What's wrong with this picture?

[Peltonx]

Historical German losses were 800k and most games I play that have hvy fighting I have 600K to 800k. Yes less then historical, but only because of tactics and not game engine.

My game vs Kamil 661,000.

My game vs TVD 880,000.

So its 100% not game engine is play style. Kamil was very defensive and TVD counter attacked allot.

Pelton

[Peltonx]

My game vs TVD 880,000

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: Pelton
The German player can be close to topped off but only if he chooses not to go after Leningrad and Moscow and the Russian play gives up the south.

I agree with that and makes sense: those two theaters were historically the killing grounds for the Wehrmacht in 1941. However, I doubt that not going after Leningrad and Moscow is that much of a good idea. Looks like we're going to find out pretty soon, aren't we?

ORIGINAL: Pelton
German losses can be greatly lowered by only doing attacks you know will probably win, in other words very few hasty attacks.

There's a trade-off there Pelton. Hasty attacks - especially with high morale units - keep losses low, and given the rag tag nature of Soviet outfits, it's pretty likely that final odds force a retreat or a rout, even with a smaller force attacking a larger one.

So hasty is chancey - you might be generating Held results which are good for Soviet experience and progress towards elite status - but might be saving you a lot of MP as well.

Hasty attacks with infantry also work pretty well, especially when three Infantry Division are stacked. That sort of "flying column" tactic can dislodge any single Soviet division from their entrenchments (or almost any).

[*Lava*]

ORIGINAL: timmyab

It would also make sense to me if the cost of moving through enemy ZOC was dependent on the strength of the defending unit.

Agreed!

That was what I was thinking about making the model a bit more robust based on distance of the enemy and lets add strength as well (thank you timmyab). Thus, at the start, German movement would certainly slow (greater danger, more friction), however, if the Soviet ran too quickly it would pick up pace (modified, of course, by supply).

Dunno, but it would probably also make it more easy to attack hastily built checkerboards with hallow units. Checkerboards in the Ukraine at the start of the war, shouldn't really be very effective, should they??

Space alone cannot be the Sovs only real tactic. He also must force Axis attrition such that at some point, it finds itself nearly exhausted. This is why I really like the Flaviusx vs Pelton game. Flaviusx puts up the good fight but at the same time anticipating Pelton's moves... very cool. His retreat shocked me a bit, but in hindsight, and reviewing his comments (time line, casualties, etc), it appears, it was the correct move.

I, OTOH, could only dream of such game play. But as I say, my comments are normally directed at trying to contribute to the game, believe it or not.

Ray (alias Lava)

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: randallw

The idea of having to spend extra MPs to move into hexes that were last controlled by the enemy, isn't this pretty common in big unit giant map games?

The MPs available to a mobile division in tactical movement formation should allow it to move on the order of 28 hexes along roads and 14 hexes cross-country in a week's advance in pursuit or exploitation. A German infantry division in movement formation would have been able to move about 10 hexes along roads/5 hexes cross-country. Soviet infantry would have been more like 8/4 hexes. Administrative movement (on their own side of the front line) would be double that, but limited to hexes in supply and leaving the unit strung out at the end of its movement. Wagons would be about 10 hexes/week, while trucks would be more like 45.

Tactical movement of units deployed for combat would be less. Mobile units would be limited to about half those numbers. Infantry would be about 3 hexes per turn--enough to move around a bit in the corps position.

At best, putting a Red Army infantry division into administrative movement would have allowed it to move about 16 hexes--not enough to get away from German mobile forces. Stay-behind forces would have been needed, and once those were pushed off the road, the mobile units could have moved out. Mobile units on both sides were essentially immune to ZOC effects, as were units deployed for combat.

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: herwin
At best, putting a Red Army infantry division into administrative movement would have allowed it to move about 16 hexes--not enough to get away from German mobile forces. Stay-behind forces would have been needed, and once those were pushed off the road, the mobile units could have moved out. Mobile units on both sides were essentially immune to ZOC effects, as were units deployed for combat.

The only Red Army units really able to get out of contact with the German Army motorized divisions are those moving by rail. Regular overland movement in WitE and the numbers you give, more or less match my experiences in WitE current version, though there isn't such a thing as "Administrative" or "Strategic" modes (as such, Rail movement is the thing that gets closest to that).

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek

ORIGINAL: herwin
At best, putting a Red Army infantry division into administrative movement would have allowed it to move about 16 hexes--not enough to get away from German mobile forces. Stay-behind forces would have been needed, and once those were pushed off the road, the mobile units could have moved out. Mobile units on both sides were essentially immune to ZOC effects, as were units deployed for combat.

