Role Reversal - GamerDad (Axis) vs. Shalkai (Sov) v1.12.0x

[Shalkai]

Orel and Kharkov MD see only minor adjustments in their lines on and behind the middle Dnepr. The new 54th Army is sent from Kalinin to Chernigov to take charge of light STAVKA forces screening south of the Kharkov MD forces. I expect a strong crossing attempt around Mogilev (a PzK is waiting just west of the city) but I have deep defense lines and this is the best terrain to hold until I withdraw 100 miles to the Desna River.

[Shalkai]

Western Front under Timoshenko is very strongly concentrated, with over 30 divisions holding only a 60 mile front in considerable depth. Two panzer corps are poised to strike, just south of Vitebsk, but I suspect they won’t get anywhere near Smolensk next turn. Moscow MD has two armies forward, holding a 30 mile front with 11 divisions just north of Western Front. Another strong and deep zone.

[Shalkai]

20Feb2020: Only a few AP have been used so far (48 left). I’ll probably need some to sort out NW and North Fronts, then will see about building Fort Regions and SUs. Northern Front 7th Ind. Army does a bit of shuffling and deletes the fort region at 83,2 to make room for a third RD in that hex. Defense level in this key spot is 0.00 before any end of turn digging, but it now has three very strong rifle divisions with a DCV of over 40, and is in light woods behind a minor river. A reserve division is available too. Finns can probably wear it down but they will get worn down too doing repeated attacks. Will it be enough? As I mentioned way back at the beginning of this AAR, trying to stonewall the Finns on this line is very much an experiment.

[Shalkai]

Around Leningrad, seven rifle divisions are engaged in digging strong forts both north and south of the Neva. I’m hopeful that all stacks on both sides will be able to get to Fort 4 (except in the swamp hex) before Axis can put the city under close siege. Three more armies with about 20 total division equivalents are holding the Luga River line from Novgorod to the Gulf. Line is only strong at the north end, but that’s the only part that can be attacked next turn. German Infantry from AGN seems to be mostly southwest of Novgorod, where I have the most space to give, so I don’t think Leningrad will be in serious trouble before September. This area still gets several reinforcements, currently forming up and getting started on defensive positions east of the Volkhov River. After a few weeks of training I'll feed them into reserve defense lines closer to the front.

[Shalkai]

Northwest Front is very spread out at the moment. One army is spread in checkerboard screen in the forests west of Novgorod to slow down panzer/infantry advances. They will fall back past Novgorod in future turns and anchor the Lake Ilmen/Volkhov line. Three more armies are lined up, mostly in the swamps, from Lake Ilmen south to past Velikie Luki. Axis forces have a nearly solid line of InfDiv coming at them, so I expect to fight and lose a hex or two each turn as they are pushed back into the Valdai Hills. No panzers in this area at least. All available new arrivals north of Kharkov were railed up to N and NW Fronts, but more will be needed. The holes in the Northwest Front line are starkly visible. With only infantry coming at them I can cheat a bit by withdrawing a hex or two as needed to avoid getting pinned. If panzers were closer to this section of line then this would be a definite weak area. As it is I can wait a turn or two for future arrivals.

[Shalkai]

At this point I can’t claim defenses are great anywhere, but I’d rate the central section (Smolensk to Kiev) as very good, along with Southern Front in the Odessa area. I don’t expect any of these three cities to be lost within the next 2-3 turns; Odessa especially will be a major task to conquer. Even the weaker areas of my line (North Ukraine, NW and N Fronts) are in decent shape and Axis advances in all areas are falling behind historical achievements. A combination of my harrassment/isolation of panzers, minor FBD errors, Axis Supply isolations, and low Soviet unit/casualty losses have me in better shape at the end of July than in any previous solo game I’ve done (this is my first Soviet-side PvP).

Some air attacks were done earlier, and the rest are completed now. Every AGN panzer and Lake Jan Finn unit was already plastered by Northern Air. Northwest and Moscow Air hit most (12+) Axis units in clear terrain north of the Dvina. Coverage is almost as good from Smolensk south. Total Sov ground attacks-99, causing about 2400 casualties. Air losses are under 60 for operations during my turn.

