Ostfront H2H

[Captain Cruft]

Ostfront

It seems to me that the old beastie might need a bit of publicity to get someone to play it with me, so here is a run-through with me playing both sides.

This AAR might be quite voluminous ...

The Strategic Map

From the German perspective. One thing you can see is that the "backfield" is more detailed than with the stock GPW map, which is what I used as a basis. Also, Finland is not included, a decision I made for various reasons most of which I can't now remember.

[Captain Cruft]

Initial German Morale

One of the key features of the scenario is that each side's morale varies with the number of VPs they have. Every town has a VP value, and there are 300 available in total. The more VPs you have the higher your "RegimeBaseMorale". I can't remember the exact algorithm without looking but there are limits. Morale cannot go to zero for example.

The idea is that the players are incentivised to fight over every scrap of ground, as was mostly true in reality.

Germany starts with a small advantage, with a value of 104.

[Captain Cruft]

Initial Soviet Morale

Conversely, the Soviets start with a slight disadvantage, having a value of 94.

[Captain Cruft]

Germany T1 pre-combat admin - Tank Refits

This is something that the German player should look to do every turn where possible. The scenario introduces a concept of "Refits", which is something I managed to come up with as a way for experienced troops to upgrade their equipment in a scenario where, generally speaking, the standard AT method of "upgrade via supply consumption" is totally disabled. This disablement was for very good reasons, which again I can't really remember.

Germany has a tank refit centre at Breslau which operates from the start of the game. The Soviets have an equivalent facility at Gorkiy, but this does not start operating until later on.

Basically, the idea is that "Tank Parts" are converted into actual tanks via "SFType mutation". This is an exec event which you can call from an action card. The new tanks replace the existing ones attached to the experienced troops, while at the same time a Hungarian or Romanian "newbie" tank of the old type is also created. The idea being to replicate the donations of obsolete stuff which Germany made to the Axis Minor powers throughout the war.

[Captain Cruft]

Here is an example of a refit action card.

[Captain Cruft]

Here is what the Breslau Refit Centre looks like after playing all available action cards on Turn 1.

You can see that 2 GE Tank Parts have been used, along with 1 HU Tank Part & 1 RO Tank Part. 4 experienced Pz-III 50/L42s have been created, along with 4 new and inexperienced AFVs, being a Pz-III 37mm, an "Aufk" (generic German recon), an R-2 (Romanian Pz-35) and an LT vz.38 (Hungarian Pz-38).

As with many things in life, this process is possibly more understandable when you actually do it ...

[Captain Cruft]

Production

There is a lot to cover with production and moving stuff around, but I always do all that at the end of the turn. So, now it's onto the combat ...

[Captain Cruft]

We start with Army Group North, which is located at Konigsberg.

You can see that it is attached to something called "Konigsberg Railhead". This is absolutely fundamental to the scenario. Railheads are basically static non-combat HQ units which form a logistical rail network entirely separate from the actual combat HQs. The idea being that you don't need to encumber and dilute these HQs with production output.

[Jay Doubleyou]

It is definitely an interesting scenario with many new/different features.
Looking forward to your AAR and I am interested to play once I have less games running.

[Captain Cruft]

Thank you Jay [:)]

Now, here is the afore-mentioned Konigsberg Railhead unit.

You can see that it contains a 1 x Supply Dump, 1 x Train and 2 x Grenadier 41.

Supply Dumps are simply immovable units that hold the Railheads in place.

Trains are the only means of Transferring things in the scenario, other than Own Power. They basically perform the same function
as Trucks in the generic product, but they can only move on rail lines i.e transfer between units that are on rail lines.

The 2 Grenadier 41 SFTypes are production output from the GE Inf factory to the south of Konigsberg. By default all production is delivered to the nearest railhead, though players can of course change this should they want. The production and supply radii are quite truncated compared to default though.

[Captain Cruft]

AGN Turn 1 Frontline

Here is most of what is facing AGN on turn 1.

Air superiority is VERY important in this scenario since air anti-supply is turned on. Therefore the primary objectives to start with are to take or at the least deny to the Soviets the airfields at Kaunas and between Skaudvile and Siauliai.

I am not concerned with getting 16. Armee (the purple guys at the bottom) over the river this turn. Better to wait until turn 2 to make a more co-ordinated assault in conjunction with 4. Panzergruppe (the dark blue guys in the middle with the tanks) coming down from the north.

One thing to be aware of as the German player is that although the Soviets are basically useless, they can still hurt you if you screw up. So, especially with things like river crossings, it pays to be slightly careful.

IMPORTANT NOTE

On all fronts as the Germans I will perform all the ground action first before running a single air mission. This is because:

a) The ground forces do not need any help at this stage.
b) Air superiority and getting the Luftwaffe forward is VERY important. I shall keep repeating this ...
c) The advancing ground forces will certainly reveal if not over-run numerous airfields thereby removing the need to waste air missions finding and destroying them.

[Captain Cruft]

AGN turn 1 post-ground combat

Objectives achieved ...

Kaunas airfield is under threat and we over-ran the fields between the two 'S' towns, destroying several Soviet aircraft in the process. You can see that we have indeed already occupied and repaired this airfield and installed two fighter units along with some Stukas.

IMPORTANT - Virtually all the Luftwaffe exerts some anti-supply (or interdiction) but the Stuka is the best at it. So we always move them forward as far as we can.

No explicit air missions have been run yet. However, that will change as I am going to try and wipeout Kaunas and then maybe have a look at Riga with what's left. There are some long-range Ju-86 recon planes available to help us with the latter.

[Captain Cruft]

Kaunas airfield

The attack at Kaunas airfield was mostly a success, though not without loss. The Soviet fighters there are/were Mig-3s, which is probably their most dangerous plane at this point.

60% of AGN's air strength went into this raid, and the German planes are BF-109s and Ju-88s.

I used a 'Z' attack since I want to use the field from next turn, so the tank division in the hex also got some attention.

[Bombur]

Welcome back, Captain Cruft, I hope you finish the development of your excellent scenario!

[Captain Cruft]

Riga airbase

More success with the attack on Riga airbase. The Soviet fighters here are old I-15 biplanes, and no match for the BF-109 at all. However, we do lose some Ju-88s to, at a guess, the AA units. This may be partially because I used an 'X' attack this time, so the attacking planes will not have targeted the AA. Fighters have a preference for doing this if they cannot find any planes to attack BTW, which is supposed to represent SEAD type missions, as it were.

NOTE - An "airbase" is a new LandscapeType which is basically just an enhanced airfield. With more structural points and some entrenchment bonuses for AA SFTypes IIRC. You can't build them but they are present on map in major cities etc.

[Captain Cruft]

Hello Bombur,

I am not developing the scenario, just playing it ...

[Captain Cruft]

Army Group Centre

Here is the frontline for AGC.

Objectives here are to try and throw a net around Bialystock and Brest-Litovsk while at the same time hopefully putting 1. Panzergruppe through in the south towards Slonim, which is on the way to Minsk.

[Captain Cruft]

Southern part ...

[Captain Cruft]

Brest-Litovsk

Here is the "fortress" at Brest-Litovsk.

One thing that is radically different from the stock game is the entrenchment bonuses available with different terrain types. You can see here that this unit has something over 600 entrenchment points.

I do not intend to frontally assault this city over the river on turn 1, but will instead soften it up with artillery, surround it and then take it on turn 2.

[Captain Cruft]

Post ground combat.

In the southern area, Brest is surrounded, and cavalry units head into the Pripet marshes. The panzers have not made quite as good progress as I had hoped, they got distracted by beating up on Soviet HQ units.