The only Red Army units really able to get out of contact with the German Army motorized divisions are those moving by rail. Regular overland movement in WitE and the numbers you give, more or less match my experiences in WitE current version, though there isn't such a thing as "Administrative" or "Strategic" modes (as such, Rail movement is the thing that gets closest to that).

A unit in administrative movement was totally unprepared for enemy contact. A unit in tactical movement formation was prepared for combat, with only about a third to a quarter of its combat power available. So if a Red Army infantry division was doing a tactical road march, it had the combat power of a deployed regiment. Note these movement numbers were valid for a WWII pursuit or movement to contact, so the game engine has to allow a mobile division to move 28 hexes per turn along roads in areas that had been occupied by the enemy.

Basic source: Martin L. Van Creveld, Supplying War.

[*Lava*]

ORIGINAL: herwin

The MPs available to a mobile division in tactical movement formation should allow it to move on the order of 28 hexes along roads and 14 hexes cross-country in a week's advance in pursuit or exploitation. A German infantry division in movement formation would have been able to move about 10 hexes along roads/5 hexes cross-country. Soviet infantry would have been more like 8/4 hexes. Administrative movement (on their own side of the front line) would be double that, but limited to hexes in supply and leaving the unit strung out at the end of its movement. Wagons would be about 10 hexes/week, while trucks would be more like 45.

Tactical movement of units deployed for combat would be less. Mobile units would be limited to about half those numbers. Infantry would be about 3 hexes per turn--enough to move around a bit in the corps position.

Which reinforces my opinion that Sov units rout too far, and seem to almost always land on roads.

[:@]

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: herwin
A unit in administrative movement was totally unprepared for enemy contact. A unit in tactical movement formation was prepared for combat, with only about a third to a quarter of its combat power available. So if a Red Army infantry division was doing a tactical road march, it had the combat power of a deployed regiment. Note these movement numbers were valid for a WWII pursuit or movement to contact, so the game engine has to allow a mobile division to move 28 hexes per turn along roads in areas that had been occupied by the enemy.

Basic source: Martin L. Van Creveld, Supplying War.

Thank you for the citation. Those 28 hexes are 280 miles, or 420 kilometers. If those vehicles would be able to use thin air as fuel I'd certainly buy that figure.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Lava

ORIGINAL: herwin

The MPs available to a mobile division in tactical movement formation should allow it to move on the order of 28 hexes along roads and 14 hexes cross-country in a week's advance in pursuit or exploitation. A German infantry division in movement formation would have been able to move about 10 hexes along roads/5 hexes cross-country. Soviet infantry would have been more like 8/4 hexes. Administrative movement (on their own side of the front line) would be double that, but limited to hexes in supply and leaving the unit strung out at the end of its movement. Wagons would be about 10 hexes/week, while trucks would be more like 45.

Tactical movement of units deployed for combat would be less. Mobile units would be limited to about half those numbers. Infantry would be about 3 hexes per turn--enough to move around a bit in the corps position.

Which reinforces my opinion that Sov units rout too far, and seem to almost always land on roads.

[:@]

In the OCS system, the inability to rout far enough was initially a problem. They added a rule covering the case. See section 1.8 in this document. In WitE terms, Red Army infantry should be able to rout 40 road hexes. And, yes, it should be to and along roads. Those guys were hauling a**, probably with little or no equipment.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek

ORIGINAL: herwin
A unit in administrative movement was totally unprepared for enemy contact. A unit in tactical movement formation was prepared for combat, with only about a third to a quarter of its combat power available. So if a Red Army infantry division was doing a tactical road march, it had the combat power of a deployed regiment. Note these movement numbers were valid for a WWII pursuit or movement to contact, so the game engine has to allow a mobile division to move 28 hexes per turn along roads in areas that had been occupied by the enemy.

Basic source: Martin L. Van Creveld, Supplying War.

Thank you for the citation. Those 28 hexes are 280 miles, or 420 kilometers. If those vehicles would be able to use thin air as fuel I'd certainly buy that figure.

Van Creveld cites evidence of mobile divisions sustaining 40 miles a day for a week or two. Their supply columns were busy. Western Allied infantry divisions could sustain 30 mpd using their organic trucks and attached motorised units, and experienced foot infantry with animal transport could sustain 15 mpd.

[Peltonx]

40 miles a day is 280 miles a week.

A turn is a week not a day.

Pelton

Also if and infantry division can go 280 miles in a day, then a mech division surely can in a week.

Quote" On August 25, the 80th Division began its move to eastern France with an advance of 280 miles in one day."

http://www.jcs-group.com/military/war19 ... riant.html

[BletchleyGeek]

Just one question for you herwin. Do you consider the image that WitE displays regarding unit positions and the like as a "true to nature" representation?

