Hey everyone, first off thank you all who have followed my writings and apologies for the break I took. I burned myself out playing foxhole and didn't realise it until I was staring at the home island contemplating uninstalling the game honestly. The early defeats and the loss of the entire western half of the hex shattered my morale more completely than anything else the wardens were able to throw at me in the centre hex. The loss of the old captain cemented my lack of will to play the game. I've also been busy in the background working on a new website to host these news stories on. I realised that with the war being over there isn't a well-designed/cohesive way of organising my posts into wars. So here is the nice new link Let me know if anything doesn't work!​

So I wanted to dedicate this post to my thoughts on how War 119 was lost by the colonials and how War 120 could be turned around in to the colonial's favour Below I've attached the starting conditions for the upcoming war

WAR 119

By the war’s conclusion, the fiercest battles were concentrated in Deadlands, Loch Mor, and Drowned Veil. Colonial forces had gambled heavily on breaking through Callahan's Passage, sacrificing Linn and Marban, a move that ultimately backfired. Meanwhile, the Warden's advance surged uncontested from the Fingers, quickly securing Reaver's Pass, Endless Shore, and Allod’s. At this stage, the war was effectively lost for the Colonials, with little hope for a counterattack due to logistical constraints. The Wardens’ westward dominance, supported by critical refineries and a frontline logistics hub, solidified their position.

A drastic pivot by the Colonials—redirecting focus from Callahan’s to Drowned Veil and Clahstra—might have forced the Wardens into a defensive posture. However, the Wardens’ momentum proved unstoppable, without such a bold move. The absence of a strong Colonial navy further compounded their losses, as naval dominance allowed the Wardens to strike deep into Colonial territory, including successful landings in key logistics hubs like Terminus.

Honestly, the lack of colonial navy likely stems from the open-top nature of the colonial gunboat, whilst effective to an extent for what it is used for, the warden gunboat is just superior. 1 accurate shell can pretty much decrew the entire gunboat except for the gunner leaving the entire boat free to kill. Many sailors did indeed try the boat and decided that the resource commitment just wasn't worth it. Likely this is the core reason for the naval defeat. The wardens had a head start advantage on solidifying their foothold on the naval tiles and they took it. Clans like the warden navy did an excellent job at punishing the colonials for their lack of investment and forcing themselves into any slight sign of weakness.

War 120

Looking ahead, War 120 is poised to hinge on the same factors, though a renewed Colonial focus on naval warfare might finally challenge Warden sea dominance. The Colonial faction must prioritize naval strategy, as vulnerable supply routes allowed Wardens to infiltrate key logistics corridors in War 119. Heavy-handed pushes into central territories left vital routes exposed, enabling Wardens to ambush Colonial truck lines with impunity.

A stronger Colonial navy, capable of defending sea tiles and countering Warden invasions, will be essential. Whether this shift can disrupt the Wardens’ iron grip on the seas remains to be seen. A key focal point of myself at the least will be on the far right side of the map, The fingers and tempest, and the centre of the map, deadlands and umbral wildwood. So expect to see some news stories coming out of those regions.

Another lesson the colonials could learn from is organising front liners, randoms are a key part of any frontline. Players who aren't serving as any part of a cohesive operation are just thrusting themselves at the frontline endlessly in the hope of finally breaking through, which inevitably leaves the rest of the area around where the main fighting is happening pretty exposed. Colonials, with the exception of clans running ops, don't try and coral their randoms into any form of cohesive fighting unit and just fight as an individual rather than a team. Medics are an exception on some frontline as well, maybe 1 or 2 medics serving an entire bunker base because supplies are scarce of people would just prefer to throw themselves into the enemy meat grinder. Arguably, medics and logistics players are the heart and soul of any war and at times the colonials lack both. Fighting in Deadlands did show me that much at least. T3-C carried the logistics for the colonials and for 1cmd, without them, the war would have been over far quicker than it was, WLL I didn't see much of it because I think they weren't operating where I was playing. But more frontline logi runners are often needed than are present.

With any luck, the colonial forces will focus on these key things* and strive for victory in War 120, but we shall have to wait and see.

One strength the colonials did utilise though was their artillery, I ran a few sporadic artillery operations during the defence of the abandoned ward which was super fun, I dropped well over 1000 shells onto the warden from 4 guns over a few hours and stabilised the frontline before myself and my random gun crew members hopped off for the night. Sadly it fell during the night, but the artillery was definitely what was keeping the warden's advance in check. The lack of leadership does also, to an extent, extend to artillery, many randoms don't understand, don't know, how to run artillery effectively and the lack of experienced spotters didn't help it either

*TLDR: Colonials lacked organisation of randoms, frontline logistic runners, medics and naval crew.