Defender of the Revolution: Q-Ball v Tarhunnas

[Mehring]

Fast forward to T26.

Here you have routing Romanians everywhere. It's fun, it's good for our morale, atrites the enemy and promises to bestow guards status on our combat units.

[Mehring]

But by t32, he's holding his line with German regiments and with my extended lines of communication, picking away at them costs me more than it does him.

The Crimean Front has retaken Stalino and Makeevka (never lost Gorlovka) but...

[Mehring]

... here's the problem-

[Mehring]

It will be spring before I'm able to reconnect the Crimean railnet and in spite of a successful amphibious landing at Odessa and pushing to the outskirts of Krivoi Rog and Nikolaev I can go no further. My units are hopelessly depleated and attrition wears them down faster than the enemy. More units are rotating to and from the front than actually man the front. I have to withdraw and the Odessa operation proves an expensive mistake, costing me a Cavalry Corps and guards Division.

This front is undoubtedly a thorn in the enemy's side but it is not, and cannot be a strategic issue because of that rail net. By holding on here, you can cause your enemy anxiety and pain and perhaps lay the foundations for a future strategic offensive, if you have the forces to invest in it. That won't be for a while though and if you're stretched thin, I say again, don't build up unrealistic hopes in this front.

[Erik Rutins]

Good counterpoint, Mehring. I guess I see it as a zero sum game for the Germans. If they are forced to defend an extended line at the start of the winter, with Rumanian divisions on the front lines, that is far better than having them defend a shorter line with only German divisions. If the Soviets rout the Rumanians and force the Germans to redeploy more German divisions to the Crimea / Dnepr front, it means that other areas of the line will be even weaker during the Blizzard, making it more likely that attacks along the southern front could shatter it and lead to greater gains by Spring. I don't think Crimea on its own can roll up the German line, but I think it is a major strategic plus to the likely effectiveness of the Blizzard counter-offensive.

Regards,

- Erik

[Flaviusx]

I'd push that crimean bulge hard all the way to the end of January, and then withdraw back to the chokepoints. Don't let him pull a backhand blow during March snows.

[Q-Ball]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

I'd push that crimean bulge hard all the way to the end of January, and then withdraw back to the chokepoints. Don't let him pull a backhand blow during March snows.

This is the plan. Trying to hold all that empty ground is suicidal; the Germans can take 2-3 hexes at the bottleneck on HQ buildup, and everybody is cooked. There is also nothing really worth defending above the bottlenecks, just empty space and a few villages.

The principal is this:

Long Lines in Winter = Soviet advantage. Make them as long as possible. I am actively trying to do this.

Long Lines in Summer 42 = German advantage. You need to tighten up, or you are exposed to massive pocketing.

I understand Mehring's point, but I'm not trying to open a permanent front like he did.

I am trying to cut the rail line along the Dnepr from Nikolev, which right now is the only one to Stalino area. I am trying to force Tarhunnas to divert units from elsewhere, and/or pull back from the Donbas. Then run. the bigger I make the bulge, the more units he will need to contain it, regardless of how strong those units are. Forcing him to pull units from elsewhere in the front will pay dividends. Minus the Crimea bulge, he already has 95+ hexes to cover with non-Finns, which should stretch the Wehrmacht.

A summer defense is ONLY feasible, IMO, if you can secure the Dnepr river all the way through Dnepropetrovsk. I probably can't.

PS: Mehring, I also think routing piles of Romanians isn't a bad result anyway. Though they are not Germans, a) that will chew-up armament points, and b) the Germans need every man in the line they can get their hands on, regardless of quality. The fewer Romanians around, the more the Wehrmacht has to carry the load.

[Ketza]

My game against 76mm I was able to destroy quite a few units in this area during snow. Its a deathtrap for Soviets in the spring.

[Mehring]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

Good counterpoint, Mehring. I guess I see it as a zero sum game for the Germans. If they are forced to defend an extended line at the start of the winter, with Rumanian divisions on the front lines, that is far better than having them defend a shorter line with only German divisions. If the Soviets rout the Rumanians and force the Germans to redeploy more German divisions to the Crimea / Dnepr front, it means that other areas of the line will be even weaker during the Blizzard, making it more likely that attacks along the southern front could shatter it and lead to greater gains by Spring. I don't think Crimea on its own can roll up the German line, but I think it is a major strategic plus to the likely effectiveness of the Blizzard counter-offensive.

