Polish/South Korean vacation succession

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 95

A lull in the fighting, as the Indian army withdraws from Madurai and Canada is mostly empty of enemy units. There's a bit of skirmishing - for example, my raiding courser has landed and had a bit of a dustup with a garrison Varu hanging out:




However, he didn't dislodge from the niter, so I cut off 33% of India's niter income this turn. The mine near Winnipeg will fall next turn or the turn after, I think, and then I won't have to worry about Indian muskets until he makes repairs. 

The real news of the turn, though, is Refining is in:




I prioritized this above Steel or Replaceable Parts because Oil is a requirement for all modern units. It doesn't do much good having Artillery and Infantry unlocked if I can't build them due to resource shortages, and I know oil is notoriously hard to come by, so I wanted a headstart on getting it hooked up. Does Poland have oil? If so, how much, and where is it? 

I have a deposit near Gravitas Shortfall...




Another in the north near Cargo Cult...




A source at sea near Look Out Below!:




And a patch in the no man's land outside former Madurai (now An Unfortunate Conflict of Evidence):




This justifies a slick play that will solve a lot of my problems at once. I'll get there. First, let's handle the limited fighting on the turn. 

Second Army has indeed suffered one cuirassier heavily attacked, by the city, a crossbow, a varu, and a pike. India redlined the cuirassier but did not kill him. I hope India tries to fight outside his units - the more units in the open I can kill, the easier everything else is. First, I bring up the observation balloon and boost my two bombards. I can begin shelling Poutine from out of range, and the best part is I think my balloon is out of India's line of sight so he'll be a bit confused (or he'll work out whcih tile the balloon is on instantly, since there's only one possibility):




With Gustavus Adolphus, my bombards can move and fire on the same turn. We do about 100 combined damage to the walls, meaning it'll take 3 turns to blast through the Renaissance Walls. This is absolute top-of-the-line stuff for any civilization. Only Steel gives stronger defenses, and I'm tearing through it like paper. Next turn, I'll have artillery available, depending on my oil income, so Winnipeg, Quebec, and Jerusalem will be facing even stronger shelling. I used to be sour on bombards, because they didn't do much damage, but honestly with a balloon they're not a bad unit. Gustavus won't boost artillery, sadly. 

With no units to target, I unleash Second Army's cavalry to begin looting the countryside for gold and faith. Canada has no campuses beyond Vancouver so no free science, but we can use the gold and faith for sure:




The Second Cavalry division here is triply promoted, pillaging with only 1 MP and having +1 MPs to start with, plus the boost from Gustavus. This is a pillaging monster. I also bring up a fresh cuirassier and launch an assault over the river at the crossbow, crippling it. That should minimize retaliatory fire:




He'll need to post up in Winnipeg to heal. 

Final setup of Second Army:




Next turn I'll pillage the remaining mines of Poutine, as well as finishing burning out that Holy Site. I need to dislodge the pike from the niter so I can burn that, as well, and cut off his niter supplies entirely. 

All the looted faith lets me do this:




I'm running monumentality, precisely to spend my excess faith on moments like this. I buy a settler at Madurai, and can walk to a new city site in 4 turns. This city will be dry, but it will do two things for me:

1)Most importantly, it will bring oil into the empire. Every source is precious since modern units cost maintenance in oil, not just production. 
2)It will finally solve the road problem we discussed back in the war planning phase. I can run roads from here to JPT and to Madurai, even railroads, and speed reinforcements to First Army. I'd do the city for the oil alone, but this is a nice bonus. 

First Army advances cautiously while various units promote and heal. I don't want to plunge into a headlong attack until the entire army is formed up, although if those crossbows are still there next turn I'll hit them.




Finally, my raider heads for the Chennai niter. I hope no garrison units appear and I can burn the mine in two turns' time:




That will force India to divert a builder up here, plus units to chase my courser down. I'll try to withdraw over the lake to Jabalpur and escape to sea from there, but this brave raider has already done his duty. 

Abroad, Japan blundered, I think moving his Sword Corps out of Kyoto. The newly-weakened capital is easy prey for Hungary:




He might hold if he can get his unit back into the city, but either way it looks like Japan has only 2-3 turns remaining. Hungary has Black Armies per the gossip screen, having just looted the Government Plaza, but he has no alliances at hte moment. He should be contacting Germany and India as soon as he unlocks Civil Service, if he hasn't already. 

