The Road to Leningrad - Did you take it?

[Chad Harrison]

Hi all

Just finished the scenario The Road to Leningrad as the Germans. I felt really good about my initial breakthrough, and getting to Leningrad was more an issue of getting fuel to my panzers than it was fighting through Russians. I felt really confident that I would be able to take Leningrad.

I was wrong. Man, those heavy urban hexes are a bear! Three Russian divisions got up to a CV of almost 3000! [X(]

Anyways, I took most of everything else and pulled off a minor victory somehow. If this were the campaign, I would be much happier with my results. I could take the time to fully isolate the battlefield and then work down the defenders over time. But with a 17 turn scenario, this isnt an option.

So, has anyone taken Leningrad in the scenario? Or the campaign? As above, I think it would be easier in the campaign given more time.

Chad

[pompack]

Gotten a major twice now with a right hook east of Novgorod. The first time I was able to link up with the Finns and clear all of Leningrad. The second time I was a little slow and the defense was able to isolate a spearhead; that time I did finally create the pocket but I ran out of time before I could take everything north of the Neva. The trick is to stay out of the swamps with panzers.

Did I mention that panzers should stay out of swamps? [:D]

[AZKGungHo]

I tried the right hook too, as per another post somewhere. It worked, but just barely because the AI kept cutting my Panzers off. But I mopped up the entire Leningrad area and won easily!

[Klydon]

I got there in good shape. I got to Pskov in a hurry with both infantry and panzers to the south. The Russians were forming up a line there and they got encircled and cut off. I also got the panzers across the Luga river line to prevent the Russians from getting a good line there.

Historically, the Germans sent a lot of the infantry to the north towards the coast. I sent 1 1/2 corps and the rest was massed on a line through Pskov and it worked fairly well.

I did not do a good job with surrounding Russian units to start with, but did not break down German units either. I got better with surrounding Russian units later, but still rarely broke down the German units.

Rail repairs headed straight east and then towards Pskov. (Not towards Riga).

I managed to get the panzers east of the Volkov and cut Leningrad off before the Russians could form a solid line. Infantry quickly followed and I started reducing the pocket outside of Leningrad (this took a couple of turns). I set up 3 very strong infantry corps (3 divisions each) and made sure they had good commanders (Model is excellent for this). I also got a lot of the pioneer and heavy artillery units from the other infantry army and sent them up to Leningrad. After that, it was max attack with 2-3 stacks of infantry against the city defenders and I usually took 1 hex a turn. I could have attacked more (and tried it a few times) but quickly realized after looking at my fatigue numbers, etc that I was better off doing just the one attack and letting the troops recover.

My game was on "normal" setting. Will try it on a harder setting or may just hot seat play the game myself to see what sort of options each side has.

I should note I got a decisive victory at the end with every German VP location in my hands.

[Chad Harrison]

Man. Looks like I need to play it again.

[drizzt73]

I just finished this scenario after reading dlazov66 boot camp tutorial and got a major victory on easy level. I wiped out every russian unit and controlled the whole map with 1 turn to spare. The boot camp is a great starting point.

cheers

[alfonso]

Yes, I agree with other players that the most efficient strategy in this scenario could be to push some Motorized and Panzer Divisions east of the river Volkhov after taking Novgorod. The HQ buildup option works nicely. The following turn you will have 45-50 MP to try to link with the Finns. It is important that Finns cannot attack, but they can move beyond the no-attack line. Interestingly, after being isolated, there were some cases of hard fighting around Leningrad 3 or 4 turns later.

[Encircled]

Had two games on it now, and despite winning a major victory in the last one, would have needed at least three more turns to take Leningrad.

If you can isolate it, then you still need a hell of a lot of infantry to take it.

I probably sent too many men to help my Panzers over the Volkhov, but without them, I don't think I'd have the had the strength to link with the Finns.

Any ideas what scenario I should try next?

[GBS]

I play on normal with little success. Two trys and a minor loss is the best I have done. Just started a third but I don't know....

[KarlXII]

I play it for the first time and are on turn 9 now and have just begun to attack the outskirts of Leningrad. But Leningrad only give you 500 points of VP so I have prioritized to move half the army east to take the other objectives (which still give 200-300 vps each) which I´ve so far succeeded in and are now slowly moving north. It seems that within 3-4 turns I will be able too hook up with my forces around Novgorod and use them to clear Leningrad from the east side.
If you take all other objectives except Leningrad, you still win or ?

[KarlXII]

ORIGINAL: karlxii

I play it for the first time and are on turn 9 now and have just begun to attack the outskirts of Leningrad. But Leningrad only give you 500 points of VP so I have prioritized to move half the army east to take the other objectives (which still give 200-300 vps each) which I´ve so far succeeded in and are now slowly moving north. It seems that within 3-4 turns I will be able too hook up with my forces around Novgorod and use them to clear Leningrad from the east side.
If you take all other objectives except Leningrad, you still win or ?

Arghhh! It´s over. Took almost all other objectives except Leningrad and one outskirt but got only marginal victory so next time Leningrad must fall!!!

[sztomcat]

I took it (normal difficulty against AI) after first capturing the port on the eastmost side of Lake Ladoga and linked with the Finns. After Leningrad was fully cut off, the defense value of all troops there decreased significantly so it only needed to be mopped up by 2 infantry corps. In the end of scenario, I took all but one VP and achieved decisive victory.

Key of my strategy:

1)Use only AGC troops to push to the east (you can take 300VP Rechev with only 2-3 divisions) and guard the whole front south of Novogrod (I also used security troops to protect back area and communication lines). Thus you can save all AGN and OKW troops to attack north.