A total of 6 Fort Regions are built, mostly in the Moscow Defense Belt. This leaves me 19 AP for SU and rail changes. Hum...at 19 AP showing, I can’t create any new units, even 1 AP air units. Oh - right! Can’t build air units til August. I was going to make six U2VS tac bombers.

Turn 7 to-do - check battalions in NR [done]. Set to auto-auto if it looks like they aren’t upgrading to regiments [done]. Build some air units of stuff with lots in the pool [wait til August - Turn8]. Check unit rail % near end of turn, lower if needed. [lowered to 9%].

My last AP are spent on building an assortment of MG-Art, Sapper, and Const battalions for STAVKA and the three newly arrived armies. Air Armies are rebuilt by pulling down 60 regiments from NR; this leaves me 60 more low morale/exp regiments and about 30 battalions rebuilding. Soviet Air should be stronger next turn than it has been for a while - heh, make that for the whole game.

Factory Evacs: Kirovograd - Kutaisi, 1 arma 3 HInd. Vsevolzhsky - Zuemha, 1 arma. Khimki - Zlatoust, 9 Li-2, 3 Li-2VV. N Moscow - Nizhny Tagil, 4 Yak-6, 3 arma, 6 BM-13-16, 1 BM-31-12. W Moscow - Serov 22 Pe-2. Evacs going well. N and W Moscow are now almost clear, and I may not need to evac Moscow itself which will bump my eventual Mig-3 totals by several hundred if that can be avoided. My big tank factories are already moved east and getting back online, along with one moved IL-2 plant. That leaves one more IL-2 in Voronezh and both MiG-3 plants in Moscow (along with several more key plants - T-40, vehicle, IL-4) for the critical ones.

Some final checks find a couple small tweaks for HQs that need to be done. I do a bit of surveying enemy positions as well. Almost all his tac LW strength is very near Mogilev (all three Stuka wings, plus 2+ wings of Bf110 etc.). Those will be able to really punish Red Army units in clear terrain - and there is plenty of that I have to defend west of Smolensk. Still, at least I’m defending west of Smolensk - far better than the alternative! Here is final Air Loss screen. Not much pressure on Axis Air this turn, but at least ground bombings cause a few thousand troop casualties. I'll settle for the Red Air Force being 'somewhat useful' this early in the game. Things will get better as my air gets more experience, plus some German air units withdraw soon.

[Shalkai]

For Turn 8, I’m expecting strong attacks on the land bridge and across the middle Dnepr. There’s an entire Inf Army 5 hexes northwest of Gomel, more heavy forces including panzers near Mogilev, and another big group of 8 panzers and 12 ID ready to roll east on the land bridge. Supplies to the Germans aren’t great in the area but he should be able to blow holes and push me back along this whole line. North Ukraine will be muddled - he has to break pockets to free most of the AGS panzers, and this will be a furball. Hopefully he doesn’t have much fuel in those trapped panzers, because my defenses east of Vinnitsa are very weak. If busted I’ll be falling back quite a bit. Same thing goes farther south - he should be able to push me east away from more of the Dnepr River defenses, which I’ve already been expecting for two turns now. If I were playing the Germans, I’d be using these nice force concentrations to punch 50+ mile penetrations and get the line moving forward. Making pockets isn’t paying big dividends for Axis right now. This turn is finished and sent off. We’ll see what the next turn brings.

Turn 7 Epilogue: 11 hexes to Osinovets, 27 to Moscow
Current Turn/Total losses at end of Soviet Turn 7:
Axis 22157/116098 men, 355/1633 gun, 144/865 afv, 21/113 spac. Axis losses down slightly this turn.
Soviet 91285/1287656 men, 1136/16394 gun, 379/8357 afv, 106/2460 spac. Red Army losses down 30-40% this turn over last.
Net loss of only around 3100 vehicles this turn: 2.7k lost, 0.5k captured by the invaders, 0.1k seized.
Air losses: Axis 28 (this turn), 215 Total. Soviet 253 (this turn), 5516 Total. 9:1 ratio, decent. 60% Axis losses were Bf-109 (18). Light losses on both sides, and Axis air units still in very good shape, but at least the grind is mostly on his fighters.
Important Soviet type losses: 28 MiG-3, 2 LaGG, 4 Yak-1, 3 SB-2 Rcn, 1 IL-2. New build numbers were far higher. Also looking good.
Unit Losses: 1 TankD, 1 RifleD, 1 CavD. Disbanded: 2 SecRgt, 2 FortRegion, 4 Corps HQ. Amazingly light unit losses.

