Power of the Dark Side, Stephan61[A] vs Stamb[S]

[Stamb]

Hello comrades,

After playing my first Axis game in PvP match (https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 2&t=379354) i decided that it is time to play the other side.
It is my first game as a Soviets in GC.

This is GC no early end version, as it was in my previous game, just to compare experience.

With Stephan we made gentlemen's agreement to follow this house rules:
- no merging in pockets
- no temp. motorization
- no paratrooper drops
- no flak regiments as support units for a units on a map

Initially i was not planing to make any AAR, thus i am missing some screenshots for the initial turns, but i think i have key moments captured.

[Stamb]

Initial turn:

Axis t1:
Riga fall in a hasty attack against Totenkopf + RFSS which is the strongest combination of units that Axis can have in 1941. Also there was heavy support from a ju88A bombers.
Fortunately VVS were not sleeping and showed that even on an older planes they can do pretty heavy damage to the invaders if they fly without escort.


As we can see here my units had pretty high morale after such battle:


As i said i am missing some screenshots for the first 7 turns cuz i was not planning to do an AAR but i will do my best to give you a general overview what was happening.

Overall it was typical t1 turn from an Axis where Soviets and VVS are murdered.
It is worth noting that it was unusual Bialystok pocket:


Lots of the units were attacked and routed outside of a pocket. In my opinion there are pluses and minuses in such approach. Plus is that pocket is very small and easy to finish, which will allow IDs to move forward quickly. Minus is that there will be less captured trucks for an Axis.

This leaders were killed during Axis t1:


This are overall losses for t1:
pay attention how many Axis AFVs were lost. We started this game with 25beta and it (and previous patches) corrected axis/soviet tanks performance.
Only 21 AFVs lost. While it was common to see 100-150 or even more in a previous patches.



Soviet turn:
Because i lost control of a Riga i decided that no supply shall pass there via a sea. And to do so i decided not only isolate it via naval patrol but also to bomb it with my long range bombers!
Unfortunately i had big problems setting fly path as i want cuz some of a points that i can drag and drop are hidden under an air mission name:


I was trying setting UI scaling at 100% as typically i play with 125%. But it did not help. Very annoying.
Nevertheless i successfully isolated Riga as well as destroyed its port*.
*At least according to my reports.
** At least according to my reports of some of my groups. I had multiple air missions set to bomb Riga and while some of them were saying 20%+ damage another was saying 100%...
I will let NKVD figure out where is the truth.

Now we get to the ground phase.
As a Soviets we have a lot of units.
So what do we do? We click on all of them and see how we can hit morale of his units!

And this is how you do it.
In the South:


Spear head isolated. No fuel for them. Unfortunately they have some stocks from a t1, but we will deal with it.

In the Center:
pocket opened and 1 hex short to liberate our fearless comrades in another pocket


I was very close to cut a big chunk of AGC mobile forces. But i had not enough MP. It would be a huge victory for a Soviets and a disaster for an Axis.


End of t1.

[Stamb]

I decided that in my first Soviet game i will not abandon the South and try to play, lets say normally, without utilizing one of the strongest Soviet super abilities.

From turn 2 to turn 3 there was nothing special.
After fall of Riga Axis was moving north, in direction of Tallin. I was not sure if he want to go for it or he will turn East and attack Pskov.
Thus i was not sure where to focus. I decided that Pskov is more important.



Then at t4 there was a Great Battle.
And before showing it i wanna say that i already posted that i think that this is a wrong game mechanic where units route in 100% if they have no hexes where to retreat and they lose a battle. But we have it in a game. And it is widely used. So why not to use it?
Unfortunately i was late to a party where Soviets were literately hunting for a panzers with their over toe tank divisions. But i decided to try and test out what we can achieve now. I was preparing for this. I had western front as an assault one.
I had good leaders on a corps HQ lvl. I build CPP. Soviet mech and tank divisions on defense are useless. Thus it is better approach to strike first. IMHO.
After flying recon and looking on a Kulik's portrait i decided to strike first!

Grand battle of Smolensk t4.png (1.5 MiB) Viewed 1586 times

What a battle it was. 1 motorized division routed. 1 panzer division routed. Multiple regiments routed. I had no units to retake captured hexes, otherwise i would also route those 2 regiments on the north with 3=3 CV.
But at least i pushed one of them back. This is t4 1941. Not 1944. I was very happy. It is even hard to imagine what was possible to do in the previous patches were panzers were bad.

Also i displaced German HQ 3 times and 1 routed regiment or division once. Unfortunately no leader's death was recorded.

With this battle not only i removed admin movement to Smolensk for the next turn. I also made a big hit on some of his mobile forces. Some are routed without all trucks + now they are with 0 CPP. As we will see later on it helped me a lot!

