8MP Team Game - The Axis team

[Telemecus]

Turn 3 9-July-1941 Axis South

Stelteck takes temporary charge of South as acting commander

Our worst fears come true when we see the Soviet forces on the Rumanian border have moved when we had intended for them to stay frozen.

In addition our motorised corps heading to Kiev finds itself cut off by a Soviet corridor 4 hexes wide. A lot of territory in our control has reverted to the Soviets. Having left a corridor of Axis control up to eight hexes wide the previous turn the Soviets needed some luck too to have enough movement points from each side to cut off our forces.

All the soviet movement allows us 13 interdictions (excluding pockets). Soviet phase air activity is restricted to a little reconnaisance west of Kiev.



It will be several turns before we get this close to Kiev again. But the upside is we can isolate another airborne corps and more motorised units west of Zhitomir. But Soviet airbases remain close to the front and achieve five interdictions of their own. Our pocket east of Lvov is largely reduced and the 17th army links up with Rumania as they begin their march across Moldova.

[center][/center]

[Telemecus]

Turn 3 9-July-1941 Air War

A less active turn as much of the Luftwaffe returns to reserve for rest, recuperation and refitting.

[Telemecus]

Turn 3 Allocations

For information only - team allocations and submissions for turn 3 attached.

Also click the following links for

https://i.imgur.com/C8RckRs.png https://i.imgur.com/xqRzTr6.png command boundaries
https://i.imgur.com/nVMJWxz.png ground losses

see Soviet turn 3 AAR here fb.asp?m=4273595

[The original post 63 has been moved to post 69]

[Telemecus]

Turn 4 16-July-1941 Axis Centre

A lot of combat to get accross the Berezina and advance towards the landbridge - but the upper Dnepr is crossed without a shot.

No soviet air activity, manual or automatic, either in the Soviet phase the previous turn or during the Axis phase this turn.

[Telemecus]

Turn 4 16-July-1941 Axis North



Motorised columns cross the Velikaya trapping some valuable units, and if not quite encircling Pskow certainly leaving a very awkward exit.

Apart from a lot of reconnaisance there is no soviet air activity, manual or automatic, either in the Soviet phase the previous turn or during the Axis phase this turn.

[Stelteck]

Letter from center front commander.

My dear Olga. I'am sûre i will return home soon. Please prepare another set of vacation in France. Moulin rouge !!!

The ennemy defense is crumbling in the center without much resistance. I suppose the center Stavka commander got punished for whatever reason and was forbidden to receive renforcements.

High command keep building despite all logical sense the railroad far north of my glorious offensive and i was not able to rob a construction unit, so my shipment of champaigne was delayed !!!

I hope infantry which is quite close now will bring some.

Minsk is really an awfull town, dirty and full of unfriendly gentlemen. And the women here are so skinny and boyish. Not at all like you my beloved olga you have nothing to fear.

See you in a few weeks !!
Her general Stel

[Telemecus]

Letter from Mrs Stelteck

Who is Olga?

[Stelteck]

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

Letter from Mrs Stelteck

Who is Olga?

Ho, did i made a mystake on her name ? it is difficult to remember all of these berlin's cabaret artists.

[Telemecus]

Turn 4 16-July-1941 Axis South

Stelteck continues in temporary charge of South as acting commander

The Soviets launch 4 ground bombing attacks on our motorised units and a little reconnaisance.

While we have had some reverses in the South, it has come in the cost to the Soviets of many units still well west of the Dnepr. We get 15 ground interdictions in the South alone with all the fleeing units and now set about encircling them. There is no Soviet ground interdiction.



Progress East of Rumania is painfully slow as it is still low morale Rumanian infantry crossing into newly controlled territory.


[The above was originally post 63]
[The original post 69 has been moved to post 71]

[Telemecus]

Turn 4 sees Stelteck engaging in a lot of long range recon of his own - what is he looking for?

[Telemecus]

Turn 4 16-July-1941 Axis Air War



[This was originally post 69]

[Telemecus]

Turn 4 Allocations

For information only - team allocations and submissions for turn 4 attached.

Also click the following links for

https://i.imgur.com/cX3SgNM.png command boundaries (North-Centre-Rear only)
https://i.imgur.com/l3Pwvoe.png ground losses

The Soviet team are looking for a new commander. It is a much lower commitment than going solo. A great way for a beginner to do their first game against others. And if you are an old hand come and show us your stuff. If you would like to join the team do post here or on any of the games other threads, or feel free to message Panzerjaeger Hortlund or myself.