Regards,

- Erik

There are two factors in this game to which I give a lot of weight and which make me doubt whether the Russian can achieve anything more than a good handful of victories and a modest advance.

Firstly, unless I'm mistaken, the Axis player in this game is one of the most skillful around. If that's correct, I think it very unlikely that when his Romanians rout- and they will- he will panic and over react with a massive German defensive redeployment to the Dnepr, thus significantly weakening his line elsewhere.

Secondly, and following from the first, with just a small investment of German troops the line will stabilise and reform. From that point onwards, and more so the more the Russians advance, the relation of investement shifts sharply in the German's favour. If for every German regiment bolstering the Romanian line there are 3 or even 4 Russian divisions (one on the front, the other two or three travelling to and from refitting), we have diminishing returns to the extent that the German is actually weakening the Russian ability to make powerful attacks elsewhere. It becomes very expensive for the Russian even to maintain a cohesive front line, let alone attack.

I should add that what my screen shots don't show is the Black sea and Azov ports, later the westernmost railheads, crammed with depleted divisions hoping for some replacements. This is not a sure thing at the best of times, let alone with such damaged industry and loss of population centres as Q-Ball has suffered.

If the Axis forces are in reasonable shape there is also a danger, increasingly pronounced as winter advances and its effects on them soften, that the Germans will be able to mount a counter-attack on any Russian deployment north of the Dnepr, with very unfortunate consequences. I was lucky in this respect, but I had air superiority and a good fleet of recce planes hard at work all through winter.

[Mehring]

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball

PS: Mehring, I also think routing piles of Romanians isn't a bad result anyway. Though they are not Germans, a) that will chew-up armament points, and b) the Germans need every man in the line they can get their hands on, regardless of quality. The fewer Romanians around, the more the Wehrmacht has to carry the load.

Don't get me wrong, I love routing Romanians. It's delicious. All I'm saying is there's no strategic advantage to be gained at this point and to be wary of the risks. I agree with your plan to hit and run though, you'll do better than I did.

[hfarrish]

I did use this strategy in one of my PBEMs and I thought it worked pretty well...albeit under old blizzard rules (and I started with a lot less bridgehead than you, Q-Ball). It is possible to do the link up - really essential if the plan is worth a damn, but Mehring is right, you have to get and secure that rail link. Otherwise your Crimean forces will be a total mess by the end of the blizzard and ripe for a pretty harsh counterattack.

[Q-Ball]

Turn 23: SNOW

Tarhunnas has stopped his Snow Offensive. He cleared the Industry out of the DONBAS, but other than that, he's pretty much done.

I was hoping he would continue to push it; I will post detailed stats next turn, but his losses I think are high for this stage: 838,000, including 8,300 Guns and 3,914 AFVs. Mine are over 3.3 mil now and will probably touch 3.5 mil just before the Blizzard. Not great, but acceptable.

But he did the prudent thing, which is halt and get the shovels out. He has some lvl-2 and 3 up already (Germans are good diggers), but there are still some soft-spots in the line that I see.

Attached is a shot of the line: It's long. Very long.

In general I hope to make it longer; I am attacking out of salients, forcing him to either lengthen the line further, or just fall back out of prepared positions. At that point, I hope to uncork further attacks up and down the line. That's the theory anyway, it's easier to make Red Arrows on a Map than it is to actually pull it off.

Crimea: Good feedback here on the forum! It is an interesting debate on what to do/not to do with the Crimea. A subject in itself.

It is suddenly getting more attention from Tarhunnas; 2 divisions are now on the Dnepr, including the "Ersatz 10th Motorized". The original was destroyed in Moscow. The new one has a CV of 4. I guess they are just "average" now. I bet I see the 3rd and 20th before too long.

[wpurdom]

Kudos on your morale recovery. You did very well with the psychological trick of pretending you were taking over someone else's game and taking a fresh look. As Nemo121 discusses in some of his recent postings, normally when someone takes a blow like you did, they either try increasingly desperate measures, or lose the ability to contest the initiative. After the uncharacteristic, egregious error of leaving a couple of vital cities unprotected, your play seems to have been as exemplary as possible in a FOW game.