Germany is basically the Dubai of this game, with FIVE oil sites very near his borders:




All within his Petra city, too, so every oil tile will be 2/5/2 even without improvement. That's going to be a monstrous city if Germany ever reaches refining. I must attack and burn the city before he reaches that point (then build Petra myself, out of spite). 

India's only site is here, at Chennai. He'll have a hard time supporting modern units, but if he gets close to refining I need to think about sending a naval strike force from Hyderabad across the sea to burn Chennai.




Resource screen just to keep track




On the whole, I think Civ VI's Renaissance/modern wars are good. I think it's tremendous fun to think about resource flows, and the strategic resources are really influencing my strategy - where to send units, my own force composition, etc. I think the designers really achieved their aim here, and it's a shame that against the AI you don't need to think about this stuff, and against humans the game rarely lasts long enough for this to matter. It's also enjoyable to think about terrain and logistics - how can I keep my units flowing to the front faster than the other guy's? I'm not a tactician at all - I just follow Nathan Bedford Forrest's maxim*, but I thrive on operational issues. This whole road problem around Madurai is like catnip for me. 

*

"Get thar the firstest with the mostest"

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Japan is no more! Hungary played right after me and eliminated them, per the PYDT client.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 96

I played this turn in a hurry today, only 15 minutes before I had to leave for work (technically I was late, but I made it okay). As a result, I have another turn waiting for me now that I'm home! Excellent. 

Well, 96 first.




I open the turn by completing the military academy at Me, I'm Counting. Unfortunately, this precedes Nationalism by a single turn, so I need to think of something else to build in the meantime. I don't want the production to go to waste, so it should be something I can finish quickly and then start pumping out corps. I settle on another military engineer. I want to play with railroads and I have iron/coal in abundance. I think a railway from BWC all the way to Madurai will be a great help, and one from Poutine north to my colonies on the sea might be useful, too. I dunno! I never get this far in the tech tree! 




Battleships, artillery, and city defenses, and not a moment too soon, as German raiders have begun to stir on the Western border. Aachen has a direct road connection to Home by Christmas, and I'll soon see German coursers pouring over the pass, I expect. I am training cavalry and cuirassiers of my own to defend the border, but I still want to channel most reinforcements towards India. A flying column of 4-5 horsemen should be enough to plug leaks and keep the raiders from getting through to the heartland. In the northwest, the young cities are nearest the border with Hungary. He'll either need to take a few turns to regroup and repair his army before launching an attack near Boo!, or he'll march straight east and hit me nearer Ask Your Mother, from Nuremburg. 




I'll begin study of the German frontier next to think about how and when to take the offensive on that front, but for now I need to focus on Delhi and Canada.

Forgot to take an opening picture, so after some raids but before moving any units, Second Army situation:




The crossbow withdrew into the city. Until it heals, it will shoot VERY ineffectually, and in the meantime it's blocking the pike&shot from attacking. He pulled the pike off the niter and upgraded it, which is a mistake. The P&S could be tough to dig out of the niter mine from across the river, supported a bit by Winnipeg's defensive fire. It could also raise Winnipeg's defenses and make the city a tougher target for me. Instead, it's sort of in no-man's land, and I might be able to get some attacks in on it before it gets into cover. P&S can sort of defend themselves against cavalry, but are still ultimately losers. They beat knights and coursers, NOT modern units. 

My attack is simple and straightforward - I pound away with my bombards, while I move up the musket division, now 3 units strong. Cuirassiers and cavalry provide flanking and support but content themselves with raiding. A single musket is able to attack, and the city should fall next turn, 3 turns ahead of schedule:




Final situation of Second Army:




First Army cautiously moves along the road to Delhi. I swing most of my cavalry north. My intention here is to send the infantry straight up the road once they're assembled in a frontal assault, supported by the field cannons. The horsemen will move north of Delhi and flank the city from the rear. The garrison marching out threatens the city's loyalty, so I swap Magnus over from the south. 