Pool of modern planes: 307 MiG-3, 199 Yak-1, 393 LaGG-3, 74 IL-2, 249 IL-4, 370 SB-2R, 31 Li-2. Numbers still going up
German OOB: 3377362 men (+10k), 34069 gun (flat), 4906 afv (-), 3844 plane (+37).
Sov OOB: 4237337 men (+110k), 53849 gun (+0.8k), 13330 afv (-0.3k), 5964 plane (+400).

Only tiny advances (one hex each) towards Leningrad and Moscow this turn - that’s two weeks in a row with minimal gain. Most excellent! Soviet casualties low again this turn both in men and units. Even the ratio, about 4.5:1, is excellent. Next couple turns should be a bit bloodier for the Red Army and I’ll finally lose these great defensive lines I’ve been milking for all they're worth. There is space to trade which I’m ready to do.

My defenses are ready to take some blows. I don’t think Axis is going to be able to manage any crippling ones next turn, though. We shall see!

Turn 8 to-do: Create U2VS Tac x 6 before moves. SB-2 and DB-3B also have large pools. Replace Pronin, 34th Army, near Smolensk. Arriving Army to Rzhev. Put more fighters by Smolensk to whittle Stukas.

Ground casualty and OOB screenshot below...

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: Shalkai

He may be Stalin's favourite - but Mr Kulik is loathed by most WitE players!

[eskuche]

The Pripyat Marshall eh?

[Shalkai]

LOL! Yep, at least for a few turns. I finally noticed how crap he was on Turn 11 and reassigned him to be Marshal of Ural AA defenses. I'm just glad I noticed before German troops attacked that army!

[Turbo624]

Is this a current game?

[Shalkai]

Yes, this game is still ongoing. We just finished Turn 14. I've been too busy to keep up with AAR the last few weeks, but I'll get some reporting done this week.

On to Turn 8!

First glance shows decent advances in line with what I’d anticipated. Northern Front is pushed back a bit further from Narva and the PzK near the Baltic is positioned for further gains. Not much Axis headway further south on the Novgorod axis. Unfortunately, the Lake Jan line retreated after a single full-strength Finn assault. Odds were close, but without high fort levels even three good Red Army RD isn’t enough. Not when Mannerheim can send six full strength veteran divisions at them. A small disappointment, but it was definitely worth a try. I’ll now have to choose between running a delay fight using the 7th Army, or just move them all down south and get them in place on the Svir.

This is turn 8, so nine more clear turns. If I do delaying fights, it’ll bleed the Finns a bit, but when would they get to the no-attack line? It’d take 12 hexes. Probably soon enough. Something to ponder.

Northwest Front was pushed back a bit, and will withdraw a bit more. I’d like to keep him from getting past Lake Ilmen for at least three more turns. Leningrad will be cut off within the next five turns. We’ll see if we can hold enough of Ladoga to make it like the historical siege. Velikie Luki will almost surely fall next turn as well, and I’ll be doing a slow fighting withdrawal toward Rzhev with Northwest Front’s left wing.

AGC only pushed 20 miles towards Moscow on the land bridge, so that’s a small pleasant surprise. 3rd PzG leads this effort. East of Mogilev, 2nd PzG made a bridgehead across the Dnepr and got seven units into a spearhead on the east bank. This has trapped two of my RD, and will force a full scale retreat from the Dnepr, but that’s fine - it’s time to go.

In Ukraine, Vinnitsa still defies the invaders but it won’t get another reprieve. Second turn of this pocket sees it squeezed down to two hexes (5 of my divisions total) and the panzers I’d have to retreat to break the pocket are very strong. Southern Ukraine saw some Axis advances, but less than I expected - Red Army even won a battle or two down here. Dnestr forts were held weeks longer than I anticipated - at one point the German/Rumanian forces have only made it 60 miles east of the border through the first eight turns. Again, it’s time to go.

