, and force preservation is the name of the game.
LimitedFilling said:
Those tanks must be going for our supply lines to the north, the Vickies aren't dumb enough to put their tanks somewhere we can hit them.
edit: There's almost no way we can turn Detroit into Stalingrad with the quality of our troops, so grinding them up a bit was good.
videoWarlord said:
I don't care what it costs, when this is over we're getting medals for every last one of those brave bastards.
DeusSuperarum said:
[ ] Force Preservation: Enemy air supremacy and foul weather, in shallow-drafted boats with no deck armor? Yeah, no. Pull your gunships back, and await a better opportunity. Time plays to your advantage with both of these problems. The army can endure, but every ship you lose is precious.
We need to have a navy to contest the lakes when the Victorians churn out yet another navy, and we cannot replace our purpose-built gunboats as easily. We need to be watchful of the F-16s from the air, and if they come our navy needs to be safe in the docks.
Horrible as it is, we're more capable of rebuilding the army elements under threat here. We'll just have to hope that being out of supply actually matters for this quest, instead of the penalties from it being totally offset by various fanaticism-related bonuses.
Baz said:
I really hope the foul weather takes out their airforce next turn.
Heck, bad weather favors us as defenders too.
DeusSuperarum said:
Baz said:
I really hope the foul weather takes out their airforce next turn.
Heck, bad weather favors us as defenders too.
Bad weather can be ruled as a penalty to falling back too.
