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

[notenome]

ORIGINAL: 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).

Good advice, but in my case I really feel like I need to win back some ground, especially in the Moscow area. I want a 10 hex buffer around Moscow.

[Flaviusx]

ORIGINAL: Seminole

Any and all blizzard advice is welcome.

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.

Disagree with this. He needs to save at least one of those 6 divisions to march into the hex. Preferably 2. Farming guards matters, yes, but so does killing Germans, and to do that you need to zoc them.

Cavalry can also advance in the hex, but is less likely to hold it, and should be used for follow up hasty attacks when it marches into the hex. If possible it should exploit into the newly cleared hex from that hasty attack (hence the need for rifle divisions to hold the initial penetration.)

Attacks should be conducted on every other hex to place the units in between in ZOCs.

Position matters more than combats per se. If you have to choose between advancing and attacking, it is often better to advance with the idea of setting up follow on attack opportunities and ZOCs. You have to press the pace and prevent the German from withdrawing out of range of your units or getting a chance to dig in.

If you merely conduct frontal attacks across the length of the line you'll just push the German back and he will recover quickly enough come spring. The Wehrmacht needs to be cut down to size while the going is good and mark down as much of it for destruction as possible, and trash its morale.

[notenome]

Turn 26: Aggressive turn by 821 as he actively counterattacks my forces, scoring 9 routs, 12 retreats and 3 holds. A little miffed that the Axis can still put up these numbers, but on the other hand most of those were the fins attacking brigades up north. In other news, Rokossovky finally got promoted, but unfortunately the bump from General Major to Leyenant doesn't do anything as he'll still loose stats if I give him a front. What really mifs me is that the Axis managed to open up a supply line to the encircled division, despite a 20 mile hex of encirclement. Oh well.

[notenome]

Operation Pyotr update.

Leningrad Front continues a steady if unspectacular rate of advance of 10 miles. On the other hand NW Front (of all Fronts this is the one I least expected to score a success) manages to blow its Front wide open thanks to Zacharov's 8th Army. As this breakthrough is located exactly at the meeting point between two Axis lines, hopefully it will force both of them to dislodge.

[Flaviusx]

You need to get all your cav in action and aggressively pursue, Notenome. He's flat out running away. Forget about those refits. Just concentrate them all somewhere and overtake his grunts. You won't be able to do this along the whole front, so pick a good spot and group them all up into 2-3 shock armies, with some tank brigade support.

If you have any mountain units left, include those in your mobile groups. They're pretty fast.

Chasing him with rifle divisions won't get you anywhere.

I still like Brysank Front's axis, but really, anyplace along the front south of Kaluga will do.

[Michael T]

FWIW notenome you will not find any other published game on this subject that weakens the Axis as much in winter 41 as this game does. Rejoice.

[notenome]

MichaelT:

well first winter rules are notoriously hard to model. I remember FITE (the TOAW mod) collapsed the Axis supply grid, drastically increased force pestilence with a bunch of other variables. What you're modelling in the First Winter for the Axis side is basically four things: Environmental damage to men and machines(-50 and no coat sure does suck), supply collapse (the only way to get supply to the front was the Smolensk-Moscow road which turned into hell), inexperience fighting in such inhospitable land (the Wehrmacht was a first world army made for fighting in the first world) and exhaustion.

WitE models three of these (in a fairly heavy handed fashion) but I get the feeling it doesn't really model the supply collapse as harshly as it was. Also, it doesn't model that the Luftwaffe was not even remotely close to prepared (there should be basically no German planes in the air during Decemeber. I'd be fine with the First Winter getting toned down if logistics got toned down, as right now it is the counter balance to a way over-performing Barbarossa.

Flavio:

Oh I immediately sent all the cav to the front as soon as I made them last turn, its just that I also set them on refit to hopefully keep their strength up. I'm a fairly vicious player, to my own troops and my enemies, that said I do need to give a lot of the infantry a break. Majority of Red Army divisions are unready now.

[Flaviusx]

The game doesn't model the supply collapse at all, as this would require that it have a working logistical model. What it does is a total kludge of combat penalties and whatnot.

There's little doubt in my mind that 1941 right now is way over the top in favor of the Germans and has been since 1.05. The game's operational tempo is much too high and systemically biased in favor of the offensive. Only the weather really puts the breaks on this. I do not see an easy solution for this, so what we've got is what we're stuck with until the game gets a do over.

The old fort rules masked this problem. With forts largely neutered now (and something had to be done about this, unquestionably, as the game broke down in 1942 thanks to fort spam) the game lacks other ways of slowing down the pace of operations besides weather.

[Michael T]

If given a choice of sides to play and winning is the only consideration…..I choose Russia.

[M60A3TTS]

ORIGINAL: Michael T

If given a choice of sides to play and winning is the only consideration…..I choose Russia.

