So how easy is it to run away from the enemy?

[chuckfourth]

Hi All
from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge
"However the actual evidence introduced at trial was obtained from forced confessions.[30] The purge of the army removed three of five marshals (then equivalent to six-star generals), 13 of 15 army commanders (then equivalent to four- and five-star generals), eight of nine admirals (the purge fell heavily on the Navy, who were suspected of exploiting their opportunities for foreign contacts),[31] 50 of 57 army corps commanders, 154 out of 186 division commanders, 16 of 16 army commissars, and 25 of 28 army corps commissars.[32]

At first it was thought 25-50% of Red Army officers were purged, it is now known to be 3.7-7.7%. Previously, the size of the Red Army officer corp was underestimated and it was overlooked that most of those purged were merely expelled from the Party. 30% of officers purged 1937-9 were allowed back.[33]
"
I believe it takes about 8 years to train a staff officer to the level where he can successfully manouver a division about the battlefield.

Stalin may have suspected his army wasnt capable of a successful retreat/blocking action.
Maybe he thought a policy of standing fast and counterattacks would make the Germans pay at least some price for the land they gained. Better than running the risk of a retreat turning into confusion, turning into rout.
After all he had big factories and I think about 20 million more men he could conscript.

I agree there should be some incentive for holding the major cities vps I guess, and I also like the idea of reaching the volga blocking Russian supply of oil/lend lease.

[randallw]

The Soviet player knows he has until 1945 to try to win.  In the actual war there was perhaps an attempt by the Soviets to win in a short war, which meant Stalin would often try to hold ground as often as possible and ordered offensives with grandiose ideas, in both expected German casualties and ground regained.

[B455]

As for WitE...how about reducing Soviet rail capacity so that it would be more difficult and slow to evacuate those factories? So that the Soviet player would really have to think whether he can afford to run and give ground around key industrial cities if he is going to save his war-economy. Also, VPs for key cities please.

[timmyab]

Yes, also national morale hit/bonus for capture of important cities please.
Something like this.Undone when recaptured obviously.
Moscow, +2 Axis -2 Soviet.
Kiev, +1 Axis -1 Soviet.
Leningrad, +1 Axis -1 Soviet.
Stalingrad, +1 Axis -1 Soviet.

I'd also like to see significantly more damage to the Soviet rail network as major cities and important rail junctions are captured.

[Flaviusx]

ORIGINAL: Klydon


The game is too much of a track meet right now. Russians retreat very quickly

No they do not. People need to stop repeating this nonsense. It is not that the Soviets are retreating too quickly. It is that the Axis offensive is preposterously accelerated. The Red Army is simply being blown away too quickly and stuff is being overrun as a result.

You can't hold Kiev until September when SW Front is pocketed on turn 1. Generally the Dnepr is being crossed as early as turn 6. Leningrad can't be held at all. Moscow is falling in a non trivial portion of games. None of these things are because of "runaways." The first real runaway is the one that happens in the winter...by the Axis.

[EddyBear81]

Just my two cents here (and maybe it has already been discussed elsewhere) : why couldn't there be a RANDOM AND UNKNOWN number of VP that triggers auto victory / victory levels ?

That way, either player cannot be sure that "running away" would be a viable tactic, because they wouldn't be sure it would not cost them the game (for Soviets - in 41-42 - and Germans alike - in 44-45).
After all, "game over" was more of a political decision (well, I know the Wehrmacht actually SURRENDERED, but then they were clearly ont the knees), and political ways are not modeled in the game, so it would be surreal if you received a "stab in the back" from time to time
=> So the player / military commander would have an incentive to hold on to cities, from fear of losing the game altogether

Note also that it would only be applied if you lose homeland cities, as the random VP number cannot not make you lose the war on turn 1 ! Of course, it shouldn't be so low as to declare Axis a winner when you take Brest Litovsk

[mmarquo]

"I do think the Soviet ability to trade massive amounts of space for time is ahistorical"

This has been a viable strategy for Russia since since time immemorial; scorched earth...remember pictures of Napoleon staring out of the window of an abandonded Moscow hotel, at the desolate, frozen streets of empty Moscow?


Marquo

[Klydon]

ORIGINAL: fbs

Here's the thing... Stalin had many defeats in the first months because he refused to trade space for time. He'd rather trade soldiers (and Generals) for time. Only by 42 the Soviets had a clear strategy of giving space to avoid encirclements - and the proof is that they had much less of them in 42.

He traded blood for time to evac factories and to try to hold the Axis back.

As far as 1942 goes, this was certainly not his intention (to retreat) as the general orders out of Moscow were to hold at all costs. Part of the issue is the Russian high command lost partial control over the southern front where troops were ignoring orders and running for the hills. I don't know for sure, but I think a fair amount of those troops were not "Russian" but rather other groups within the Russian empire.

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

ORIGINAL: Klydon


The game is too much of a track meet right now. Russians retreat very quickly

No they do not. People need to stop repeating this nonsense. It is not that the Soviets are retreating too quickly. It is that the Axis offensive is preposterously accelerated. The Red Army is simply being blown away too quickly and stuff is being overrun as a result.

