41-45 GC AAR notenome (sov) vs 821Bobo (axis) no 821 past first page.

[Farfarer61]

Just be fracking patient - it's 1941! The Axis player has to have some fun. Moscow is a toss up, as it should be. Makes for a fun game. You will crush him.

(Oh and the reason I lost so few tanks at Gorky is because my Panzer Divs were Motorized Infantry by that point. I'm sue the engine would have killed more AFV if I had had them. I really missed those deadly Pz38t's amongst the buildings. Learned that one from Saint Pelton

[RCHarmon]

If the Soviet player loses Moscow it is easily recaptured in blizzard. The loss of Moscow will not be for long. Losing Moscow is but a small bump for the Soviet and easily recoverable.

[notenome]

Just to explain: my emo-rage episode was due to the fact that this was so unexpected. When I lost Leningrad I was mad at myself, because I set up the defenses in the North incorrectly, same with Kiev etc. The problem here was there was no reason at all for me to loose Moscow. I lost in a frontal assault, that's what pisses me off, that the Axis in a week during blizzard weather can take 30 miles of urban hexes even though the initial CV value of the defending units was greater than the attackers, the forts were lvl 3 and (one of them) was lvl 2. Even though I had some 40 divisions in reserve etc etc etc. Worse the Axis suffered only suffered 3000 losses in the entire assault.

That's why I flipped. If I lost Moscow on turn 15 because I had screwed up (like Leningrad) and the city had become encircled, I could deal with that because its on me. But the way things went down gave me a profound sense of futility, as if nothing I do until turn 24 is ultimately going to matter. Hopefully this explains my little emo hissy fit.

[RCHarmon]

I believe that you do have a very valid reason to be a bit upset.


I don't know all your details, but taking Moscow by direct assault is really the last option. The strategy that usually is employed is to cut it off by surrounding it.

If the Axis lost only 3000 men then I would say that was much too low; fighting into a city would have been a mess.

And you stated during blizzard????????

[TulliusDetritus]

ORIGINAL: RCH

I believe that you do have a very valid reason to be a bit upset.

Not really. Ok, Leningrad does not count (it's lost before the game starts [:D]) but after all the Germans got to the outskirts of Moscow [&:] To be honest I thought it would not fall: the Soviet counter-attack in the Bryansk Front made sure two pincers would not be possible. A frontal assault was the only option. And yet it worked.

[Flaviusx]

Ultimately I think it was the weather that made it possible to take it by frontal assault. The German had way too many bites at the apple.

Yet his position there is totally untenable. He would have been better off, in my estimation, cancelling the attack and making winter preparations. Victory disease.

There's just not much point in taking the city in this fashion, with the Red Army intact, the Axis exposed, the panzers worn down to nubs, and the flanks hanging in mid air, especially the south. There is the potential here for a first class fiasco. I really think the Axis player here has played incredibly recklessly and can be punished for it. He seems not to understand how to deal with weather changes. He got caught flat footed already by the first instance of mud, and is in for a very unpleasant blizzard season with his dispositions. Worse yet, his army could be crippled going into 1942 as he has taken no steps to husband its strength.

If he was going to take it for real, he ought to have concentrated two pincers, north and south, and bagged the city, a goodly chunk of the Red Army, and created some space east of Moscow to fall back on. What he actually did is about the worst possible way to take the city that I can think of -- a classic example of a pyrrhic victory.

I can understand Notenome being upset here, the city really shouldn't have fallen, but the situation is ripe with opportunity.

[notenome]

Turn 25:

Payback Time

Two more Guards divisions, bringing the total haul for the Axis campaign to 4 guards infantry and about a dozen artillery divisions. Not bad at all, if I may say myself.

Large scale Axis pullbacks all across the front. Where they seem determined to fight is near Rostov, Moscow, and the North. Suits me just fine. What we really need is for the Western Front commanders to get promoted, sooner rather than latter. Our timetable is to have Moscow encircled by the end of December, or at the latest by mid January.

[Flaviusx]

Lol. He'd better run. He's way out on a limb.

The thing you need to do is find a good spot or two on the front where you can concentrate all your fast units and overtake him before he can settle down and dig in a line. His infantry cannot outrun your cav. Out in the open and unfortified...they are dead meat.

Moscow and Rostov can be left to the grunts for grinding him down. They are both deathtraps for him, imo. If he tries to stay in either place too long, it's going to cost him.

[M60A3TTS]

I noticed in post #239, the screenie shows the 101st Engineer-Sapper Brigade. Wonder if that's a bug, those don't come until later.