If you get around to playing glvaca, that should be a very good game.

[Michael T]

I am up for it. Just waiting for him to return from a trip.

[notenome]

A look at our rather dire RR repair situation. We have 61 RR brigades and I'm going to have to order some more from the pipeline. We have the manpower, that's for sure. Also a look at the brigade-caust, as I cannibalize brigades to maintain some semblance of strength. I've decided to stop cannibalizing anymore brigades from now on except the Naval Rifle ones, as those can't be merged into divisions. In total 62 brigades have gone to the great gulag in the sky. Brigades will from now on dig our new defensive lines. Do note that the 1/8th Jagpanzer Batallion bears the dubious distinction of being the first Axis union destroyed in Russia (not a disband).

[Flaviusx]

Brigades are horrible at digging now and especially in poor weather. Unless they get a ton of outside engineering support, don't expect much from them.

31 rifle division equivalents in merges is a lot. More than I'd feel comfortable with.

Your rail lines aren't that far behind the front, 61 RR brigades is surely more than enough to handle that. Rather than building more of them, take the ones attached to static Fronts and send them to STAVKA or active Fronts. You really shouldn't be building more of these things.

[M60A3TTS]

One comment on the RR Construction Brigades. Suggest you buy them for just that purpose, fixing RR hexes. If you want them for fortifying units, sapper regiments have 1/3 the manpower (3k vs. 1k) and about the same construction values. I'm starting to restrict RRCB assignment to just the front HQs and loading the armies with sapper regts. After the RRCBs have done their work in the Winter and Spring, you will probably want to disband some to return the manpower to the pool.

[notenome]

A few other things to mention, I'm thinking about reorganizing the Red Airforce and putting all VVS bases under Long Range Command. Doesn't make much sense to have them be under Fronts. Also, should I build cav divisions to get more Cav corps in play?

[notenome]

Whilst brigades are horrible at digging, they'll have 5 months to dig so its better than nothing, and they won't be receiving frontline attrition. The Red Army has three problems right now: Readiness, low morale and bad Front leaders (as we wait patiently for our Major and Lieutenant Generals to get promoted).

Also: independent AA brigades. Worth it? We have a lot of spare AA guns.

[M60A3TTS]

ORIGINAL: notenome

A few other things to mention, I'm thinking about reorganizing the Red Airforce and putting all VVS bases under Long Range Command. Doesn't make much sense to have them be under Fronts. Also, should I build cav divisions to get more Cav corps in play?

Keep in mind that the unit designations such as VVS don't mean much. I would not do that though because of the funky way in which the LRAC commits aircraft. Frontal aviation tends to provide a source of more reliable sorties.

How many cav divisions to you have? You should wind up with about 15 cav corps in blizzard, all with the appropriate attachments.

[Flaviusx]

Yeah, M60 has the right of it. RR brigades have been seriously devalued by the new fort rules, and it's not very cost effective to spam them anymore.

How many cavalry divisions do you have? I wouldn't buy anything until their costs go down to 10 APs.

[M60A3TTS]

ORIGINAL: notenome

Whilst brigades are horrible at digging, they'll have 5 months to dig so its better than nothing, and they won't be receiving frontline attrition. The Red Army has three problems right now: Readiness, low morale and bad Front leaders (as we wait patiently for our Major and Lieutenant Generals to get promoted).

Also: independent AA brigades. Worth it? We have a lot of spare AA guns.

Front commanders have one major qualification: Admin level. 7 is desirable, 6 acceptable. Anything less, they're replaceable. You can overload a front at level 7, and still stand a good chance to keep supplies flowing. Remember these guys are not needed for their combat skills, but their ability to keep the chow and the bullets moving forward. Vasilevsky is a strong candidate for front command if you can get him promoted up the ranks from major general.

There are no AA brigades as SUs. There are regiments and battalions, the relative sizes being 2:1. PVO units have the larger 76mm guns because they're used for firing on hign altitude aircraft. The regular AA units are all small arms up to 37mm. You can order up some, but suggest keeping them in the air command HQs.

[notenome]

End of turn. Soft factor is set to supplies. Losses were much closer now, greatly thanks to Rokossovky going on a tear with 13th Army. Our biggest problem right now is that very little of our infantry can catch up to the retreating Germans, who are moving to occupy level 3 forts near Orel. To try to rectify this we have begun to airdrop a lot of supplies to our cavalry and to any unit with red supply, hopefully it helps.

Also a screenshot of the AA brigade that I'm apparently permited to make. As for cavalry, that's what I have, all corped up. No cavalry are showing up in the reinforcements screen, so... I guess that's all I'm going to have to work with.

We're gaining a lot of ground but we're not pounding the Germans the way I'd hoped.