Winter Defense: Checkerboard, or Linebacker?

[Q-Ball]

Comrade P and BigAnorak have debated a couple times the ideal German set-up for Winter. I am still a little fuzzy on what the exact concept is for each, so I am soliciting advice/opinions on what works best.

For winter, minus Panzers, the Germans will have a little more than a Division per hex available, plus some Allied Extras (how many depends on how you garrison cities, and how many). 90 hexes is about the minimum defense line, maybe 95 or 100 if you have a few curves. The Germans should have, by Winter, 106 Infantry/Mtn Divisions, plus 4 Rom/Hun Mtn Bdes that are about as effective as a German Division.

I have screenshots below. Pretend there are forts! Illustrative purposes only. And it's actually summer in this shot, but hopefully you get the picture.

Checkerboard leave gaps in between the stacks. The way I understand it has certain plusses/minuses:
PLUS: Greater concentration of force. Fewer hexes to dig in. Most importantly, the Reds will launch fewer attacks per turn, resulting in fewer gains/loss via morale (NOTE: This may be less of a factor in next patch).
MINUS: Easy to shoot gaps with Cav, forcing retreats.

Linebacker is more of a carpet defense.
PLUS: Forces Reds to attack each hex to advance. You can rest and rotate your troops easily, keeping some units fresher.
MINUS: There is a cap to number of units that can receive benfit from towns/cities; more units = fewer guys getting benefit. Also, each individual hex should be easy to hit by the Reds. LOTS of morale boosting attacks

Not sure what the best approach is, any thoughts out there?

[Swenslim]

Definitly Linebaker. Because on left picture soviet forces can make the deliberate attack from 3 sides of hex and on the right picture only from 2. And on left screen they can easily cross the river without fight and dont have penaltys for direct attack across the river.

[Mynok]

I definitely am going to use linebacker. The Russians can ooze into those holes in the checkerboard and you can't push them out in blizzard. They'll be getting 3 hex attacks on your front line.

[Mynok]

[:D] Your post finger is faster than mine apparently.

[heliodorus04]

I'm not sure, personally, BUT
The presence of the river creates a strong incentive to go Linebacker.
Even minor rivers are very helpful in diluting attack CV.

[Mike Parker]

I would point out the problem with the linebacker defense is that signifigant portions of your defending units will not be in urban or town hexes meaning the blizard will hit hard. But the problem with the checkerboard is that not only will they get 3 hexes to attack you, they can (and should) just ooze right on past you to isolate units and formations. During the blizzard there isn't much you can do then but fall back or face isolation, they will attack to gain morale, and ooze around you to isolate you and gain attrition contact which is the SU's friend.

I still don't know how the Axis defends in blizzard?! Linebacker seems best but your units not sheltering in urban/towns will be slowly crushed by the cold!

[Q-Ball]

ORIGINAL: heliodorus04

I'm not sure, personally, BUT
The presence of the river creates a strong incentive to go Linebacker.
Even minor rivers are very helpful in diluting attack CV.

Rivers are frozen in Blizzard, and don't help at all. Even Major ones. The only terrain that matters is cities/towns, rough, swamp, and heavy woods.

Good thoughts so far...

[cookie monster]

The checkboard's ZOC's would probably be too strong for the Soviet Cavalry to slip through on a pure movement only encirclement.

Early war Cavalry morale should be alot lower than the magical 85 number, which would mean increased MP's cost to enter enemy ZOC.

Hell 65 morale units sometimes won't even advance with 4 MP's.

The Linebacker Defence should give a greater amount of reserve unit commitment potential.

[Klydon]

I think I would lean more towards linebacker for a couple of reasons. As some have already mentioned, I think one of the keys is to deny the Russians more than two hexes to attack from. They attack from two hexes, it may move you, but you won't get as hurt as bad because you are not getting as ganged up on. Another factor is I think someone running a linebacker defense is likely to give up less territory than using a checker board. As a Soviet, I would basically be trying to ooze through the German line as much as possible. If the Russians have a lot of cav, they can absolutely get behind the first rank of Germans and you risk units getting surrounded. At the very least, you are backing up a lot to avoid encirclement.

[Q-Ball]

Not sure where I lean (which is why I posted), but in defense of Checkerboard, Red Cav would have a tough time up in there. They would probably be one-hex only for movement, and supply would be a problem.

A Cav Unit on either end, though, would result in a forced retreat; you can't just sit there while they surround the unit.

A negative on Linebacker is unit clutter. You will want to keep Regts from same div together, because if you want to rest the unit, you have to recombine it to get maximum advantage from putting it in a city.