I'd love to have a Great General lead this attack, but I need Adolphus to keep my momentum in the more important Canadian theater, and I'm still 4 turns away from Jeanne D'Arc. Her arrival in Madurai will be probably my go-signal for the Delhi push. This army, once it's entirely mustered, is stronger than the entirety of India's armed forces, but he's got his best units here or defending south at Trivandrum. So I must be cautious. Final situation:




My spy arrives in Patna, and I start raising my diplomatic visibility. I already get +6 combat strength from my superior visibility of India. This mission, in 4 turns (ie, right around the time I push on Delhi), will be granting me +9. Jeanne will take it to +14 combat strenght, which more than compensates for India's alliance buff with Germany. 




I might swap the spy to Delhi after this mission completes, to participate in the attack from within. Should have sent him there to begin with since I can do the mission from any city! D'oh. Oh, well. 

My raider:



The brave courser that could reaches the niter supply in Chennai, even as my cavalry cross the river at Winnipeg and take control of the niter mine there. Next turn we'll burn both and India will be totally cut off from niter production. He can still raise field cannon and cavalry, but no muskets or bombards. I think this has been an excellent mission. Now to see if I can extract successfully...

[marcopolothefraud]

This is a great read for learning about Civ 6 military tactics! Even in singleplayer, I struggle with land warfare

Does India have suzerainty of Kabul, and can it pose any sort of threat? In my experience, city-states start with a lot of melee class units, and they can upgrade without resource requirements. That means an army of musketmen may be waiting for you nevertheless.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Turn 97

All is not quiet on the Western Front:




As expected, Germany is invading Poland the only real way he can, with light cavalry raiders. My holy sites and commercial hubs on this frontier are somewhat vulnerable, as I didn't build them with defense in mind. I have my city defenses, and I am raising cavalry units to defend the space between the cities. Once I have a good number it's back to sending units to the drive on Patna. 

In the southern pass, my Encampment and then Steel came online one turn after the other, taking Germany from an easy march through the chocolate hills to a slog under fire. That P&S won't get anywhere important before being shot to death:




I'll take the free unit. He should withdraw into his encampment next turn, though. 

Situation, Second Army:




India still has no real field forces here. His P&S is attempting to...withdraw to the east, I think? Nothing could be done to alleviate the siege of Poutine, and so on the third day the Battle of Poutine comes to an end. I blast the defenses down (pictured above, forgot to take a start-of-turn photo) and send in my injured musket to capture the city and begin recuperating:




And so Poutine, the Canadian capital, falls for the second time in 20 turns. 7 turns into the war and we've taken 3 cities, a phenomenal pace that I don't think I can maintain. Once we hit Quebec and Jerusalem, the easy conquests on the plains of Canada will come to an end and I'll need to make a final decision - a thrust to Hyderabad and via sea to Patna, through the center at Calcutta, or both? 

Anyway, as the battle of Poutine ends, the battle of MacKenzie River is still raging. Thanks to Gustavus, my cuirassiers have incredible range, able to reach this Indian crossbow caught in the open to the rear of Winnipeg:




Naturally, we pounce. 




The loss of the varu in the city and the crossbow outside Winnipeg adds to our tally, while we've suffered no casualties of our own in the last 3 turns. A big chunk fo that has been the Terracotta Army - he's thrown a lot at a few units, but I've promote healed the damage right back. Worse, he no longer musters enough strength to outright kill a unit on his turn. Below that critical threshold, my units either pillage a farm or promote to heal and his work is undone. Thus, Poutine has been essentially a bloodless conquest. 

I take a more even slugfest at the pike and shot - only a slight edge, but better to hit this guy before he can fortify in the city:




One last move I make is to pillage the farm to bring my last cuirassier to full health - then send him at the city at absurdly bad odds. Why do I do this? Mostly to scratch the walls:




Winnipeg only has Medieval walls still, and he's been building Renaissance walls per the map graphic. But, even the slightest bit of wall damage makes it impossible to work on the next level until the previous level is repaired - and you have to have a turn with no damage to the walls in order to begin repairs. This little scratch thus neutralizes Winnpeg's effort at Renaissance Walls and saves me 100 points of defenses to chew through with my bombards. With that done, I move up all of Second Army. Next turn I can begin pounding away with THREE bombards, while moving up 2 muskets and the cavalry chases away any reinforcements. We should take Winnipeg before turn 100:




After that, my plan is to upgrade my three bombards to artillery and begin moving across to Quebec, then up to Jerusalem. Quebec only has Ancient Walls so if I can damage the walls next turn I will do so. Then I can take the city with the siege tower alone. 