Things have been going so well administratively that I actually have some unused manpower (~60k) even after normal refits. 700k armaments still saved up as well. Way more than I’m used to having in early August. Looking at the map doesn’t make me feel like things are going well, though. I see about four turns of steady withdrawals and 120 miles given up along most of the line for August ‘41. I’ll just have to make it as slow and costly as I can. Losses in both casualties and units were light, and the isolated list is again short. Glass is at least two-thirds full.

26Feb2020: Apparently I was not in a good mood last night when taking a look at the turn. This has been a very rough week as I try to recover from my procedure and get back to work; seems I’m pushing a bit too hard. I’ll adjust things a bit the rest of the week so I don’t completely hit the wall.

As far as WitE goes, there’s no reason for me to feel this game is going poorly. Soviets get hammered and forced to retreat in almost every single one of the first 20-odd turns. The hammering and retreating in this particular game is less (so far at least) than in most games - really, the glass is probably 95% full.

So, back to planning. Key decisions are going to be needed for both Karelia and near Odessa on how much fight to put into my fighting withdrawals. Down south, I can probably hold a section of the Dnestr River defenses for one more turn. The section of the line near Kishinev will pull back and gain some density, but the area down by the river mouth will be very hard to force via assault crossing, and can’t be outflanked from the north yet. This will keep a couple Rumanian Corps tied up and give Odessa another turn unbesieged.

Karelia got some serious pondering last night and this morning. A fighting withdrawal is my first instinct, but there is simply no strategic benefit in doing that. I’ve got eight decent to good Rifle Divisions in Karelia, but they are facing about twelve division-equivalents of Finnish veterans. Axis could bring in even more forces from the west side of Lake Ladoga if they wanted. Karelia has some manpower centers but nothing worth investing more troops in to save. Even if I fight and the advance is slow, Finns should reach at least part of the no-attack line before mud. All they need is one spot at or near the line that panzers can link up with from the south. Wearing down the Finns doesn’t help much either, as the majority of that army withdraws in early ‘42 anyway.

Accordingly, I’m going to just build a line of Fort Regions on the no-attack line and move the entire 7th Ind. Army south as fast as I can, using rail not needed for other purposes to speed things up. Two or three turns should see them all digging in near the Sviritsa/Volkhov region. Having this army defending the final Ladoga port is a clear strategic benefit. It still may not save Leningrad but this will have more chance of affecting the overall war than anything I can do to the Finns. My Inner Stalin may not like running away, but it is the right thing to do.

Turning the focus to Leningrad itself, saving the city is going to be very difficult, perhaps impossible if the Axis focuses enough resources on it. Best case scenario is the Germans taking another 5-6 turns to clear the south bank of the Neva and then getting stalled trying to get north to Osinovets. To have even a chance of achieving that I’m going to need to throw considerably more forces into the fray. My units digging in on the north bank of the Neva are only at fort levels 3.08, 3.76 and 2.80. All will need to be above 4.00 and able to absorb a couple of full-strength German attacks to achieve something like the historical standoff. Dunno if there are enough turns left to dig that deep. Plus I still have to keep AGN from rolling south then east of Lake Ladoga and linking up with the Finns.

Things I need to do to make that happen:
Replace any mediocre army commanders in Northern Front, and review the Front commander as well. Leader admin ratings are more important than usual as digging in will be key.
Adding more Const. SU to all NF armies and beefing up their SUs in general. I’ve got extra AP, manpower, and armaments available this turn.
Turning over defense of Novgorod to Northwest Front and using the units freed to build 3rd/4th lines south of Leningrad.
Rail in more units and an Army HQ attached to STAVKA. Northern Front is at CP capacity right now so another HQ is needed.

That’s going to be my top focus for this turn. There are plenty of other things I need to do - see to-do list at end of Turn 7, plus adjust Fronts to account for upgrade of Orel MD to Bryansk Front. Front activation gave me a huge chunk of AP so I can indulge in some reorg and leader upgrades. Moscow environs will see the fort region lines finished.