[Stelteck]

Moscow offensive.

Hi. As the battle for moscow will soon begin, let me share some view about it.

First, i will probably not be able to take moscow with only 2 panzer groups (even considering the extra corps robbed from me at the start of the war are returning to me soon).

Panzer group north and south have to participate in the battle of moscow, with some infantry support, if we want to succeed.

On the other hand, giving me, as AGC commander, control other panzer group north and south would be quite boring for the north and south commander.

So a good idea would be to devise a plan in order that AGN and AGS participate in the battle for moscow, by sending panzer toward moscow on alternative route on their own, for example. Like a race [:'(]

Would be great fun.

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: Stelteck

Moscow offensive.

Hi. As the battle for moscow will soon begin, let me share some view about it.

First, i will probably not be able to take moscow with only 2 panzer groups (even considering the extra corps robbed from me at the start of the war are returning to me soon).

Panzer group north and south have to participate in the battle of moscow, with some infantry support, if we want to succeed.

On the other hand, giving me, as AGC commander, control other panzer group north and south would be quite boring for the north and south commander.

So a good idea would be to devise a plan in order that AGN and AGS participate in the battle for moscow, by sending panzer toward moscow on alternative route on their own, for example. Like a race [:'(]

Would be great fun.

These are very good points which I have been thinking about but not came to a good answer. So am glad you made the suggestion. One way would be to give you control over all panzer groups - but as you say not too much fun for the other commanders (although it would be temporary). Another possibility would be to give each commander an axis of advance - North to North Moscow, South to Tula? It might be worth saying you still set the master plan for Moscow. It may also be worth saying that you go first in each turn and could take control of units in other groups bordering you if that makes sense, or leave some of your units to others control? I can see circumstances, for instance, where you would control 4Pz but north takes on 3Pz. Whatever the case it may have to be more fluid than we have done till now. Any suggestions or ideas on how to change the setup from now welcome.

If we could get a race going it would rival the Zhukov/Konev race for Berlin, or the Patten/Montgommery race for Messina.

[Stelteck]

I think it would be better if AGN and AGC commander keep control of their panzer group and forces and use them to rush to moscow on their own, with as many forces as they could.

It would be realistic and fun.

Maybe each commander could propose a plan how best to use their forces for this operation and propose an axe of progression ?

The last commander to reach moscow will be summoned by the furher for "explanation".... [8|]

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: Stelteck
Maybe each commander could propose a plan how best to use their forces for this operation and propose an axe of progression ?

The last commander to reach moscow will be summoned by the furher for "explanation".... [8|]

An army group commander led process sounds good to me. Perhaps each army group commander could post here or in our team dropbox their proposal. If all propose marching on the same axis then we would need to change, but by seeing each others ideas we could spot that problem. It may also have to change turn by turn iteratively as circumstances change too of course.

As Supreme Commander I would then have lots of free time to think up cruel and unusual torments for the "explanation." [:)]

[Telemecus]

Spurred on by Stelteck's suggestion I was going to make some broader suggestions about how we play as a team. I am thinking we should make a new team protocol or other changes at the same time. All of these would be in the new phase for the Battle for Moscow - would it be too soon to call this Operation Typhoon?

Before that a word of caution. I would give the fall of Leningrad as the start date for these changes. While it is looking very good of course we are not there yet. There can always be a rabbit pulled out of the hat or some new eventuality. But for these purposes let us assume we do it.