2)Use the whole 4th panzer group to attack northeast (along east side of the Volkov river but don't assault enemy strong points) until you reach lake Ladoga (I started "Operation Butterfly" on turn 11). Please use "HQ build up" to make sure at least one of your panzer corps is fully supplied before the attack.

3)In the meanwhile, use your best infantry corps (I Corp of 18A) to attack south east "bottleneck" of Leningrad (you should already take Pushkin by now) and threaten to reach the lake and cut off those troops along river strong points.

4)Send one of your armor division to break through to the east of the main attacking axis (normally it's much easier than the main push). It will reach the back of soviet line and cause trouble for those HQs and airbases. Don't worry too much about it's being cutoff or running out of gas. This is a fake attack designed to draw AI's attention.

5)Now AI will start to make huge huge blunders! Since its back is threatened by your lone armor division and it identified an opportunity to isolate and encircle that "valuable" division. The AI will just go for it wholeheartedly, withdraw troops from along Lake Ladoga and leave those rivers undefended! Then all you need to do is push your armor divisions cross and assault the most important object: the port on east side of lake Ladoga. It will only be guarded by a poor fortified region now.

6)After Leningrad is fully isolated, you can prepared for 40+ surrenders:)

The situation before "Operation Butterfly" started:

[sztomcat]

After one turn, I was about to send one panzer division east of Tilhevin to attack enemy HQs and airbases.

[sztomcat]

The start of turn 13. See what happened? AI withdrew all troops and clear the way for my target!

[sztomcat]

Of course I took the chance to take that port and connect with Finns to fully isolate Leningrad. The next 3 turns were the most enjoyable: I mopped up divisions trapped east of Leningrad, then assaulted the city itself after the defence value of the troops there dropped significantly. By Turn 16 Leningrad was fully cleared (I still sent a panzer division to clear Leningrad as an honorory reward to my panzer elites:)).

[sztomcat]

Final score:

[mavraamides]

After a couple of failed attempts at this scenario, I was able to win it by basically taking everything BUT Lenningrad. I'm on turn 13 now and have taken one Leningrad VP location by direct infantry assault (although those pts are not necessary for the win) while mopping up all of the other vic points with armor spearheads to the two most eastern VP's.

Here's what my VP situ looks like on turn 13 (start of):

[font="Courier New"]
VP.................GER...RUS
Tallinn............100*..300
Pskov..............100*..300
Velikie.Luki.......100*..300
Novgorod...........200*..200
Narva..............200*..200
Pushkin............200*....0
Leningrad..........500...300*
Lodeyno.Pole.......300.....0*
Vyshny.Volocheck...300*....0
Rzhev..............300*....0
NW.Leningrad.........0...100*
Pavlovo..............0...100*
Kolpino..............0...100*
Volkhov..............0...100*
..................1500...700

[/font]

As you can see, even without Pushkin, I have a 1300-700 pt lead with 5 turns remaining. I can't lose at this point, I can only increase my vic margin.



The key for me was to first push hard at Leningrad itself with the bulk of my infantry to draw all the Russian defenders. Then, while that was going on, I withdrew my armor to close to a rail head at Pskov, set them all to refit and did HQ buildups. Then I thrust those armor with light inf / sec support toward the two most eastern objectives which are worth 300 pts each.

Now, I'm going for the final assault on the city with my inf while pushing for the Finn linkup with my armor. I'll probably be able to take at least one more city VP and if I do manage a linkup, I will probably get it all.

This has been one of the most satisfying scenarios I have ever played in any war game.

[heliodorus04]

Gordian, what difficulty?

It doesn't appear to me that the east-central town (the 300 VP location) is firmly in your hands, nor the linkup.

I'm on turn 5 of my first RtL scenario and I keep wondering "Where are all the Russians" - I know they must come as a reinforcement, but I've yet to see anywhere near this force in my game (except around Leningrad proper).

If you're interested, my write-up is here:  Helio's RtL in-progress AAR

Any reason 9th Army is on your left flank?

[mavraamides]

ORIGINAL: heliodorus04

Gordian, what difficulty?

It doesn't appear to me that the east-central town (the 300 VP location) is firmly in your hands, nor the linkup.

I'm on turn 5 of my first RtL scenario and I keep wondering "Where are all the Russians" - I know they must come as a reinforcement, but I've yet to see anywhere near this force in my game (except around Leningrad proper).

If you're interested, my write-up is here:  Helio's RtL in-progress AAR

Any reason 9th Army is on your left flank?

This is on normal difficulty.

Those eastern VP's are completely under my control. No way the Ruskies can attempt to retake, they would be wiped out. I should have shown a larger view, it would be apparent.

The reason the 9th Army is there is that the Corp's HQ was pretty well stocked with Arty and I need all I can get to attack those heavy urban hexes. I needed to concentrate the absolute maximum firepower on those hexes so I tried to move every HQ I could find with artillery to that flank and re-attach units to them as needed.

Nice to have all those admin points!

[Josh]

Against the AI-normal
 
Inf only against Leningrad (taking their time, it's a tough nut to crack), fast forces on the West side of the Volkhov river racing North to linkup with the Finns. Then, still seiging Leningrad, I have a small defending force on the West bank of the Volkhov river, because by then the AI will have quite a few units on the East side of that river, that's when my armoured forces pocket them from behind (yes, through the swamps).
That is against the AI, no way this would work against a human opponent as my front east/south of Novgorod is pretty vulnerable. A determined attack there would bring me major headaches I'm sure.