I also want to do a more careful review of any counterattack opportunities before I start moving units. Doing those, or at least ground attack air missions, should be done earlier in my turn to reduce Axis interdiction effects. This has been added to my turn sequence guidelines.

Air Armies need a little extra time this turn as well. Northern Front Air Army is going to be given top priority and reinforced. This is not a good area to contest air superiority, as both the Finns and AGN’s air units are some of the best in the game, but my opponent may not notice increased Soviet forces until they have started to weaken Axis fighters. At this point I’m pretty confident I’ll hold Moscow so Leningrad becomes the #1 priority. If I can, the fighter strength up here will be increased to at least 12 regiments. Also I’ll use some night bombing attacks from Long Range Command to fatigue AGN Luftflotte 1 airbases.

Evening (and WitE) time finally arrives. First, the boring but useful stuff - taking stock, then spreadsheet wars.

Vehicle Pool: 186k (44k needed). Keep on truckin! RailCap starts at 36328/149725. Reserved rail at 10% and will probably stay.
Manpower-3359, Port-138, Railyard-292, Vehicle-150, HInd-232, Oil-128, Fuel-149, Resource-196, Armament-366.

Arrived Unit list shows 12 divisions and 2 new Army HQs. One Corps HQ was disbanded along with three NKVD regiments. Orel MD/Air is now Bryansk Front (along with 175 AP instead of 50). Six air units upgraded to late model planes. Two air battalion (10 plane) units renamed and upgraded to air regiment (20 plane). Ground unit and element upgrades scroll on and on for pages; it seems that Matrix must keep the pico-management types amused. Turn 9 will have just about the same number of units arriving, lets see.. 9 RD, 2 Cav, 3 Naval Bde, and two more Army HQ.

Key stats from EvLog production totals: 82.6k Armaments produced, 1371 vehicles, 321 aircraft, 133 afv, 184k manpower. About 710k armament surplus and 55k manpower left after replacement phases. I’m not used to seeing manpower unused and so I dig a little, but the ‘wanted’ and ‘added’ columns basically match. Soviet quartermasters declare that victory is achieved - after looking over their shoulders to make sure Stalin didn’t just sneak in. Event Log, Resource Status shows Rail at 100%: 200k free, 187k needed. 20 partisan battalions now formed, and 13 supply drops done from VVS airbases. None activated yet.

CR Battles tab reports only 63 battles of all types. No recon - I feel slighted! 2 air bombing attacks on an empty airfield; none on ground units. GamerDad must have skimmed through this turn? 40 ground battles across the whole front - Red Army held in three of those. The fight up at Lake Jan was bloody again, with Finns taking almost 1k losses. Soviets can afford that. Nine interdictions by Soviets with minimal results.

Axis main-line rail repair progress: 75,28 NE of Pskov. 71,56 E of Minsk. 74,61 to Bobruisk/Berezina R. 67,88 E of Proskurov. 74,106 S of Kishinev, right up to the Dnestr River front line. Another wasted turn for Rumanian Rail. Would be nice if I could stonewall the advance another turn, but I’m pretty sure panzers will be lunging for Kirovograd or the Black Sea next turn.

Checking for counterattack possibilities, Southwest does have a couple. I might be able to break into the Vinnitsa pocket, or retreat 1st SS. I can’t see any other openings across the whole front.

Next, checking air units shows they are doing pretty well. 22 fighter and 10 bomber/tac need rest in NR, which is less than past turns. On the flip side, less is ready to return to action than I’d hoped. Still, enough so I can beef up the Leningrad area air strength. ToeM settings adjusted for all ground units. The number of RD at 90% Toe or higher is surprising - my forces will have some resiliency.

Northern Front commanders reviewed. Popov can stay at Front HQ. 6-6-5-6:5-6 is actually pretty good. For Army HQ I’d like 6 ratings in Admin and Inf - 28th Army is the only really good commander, 7th and 30th are marginal. 23rd Army is the worst and gets upgraded to Bagramyan (8-7-6-7:5-7). That was 13 AP. I may come back later and do some more swaps. Eleven Fortified Regions are build on the No Attack Line which takes me down to 118 AP available. 48th Army (STAVKA) just got organized near Volkhov and will take some excess units from Northern Front to get it under 72 CP.