There are a few things which I think are not working well or not useful. There are some areas where I would be interested in your views. Some of the ideas on how to work as a team were based on the issue of how to allocate resources between competing needs - South, Centre or North. But if every commander is thinking about how the team does rather than just looking narrowly at their area this probem does not arise. So
i) What is the use of allocating points to each commander each turn given that most points go on buildups? We have had quite a few times when commanders have gone way over the number of points they should have used, and many times way under. Looking back every time it seems to me to have been the right decision. Because buildups are so granular, you are either spending about 20 points per buildup or nothing, what point is there in saying each army group gets a dozen points every turn. Would it make more sense to give just a pot of points to each army group only for things other than HQ buildups and consider whatever is left as a pot of points for everyone to use for buildups. Or give up on allocating points totally.
ii) Are boundary maps useful? Given how messy and unpredictable it is, would just general descriptions like "push this boundary northwards" or "push it southwards" be enough
iii) Are we using SUs in the right way? Currently they are either directly assigned or moving up the chain of command to OKH. OKH now has a transport cost of 50,000 - the size of a field army. That is great to save on trucks for supply and movement. But do you feel you can call down SUs when you do need them for a tough battle?
iv) I have been making tables of SUs that withdraw soon and would like to prioritise their use (as we lose them anyway) - is there any way to make this easier to do?
v) Currently the use of airpower consists of bombing air bases at the beginning (to use the 33% allowance first), then ground support/ ground bombing and city bombing at the end. Is this the right way?
vi) There are airbases that are empty (or just light rec aircraft) that can be used as staging bases - using them in particular means airgroups fly far fewer miles (miles flown to staging base is a quarter of what is flown then to final destination). Are they useful to you? Ideally they should be moved up with the frontline as you advance as always to reduce airgroup miles flown. But I notice this is something never done until it is back with me. Is there a better way of doing this.
vii) Very often at the beginning I wish I could move some of the front units forward a few hexes to flip control of a few hexes to move staging bases forward a few hexes before air operations start. This is particularly true in the South, this turn for instance a lot of airmiles could have been saved by moving staging bases into the empty hexes between where our forces are and where they are. Is there any good way that I could move a very few ground units at the beginning which would not create problem for your operations afterwards?
viii) Are you getting the right kinds of air support?
ix) Should we change the way rail repair is managed?
x) Most things are being copied to all or to the dropbox so everyone can see/comment if they want to - is this good or information overload?
xi) We started with ideas of drawing maps and sharing ideas on the campaign, but right now seem to be just concentrating on our respective areas. Is this because everyone is happy with the general strategy and is happy just to do their bit of it. Or should we be talking more?
xii) Does the listing out of who has what commands, and which exceptions to command are made for others to control, make sense anymore?

Are there any other areas you think we can improve or change?

I was going to suggest that in the new phase after Leningrad falls we have just two objectives - Moscow (the big one) and also the industry/manpower in and around Stalino (the little one). Other things until then are either nice to haves or only things on the way to our objectives. We should abandon boundary maps for general boundary movement descriptions, we consider buildups to be extra to our individual points allocations and make any other changes/improvements that we can. Each army group commander should submit proposals on how/what they can do to get them - and we can check afterwards they do not conflict. We start the race for Moscow - with an "explanation" to the fuhrer for whoever comes last, and a night out in Berlins cabaret for the winner.

I suggest we go with Stelteck's suggestion that we remain with a command and control structure of one panzer group to North and South each and two to Centre. However could I suggest three modifications that might address some of my concerns.

i) We could change the panzer groups each commander controls. So if 4 panzer group can most quickly be redeployed to the march on Moscow by railing it to Smolensk say, then 4 panzer group would be controlled by centre and 3 panzer group by North - historically 4panzer was the middle of three panzer groups advancing on Moscow. A lot will depend on how we redeploy after Leningrad falls, but without this flexibility you could end up with North controlling the Panzer group in the centre and infantry in the north while centre has the converse. (A more radical suggestion might be to have zonal control of panzer groups. Whichever zone a panzer/motorised unit ends up is which commander will control it that turn regardless of chain of command? But that would break Stelteck's suggestion)
ii) Each commander has some discretion to use a few units from neighbouring commanders on the borders if that makes sense - or delegate control for that turn to a neighbouring commander.
iii) Generally centre goes first, unless exceptionally we choose a different order.

How does this sound?

[Stelteck]

Telemecus, you are doing really an awesome job as leader of the OKH and game manager. It is really interesting to play this game.

But be carefull not to make thing too complicated.

I do not know for my teammate but for me, as the pace of the game is very long -which is normal considering the type of game(multi, etc..)), and most of the time from one turn to the other i forgot most of what i was doing [:)]

So we have to keep it simple. I think we should avoid to mix complex order of battle and control.
If Units attached to AGN are managed by AGN commander, it is simple.
If we begin to switch panzer corps without transfering them in game from army group to army group it will be really complicated and it could take a long time each turn to understand what we are allowed to move, which would be not very good.

We need to try to limit administrative actions each turn.

