AAR: Defense of the USSR part 14

[Vic]

The end is near...

I tried a counter attack north of Moscow but it failed.

[Vic]

In the south i managed to retake Stalingrad. However i do not have the forces to hold it for long.

Around Karkov i broke through the german lines and severly punished the local german HQ there.

[seille]

Mhh, i think this game is over already.
With the air superiority and the position the german forces have already
there is no way to come back for the russians.
The Germans got the production capacity of 6 russian cities (7 with Stalingrad)
which gives them a additional economic boost.
Russian air force is dead. German attack was too good and the russians stopped them too late.
I think there are max 2-3 turns left and the germans will have all victory locations.

[Ande]

that sort of realistic and sane thinking does not belong in the soviet army! keep on fighting

[Cpt Kernow]

Well I think some things count against the Russians in this scenario. 50/50 chance of bad weather in November is much muchto soft on the Germans it should be closer to 85/15 90/10 may even be closer to real weather conditions. In WW2 the first snows started in October and by Nov 19 the realy bad weather set in.

Also just rain in Autumn should hamper the Germans, there were very very few paved roads in Russia and the rain turned many roads into a immpassable quagmires.

Also there should be Russian partisan units to interfere with german supply.

[Westheim]

I believe partisans were mentioned in an earlier part of that AAR ... can't however remember where.
 
You shouldn't be too hard on the Germans. I believe it is hard enough to win this scenario as the German player. And I believe, Vic & The Gang may be able to answer why things are the way they are.

[mtvaill]

If you make it too realistic, the German player will never win. [:)]

[ravinhood]

And that's the way it should be the germans should "rarely" win, but, that possibility should be there of course. The weather played a big role in this loss by Vic I think and perhaps they should tweak the rules like someone said with an 85/15 chance sounds good to me. I think the germans were too easily able to waltz down into Stalingrad, it shouldn't be that easy before the first winter according to the history anyways. As much as I like whatif's there should be OPTIONS to adjust the weather condition values at least for autumn and spring turns, that would satisfy the historical fanatics who would rather see the game play out closer to history. Don't have to change the whole game just add options that would have changed many things in this particular aar.

[tweber]

I have played this scenario about 20 times and played both the Soviet and German side and I think it is pretty balanced. Fundamentally, it is very tricky to model things very closely to the actual conflict without locking players into the actual result. If you look at the real war, Germany grabbed about 1/3 of the territoritory they would eventually occupy in the first 3 weeks (Smolensk started on July 12th). This would coorespond to turn 1. They grabbed the 2nd third over the next 6 months. They grabbed the last third over the next year. The Soviets then took about a year and a half to re-take all this territory. This is a challenge to model.

In general, it takes a bit longer to get the first third, but a well orchestrated push will get the Germans back on track as the winter starts. They Germans then get a final bonus in the summer of 1942 to give them a shot at the last turn.

As for options, I assumed that different skill level of players would play and that a perfect balanced scenario is tough so I wrote in some options that you can select to give one player a bonus. The picture below shows some selectable scenario variants:

- Allow wx sets the winter and sets the Soviet winter and German 1942 summer offensives. Otherwise, the weather is always clear. This does not favor either player
- Allow scorched earth gives extra damage to production cities that change hands. This also does not favor either player.
- Allow partisan sets up random striked to German occupied Soviet production centers. This favors the Soviet player.
- Siberian reinforcements gives the Soviet player extra strong units in November of 1941, allow SS does the same for the German in 1943. Favors the selected player.
- Captured war material gives the German player extra tanks, artillery, and trucks during the first time they capture Minsk, Kiev, Riga. Favors the Germans
- Allow lend lease gives the Soviets extra production if they control the Murmansk hex starting 5 turns after the conflict begins.
- You can also give either the German or Soviet player an additional production benefit.

Through selecting any or all of these variants, you can greater tailor the challenge of a particular side. The default settings are shown.

Once this is out, I would happily play the Soviet side against a player who does not think they can win. [;)]

[tweber]

German turn 15

In the North, continue to inch toward Moscow. I grab the hex south and se of the city. I assault the hex to the sw but it holds. I am moving AG North and Group A (part of old AG south) in a large pincer movement.

[tweber]

In the south, I regain Stalingrad. My position near Rostov and Kerch is not great. I seem to have lost local air superiority. I am not too worried as my thrust from Stalingrad should prevent any deep incursion from Rostov. I think it would be difficult for the Soviets to get past the Kerch bottleneck.

The Soviets in the Causcausas are still dangerous since Grozy/Baku is a major production center.

[Vic]

@ravindhood,

The reasons the germans took Stalingrad ahistorically early is that i defended the southern front very poorly.

The choices a player makes should be able to let the scenario diverge from history.

[ravinhood]

Those are good options Tweber, especially the partisian one and the scorched earth one, were you using these two in the particular aar? I remember when I played Stalingrad (and I always played the Germans) that the reinforcement ratio was at a scale of 3 to 1 russians to germans and increased thru the years to 6 to 1. What AH did was start out the Russians getting 4 replacement points per main city (Leningrad, Stalingrad and Moscow) per turn and increasing as the years rolled by to 6 per city and then finally 8 per city. To me this made the game realistic in that it was reinforcements that overwhelmed the germans in the end. The germans never got more than 4 reinforcement points per turn. I'd always start off strong, but, by the time winter 42 rolled around I was suking hind tit for reinforcements while the Russians were pouring them in at up to 24 points per turn. Then I got to watch all that wonderful territory I had taken disappear. The realistic approach is in the reinforcement pool size I think, not just stronger units. The russians should be able to fill gaps as fast as the Germans can open them at a certain point in the sceanrio. If the German player can't win before that point then that's what I mean by it should be rare if the Germans win. The replacements/reinforcements should overwhelm them.