Railing forward new units from Urals and east of Moscow leaves 25k unit rail still available. All but one 7th Army division can reach rail and board trains this turn. They get moved down to around Volkhov. Interestingly, the trains are interdiction-bombed twice. I didn’t know rail movement was subject to interdiction - can’t remember seeing that ever before. Good that it can happen, whether it is a new feature or has been in game forever. Still 8k unit rail left. I knock Unit Rail from 9% reserved to 7%. That will give supplies etc. more of a cushion.

Screenshot of overall front lines, excluding Karelia since that area will become inactive.

[Shalkai]

27Feb2020: Southwest and Northern Fronts are the only ones with CP overload right now, and Northern only needs to downsize by two divisions. Southwest is overloaded by 21, so a whole army. They do have six pocketed divisions - 12 CP worth if forced to surrender. What I do to fix CP will depend on if I can pop open the Vinnitsa pocket again. Making the attempt will severely weaken my defense lines in that area, however. That said...hmm. Southern Front can extend their lines northwards level with Kirovograd. No chance of cutting off any PzDivs but it would at least snarl half of them up. OK. Attempt to relieve Vinnitsa is worth it - puts about 3-5 more divisions at risk of getting pocketed next turn, but also gives the five RD in/near Vinnitsa a chance to be back in supply and rout out instead of surrender.

Grr, another possible issue - I’m not seeing enough panzer divisions here.
1st PzG - LAH 1 SS.
III PzK - 13th Pz, 16th Pz,
XIV PzK - Wiking SS, 60th Mot
?? PzK - 9th Pz, 14th Pz, 25th Mot
I can see 8 mobile divisions, and tie half of them to their HQs from battle reports. I think there are one or two more mobiles that I can’t see, even after a heavy scout effort that costs me almost ten recon planes. All right, one more thing to keep in mind as Ukraine forces go into action. Everything from the Pripyat Marshes down to the Black Sea will need 3-deep checkerboard to inhibit panzer exploitation if I can manage it.

Prep air attacks on 60th Mot bring a surprise - Russians shoot down 5 Axis fighters with no Soviet losses. Not sure why the LW delegated interception to the Hungarian RAF here, but I’ll take it. Each prep attack causes about 50 casualties and about 500 disrupted men. Interdiction disrupts one unit moving up to attack, leaving it not enough MP for a deliberate attack, so it has to pull back to make room for a weak Cav division. Ground attack finally set up and goes in with 7 divisions attacking from three sides, base CV 25:7. Results bloody for both sides, but 60th Mot is forced to retreat. Axis losses 550 men, 20 art, 2 AFV. Soviets 1700 men, 12 art, 130 (ouch) AFV. Only 3 T-34 and 2 KV-1 in the scrap yard, at least. Anyone need a well-ventilated BT-7M? Extra cooling in the August heat! Buy five, get one free!

[Shalkai]

My second attack is targeted at the 1st SS. Six divisions are used, all assigned to the same army, base CV 25:6. Soviets win a squeaker - their CV got halved, but it still came out as 2.04:1. Casualties nearly equal at about 200 men, 10 art, and a couple AFV per side. That was a lot of analysis, worry, and prep for two measly little fights. Against a good Axis player in Summer ‘41, unfortunately, this kind of effort is the only way to get a decent chance to win a battle or two during the Soviet turn.

[Shalkai]

The rest of this turn will be pretty quiet. Southern Front holds on to the last 30 miles of the Dnestr River line, but otherwise pulls back up to 60 miles, making a line across the steppes to the Bug River. Southwest Front’s counterattacks have left the area east of Vinnitsa manned only by weak or refitting units. All I can manage is a three-deep checkerboard. Acceptable, though. I’ve traded 5 surrounded divisions in Vinnitsa for 9 outflanked divisions, but at least when they start outflanked they can hopefully rout. Nine divisions is also probably a big enough bait to keep some/most of his panzers right here to make another solid pocket. I’ll be OK whether he goes for pocket or penetration south towards the Dnepr/Black Sea.