In total for that turn, including logistics phase Axis lost more than 5k trucks!

At that point i realized that playing as a Soviets for 4 turns i already got more joy from a game than playing as an Axis for 30+ turns.

[Stamb]

Example and losses for one of the battles near Smolensk on t4:
great job by il2:


And unfortunately, for me, most of the German losses are some outdated panzers that will be replaced anyway.

[Stamb]

But not everything was going according to my plan
for example there were results like this:


0 losses for an Axis

I had to bring another units and again that regiment again.
This is what 6 combat delay is representing.

[Stamb]

After finishing my turn i was able to make a screenshot for a weather for an Axis turn 5.
It was great!

[Stamb]

On the next turn in the South i was able to isolate some of the Axis mobile forces with a cavalry and a special unit. I name it suicide squad unit. It has 30+ mp and his use is for a special cases like this. Where i had no other cavalry unit nearby and i did not want to sacrifice rifle division. That units have around 400-600 trucks but Soviets do not have problems with a trucks and i will show it later on.

1.png (1.46 MiB) Viewed 1547 times

Also i was trying to liberate cavalry unit that got encircled but new patch made panzers really strong. Even panzer regiments. I thought that i can defeat two regiments but as a result i lost both fights.

[Stamb]

Now i do not recall exactly where it was, but i think somewhere in a Center.


Soviet pilots know which targets to select

[Stamb]

I forgot to mention that on turn 3 Stephan was trying to isolate and capture Tallinn!
But VVS were ready for this.



Also there was an attack on a Tallinn. Fortunately only a hasty one.


In my turn (turn 4) i was able to isolate some of his units near Tallinn and winning a little bit more time.


In other parts on a map i was also able to isolate some units.
In the South


And in the Center

[Stamb]

On turn 5 there was another attempt to isolate Tallinn but it failed again. VVS are not sleeping.
But there was no more ground connection between Tallinn and rest of the Soviet Union.


Also mobile forces were rushing to Narva river:

[Stamb]

I had corps HQ in a Tallinn and other places on map. I even spent some AP to get better leaders there only to get such "upgrades"


Oh, i said a lot of bad words, fortunately i am not a streamer.
The worst situation is that one of such HQs was in a Tallinn. Which means that units were reassigned to an army that was near Leningrad! I had to move this army to a 5 hex range to a Tallinn via a sea and leave it there (in the sea), to provide at least some support in terms of leaders checks. There will be no support units commitment in this case. Its a tragedy. I wanted to give a good last stand in Tallinn, especially when Axis had troubles while trying to isolate it.

[Stamb]

In the Center it was still a pleasure to see a routed unit from a Grand Battle of Smolensk

[Stamb]

At that point bonus victory points for Smolensk was down to 2 and for a Pskov down to 1.

[Stamb]

On turn 6 there was battle in the North in the swamps near Narva river.
I thought that i will be safe there, but something bad happened with a CV despite pretty good leader.
If only game tells a reason for such drastic drop...



Also Tallinn fall. Even without isolation. You can see that units were attached to an army in the sea.


Also i have no clue what happen with my CV in this battle. Panzers + ID into rough terrain. Was i destroyed by an arty?


At that turn there was no more bonus points for Pskov and it was time to fall back as it was risky to stay and fight there. I had no units to sacrifice in Pskov and left it undefended.

[Stamb]

Now i wrote that i do not plan to abandon the South or other parts of map. I try to play "normally". Thus i was defending near Gomel.


I was thinking to strike that 2=2 regiment in a clear hex to isolate 2 panzers and other regiment. But i did not have good leader there nor i was sure that 6 CV + 2 CV rifle divisions will be able to do it.
And i decided that it is time to retreat.

[Stamb]

In the South there was battle for Odesa. It was not isolated.

Still Axis was very close to take it in direct attack.
Knowing losses from a previous patches i was expecting HUGE losses for an Axis but with the latest changes they are minimal.
And only useless Axis allies make numbers more serious. If there are only German units then losses are super low.

[Stamb]

My lovely airborne brigades are doing their dirty job.

[Stamb]

And one more time. But here Axis units were also punished. As a result 229 vehicles from 1.2k for that divisions are gone.

[Stamb]

On turn 7 non isolated Odessa fall to direct attack. A little bit more luck for me or a little bit less luck for an Axis and there would be a hold. Still losses will be minimal cuz there are no retreat losses for an attacker if he attacks urban/heavy urban/port. It makes no sense.

[Stamb]

The only plus is that on a previous turn 10 divisions used 50% of their CPP when they were attacking Odesa.
While this turn 12 divisions used 50% of their CPP for an Odesa attack. I am afraid that's the biggest losses that Axis is paying when attacking hexes without retreat losses.