From: "Patrick R. Collins" Subject: Air Bridge to Victory - replay Just finished a game of AbtV via PBEM. As the Axis, I failed miserably to keep those pesky Allies south of the Rhine. I have to admit, my early play was not the best, and a bad strategy led to my demise. First, I will have to say all the talk about being able to blow bridges in this game had me a bit cocky. Well, my ENG never got close enough to a main highway bridge to hear the river, much less blow one up. If an Axis unit gets to blow a bridge (requiring control of BOTH sides) he probably deserves it! A number of bridges have an "auto destruct" roll, 30% to blow it, which I only made once, if an area of the map were neither side was likely to spend much time. So much for Teutonic Engineering. The game opend with 30 Corps blowing past the main German line, and the 101, 82, and 1 ABn landing near their objectives. The 101 and 1 have an easy time of it, and their DZ are close enough to their objectives to take them on turn 1. 82 Abn has a harder time, as their DZ puts their main objective in an OOS position! Unfortunately for me, there are no Axis units close enough to bother them. 30 Corps was delayed by a few surviving German units on the main line, but that really only lessened their push northward. 30 corps linked with the 101 early, but the Axis did get a desperate attack at Grave to worry the Allies before 30 Corps arrived to put an end to such nonsense. The Axis (me) made a fatal error at Arnhem by trying to retake the bridge hexes to soon. I SHOULD have masked Arnhem, kept the bridgehead from expanding, moved my ARY north and stomped on the DZ first. I also did not cut off the other bridge across the river. BAD idea. Next game, I will keep the Allies cut off in Arnhem, but not attack there. With all the ARTY and 5 air points, the main thrust MUST be in the clear terrain the DZ is in. That forces the Allies to give up a DZ, (and put the Arnhem guys OOS) OR take their lumps in clear terrain. Given the edge in effiency the Allies have in general, the Axis needs all the help it can get. I also should have built up a large force North and South of Grave, before attacking the Abn there. It is a long game, and the Axis should not go in piecemeal. Proper use of terrain, and ARTY is important in this game, I lesson I have learned courtesy a gentleman in France. All told, a fun experience, and I can't wait to try the Guadalcanal game in this series. Regards, Pat pcollins@prairienet.org Last Played: Fury on Champlain, Race for Space, Air Bridge to Victory (PBEM) In Progress: April's Harvest, Guadalcanal (via Web based game), Desert Victory http://www.prairienet.org/~pcollins