Return to Smolensk and Beyond, IdahoNY vs Scar

[IdahoNYer]

Turn 221; Sep 6, 1945.....Clear

Quick update as things outside of Rumania remain fairly quiet. South of the Pripet, German defenders hold off four attacks - looks like the Soviets have shifted their main effort to Rumania.

In Rumania, it goes from bad to worse. Soviet tank and mech corps continue to push west at speed. I was hoping they'd slow due to running low on fuel, but that is apparently not happening just yet. 17th Army has managed to establish a Korps to screen the westward progress - but that is the best we can do right now. 4x IN Div remain isolated - the Soviets bypassing for the moment. The remainder of 17th Army falls back into the mountains to prevent the Soviets from moving quickly through the passes.

On the bright side, AGN has released about half a dozen divisions to assist in Rumania, including 5th Pz Div. Also, the remaining Hungarian units have been released, adding about 8xIN divs - six of which I deploy to northeastern Hungary to backstop 1st Pz Armee.

[IdahoNYer]

Turn 223; Sep 20, 1945..........Clear

The only activity of any significance is the fall of Bucharest and the 17th Army attempting to run faster than the Soviets can advance.

North of the Pripet - nothing......at all.......

Front has remained pretty much the same for most of the Summer - no major Soviet advances here. The once level 2 fort lines are now level 3 and 4 in most places - behind rivers. He's given up here.

[IdahoNYer]

Here south of the Pripet - quiet everywhere but Rumania.

12th Army pulls back to the mountains, maintaining contact with the 1st Pz Armee to its north. 17th Army was pretty much routed on the plains of Rumania, with a number of divisions being encircled and destroyed. Two divisions retreated into Bulgaria, and are trapped there - neither side can move into Bulgaria.

I've pulled divisions from AGN to backstop 17th Army and form new lines in the mountains of western Rumania - game time will run out long before Scar can punch through.

I'm just trying to hold on to a minor victory by end game - its going to be close!

[Walloc]

ORIGINAL: IdahoNYer

Front has remained pretty much the same for most of the Summer - no major Soviet advances here. The once level 2 fort lines are now level 3 and 4 in most places - behind rivers. He's given up here.

Funny, how changing the Fort rules to avoid the '42 fort carpets, has swicthed around so the side that used forts much less than the other side nerfed even if rightly so now has the clear advantage(AP game and so on) to the effect of stopping the enemy using forts/eastwall on east wall on east wall.

How did u not see this comming.....

Rasmus

[Farfarer61]

Fort nerf? Moscow MD plus divisional units plus RR Engr brigade spam, plus civilian labour - works a treat. Those Lvl 4 pop up nicely.

[Walloc]

ORIGINAL: Farfarer

Fort nerf? Moscow MD plus divisional units plus RR Engr brigade spam, plus civilian labour - works a treat. Those Lvl 4 pop up nicely.

Well nerf im taking about is that we post 1.04 arent seeing any more carpets of 3-4 forts several hexes deep through out the entire russian front. Can we agree on that?

Which incidently or not so incidently is why the fort rules was changed.

Kind regards,

Rasmus

[IdahoNYer]

Walloc - I agree the Germans have an edge in APs in the later war years - so they have APs to build forts. Forts can build to level 4 (2xconstruc Bns in each fortified unit works great), if enough time is allowed. Most of my fort "belts" were constructed about 6 months prior to the Soviets making contact with them. Some, a bit more. Having said that, the fortified units are also a manpower drain - so its a trade off. Especially if the Soviets hit the Fort lines before they are properly manned, or force an abandonment of a fort line.

Once the German goes on the strategic defensive, I think fortified lines need to be constructed in depth along river lines deep in the German rear. The Soviets will reach them, trust me....

[IdahoNYer]

Turn 225; Oct 4, 1945.......Clear


Endgame, final tally. Managed a minor victory.....

Cudos to my opponent, Scar, who stayed with this from start to finish!

[IdahoNYer]

Front line trace at the end. Plus Leningrad held and Finland still fighting.

[IdahoNYer]

Forces available at the end. Germans were still able to pack a punch despite no armor production since April.....

[glvaca]

Well done! Thanks for the incredible effort of making the AAR!

[IdahoNYer]

Final casualty tally......

[IdahoNYer]

Best of the rest. Commander's report showing the German divisions with the best CV value at the end. Herr Goering would be proud.....

[Walloc]

ORIGINAL: IdahoNYer

Walloc - I agree the Germans have an edge in APs in the later war years - so they have APs to build forts. Forts can build to level 4 (2xconstruc Bns in each fortified unit works great), if enough time is allowed. Most of my fort "belts" were constructed about 6 months prior to the Soviets making contact with them. Some, a bit more. Having said that, the fortified units are also a manpower drain - so its a trade off.

I agree overall, but ill differ about the manpower drain. Not that it doesnt cost MP and arm to make the forts, but as u say if u have enough time. This is ofc the trick to use when u get the forts up too 4, not to take lightly on the restrictions on getting them. Fortification 4 dosnt decay. Disband the forts, build a new line. In essence u just recycle the same manpower and arm. Even if u dont get lvl 4 fortification, as long as u get to disband the forts getting teh withdrawing troops into the line. U again can recycle the same manpower and arm. All it then costs is AP. There is no continious loss of manpower of arms, but an continous lines of fortifications.