The other negative is that although Linebacker limits 3-hex attacks, it will likely increase the NUMBER of attacks along the line, thus opportunities for Germans to lose morale and Sovs to gain it. This might be mitigated, though, in next patch, because the Germans should recover quicker if I understand the changes, and the Reds will hit a Morale Ceiling at Nat Mor + 30, or 65.

[CharonJr]

How about a mix of both?

Checkerboard close to large cities which have some mobile reserves (panzer) to push back cav penetrations and then retreat back into the city. Linebacker where there are no mobile reserves present.

[Mynok]

Soviets can always move at least one hex, so they will definitely be able to slowly ooze into that checkerboard. And the Germans will either have to retreat or get surrounded because you won't be able to knock the leading units out.

Plus, he's going to be hitting lots of them with nine units plus reserves and probably causing routs.

[CharonJr]

Shouldnt a panzer div that is/was resting in a city hex be able to push back the leading Soviet unit(s)?

[Q-Ball]

CHARON: You can't count on having Panzers near by all the time, and counterattacks in Blizzard chew up ALOT of tanks! Still, you probably have to whack a Cav unit now and then to keep them honest

What about Straight-Up LINEAR? Just putting a division in every hex?

Obviously that is a real bad idea in the Summer, but in the Blizzard, isn't mobility so limited, that the Reds won't be able to really exploit the hole they make?

I am dubious, but just asking. And this seems to be what I see on most of the AARs, whether by design or desperation.

[heliodorus04]

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

ORIGINAL: heliodorus04

I'm not sure, personally, BUT
The presence of the river creates a strong incentive to go Linebacker.
Even minor rivers are very helpful in diluting attack CV.

Rivers are frozen in Blizzard, and don't help at all. Even Major ones. The only terrain that matters is cities/towns, rough, swamp, and heavy woods.

Good thoughts so far...

Err, except for mine. D'oh!

[karonagames]

What about Straight-Up LINEAR? Just putting a division in every hex?

I would say straight-up NO GAPS. When I used linebacker, it generally lasted 3-5 turns in most sectors of the front, and the reserve regiments had to recombine to take the place on unready troops in the line. I know that the unready state does not affect defence, but unready units are much more likely to rout, and it takes much longer to recover from a rout. I always felt that maximising the 2hex-side attacks did help, and would always withdraw from 4 hex-side threatened hexes.

But, my blizzard philosophy has always been based on pushing as far east as I possibly could, by attacking through the mud and snow, then being prepared to retreat through a "blizzard buffer", and then counter-attacking in the March snow,but not too many AARs have been able to replicate this.

As long as the panzers were in winter quarters, I was OK with the Landsers absorbing the attrition and combat losses.

[Pawlock]

I think a combination of both, depending on defensive terrain and localty of nearby towns. A few questions do spring to mind though which could influence choices,

Linebacker obviously uses regiments, do they exert the same amount of movement penalties as divisional ZOC?

Also with linbacker, you may be only facing a two directional attack at most, but you only have a regimental CV to defend with.

Again, would a division fortify quicker than a regiment?

[karonagames]

Q-Ball's screenshot is not quite showing what I would call a linebacker. In my tests , I would build 4 inf. div. corps, with 3 divs in the front line, with the 3 regiments behind. I would usually give the regiments pioneer bns to help with digging.

Below shows the defence I built in front of Moscow for my Game with Trey. I had not pulled the Panzers out of the Line, because I went all-out to get A hex of Moscow:

[karonagames]

8 turns of Blizzard later:

[krieger]

I would combine both kinds of defence if necesary but prefer checkerboard to keep things organized cause the blizzard is a major mess by itself. If they try to sneak in between your units then a fighting withdrawal is next, but never lose the combat integrity of the kampfgruppen (by having 2-3 divs by january41 in most such groups), this will make you holding many more major attacks or at least is the only viable or thinkable solution to resist such attacks (try to use forts from the summer advance as well, they last several months). In a linebacker defense a general defeat can be much worse to recover from as you get attacked so many times and loose much morale and experience (due to replacements) except when you get isolated in the checkerboard defense of course. Havent played the soviets yet (well, only veliky luki scn), so I'll have to see how much they can infiltrate, if they can infiltrate 2 hexes/turn moving from EZOC to EZOC even in enemy hexes, then a linebacker would be the only option to have some kind of safety. I only did 1 panzer counterattack in the whole winter and costed a sizeable amount of AFVs.

Also I noticed none of my reserves worked as such during the soviets attacks in my blizzard as axis player, none intervened in any of the fights initiated by the soviet AI. I guess this is being or has been looked at for next patch/es.

Probably the best defense for the axis in winter is planning well the acomodation of troops, the more that are protected from the winter by cities/urban/town bonuses the better...