First Army finds an unwelcome suprise:




India has reached Nationalism at the same time I did and upgraded hsi first corps - a knight. That unit is now stronger than my cuirassiers, which are my shock troops. I counter by forming a cuirassier corps of my own:




That unit will have the task of dealing with taht knight corps, with support. I don't think I need musket corps, not yet. Not until the city strength is so high that regular muskets can't get the job done. We'll see if I can take Delhi before that happens. Otherwise I continue to shuffle units while bringing up my reinforcements. Soon we'll be all assembled and ready to push:




My raider finds a musket, just too late to save India's last source of niter:




We burn the mine and withdraw to the east, trying to make the coast. 

India has 25 stored niter, which is the maximum stockpile he can have with no encampments still. That's 2 more muskets, until he gets those mines repaired. He's got lots of builders coming out of Patna, mostly chopping out the jungle. He's shown little concern for his niter supply thus far (note that the tile at Winnipeg was assigned to Poutine, even as the city was surrounded and falling - I hold that tile now!), so if I'm lucky and he's sleepwalking he won't even notice why he can't build more muskets soon. 




Two priorities now: Prepare for hte push on the Indian heartland, Phase 3 of Operation Deluge, and to begin study of an invasion of Germany.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

This is a great read for learning about Civ 6 military tactics! Even in singleplayer, I struggle with land warfare

Does India have suzerainty of Kabul, and can it pose any sort of threat? In my experience, city-states start with a lot of melee class units, and they can upgrade without resource requirements. That means an army of musketmen may be waiting for you nevertheless.

Kabul and Jerusalem are both Indian vassals. Jerusalem is on the path of conquest, Kabul is a bit out of the way. 

So far, I've seen ~3 Afghan crossbows, but no swords or muskets yet. India does like to levy troops (he levied Jerusalem's army for Canada, then did it again and got it killed in the opening turns of the war), but that costs money for valuable upgrades. I don't think he has enough gold to do everything he'd like to do, so hopefully the city-state just faffs around ineffectually with crossbows.

[Sullla]

Your campaign seems to be going well! A couple of short thoughts I had while reading:

* It's probably worthwhile to form a field cannon corps as soon as possible. I believe that your city ranged strength is based on the highest base ranged attack of any unit you've ever owned (just like the melee strength is based on the highest base melee strength -10) and therefore every city would get an upgrade from forming a field gun corps. This may have changed at some point in the expansions but it's not exactly bad to have a field gun corps anyway.

* I would advise upgrading your bombards into artillery as soon as possible - I would have done so on the turn that you just played. The strength increase is gigantic (55 to 80!) and easily overcomes the loss of getting boosted by the nearby Great General. Three artillery shots should easily remove even Renaissance walls instantly and speed up your pace of conquest significantly. (I would also advise merging two of them into an artillery corps just to ease your logistical situation as you move into rougher terrain, much easier to find space for 2 siege units than 3 siege units in some of those narrow passes upcoming.)

* I can't see Germany having any success at all against you. Defending is much, much easier than attacking in Civ6 and attacking into someone with a tech advantage is nearly impossible. You're about to unlock infantry - upgrade two muskets and form them into an infantry core. Congratulations, now every city has 70 base defensive strength - good luck attacking that with knights and pikes.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Your campaign seems to be going well! A couple of short thoughts I had while reading:

* It's probably worthwhile to form a field cannon corps as soon as possible. I believe that your city ranged strength is based on the highest base ranged attack of any unit you've ever owned (just like the melee strength is based on the highest base melee strength -10) and therefore every city would get an upgrade from forming a field gun corps. This may have changed at some point in the expansions but it's not exactly bad to have a field gun corps anyway.

This is a good idea. I have 3 field cannon in the, er, field now, and one could be spared to form the other into a corps. Only one has fired a shot so far in the entire war, removing a backlines Indian crossbow on the opening turn, otherwise they've been struggling through the rough terrain! My plan for them was for them to back up my infantry (read: musket) mass as it moves on Delhi. But being able to do a bit more damage iwth my city defenses to those German raiders, plus having the corps to instantly remove Indian medieval units, is nice. I'll probably do that next turn.