[seille]

The scenario is great. And it is balanced.
I can say this since like Tom i played it very often (mostly against him).
And i lost as German AND as Russian [:D]
 
 
I think it´s better to bring some balance in a scenario than making it ultra realistic.
Want to play a scenario where the Russians always win or want to have a chance when
using the germans and playing well?
 
Some smaller mistakes in the first turns for the russians can have a big impact in the following turns.
The russians routed the reenforcements wrong or forgot to destroy a important bridge and things like this.
Imho in this game Tom played very good and focussed his army groups very sharp. He won a lot of terrain.
That was the key. Playing agressive as possible with the germans.
Vic played very good i think, but against Tom it´s not easy to win here.....

[tweber]

ORIGINAL: ravinhood

Those are good options Tweber, especially the partisian one and the scorched earth one, were you using these two in the particular aar? I remember when I played Stalingrad (and I always played the Germans) that the reinforcement ratio was at a scale of 3 to 1 russians to germans and increased thru the years to 6 to 1. What AH did was start out the Russians getting 4 replacement points per main city (Leningrad, Stalingrad and Moscow) per turn and increasing as the years rolled by to 6 per city and then finally 8 per city. To me this made the game realistic in that it was reinforcements that overwhelmed the germans in the end. The germans never got more than 4 reinforcement points per turn. I'd always start off strong, but, by the time winter 42 rolled around I was suking hind tit for reinforcements while the Russians were pouring them in at up to 24 points per turn. Then I got to watch all that wonderful territory I had taken disappear. The realistic approach is in the reinforcement pool size I think, not just stronger units. The russians should be able to fill gaps as fast as the Germans can open them at a certain point in the sceanrio. If the German player can't win before that point then that's what I mean by it should be rare if the Germans win. The replacements/reinforcements should overwhelm them.

For production ratios, I tried to model this based on GDP. I assumed that half the German GDP goes to the Eastern Front. If this is true, then the production ratio is closer to 1.5 to 1 in favor of the Soviets. If you go with a 3:1 ratio, the Soviets will easily win in the spring of 1942.

[TPM]

ORIGINAL: ravinhood

Those are good options Tweber, especially the partisian one and the scorched earth one, were you using these two in the particular aar? I remember when I played Stalingrad (and I always played the Germans) that the reinforcement ratio was at a scale of 3 to 1 russians to germans and increased thru the years to 6 to 1. What AH did was start out the Russians getting 4 replacement points per main city (Leningrad, Stalingrad and Moscow) per turn and increasing as the years rolled by to 6 per city and then finally 8 per city. To me this made the game realistic in that it was reinforcements that overwhelmed the germans in the end. The germans never got more than 4 reinforcement points per turn. I'd always start off strong, but, by the time winter 42 rolled around I was suking hind tit for reinforcements while the Russians were pouring them in at up to 24 points per turn. Then I got to watch all that wonderful territory I had taken disappear. The realistic approach is in the reinforcement pool size I think, not just stronger units. The russians should be able to fill gaps as fast as the Germans can open them at a certain point in the sceanrio. If the German player can't win before that point then that's what I mean by it should be rare if the Germans win. The replacements/reinforcements should overwhelm them.

This was my same thought...by the time of the attack on Moscow in '41, it was apparent that the Germans were trying to accomplish too much, and they were slowly being worn down by the sheer numbers of Russians...the Germans could keep killing and killing and encircling and encircling, but there, over of the horizon was another T-34, another rag-tag group of Russian soldiers ready to fight.
I do not think that this should be a scenario where the Russians almost always win--it is true that historically the Germans made many mistakes, and that using hindsight the German player in this scenario could possibly do better. But I've been following this AAR from the beginning and I kept thinking, "Shouldn't there be more Russians?" There's no doubt that tweber is a great player--I played him once in his PT1 version of the Russian war and he wiped me out as the Russians--and that is a factor in assessing this scenario.
Anyway, from watching this (and granted that doesn't give me the whole picture), it seems to me that Russian production should be slightly stepped up. I never got the feeling that the tweber as the Germans was facing this horde of Russians, which I really feel should be the case with this scenario.

All that being said, tweber has playtested this a number of times, and so it must be balanced to some degree...and also, he has said that he will "take on" anyone as the Russians. This I would love to see...

I CALL FOR A REMATCH--Vic as the Germans, tweber as the Russians!

[ravinhood]

But a game shouldn't be balanced on just one players performance. If you just look at Tweber and balance, it will not be balanced. It should be balanced in favor of history not the player. As you said there just weren't enough russian reinforcement forces that I saw during the whole aar. The Russians just had a puny reinforcement pool and could not plug the holes as they actually did especially in the south where the little link I gave said that the Germans had a hard time in the south and slow advancement. VIC barely had enough of what he had for the North and Middle blitz, he really was missing a good army group I think in the south. If you're just making a hypothetical game on the russian front during WW2 with some slapstick OOB and slapstick statistics per side and weighing in that the germans should get a better advantage or they will lose by the spring of 1942 sobeit. I still can commend Avalon Hills game for being more realistic as simple as it was showing how the blitz of 41 can be fun, but, also showing what overwhelming production and forces even when their power wasn't quite equal in the beginning and how it pushed them back to where they came from and beyond. Don't get me wrong I like whatif games, just be sure you note that to the prospective buyers cause your hardcore grogs will be pissed to see the germans have a much easier time than they should. But, that's always the reason these games are a hard pick for the casual player. Too realistic and they are boring, too slapstick and they aren't realistic enough to play because they don't feel right. It should not be whether Tweber can beat someone or everyone though, it should be how can two average players play it and find it fun an enjoyable and realistic at the same time.