The Drive on Verdun

[jonnymacbrown]

Or, the southern thrust: Why bang heads with some of the toughest outfits in the French Army including the toughest outfit on the board; the BEF? The German Army in F 14 is actually best poised to thrust out of the Ardennes and take Verdun! French units in the Ardennes are in a precarious position to say the least. Heavy pressure can be put on them and the French can be defeated by shifting the weight of the German attack south; from Neufchateau to Lonway, the Germans may quickly establish an additional five Army Korps to assist the already heavy German attack in the Ardennes; to wit: VIII AK advance from St. Hubert, Recogne, Neufchateau, XIX AK straight to Sedan, XVIII AK @ Neufchateau to the Meuse, XII AK on the always very helpful road net through Rochefort to Sedan, and finally VIII AK sitting right on a rail line straight to Longwy which is just a hop skip and a jump to Verdun over very open terrain against no immediate opposition (see attached map with Verdun just off the map lower left). Meanwhile 1,2 & 3 German Armee can put the big hurt on the BEF. There are plenty of siege guns in 4,5,6 German Armee to quickly reduce Verdun, which is a lot closer to Paris than is Mons. The best French divisions are in the Ardennes already under heavy attack and out of position. Destroy them, take Verdun, win the campaign. jonny

[Volcano Man]

Right, well, good luck taking Verdun. If you think you are going to just waltz in and take and "keep on going", think again, you will sacrifice all sorts of maneuver opportunity and time in doing so, but I guess it all depends on what your opponent does (providing it is a human). A human Allied player can prove to be most uncooperative. You can bring every siege gun you have to Verdun, you will need it, and it will take quite some time to deal with it if the French fall back in and around it. One valid tactic would be to push around it and isolate, continue on and then try to reduce it. However, doing so will completely ignore Maubeuge and the Nancy area (use of siege guns), so you are going to put all your eggs in one basket so to speak.

A good example of this is to play the 1001_01 Antwerp scenario where the Germans have ALL the siege guns in the OOB (which is nearly twice as much as what you have available in the early campaign), D and E quality fortress units, and no protected gun turret units in the forts, and it still takes quite a bit of time to tackle Antwerp. So good luck, it won't be easy, but it's certainly not impossible either. Historically the Germans simply chose to avoid Verdun. It seems counter productive to me if you want to maintain mobility and nab all the VPs that are easier to get, but what do I know.