Some General Questions to the Masses

[501waff]

Guys,

Been practising a lot. I have now played over 10 games both up to the blizzard and through the blizzard. Any feedback and input in regards to the following would be appreciated:

* Where do you send 4th Panzer Group from the start. I feel after playing many variations that the 4th is best utilised going south. The encirclements that can be pulled off are simply too great and the ground is pure tank country. I find Playing the 4th in the centre sees it getting too clogged up with its sister group in AGC and quite simply one outruns supply eventually and gets bogged down.

* Who has conquored the Crimera and then got into the Kuban before summer has ended. I have found that a buffed 11th Army can achieve this. Heinrici as Commander, one attached Panzer Div and one attached Panzer Brigade (Lehr), dump the Rom. Divs. and one finds the 11th a machine that easily takes Odessa, Nikoleav and then into Crimera for Sev. and then bounce into the Kuban. If you drive 1 Pz Group hard and smart then it can easily be in the Stalino Area before the mud. The 1 Pz wants to reach Stalino because it is a great area to defend for the blizzard - there are cities and towns everywhere for your pz's to sit all nice and cozy.

* Are people when planning their offensive drive starting to think - I need to be at this location X so I can bunker down for the blizzard?? I have found that there are essentially to obvious defensive lines that the Germans can take that can shield a great deal of their forces from the ravages of the Blizzard.

* Are people maintaining their killing drive against the Russians right until the Blizzard. I have found that I cease my drive against the Russians only from abotu the second last turn of the snow. I have read about people stopping their drive from the point of the mud and digging in. Why? This enables the Russians to procure an extra 2M men for their winter offensive. I much rather kill russians and have the Russians forces at less than 4M men for the start of winter.

* Are people withdrawing forces from the blizzard. I have found that one infantry army can be sent back to the fatherland and all replacaement divisions from the mud onwards can be stored in the fatherland to rest. That combined with the 18th army sitting pretty in Leningrad whilst the fins fight the war and the 11 Army in the Crimera and Kuban.

* What are people doing with their german airforce for the winter.

* As a general question, what is the most russian divisions destroyed in one turn. I managed 69 and took a whopping 50 plus divisions in a massive pocket between Kiev and Sumy. All up that turn I killed/captured 690 000 men.

Look forward to the feedback

[Aussiematto]

I played some games against the computer and happily got into the Caucasus via Kuban, usually placing mountain inf there - panzers... maybe. However, everything changes against a human. Currently, I am stuck on the river line before you even get to the Crimea and there ain't no shifting his defences.

I have attacked the AI up to about 2 turns before blizzard and then dug in... probably more risky than valuable. You simply need ask - is territory important. Around Rostov, you want to be well to the east, into the bend of the Don, simply so that you can give up 10 hexes without then feeling Rostov is a worry.

I am at Turn 10 vs a smart opponent in my first PBEM and everything I had thought I learned went south. I am doing much better vs Leningrad; much worse elsewhere. I think I will be cautious when the weather turns because, like it or not, the computer is just cannon fodder. I mean, my 2 GCs against the computer were over before Feb 43.... humans will be much tougher.

[bevans]

First, you need to tell us what the difficulty level is because that makes a huge difference of what one should do/can achieve.

I play Germans at 90-100 and Soviets at 110 across the board. This changes everything as the Soviets will have 400+ units on the map by Turn 6 or so, in a carpet defense up to 100 miles deep in front of all the Pz Gruppes. You can churn through them but break throughs are next to impossible. I 'pair' Pz Gruppes and take out 1 turn bite size pockets. Still, it is all grind and perilously little glory.

- Leningrad is essentially impossible unless a second Pz Gruppe goes north and probably an infantry army as well. Therefore I also normally have 4th Pz go south as the northern pincer with 3rd Pz forming the southern pincer on the AGC/AGN border.

- Crimea is imposible to clear, just taking Odessa is difficult and time consuming. Nikolaev is alsways a major battle and the terrain between the Bug and Dnepr basin favours the defense. Unless one is prepared to use 1st Pz here, it is a slog and mud then blizzards will come before the Crimea is breached.

- Snow is great, I attack right up until the 1st blizzard turn (I play random weather so I don't know when that will be); then I fall back steadily to keep the Wehrmacht in shape for '42. The Germans cannot trade soldiers for time like the SU does, But both sides can trade space for time. So get as far East as possible (which generally falls short of history), then fall back as far as necessary. The AI is not as good as a human at exploiting blizzards, but on Difficult settings it will still chew you up if you stand and fight. I do seriously question the game mechanics where snow is good and blizzards are crippling for the Axis. But the game designers wanted a result (a huge erosion of the ability of the Wehrmacht to wage an offensive campaign in '42) and this is the mechanism they used to generate it.

- random weather is a huge impairment to the summer offense. You will inevitably get a mud turn in the first 5 turns (my experience anyway) and that will be devastating if your panzers are too far out front. At best, you will lose 1.5 turns (the Pz Corps will be at best at about 50% MP the turn after mud). At worst, they will all be cut off by the essentially infinite number of units the SU can create and rail each turn. Therefore one has to be more conservative on offense and that will inevitably leave you short of the historical Axis advance line. Not that it matters, after turn 6, it is almost impossible to get the Panzers too far out front.

- I put a lot of the Luftwaffe into the national reserve or in airbases behind the '54/72 line' the first winter.

- Don't know the max number of divs encircled/destroyed in a given turn. I have created two pockets, 50ish divs each on one turn but it takes a few turns to grind them down.