[Mehring]

Not sure about arty but his losses in men and AFV are indeed heavy. His units should be quite depleted and vulnerable. I hope you have some sinew left in your divisions to make the most of December.

What about aircraft? Nobody ever mentions aircraft!

[randallw]

Getting some construction brigades ordered up will help fix the rail lines much quicker; two of them can handle one hex in a single turn.

[Klydon]

Part of the issue is there won't be any rail lines repaired that are within 5 of a Axis unit. 

[Sabre21]

Using your map, I placed the red/pink arrows in areas that I would make my intital assaults. The green arrows would be follow on assaults providing the red/pink proved satisfactory.

In that area I placed the blue circle, if you hit that bulge you will force it to retreat or face envelopment which will create a bigger bulge that if you have additional armies in training to take over in January, should be able to press north towards Moscow where few forts currently are. This could result in him facing a large envelopment in the center.

Further south near Kharkov and the Crimea, I would strike out with the intent to envelop Kharkov and then yurn southwest towards D-town providing the initial battles were favorable. The Crimea pocket would try and cross the major river and head to D-town from the south. Here again he would be faced with a major pocket and may be forced to withdraw.

I would keep the pressure up along the line to limit his transfer of units to threatened areas.

Your armies you start the blizzard with will run out of steam after about 4 or 5 turns so you will need fresh armies ready to take their place or at least have several spare good divisions that you can rotate out for heavily damaged ones.

Both of the bigger envelopment plans are overly ambitious but will at least force him to react to you. I'm also not sure how well the Soviets will do considering all the channges that have taken place over the last few beta patches.

[hfarrish]

ORIGINAL: randallw

Getting some construction brigades ordered up will help fix the rail lines much quicker; two of them can handle one hex in a single turn.

Hopefully he would have hordes of them by now...

[randallw]

PDH probably likes that map quite a bit.

[Q-Ball]

ORIGINAL: Sabre21

Sabre:

Really nice Map. This helps, though my plan has some differences. Alot of that is because I can see the ground better, you guys just see dots on a strategic map.

The Blue Bulge is actually Panzers; we won't be pocketing those, and I think they are pulling back out of that salient, which is a wise move.

I am making a big push in front of Moscow; that one is obvious. But the line there isn't great; I have pushed 3 Infantry divisions BEFORE the Blizzard.

North, around Vishny Volochek, I am attacking; weak sector, plus I want to cut the rail line.

I am enveloping Kharkov; north of the town, I am committing a SHOCK army. This Army is loaded with good units. South of town, I also sent fresh Rifle units to punch a hole. Kharkov is a big target given the rail lines.

I am also attacking heavily south of Stalino, and out of the Crimea.

All of this, I hope, will cause him to pull-off the Sea of Azov and make a general withdrawl.

That is a good point on RESERVE units; I have most of my good units toward the front now. I am pulling back all currently "Unready" units to set to REFIT, to feed to the fire once our first-line is spent. I also have a strategic reserve of around 12 good rifle Divisions spread in various spots. I don't think that's quite enough though. I probably need to plan better in this area.

I do have a Reserve Cavalry Army; I plan to make 4 Cav Corps Dec 1, and deploy this big force where I seem to be making the most progress.

ONE LAST NOTE: Tarhunnas has failed to garrison the port between Nikolev and Odessa (Ostrakov? or something like that). We have a house rule limiting Amphib to 3000, but I will be dropping a couple units there. Why not? That should be extra irritating!

Production:

See the current production below. Not great, but somehow, I still have an Armament surplus. Is this typical? I thought Soviet players were reporting Arm shortages.

I have taken alot of steps to limit Armament Burn, like disbanding AT Bdes, Not building any support units except Construction Bdes. I have disbanded some Motorcycle Regts, which are Armament Hogs, to provide replacements for the remaining ones. I have disbanded some AA units. I even disbanded 3 203mm Regts to provide some replacements so I don't build any. I guess all of this worked, because I have enough Rifles to go around. Maybe disbanding a couple high-Arm Hog units for replacements is a good idea.

I need to make more Tanks, but I saved all the Tank factories, so I suppose that's typical.