You noticed that we are all concentrated in our area of operation. It is because it is simple and we can jump straight to the battle without too much thinking.

As army group commander, we have quite poor view of support units managements and air management as we did not move them so it is nearly impossible to know where they are. you seems to do a good job with them.
If there are unused support units, i'am sûre i can attached more to my panzer divisions.

[lowsugar]

I agree with Steltec. Not too much bureaucracy. For me that what you came up with works fine, but if there is something we can do to make game more interesting from your point of view, well, you are the boss [:)] I have already assigned artillery to AGN corps, and will look closer for staging bases and withdrawing units ( always forget about it ).

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: Stelteck
But be carefull not to make thing too complicated.

ORIGINAL: lowsugar
I agree with Steltec. Not too much bureaucracy. For me that what you came up with works fine

These are very good points. If anything the game will get more complicated if we have all army group commanders converging on the Nexus of Moscow so let us not complicate it. Probably if there is some difficulty in co-ordination the quickest is just to message each other to work it out. If you think something more is needed in future let us know - but otherwise let us play it by ear.

If anything can we make things simpler then. I would say let us drop the boundary maps - if anything that will be a complicating issue. I can imagine some horrendously complicated maps dividing army group boundaries that will be coming up that will not really be useful to anyone. Tell me if otherwise.

ORIGINAL: Stelteck
I think we should avoid to mix complex order of battle and control.
If Units attached to AGN are managed by AGN commander, it is simple.
If we begin to switch panzer corps without transfering them in game from army group to army group it will be really complicated and it could take a long time each turn to understand what we are allowed to move, which would be not very good.

Got you - we'll stick with what you command at the front is what you control.

ORIGINAL: Stelteck
as the pace of the game is very long -which is normal considering the type of game(multi, etc..)), and most of the time from one turn to the other i forgot most of what i was doing [:)]

I think you are being polite - some of the turns are extremely long even for non-AI games! The reason why I started doing a checklist for the next turn was precisely because I would forget otherwise.

ORIGINAL: Stelteck
You noticed that we are all concentrated in our area of operation. It is because it is simple and we can jump straight to the battle without too much thinking.

Ah then that is for good reasons then!

ORIGINAL: lowsugar
but if there is something we can do to make game more interesting from your point of view, well, you are the boss [:)]

Actually I am enjoying it enormously. I think I said before that I had got a bit bored of "pushing the units" and was interested in exploring more the inner workings of the game - this is the perfect vehicle to do so. There is also another side of game management (recruitment etc.) which is interesting, completely different from a solo game, and I had not anticipated its significance when we started. In many ways it is different from a "normal" game of WitE.

ORIGINAL: lowsugar
I ... will look closer for staging bases and withdrawing units ( always forget about it ).

The downside of discovering all the inner workings is that I could swamp you with all those details. So do feel free to stand back and say that is too much micromanagement for me. Or see them more as something optional you could do if interested, but can take a pass on otherwise.

I think every turn of this game I have ever played whenever I go back and look after I have pressed end turn I always realise there are things I forgot to do. Given how much you can do, I think we will always have this.

ORIGINAL: Stelteck
As army group commander, we have quite poor view of support units managements and air management as we did not move them so it is nearly impossible to know where they are. you seems to do a good job with them.
If there are unused support units, i'am sûre i can attached more to my panzer divisions.

On air groups I got the sense that you can use them when you need them. I can see you do ground bombings with them. I leave airgroups on nights to conserve them or deprioritise them - which may be a "me" way of managing the game. But I have seen that you can make judgements of when you do need them anyway and switch to days. So there is no need for refer backs or committee decisions which would slow things down.

When I play solo games while on the offensive I normally do pile up SUs at OKH, and assign them down on the defensive when the rail lines get nearer. For me it is a massive truck saver - but I do not know if that is just the way I play or a more general way of everyone playing. At the very least I would like to know have you ever been in a spot where you have thought "I really could use some extra SUs for this battle, but I do not know if I am allowed to..." If so that is bad which we need to fix, if not then there is no problem. Direct attachments are easy. But it would be good if you know that you can always call up an SU just like an airstrike to an HQ, and still know it will not use a lot of trucks as eventually it will rise back up again to OKH.

I am conscious that thedude357 is not in a place where they can check the forums easily at the moment. So it is worth holding this discussion open until they get back and can contribute if they want to. And as always if there is anything worth raising in future - do so!