[Shalkai]

Interdictions are very frequent as I pull back Southwest Front forces. A couple divisions are stranded in front of Soviet lines and will be panzer-bait. I suspect these are so frequent because the LW did no ground attacks at all last turn so they are well-rested. Are? Were, maybe? Yeah they are looking a little tired right now. I try two airbase attacks and get small but decent results. Some more Slovak fighters knocked down, and a couple Bf-109s and He-111s taken out. Two more attacks are done on the other base with Bf-109s, again taking out a few and making some others unready. A mix of airbase and ground attacks are done by all three air armies (NCauc, Southern, Southwest).

Now that I can’t count on losing 10-12 CP worth of surrendered units in Southwest Front, time to spend some AP to decrease the overload. 12 AP assigns 1st Airborne Corps back up to STAVKA (it currently has 3 airborne brigades and two refitting divisions building forts on the Dnepr). I do a lot of division reassigning, and also start setting all my independent Army and Corps HQs assigned to STAVKA to color 240.120.120 so I can tell at a glance what’s in an Army HQ (colored), or still assigned straight to STAVKA (default white). I get Southwest down to 78 CP, six over limit. I’ll finish the reorg next turn after absorbing whatever unit losses GamerDad inflicts.

By the time all is done from Kiev south, things look pretty messy but should do a good job slowing down the invaders. Looks like I’ll withdraw on Turns 9-10-11, then fight to hold the river for a while. Hopefully Axis won’t be able to cross til September, which would be excellent from the Soviet standpoint. Kiev may be outflanked from the north, though, as very strong infantry forces are ready to push through Gomel and have a railhead close behind them. The Lower Dnepr river line is mostly manned, and from Cherkassy to Kiev where it’s been manned for several turns almost all hexes are over Fort 2. Odessa is still free to dig in deeper, and is up to Fort 4.24. It’s now pretty late so I’ll pause here and resume with the Central Area tomorrow night. A quick glance at the losses screen for action tonight during my turn is encouraging. Axis ground losses are about 1k so far, and they’ve lost almost 40 fighters in the air war. Only ten were actually German, unfortunately.

[Shalkai]

28Feb2020: I mentioned the unusually strong infantry forces gathered along the Dnepr. What I can see between Orsha and just south of Gomel tallies up to 8 mobile units and 28 ID. Basically 2nd PzG plus two full infantry Armies. I’m not sure of the rationale behind having 60% of AGC well south of Smolensk and the direct line to Moscow. This might make short-term tactical sense, as the rail line being converted towards Gomel is the farthest one east at the moment, and defensive terrain isn’t great east of the Dnepr, but making Orel the primary axis of advance makes no sense to me. Is this a deliberate plan on GamerDad’s part, or is he just unconsciously massing his forces against the obstacles/targets I’ve made in front of them? I probably won’t ever learn why, but it should make my defenses around Moscow and even Leningrad easier with all the strength the Axis has placed in this less critical area.

Another mystery is why the 12.03 rout algorithms cause units to flee 18 hexes yet end up on the front lines two Fronts away. I know Morvael has this listed on his things that’ll be fixed in the next hot patch but it is still annoying. Anyway, Bryansk Front and Kharkov MD armies pull back about 3 hexes and settle in behind the Sozh River. I’ll happily shuffle back 3 hexes/turn til mud arrives. My line isn’t very strong, especially considering those 28 ID marching east, but it’ll hamper Panzer operations and allow me to focus my forces elsewhere.

[Shalkai]

In the land bridge area, panzers are still 40 miles west of Smolensk. Defenses here are strong and deep, with all of Western Front now concentrated into a 5-hex wide sector. I may be able to keep AGC tied up near Smolensk for most of August, which would be fairly near the historical outcome. Those heavy forces near Gomel can eventually outflank both Smolensk and Kiev but I’ll react if that starts to happen, and it won’t happen in the next few turns.