* I would advise upgrading your bombards into artillery as soon as possible - I would have done so on the turn that you just played. The strength increase is gigantic (55 to 80!) and easily overcomes the loss of getting boosted by the nearby Great General. Three artillery shots should easily remove even Renaissance walls instantly and speed up your pace of conquest significantly. (I would also advise merging two of them into an artillery corps just to ease your logistical situation as you move into rougher terrain, much easier to find space for 2 siege units than 3 siege units in some of those narrow passes upcoming.)

I agree with everything you've written, and indeed I would have upgraded this turn; however, that's impossible - I have to connect up oil first and my first well just got planted on this turn. Over the next ~5 turns I will have 3 more wells coming online, so I should be able to support about 12 modern units. My intention was to proceed with the single artillery pieces until we take Jerusalem and Quebec, since the plains are wide open and it's easy to maneuver. Then once we start to squeeze through the passes we'll combine into one corps and one supporting artillery. 

If corps have laxer resource requirements, then I'll be working feverishly to upgrade everything into a corps. The biggest weakness of modern armies is that they need oil as maintenance every turn, instead of building up a stockpile that's then cashed in to build the unit. So, on the one hand, it's easier to build modern units since they only cost typically 1 oil each to build, but it's hard to field a large amount of them. So for the immediate future I get 12 modern units - Artillery, Infantry, Tanks, planes, and Battleships competing. What this means is I probably have to scuttle my plans to invade Hungary by sea before they even begin, since I can't build quadriremes or frigates and I can't afford battleships' oil maintenance - BBs are a luxury, land units are a necessity. 

Anyway, 3 artillery pieces per front means I have 6 more modern units - an infantry corps will probably occupy 2 of those 6 slots, so I could field 1 corps and 4 infantry, or less if I want more artillery (more on that later - I think artillery is absolutely a requirement for a successful invasion of Germany, and I'd like to do that before Germany gets close to oil himself, meaning it's hard to justify waiting for the army to finish in India and then schlepping all the way back across the continent). 

One other measure I'm taking to maximize my oil production is by pillaging all this faith from India. I'm in monumentality, and one round of pillaging the holy site earns me ~500 faith, which I then use to purchase a settler. You've already seen the one out of Madurai heading for the central oil spot. I've got one more spot in the north near Boo! that I purchased the settler for this latest round, and there's a final spot in the tundra near Lisbon that will get my next settler. The new cities wouldn't pay back the investment of production at this point in the game, BUT the opportunity cost of faith is low since I've converted all my cities and purged Catholicism from my lands - the only other purchases to make are Stupas in my holy site cities for a bit of amenities, and missionaries/apostles to convert conquered Indian cities. The return on oil is much larger, and I just intend those cities as resource colonies, not research or production centers. 

The best part is now with Steel, they'll spawn with instant defenses that Hungary and Germany can't hope to scratch!

* I can't see Germany having any success at all against you. Defending is much, much easier than attacking in Civ6 and attacking into someone with a tech advantage is nearly impossible. You're about to unlock infantry - upgrade two muskets and form them into an infantry core. Congratulations, now every city has 70 base defensive strength - good luck attacking that with knights and pikes.

Agreed here. With Steel online, there's no chance Germany can successfully invade me. My worry here is his raiders slipping past my frontier cities and pillaging in my core. It won't be fatal or even all that harmful, but it WILL be super irritating. I just will detail a few horse units to maintain a flying column on the border to run down his coursers. I also want to start heading towards Communism as my next government - I want the policy slots to run Logistics, Levee en Masse, the extra oil producting card, and a unit production card, which obviously is far more military slots than I have. I also need to keep Natural Philosophy and Triangular Trade slotted to keep my research and gold generation ahead of India. Logistics is one of my favorite military cards in the game, though. That will let me outrun him everywhere he goes, and make it easier to launch invasions.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Ladies and gentlemen of the Polish General Staff, we begin this strategy conference to begin initial assessments of a decisive campaign against Germany, henceforth dubbed Case White. Case White has the goal of removing Germany as a contender to win in the game and as a threat to Polish victory prospects, by invading, occupying, and otherwise destroying the major productive portions of his empire. 

Here is a map of the immediate operational area:






The Polish-German border is long, running from the Bar Yussef River in the north all the way down to Portugal and the Southern Ocean. Various small mountain ranges divide the border into a few clear zones, with 6 passes giving access from either side. The 6 passes are, from north to south:

1)Nuremberg pass, 2 tiles wide south of Nuremberg.
2)Cologne Pass, 1 tile wide, fortified by an encampment under construction.
3)Aachen Pass, 1 tile wide, with a road and no fortifications.
4)Danube Pass, 1 tile wide, leading to a hilly area guarded by an encampment.
5)Berlin Pass, 1 tile wide, fortified by an encampment.
6)Lisbon Pass, 2 tiles wide, passing through the terrain of the city of Lisbon. 