[notenome]

DAR: Operation Pyotr gets off to a decent start, with 10 mile penetrations all along the front. Only serious mistep was an attempted exploitative attack that got a serious bloody nose. 23rd Army, Leningrad Front's second echelon army, is moving forward to continue attacks next turn.

[notenome]

On the other hand Kalinin Front has stalled in its advance, taking atrocious losses. Maksim Purkaev, commander of Kalinin Front has just recieved a message from Comrade Stalin: 'If you don't take Kalinin, I'll find a general who can.'

Which does remind me, this all or nothing model for losses is kind of bonkers. I know it evens out over the course of the game, but 75 to 3000 KIA is rather absurd. Which does remind me, all attacks are deliberate (not counting the failed armor strike up north).

[notenome]

Quick question:

What is the feasibility of hasty attacks for the Soviets? Here we have a picture of Bryansk Front (loving those 1-1 German divisions). All those divs have the mps for hasty attacks, and in cv terms they should hypothetically have a 2:1 edge, but I'm antsy about it.

[TulliusDetritus]

ORIGINAL: notenome

Quick question:

What is the feasibility of hasty attacks for the Soviets? Here we have a picture of Bryansk Front (loving those 1-1 German divisions). All those divs have the mps for hasty attacks, and in cv terms they should hypothetically have a 2:1 edge, but I'm antsy about it.

From my own experience it works. If you plan to trash 1:1 ants at least. Now it's true that I attack everything in sight [8D]

[TulliusDetritus]

Forget the 1:1 or 2:1 by the way.

My rule of thumb is that 3 rifle divisions should force a German regiment to retreat (yes or yes). 4 rifle divisions can dislodge a German division. Sometimes you need less than that. And sometimes the attack will of course fail [8D]

[notenome]

DAR:

Western Front, composed of the Soviet Union's best soldiers and generals, meets heavy resistance but manages to advance 10-20 kms along the entire front. Volkhov Front likewise manages a 10 km advance.

It is in the far southern arm of operation Anastasia that our greatest success is had. 40 km penetrations alongside the encirclement of 292nd Infantry Division. The Axis appear to be relying on mobile reserves to foil some attacks, but with only 764 operational tanks, we do not expect this to be useful for long. Losses are for Operations Pyotr and Anastasia combined.

[Flaviusx]

Hasty attacks against unfortified targets in open terrain are yummy during blizzard. You don't even have to force him out of a fort line here...he never bothered throwing one up.

[notenome]

End Turn report:

Due to the Axis pullback, operation Nicholas advances briskly, advancing 20-30 miles. Unfortunately most attacks fail due to poor cvs, though we are succesful pushing some Axis minors around, including a Hungarian mountain brigade. One curiousity is that we are closing in on half a million men in the manpower pool. To try to stimulate Rifle Squad pruduction (we have a dire shortage of rifle squads) Im aggressively disbanding low TOE artillery regiments, but its very costly (as is my active canibalization of 15 rifle brigades per turn. If we're going to keep momentum on these attacks we have to keep readiness high at all costs. Also we commision some 15 new sapper regiments to deal with whatever German forts we encounter (another large AP expenditure).

Still, all in all, this has been a succesful first week of blizzard. Only four hexes separate Moscow from encirclement, an axis division encircled (in depth), the Axis are at 750 operational tanks and well below the 2.9 million mark in manpower. If we continue to gain 10 miles a week on both sides of the Moscow flank the city will be encircled within two weeks. We also desperately need Western Front's leaders to start getting promoted. All cavalry are now on refit to get them up to speed as fast as possible, but as always low morale hurts. I commissioned separate tank batallions as in my test games those increased cav CVs handsomely. Still our AP piggybank is hodling fast at the 300 mark, a testament to my C & C discipline I suppose.

[notenome]

ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

I noticed in post #239, the screenie shows the 101st Engineer-Sapper Brigade. Wonder if that's a bug, those don't come until later.

Yeah no clue about that, I can commission them from STAVKA, go figure.

[Flaviusx]

What is your armaments pool like? I'm guessing you've flat lined that.

[Seminole]

Any and all blizzard advice is welcome.

First winter is all about harvesting Guards divisions.
If you're hitting a hex from two adjacent hexes, try to make sure you're using 6 divisions. That way you can register 6 divisions with a win towards Guards status.
Your goal by the end of Feb. should be to max your Guards allotment.
Usually once a unit gets Guards status in the first winter I pull them off the line to refit and let someone else get some wins.
When summer rolls around and you can make rifle corps use two Gds divs and 1 bde start turning out Gds Rifle Corps. You don't want to place these on the front line where the Germans can encircle and destroy them, but keep them in reserve (strategically, not simply the 'reserve' stance available in the game).