It is not, since here we have each time step broken into two different phases that aren't resolved simultaneously, but in order. So what you see in your turn is a highly abstracted representation of the processes meant to be simulated. Not only refueling (or just mere resting) constraints on movement have to be taken into account, also the fact that those "empty" hexes are actually not depicting "empty" hexes, but hexes being in the process of being vacated. Your guys moving 60 kms per day would only be able to do so because they know that the territory is vacated. Joel already explained the rationale for the rules in the third? post of this thread.

Very much the same with routed units. They're represented with a discrete counter, which is considered to occupy one single place, when in reality, they're spread over a large area (and therefore aren't effective combat units).

In a IGOUGO game like WitE you have to live with these "distortions" or "abstractions". If you would feel comfortable with a more "true to nature" representation, I respectfully advise you try Panther Games' Command Ops games, where the simulation is a real-time process, orders for both sides are introduced into it in an on-line manner and terrain and deployment are handled in a continuous manner.

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: herwin

Van Creveld cites evidence of mobile divisions sustaining 40 miles a day for a week or two. Their supply columns were busy. Western Allied infantry divisions could sustain 30 mpd using their organic trucks and attached motorised units, and experienced foot infantry with animal transport could sustain 15 mpd.

"Western Allied" as Third US Army in August 1944, right? The Germans never, ever, were nearly so motorized. In-game vehicles do not only represent trucks but also horse carts and the like.

Working for memory, here you have the route of Third US Army, from 27 July 1944 to early September 1944:

[center][/center]

According to Google that's 645.75 kms or about 400 miles. This is the textbook example of pursuit. According to Creveld, they should have covered this distance in a fortnight. Why they didn't? At what state was Third Army at the beginning of September? Roads in France were mostly paved, much unlike Russia. The Germans were broken and flanked (though they fought many delaying actions especially as they got closer to the Seine). Can you explain away this?

No armed force operates in an absolute "vacuum". And WitE representation of "vacuum" actually isn't.

[Flaviusx]

ORIGINAL: Pelton

The German player can be close to topped off but only if he chooses not to go after Leningrad and Moscow and the Russian play gives up the south.

Wrong. The German player can go on the offensive across the entire front, and be topped off in manpower this patch. He will take in the chin in AFVs and planes, but so far as raw manpower goes, not so much.

[wosung]

ORIGINAL: herwin

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek

ORIGINAL: herwin
A unit in administrative movement was totally unprepared for enemy contact. A unit in tactical movement formation was prepared for combat, with only about a third to a quarter of its combat power available. So if a Red Army infantry division was doing a tactical road march, it had the combat power of a deployed regiment. Note these movement numbers were valid for a WWII pursuit or movement to contact, so the game engine has to allow a mobile division to move 28 hexes per turn along roads in areas that had been occupied by the enemy.

Basic source: Martin L. Van Creveld, Supplying War.

Thank you for the citation. Those 28 hexes are 280 miles, or 420 kilometers. If those vehicles would be able to use thin air as fuel I'd certainly buy that figure.

Van Creveld cites evidence of mobile divisions sustaining 40 miles a day for a week or two. Their supply columns were busy. Western Allied infantry divisions could sustain 30 mpd using their organic trucks and attached motorised units, and experienced foot infantry with animal transport could sustain 15 mpd.

Busy?! Now this truely is an understatement.

Truely, according to Van Creveld, p. 159-160, Manstein's 56th Panzerkorps spectacularly made almost 200 miles in 5 days to Dunaburg. The Panzergruppe then already had outrun its service of supplies, due to the distance and road congestion. As early as 24 June only air supply could help. But even then w/o a railbound forward logistical base the tanks were immobilized until 4 July.

Thus, only by temporarily immobilizing 16th Army and allocating the bulk of HG North's Grosstransportraum (army group level lorry columns) to Panzergruppe 4, those fast troops could move on. To 10 July PG 4 made another 200 miles. But then it would have needed to halt both infantry armies, 16. and 18., for PG 4 to cover the remaining 80 miles to Leningrad.

And this happened to the Heeresgruppe with the best traffic situation.

In Russia Wehrmacht's Panzer units was not operating on a steady pace. They were leap-frogging for one or two weeks and then pausing for several weeks due to supply issues. And this not by accident or friction. There simply was no steady supply planned.

German Panzer and Mot. divisions had a normal fuel carrying capacity of 430 tons. For Barbarossa some 400 to 500 tons were added by ordering the Army Groups lorry columns to follow the Panzer divisions but to preceed the infantry divisions. Those lorry columns were NOT in shuttle mode, but because of the distances and because of the road congestion a one shot supply injection. Those 800-900 tons of fuel per fast division were enough for covering some 500-600 miles. BUT because it was calculated that the panzers had to drive two miles for every one mile conquered, we're talking about 250-300 miles jumps, with several week long pauses in between. (pp 152-153).