The terrain in and around the passes is naturally very hilly and covered in jungle. Units will get good fortification bonuses and movement will be slow and difficult. Three of the four most direct routes are all fortified by German fixed defenses, and the other two routes lead very far to the north or south, out of the way.

 We hold suzerainty of Venice in the north and Lisbon in the south, giving us bases for upgrades and repair on both flanks. Kandy was a crucial base for us in attacking Madurai, serving as an upgrade location for all our knights, coursers, and the ram - basically without Kandy we would not have won at Madurai, so don't neglect hte potential of the city-states. We might also consider spending some of our considerable gold reserves to levy one or the other of their militaries for a bit of added punch, or to serve as a distraction from the main event. Worth considering. 

A look in more detail. The front can be divided into three zones: North, Center, and South. 

The North:




The city of Nuremberg is a young city, one of two areas I wish I'd managed to settle before Germany. The city itself is relatively open to attack - defended by rivers on 3 sides, but with no hills or mountains to cross. It has easy access to A Series of Unlikely Explanations and Ask Your Mother, which would be my two staging areas for the attack. However, an invasion of Germany via Nuremberg would then have to cross south, over the mountains, and then attack either Ulm or Cologne or both. It would take a long time for the invasion to develop into an existential threat to Germany. A second problem is that this area lies closest to Hungary, and we expect Hungary to intervene in the war with his full army as soon as he can regroup and heal from his successful conquest of Japan. We would probably run into the entire Hungarian army joining with the Germans around Ulm, and so while Nuremberg is the most immediately exposed German city, follow-up advances would probably bog down. Germany can also afford to lose Nuremberg the most out of all his cities - it has no finished districts and poor production.

Central zone:




Ask Your Mother and Home By Christmas sit opposite the bizarre German colony of Cologne and, most significantly, the German capital of Aachen. A road runs straight from Ask Your Mother to Aachen, and furthermore while the two side passes are fortified, Aachen Pass is not.  Accordingly, assuming the challenge of advancing down a narrow road can be overcome and we can get enough force into place, this offers the best chance for an immediate decapitation strike on Germany. Aachen is his finest city, sporting most notably a +9 adjacency Hansa, supported by numerous quarries and mines. Cologne is more of a defensive outpost to the north. 

In the south:




The Chocolate Hills have been a slight area of friction between Germany and Poland. Germany settled Berlin on the turn I finished a settler intended for the same location, and immediately purchased half the Chocolate Hills and that random hill tile for himself. Since then he's fortified the only pass with an encampment. However, we have a road running through the pass, and But Who's Counting has an encampment itself to serve as a base of attack. Once the initial defenses are overcome, Berlin itself sits in an isolated mountain valley, and we'd once again have to cross narrow mountain passes to reach Aachen or Mainz beyond.

In the south, we could pass through the tundra and do an end-around of the entire mountain chain. Mainz is Germany's second city, is exposed to attack from the south, and offers easy access to Aachen to the north. 

Once beyond the Danube at Aachen, Cologne, and Mainz, the terrain opens up. Germany has Ulm in the north, Frankfurt in the desert in the center, and Trier along the Danube in the south. The terrain is flat and easy to advance in. 

Germany fields at present about 550 strength. The most modern visible units are muskets, but he could have access to field cannons & cuirassiers as well - he's in the right position on the tech tree and that's an easy tech to beeline. He has no niter income, so his muskets can't heal, and his science is a bit poor; however, if Germany can reach Refining and Infantry, he becomes a whole new civ. Frankfurt has access to fully 5 oil wells, letting him field 15 modern units, and Aachen's production is among the best in the world, letting him spit out units quickly. It is the Staff's fervent desire to neuter Germany before that happens. 

German weakness is in gold income (barely positive) and weak science with a low pop. Outside of Aachen and Mainz, his units will take a while to field units. 