You can't hold Kiev until September when SW Front is pocketed on turn 1. Generally the Dnepr is being crossed as early as turn 6. Leningrad can't be held at all. Moscow is falling in a non trivial portion of games. None of these things are because of "runaways." The first real runaway is the one that happens in the winter...by the Axis.

Sorry, we will have to agree to disagree to a point. The Russians need to be able to offer better resistance than what is currently going on with the Germans seemingly going wherever they please like a hot knife through butter. The Russians have almost no counter attacking ability in the 1941 campaign despite repeated historical evidence to the contrary. Take that away and the inabillity to stop the Germans at all and they have no reason at all to stick around.

I will also comment that if people keep going after the Lvov opening as part of the "problem" then you are going to have a lot of people stop playing this game as Germans as you continue to box them even further into the historical campaign. I didn't get this game to replay history, but rather to be able to explore alternate "what ifs" in strategy.

No one here knows for a fact that such an opening would have or not have worked. According to this game, the Germans attacked with just the 4 panzer divisions available in PG1 (and weak panzer divisions at that). Is it any wonder why they struggled in the opening days of the campaign down south? Now, lets double the size of that opening panzer attack force and I would absolutely expect to see a different result.

A game has to have the proper "feel" to it for what seems right. This one doesn't have it in 1941/42 and a lot of it is because of the running away done by both sides.

[AFV]

I agree with Flavio's point, to a degree. But you can't fix the accelerated gains (IMO turn 1 only) without fixing that the Russian Army has no incentive (or capability really) to defend anything in 1941.
Right now, things are roughly balancing out (I guess two wrongs do make a right?), but in a perfect world both issues would be fixed.

[mmarquo]

The Lvov pocket causes panzers to drive south west...and this is not towards Kiew/Kharkov; yes alot of units get bagged, but the Axis loses at least 1, if not 2 - 3 turns fighting in the wrong direction.

Marquo

[Flaviusx]

ORIGINAL: Marquo

The Lvov pocket causes panzers to drive south west...and this is not towards Kiew/Kharkov; yes alot of units get bagged, but the Axis loses at least 1, if not 2 - 3 turns fighting in the wrong direction.

Marquo

Piffle. The Axis can cross the Dnepr by turn 6 in the area of Cherkassy-Kremenchug and then get behind Kiev and strike directly towards Kharkov. This is hilariously ahead of schedule compared to real life. You don't lose any time at all driving SW, you are in fact reaching the historical crossing point almost two full months ahead of schedule.

[Klydon]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

ORIGINAL: Marquo

The Lvov pocket causes panzers to drive south west...and this is not towards Kiew/Kharkov; yes alot of units get bagged, but the Axis loses at least 1, if not 2 - 3 turns fighting in the wrong direction.

Marquo

Piffle. The Axis can cross the Dnepr by turn 6 in the area of Cherkassy-Kremenchug and then get behind Kiev and strike directly towards Kharkov. This is hilariously ahead of schedule compared to real life. You don't lose any time at all driving SW, you are in fact reaching the historical crossing point almost two full months ahead of schedule.

Have to agree here. The Lvov opening can be extremely powerful. The best way to see the effect it has on the Russian player for the first several turns is to play a "hot seat" game where you play both sides. I think any Russian who says they prefer a Lvov opening vs a weaker central thrust compared to a historical opening is sort of kidding themselves at this point in time with the game. Look at how much more you can rescue out of the Lvov area, including at least some of those mountain divisions, which can come back to haunt the Axis during the winter, not to mention the amount of extra resistance AGS is going to face over the next several turns.

[MechFO]

ORIGINAL: fbs

Here's the thing... Stalin had many defeats in the first months because he refused to trade space for time. He'd rather trade soldiers (and Generals) for time. Only by 42 the Soviets had a clear strategy of giving space to avoid encirclements - and the proof is that they had much less of them in 42.

My point is: it's easy to think of Stalin's stand-or-die orders in 41 (and Hitler's similar orders in 44) as a megalomaniac caprice of an all-powerful dictator who ignored the mathematics of attack/defense ratios, but the reality was probably more complicated. A general (or even dictator) that retreats with no gains easily ends up in disgrace, because it's easy to see in the map the lost territory, but difficult to see exactly how much time he gained.

So problem with retreat (even if necessary) is that nobody likes to lose territory and population. In a democracy we can call that the heroic call of duty to protect the innocent while in a dictatorship we call that a cynical waste of soldiers and refusal to see reality -- but I suspect the underlying reason is the same: nobody likes a retreater.

Therefore, the way I see it, Stalin was not the czar Alexander. The czar could not be deposed, while Stalin could; immediately after the invasion he thought he would be killed, and being so neurotic I bet that he wasn't too comfortable even by 42. I doubt that the official discourse in the STAVKA on 41 was: "Comrades, let's allow the Huns come to the gates of the capital, when a very timely winter will freeze them solid and we'll unleash our Siberians to victory!!". I think it was more in the lines of "Comrades, we'll protect Minsk to death!"; then "Comrades, the enemy will NEVER conquer Kharkov!"; then "Comrades, the war will be won at Smolensk!". And so forth.

