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romagister
January 3, 2026 at 8:24 am

Mircea Pauca (Allies, bid 1.5) won over Carla Mondragon (Axis) by 2.5 points after bid (4 Allied raw).

T1: My by now standard Barents-in-1 is challenged in the North Sea, balanced on a knife edge. Usually the 4*44x, 3*CV are just enough to defend the area or maybe make a German victory a pyrrhic one, and that’s what happened. Only Lutzow got sunk (and both battlecruisers damaged) vs Valiant, Royal Oak and Courageous in pursuit. And that because confident Germans kept a cruiser back to the Baltic – else the pursuit would have been worse.
In the South Atlantic, extremely lucky 4 ASW sink all 3 U-boot counters!! But Luftwaffe cripples back Renown in Barents Sea.
Axis gains 3 points!

T2: The strategic situation resembles the first turn again – all 4 seas open and Allies stretched. Axis now avoids the similarly knife-edge-balanced ‘reception committee’ in North Sea and brings everyone, including Italians, to South Atlantic. They win control but lose Bismarck and Scheer, in return for Allies only disabled.
German battlecruisers stays in port to repair but Scharnhorst is destroyed for good by accurate RAF!
Axis gain 3 more, total 6 Axis raw.

T3: With strong reception committees everywhere, Axis take refuge from Neutral ports to the Med. RAF misses them.
Allies gain back 1 PoC, total 5 Axis raw.

T4: Heinkels sink Victorious in Baltic, while Skuas sink Blucher in Italy.
Convoy1A unloads in Russia.
Allies gain 4 PoC, total 1 Axis raw.

T5: Marat comes out to fight and gets sunk. 6U try to break the N.Sea blockade of 15 ASW and fail.
Convoy 2B unloads in Russia too.
Allies gain 4 again, total 3 Allied raw.

T6: Okt. Rev. comes to fight and gets sunk too without scratching anyone.
7U now open the same 15 ASW North Sea blockade.
Desperate Germans trapped in France come out to fight before the ports fall to invasion. Hipper and 2 Italians are sunk.
Score stays 3 Allied raw.

T7: Another desperate sortie to South Atlantic, all surviving Axis forces from Germany including 6U wolfpack, Italy and France: 3 Axis sunk vs 2 British battleships!
Score stays 3 Allied raw.

T8: 7U manage to sink Illustrious in Barents, the Axis survivors from Neutral port try even more desperately the North Atlantic, all are lost except Pola is just disabled for the 3rd time!
Allies gain 1, total 4 Allied raw, or 2.5 after bid.

Thank you Carla for the quick and fair play!
Thank you Mark for keeping keeping this all organized!

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David Gubbay
December 3, 2025 at 6:58 pm

In Gubbay (Allies Bid 2.0) vs Pack (Axis), the Axis won by 1.0 POC. The Allies got off to a flying start sinking Scharnhorst, Spee, Lutzow and Zara and one U-boat. But the following round the depleted Kriegsmarine struck back with devasting efficiency. Axis attacked Barents on alternate turns repairing on the off turns. They lost nothing. Meanwhile u-boats keep depriving the Allies of any point gain and benefitted from carrier losses while reaching the magic number of 7 despite losses. The Luftwaffe turned critical battles in the Barents. The final result came in close but one the Allies lost the initiative it seemed they could not claw it back.

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Rob Drozd
December 2, 2025 at 2:57 pm

In Tow (Allies 1.5) vs Drozd (Axis), the Axis won by 0.5 POC. There was a key battle on Turn 1 in the North Atlantic where only the Gneisenau with 5 damage remained to flag the zone. The Axis was hopeful until Turn 6 when 16 ASW managed to sink 5 U-Boats and disable the other 2. The critical Turn 8 battle was in the Barents where 5 Axis airstrikes finally delivered results by sinking KGV and Renown and disabling Warspite. 5 Allied airstikes disbled Bismarck and put 6 damage on Tirpitz. At the end of Round 4, Graf Spee (2 damage) and Admiral Scheer (2 damage) remained to claim the zone.