Northwest Front takes over the defense of Novgorod with one army, pulls back slightly to a new line southwest of Lake Ilmen, and stands fast at VeliLuki. This section of line should be breached by Axis Infantry, but the terrain and fort levels will make it bloody at least.

[Shalkai]

Up near Leningrad, all of 4th PzG is now up near Narva. The FBD is down near Pskov so the panzers are only getting middling supply. They are still very strong compared to the outer defense line, and one of my brigades is surrounded. I’ll probably be pushed back 30 miles or more next turn towards Leningrad. Northern Front pulls back slightly from the Panzer Group in Narva, but still holds most of the Luga River line. Enough units were railed in so I have a strong 3rd line about 30 miles southwest of Leningrad. Five more RD are in rail transit through Vologda, and will arrive next turn to strengthen lines even further.

[Shalkai]

29Feb2020: I’ve been going slow on this turn; a combination of in-depth work and limited hours due to my shoulder. Hopefully I’ll finish tonight and get it sent off.

First project is to spend some AP and create a pile of new air units. [I'm including this full description of my work so everyone can see how complex creating air units can be, and also how poorly I recalled the rules. :p ] There are currently around 7000 planes in the production pool, which I think is more than I have deployed plus in NR combined. Things I want to build new regiments with: LaGG-3 (443), U-2VS (724), SB-2 (1082), DB-3B (878), maybe some I-153BS (201). Meh, skip the I-153s. I’m going to start with 30 regiments which will use up 600 planes (plus probably another 300 in training crashes before they get up to 50 EXP). I want to make 12 SB-2 regiments, along with six each of the other three types. Hum - looks like I can’t pick in detail? Only one plane type is offered per regiment type. LaGG-3 and U-2VS are options, but for BAP units IL-4 is listed. Guess I can create some as IL-4 this turn, swap them to SB-2 next. Nope, can’t even do that. Air Regiment creation option goes away after 8 are made. That is REALLY going to take a while if I can only get 160 planes/turn out of the pool. Annoying, but I can understand the limitation. Flight schools aren’t set up and producing finished pilots in a single week. Anyway, net result is I created 6 U-2VS and 2 LaGG-3 regiments. Anything else I...yes. Let’s see about switching some units in NR from IL-4 to SB-2. Spreadsheet says...drat, only four of them, plus one battalion. Those get swapped to SB-2 or DB-3B for BAP or DBAP, then I swap one oddball Yer-2 and two AR-2 units. That gives me 300 IL-4 in the pool, so next turn I’ll try and create two LaGG-3 and six IL-4 regiments.

Let’s review my fairly long to-do list for this turn…
Create U2VS Tac x 6 before moves. [done, plus two LaGG-3 as well as some bomber swaps]
SB-2 and DB-3B also have large pools. [future turns, see above]
Replace Pronin, 34th Army, near Smolensk. [replaced with Govorov, 15 AP]
Arriving Army to Rzhev. [50th Army railed up from Bryansk]
Put more fighters by Smolensk to whittle Stukas.[reinforced Western and Bryansk Air ~80 fighters each]
Check/Replace army commanders in Northern Front [23rd swapped, 7th and 30th Army commanders possible future upgrades]
Adding more Const. SU to all NF armies and beefing up their SUs in general. [done]
Turning over defense of Novgorod to Northwest Front and using the units freed to build 3rd/4th lines south of Leningrad. [done]
Rail in more units and an Army HQ attached to STAVKA. Northern Front is at CP capacity right now so another HQ is needed. [48th]

Factory Evacs: Bryansk-Orsk 4 arma 4 HInd. Ordzhonikidzegrad-Poti 4 arma 3 Hind. Moscow-Serov 10 vehicle, 1 Il-10. Evacuations going fine; there’s very little west of the y=100 column left to move. Moscow still has ~400k rail-cap of factories (about 3 turns worth) to move, but if I can avoid moving those plane factories that will be a bonus. About 20 air units were sent to the front, but I left another 10 (mostly I-15 and I-16) in reserve. Biplanes are not much use and at this point I’d rather keep their good morale/EXP pilots in NR til planes get upgraded. While reviewing unit status I put a higher number on refit since my manpower/armament totals are in good shape.