I'm not saying the Soviet generals were a warm bunch - I'm sure they would allow 100,000 soldiers die for nothing. I'm just saying that in the real USSR it took a specially ruthless and specially confident general to order and survive a general retreat. Your run-of-the-mill general would order his men to stand firm and die for the Motherland - that's way safer for him.


ps: I think the best way to argue about retreat is this: resistance is always expected to increase when the defenders are defending their own country. In military terms there's no reason to defend a hill in one's country more strongly than the same hill on someone else's country, but that's what happens. The reason is not logic, but ethos.

I agree. Key turning point was probably the successes of the Blizzard offensive, after that Stalin was safe. But if there had not been a successful Winter-offensive, for whatever reason, and another pounding in the summer of 42?...shades of 1916-17. It's often forgotten that Stalin had a huge victory within half a year, and another one a year later. That does wonders of a dictators legitimacy.

Same for Hitler, he's strong late war position, even in the face of reverses everywhere, was built on his resounding initial successes. A German Army stalled in f.e. Poland and France would have been a different story.

[mmarquo]

"Piffle. The Axis can cross the Dnepr by turn 6 in the area of Cherkassy-Kremenchug and then get behind Kiev and strike directly towards Kharkov. This is hilariously ahead of schedule compared to real life. You don't lose any time at all driving SW, you are in fact reaching the historical crossing point almost two full months ahead of schedule."

Oh I beleive that the whole S-SW scheme is indeed, "Piffle." [:)] My point is that going for Proskurov and cutting the rail acheives pretty much the same thing yet keeps things going in a more easterly direction. Fix logistics, and the issue in this theatre will be fixed.

[Aurelian]

ORIGINAL: Marquo


Fix logistics, and the issue in this theatre will be fixed.

Probably a post WiTW/pre WiE thing.

[Denniss]

Reduce movement points a unit receives or increase movement costs?

[timmyab]

ORIGINAL: Klydon

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

ORIGINAL: Marquo

The Lvov pocket causes panzers to drive south west...and this is not towards Kiew/Kharkov; yes alot of units get bagged, but the Axis loses at least 1, if not 2 - 3 turns fighting in the wrong direction.

Marquo

Piffle. The Axis can cross the Dnepr by turn 6 in the area of Cherkassy-Kremenchug and then get behind Kiev and strike directly towards Kharkov. This is hilariously ahead of schedule compared to real life. You don't lose any time at all driving SW, you are in fact reaching the historical crossing point almost two full months ahead of schedule.

Have to agree here. The Lvov opening can be extremely powerful. The best way to see the effect it has on the Russian player for the first several turns is to play a "hot seat" game where you play both sides. I think any Russian who says they prefer a Lvov opening vs a weaker central thrust compared to a historical opening is sort of kidding themselves at this point in time with the game. Look at how much more you can rescue out of the Lvov area, including at least some of those mountain divisions, which can come back to haunt the Axis during the winter, not to mention the amount of extra resistance AGS is going to face over the next several turns.

Yes, agree with this as well.With the way the game is setup, a big Southern opening is virtually forced.The majority of the Soviet SW front can be destroyed in the first month of the war, so must be.
Also agree that Cherkassy South is the best place to cross.

[DorianGray]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

ORIGINAL: Klydon


The game is too much of a track meet right now. Russians retreat very quickly

No they do not. People need to stop repeating this nonsense. It is not that the Soviets are retreating too quickly. It is that the Axis offensive is preposterously accelerated. The Red Army is simply being blown away too quickly and stuff is being overrun as a result.

You can't hold Kiev until September when SW Front is pocketed on turn 1. Generally the Dnepr is being crossed as early as turn 6. Leningrad can't be held at all. Moscow is falling in a non trivial portion of games. None of these things are because of "runaways." The first real runaway is the one that happens in the winter...by the Axis.

I know the PBEM game I played was like advancing across a frontier ghost-town and I could not find the SU. SU losses were minimum in 1941 in my PBEM. Yeah, I got some initial pockets, but after that, hardly anything.

Perhaps I was too used to playing against the AI and did not zealously pursue fast enough to keep up?

Anyways, it left some deep emotional scarrs as a result.

[AFV]

How about the SU initial setup being slightly different each game? In another words, a unit here or there with a higher CV, or 1 hex away from its normal spot?
If the Llov opening is not a for sure thing, then it would not be done for sure every game.
 
But with that said, if you take away something from one side, you should give it something else or take away something from the other side for balance issues. Changing turn 1 has a huge effect as it affects the next 200 turns (as opposed to something that changes on turn 150, that only affects things from that point on), so this is a very sticky issue, and has potential to really unbalance the game.
 

[randallw]

I see some variance in unit quality for the Soviets; some units can be bad to begin a campaign, in another start they'll be mediocre, or the other way.