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James Kramer Jr.
November 25, 2025 at 12:24 pm

I want to add some axis input to Eric’s win in our game at the top of the ladder.

T1 against a Barernts in 1 deployment I usually go to the SA unless both BC fail speed. One failed, one did not so I decided to try the NA and Eric’s comments show what a disaster it was. At least the NS was held open.

T2 to the SA with 4 POC captured and acceptable axis damage suffered.

T3 as noted, time to reset axis forces for repair, lost a POC.

T4 Trying to hold the line. Luftwaffe scores 2 hits in the Barents but darn only 1 damage each. Convoy 1A gets thru.

T5 and a push against the NS fails miserably like the T1 NA move. Convoy 2B unhindered gets to Russia, allies gain a 4 POC lead. Graf Zeppelin stayed out of harm’s way in the Baltic.

T6 and the axis surface forces stay out of the fight. The 7 subs go to the NA seeking shots at Convoy 3C. For the loss of 3 U-boats no hits were scored. The convoy then then lands in England for another POC added to the allied score. But perhaps the largest loss of all this turn was 2 Italian CA sunk by allied LBA in Italy.

T7 and only opening the NS gives axis chances any hope. It works but, in the Baltic, a Soviet BB is exchanged for a German pocket battleship. Another frustrating axis loss.

T8 as Eric noted got close but no cigar as the surviving German pocket battleship had to stay in the Baltic for any possible winning score.

Of particular note, for T3 thru T7 the allies only loss was the Soviet BB in the Baltic. Axis losses were Germans 5 subs, a BB, PB and a CA and those 2 Italian CA’s the RAF took out on T6.

So, I will start out again trying to get to the top of the mountain again.

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Eric Anderson
November 13, 2025 at 7:59 pm

Eric Anderson’s Allies (bid 1.5) have defeated Jim Kramer’s Axis, with a final POC tally of +3.5 after the bid. My one sentence overview of the game: The dice were wholeheartedly opposed to the Axis forces throughout the entire contest.

On turn 1 the Axis forayed into the North Atlantic but found itself in an uneven match after Adm Scheer failed his SR and Gneisenau was disabled by Glorious. In the ensuing battle, the Germans lost Scharnhorst, Graf Spee and Blucher, while sinking only one BB and crippling another. One positive for the Axis was that the U-boats easily broke the feeble North Sea blockade, so the Kriegsmarine would have free reign again on turn 2.

On T2 the Germans sailed to the South Atlantic, joining up with the Italian cruisers. This time it was Bismarck’s turn to fail an SR, so she diverted to France. This battle went much better for the Axis navies, which sunk Rodney, RS and Eagle, while losing only Prinz Eugen.

On turn 3, all of the Axis forces returned to friendly ports without taking any further losses. The damaged Scheer failed her SR to North Sea, while the successfully refueled Hipper made it all the way to the Baltic. Meanwhile, the damaged Gneisenau followed her Italian escorts to the safety of the Mediterranean. However, Bismarck elected to remain in France.

Turn 4 was mainly about rest and repair in both Germany and Italy. But now the Luftwaffe finally came to life, getting hits on both Hood and Convoy 1A… but only 1 damage on each? This seemed to be confirmation that the dice were not playing fairly.

On Turn 5, the Germans elected to hit the North Sea with all available forces, including Bismarck from the French coast and all 6 U-boats. This did not end well for the Germans. After the Royal Navy’s ASW removed all of the subs (sinking two), the Kriegsmarine lost the Bismarck and Admiral Hipper while sinking zero RN ships. Meanwhile, the second convoy landed in Murmansk. And all of this time, the Luftwaffe had not sunk a single ship.

But a turn 7 blockade break gave the Axis one more chance! Needing 4 POC to pull out the comeback, the Axis forces sailed again to the South Atlantic. This time, Tirpitz, Gneisenau, Graf Zeppelin and 2 Italians were pitted against 6 BBs, 2 CAs and 2 CVs. After several rounds this battle got interestingly close, but the RN eventually prevailed, sealing the Allied victory.

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