More importandly and u cant know this is that im currently writting up an synopsis on german manpower in the game. I would think it will have an effect up on how german manpower levels are percieved. I hope ill have the energy to finnish it soon and ill post it on the general forum.

Once the German goes on the strategic defensive, I think fortified lines need to be constructed in depth along river lines deep in the German rear. The Soviets will reach them, trust me....

I dont disagree, but i just find the effect of the fort changes to be rather funny. Tho done with good reason and intention, im not very impressed with the result of the changes. Further more I think that the ramification was easy to spot before hand. It has made a situasion where in effect the game only makes it possible for the axis side to make fortification lines and plenty of em in succesion.

Load up the 44 scn look at the german frontlines in AGC. Fort 2s. After 1 and a half year of a largely static front line u have fort 2s with no backing lines.
Where as while not impossibe to make a fort line similar to the onces at Kursk, u dont see em ever made by russian side outside maybe a few hexes around Moscow cuz the AP game is as it is.
Illl stipulate that in effect the sides compared to history has been reversed. The side that want/tried to the extend it was allowed making elastic defences, relying much less on fortification then the opposite side. Is now in game relying on fortifications to a great extend. Like wise the side that did try and rely on fortifications more so than other side, in effect in game doesnt rely on the high fortifcation levels/succisive lines that forts can do for u.

Its not that i dont do the same playing german side. Its non sense not too. In some sense its also needed cuz of teh way modified CVs work. I just overall find the whole situasion as said rather funny.


Btw could u post an OOB and possibly reveal the manpower pools, if u dont mind me using them in the synopsis. Edit lol u beat me to the punch, Nm.

Kind regards,

Rasmus

[Walloc]

Gratz on the win and thx for the AAR IdahoNYer.

Kind regards,

Rasmus

[Ketza]

Thanks for the AAR Idaho. Been reading it since day one and had a feeling you would win for a long time.

Another!

[Scarz]

I want to thank Ed for the great game. He really put the whooping on me in 41, and I never really recovered. Well played my friend!!

I did want to post a few things that I saw, and felt, about the game, now having done all 225 turns of one game via pbem. I would greatly appreciate everyones thoughts. I will start by saying I have already told my opponent about my 'issues' and nothing I say is intended to detract from the game, but is only being said in the hopes someone will change a few things.

First Russian issues:

The game sends back support units to STAVKA when they are depleted, even when HQ is locked. This makes getting them back to the right HQ a pain. Why not just keep them in place, as "unready" until they have come up to strength again.

There were lots of refit "bugs/issues' but these could have been caused by our patching as we went. I had thousands of planes that I couldn't use, as they flat would not go into air fields.

Same with replacements in artty, engineers and rocket artty, they would have the troops in the pool, just wouldn't feed timely to the units that needed them. For example, I had two rocket bde's that took almost a year to final get replacements, even though the rockets were in the pool.

Overall issues:

I don’t believe the supply model works at all. Both sides can launch broad attacks, all across the map, and all at once. No need to focus or worry about supplying multiple areas while on the attack. This seems too basic for a game with this much detail. I should be husbanding my supply resources, as should the Germans at some point.

I think isolated units fold too quickly. The reduction to their CV should be linked to supply better. A 12-15 CV unit with 80% supplies will go to 1 CV as soon as isolated, if it still has enough supplies on hand to continue to fight effectively there should be a drop to moral for being isolated, but if they have the supplies there should not be such a big drop in CV. Now if it is attacked, and burns through its supply, I could see the drastic reduction… so multiple attacks on an isolated unit would cause use of supply, thus reducing its CV. I don't see how a Stalingrad encirclement could ever be simulated by the game, as it would never hold out more than a turn or two unless it was level 4 entrenched in a city. Then maybe two turns.

Something still seems wrong with the entrenchments. At times our game seemed to be too attritional. Maybe tie entrenchments to Action points or something. I know the Russians need the entrenchments to hope to stand against the Germans early on (and this could be fixed by making the Russians a little better so they would not rely so heavily on entrenchments, but most of their units are 1-3 CVs, put 25-30 CVs in a level 3 entrenchment and it’s not possible to successfully assault the hex. I was losing 6-8k in men on assaults for no real gain, even if I won the hex…there was another level 2-3 entrenchment behind the first one.

Thanks.

Scar

[Seminole]

Was the Red Army packing sappers into their corps trying to make the breech in your fort lines? I realize you can't see the SUs, but you should see the Eng Fort value going down if they are. If they're just hitting their head on high level forts without sappers that's in indictment of tactics, not the game engine.

I had a similar problem trying to push into the Karelian peninsula. I could hit a hex with 9 Gds Rifle Corps with 6-9 on map Arty Bde in support and not move them. Packed sappers into those corps and suddenly the eng. fort value goes down and I started to make progress. Part of the reason I focus on terrain is that sappers/pioneers can't reduce those fortification values.

[juret]

how many tanks u had in the resource pool at the end and airplanes?

[Scarz]

Not sure exactly, but thousands for each. More than I could ever hope to use, and the fact that the newer model planes were not being used was also painful.