And the very Barbarossa concept was about annihilating the Red Army in just this 300 miles zone by cauldrons with everything but the kitchen sink.

I'm not sure how and if the Russian road network somehow is abstracted in the game. But in German planning and IRL traffic and supply situation in the North were (calculated to be) much better than in the South.

Imo, all those discussions about in game balance and realism should be more about supply and logistics. Those aspects are crucial, ranging from supply quantity, the ammount of railroad tracks per line to the building times of solid ice-proved railroad bridges crossing the big rivers.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Pelton

40 miles a day is 280 miles a week.

A turn is a week not a day.

Pelton

Also if and infantry division can go 280 miles in a day, then a mech division surely can in a week.

Quote" On August 25, the 80th Division began its move to eastern France with an advance of 280 miles in one day."

http://www.jcs-group.com/military/war19 ... riant.html

Yes, I was working from 40 mpd to 280 miles per turn = 28 hexes per turn.

You're referring to a planned administrative movement. Much more efficient. Also, the US Army was well equipped with trucks designed for long-range hauling. Still, 280 miles in a day was 11+ hours of driving plus perhaps 4 hours for loading and unloading. A long day.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek

Just one question for you herwin. Do you consider the image that WitE displays regarding unit positions and the like as a "true to nature" representation?

It is not, since here we have each time step broken into two different phases that aren't resolved simultaneously, but in order. So what you see in your turn is a highly abstracted representation of the processes meant to be simulated. Not only refueling (or just mere resting) constraints on movement have to be taken into account, also the fact that those "empty" hexes are actually not depicting "empty" hexes, but hexes being in the process of being vacated. Your guys moving 60 kms per day would only be able to do so because they know that the territory is vacated. Joel already explained the rationale for the rules in the third? post of this thread.

Very much the same with routed units. They're represented with a discrete counter, which is considered to occupy one single place, when in reality, they're spread over a large area (and therefore aren't effective combat units).

In a IGOUGO game like WitE you have to live with these "distortions" or "abstractions". If you would feel comfortable with a more "true to nature" representation, I respectfully advise you try Panther Games' Command Ops games, where the simulation is a real-time process, orders for both sides are introduced into it in an on-line manner and terrain and deployment are handled in a continuous manner.

Yes, there are major abstractions required, which makes me wonder at the choice of a 1-week turn. The best manual games on the subject have two full turns a week, each turn consisting of two sides moving, and with two opportunities for units to move on each side. Of course, they also roll for initiative...

However, historically, during movements to contact, pursuit, exploitation, and retrograde operations, infantry with animal transport sustained 15 miles a day, infantry with motor transport sustained 30, and mobile divisions sustained 40. It doesn't matter the unit location displayed, it should displace by that much a day.

[herwin]

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek

ORIGINAL: herwin

Van Creveld cites evidence of mobile divisions sustaining 40 miles a day for a week or two. Their supply columns were busy. Western Allied infantry divisions could sustain 30 mpd using their organic trucks and attached motorised units, and experienced foot infantry with animal transport could sustain 15 mpd.

"Western Allied" as Third US Army in August 1944, right? The Germans never, ever, were nearly so motorized. In-game vehicles do not only represent trucks but also horse carts and the like.

Working for memory, here you have the route of Third US Army, from 27 July 1944 to early September 1944:

[center][/center]

According to Google that's 645.75 kms or about 400 miles. This is the textbook example of pursuit. According to Creveld, they should have covered this distance in a fortnight. Why they didn't? At what state was Third Army at the beginning of September? Roads in France were mostly paved, much unlike Russia. The Germans were broken and flanked (though they fought many delaying actions especially as they got closer to the Seine). Can you explain away this?

No armed force operates in an absolute "vacuum". And WitE representation of "vacuum" actually isn't.

My Dad could explain a bit of that--he was there. The breakout was counterattacked at Mortain to start with. It was also a surprise to the American planners at Army Group. Supply was handled extemporaneously, mostly by grabbing truck assets from infantry divisions and various logistical units. For better performance, look at the various phases of the campaign for North Africa or Slim's reconquest of Burma.

[wosung]

However, historically, during movements to contact, pursuit, exploitation, and retrograde operations, infantry with animal transport sustained 15 miles a day, infantry with motor transport sustained 30, and mobile divisions sustained 40. It doesn't matter the unit location displayed, it should displace by that much a day.

"Historically" means "in a very abstract way". This is a meaningless generalization which neglects the specific logistical realities of Barbarossa.