With all this in mind, I see two general possibilities:

1)An advance straight for the heart, aimed at Aachen. We would blast our way through the pass using ~3 artillery (straining our own oil reserves), supported by lots of cuirassiers and cavalry. The horsemen will be able to cross the difficult terrain more easily than infantry, plus, they're stronger than muskets and don't require oil like infantry. We could easily field corps in strength, too. The artillery blasts aside any defenders, cavalry seizes the ground, then we move up and do it again. German numbers will mean little in the pass and Polish quality will win the day. We could reach firing position at Aachen and seize the city within 10 turns of the start of the campaign. Once Aachen is taken, loyalty pressure will be an issue, but Cologne, Frankfurt, Mainz, and Berlin will be very difficult to defend. We might have a subsidiary thrust aimed at Berlin in support - secure firing positions from all the encampments there are easy to come by, and we could accomplish this task with only a few troops. The fall of Aachen will basically be decisive, as Germany will no longer have the production capability to threaten us, and we can easily take or burn Frankfurt ourselves, which will solve all of our oil problems. 

2)A southern advance. We could bring a large army through the tundra at Lisbon and attack Mainz. The city would probably have to be burned, but this would kick open the door to Aachen and bypass most of Germany's toughest defenses. Look at the campaign in Canada for how easy it is for a modern army to advance over flat terrain, versus the slog at Madurai for what happens in hilly jungles. This could also be supported by a diversion at Berlin.

Right now, I incline towards the central thrust straight at Aachen. Even bombards with observation balloons can make progress in that pass, and I can make use of the flying column I'm putting together to supply the ground troops for the invasion. With both sides only able to field a few units - well, look at German culture. About half mine and India's - he's ages from Corps still. So I should have an edge there. Once I take Aachen, well, that's the ballgame. I can hold it with Steel and my city-strength (apart from loyalty, which we can think of ways to solve), and Berlin should be easy to scoop up around the same time. Then we can run rampant and just leave him with Nuremberg and Ulm in the north to be mopped up.

[williams482]

With all this in mind, I see two general possibilities:

1)An advance straight for the heart, aimed at Aachen. We would blast our way through the pass using ~3 artillery (straining our own oil reserves), supported by lots of cuirassiers and cavalry. The horsemen will be able to cross the difficult terrain more easily than infantry, plus, they're stronger than muskets and don't require oil like infantry. We could easily field corps in strength, too. The artillery blasts aside any defenders, cavalry seizes the ground, then we move up and do it again. German numbers will mean little in the pass and Polish quality will win the day. We could reach firing position at Aachen and seize the city within 10 turns of the start of the campaign. Once Aachen is taken, loyalty pressure will be an issue, but Cologne, Frankfurt, Mainz, and Berlin will be very difficult to defend. We might have a subsidiary thrust aimed at Berlin in support - secure firing positions from all the encampments there are easy to come by, and we could accomplish this task with only a few troops. The fall of Aachen will basically be decisive, as Germany will no longer have the production capability to threaten us, and we can easily take or burn Frankfurt ourselves, which will solve all of our oil problems. 

2)A southern advance. We could bring a large army through the tundra at Lisbon and attack Mainz. The city would probably have to be burned, but this would kick open the door to Aachen and bypass most of Germany's toughest defenses. Look at the campaign in Canada for how easy it is for a modern army to advance over flat terrain, versus the slog at Madurai for what happens in hilly jungles. This could also be supported by a diversion at Berlin.

Right now, I incline towards the central thrust straight at Aachen. Even bombards with observation balloons can make progress in that pass, and I can make use of the flying column I'm putting together to supply the ground troops for the invasion. With both sides only able to field a few units - well, look at German culture. About half mine and India's - he's ages from Corps still. So I should have an edge there. Once I take Aachen, well, that's the ballgame. I can hold it with Steel and my city-strength (apart from loyalty, which we can think of ways to solve), and Berlin should be easy to scoop up around the same time. Then we can run rampant and just leave him with Nuremberg and Ulm in the north to be mopped up.

I agree with option #1. You have a direct line to the capital, albeit a narrow one, with better troops available for the time being. I'd actually consider a dedicated pillaging raid with cavs and cuirassiers to take that pass and stifle his production efforts while you get artillery support into position. Loyalty might be a problem, but his cities are surprisingly spread out in that area and Aachen is is easily the largest of the bunch. I bet with a governor in place it will hold it's own long enough to overrun an exposed satellite or two, and from there it will be uncontested.