Sledgehammer

[hugh04]

turn 13 center. The grind continues. little ground gained but many losses and routes inflicted.

[hugh04]

turn 13 south. Drive toward kursk begun, as well as infantry advance toward stalino. Not much happening though soviet stays in range and alot of attacks are launched.

[hugh04]

Turn 14 center. At this point I must tip my hat toward my opponent. I have not been showing beginning of turn screenshots, but I will here. Soviet surges forward south of moscow and against axis forces by stalino. I was shocked when I opened this turn.

As a side note, soviet cv's are low. Stacks of 3 units are showing cv's in the 3,4 and 5 area. Only a very few are 6 or higher. Soviet army must be tired. One thing that alot of attacks over a wide area (with alot of routes) must do is prevent replacements from concentrating in a few units and allowing inf divs to have a 3 or 4 cv.

[hugh04]

turn 14 beginining in the south. 4 german inf divs surrounded near stalino.

[hugh04]

Turn 14 center. With steady nerves, german counterattacks steady the front. The attack toward moscow continues and a shift toward the north of moscow bags 18 divisions. Soviet army is cracking as many routes are caused.

[hugh04]

Turn 14 south. Luck strikes the axis again. One corp of panzers near kharkov had done an hq buildup on turn 13. This corp saves the day near stalino and restores connection to the trapped axis divisions. Heavy fighting all along the line. Drive north to kursk continues.

[hugh04]

turn 15 center. Massive attacks launched around the front. 18th army from the north arrives and eliminates the pocket. I corp under model deploys and crashes into soviet lines. South of moscow the front is beginning to break. Several corp begin a hq buildup.

[hugh04]

Turn 15 south. Bitter fighting around stalino. Drive toward kursk continues. Soft link up with army group center near orel. Lots of fighting.

[hugh04]

Turn 16 center. Breakthrough south of moscow. Infantry open a path over river and 4 panzer corp exploit. The northern prongs continues to grind forward and moscow is isolated. Many routes, soviet army looks exhausted.

[hugh04]

turn 16 south. Forces link up with army group center. Bitter fighting around stalino. Reserve panzer corp arrives near D-town.

[hugh04]

Some information shots to follow.

[hugh04]

Losses are beginning to pile up.

[hugh04]

Soviet oob is still over 4 million. Hurt but not decimated. Total losses at turn 16 including isolated units would be around 3.1 million. Moscow and Kaluga had had no factory evacuations.

[hugh04]

Game seems to have ended at this point. Key takeaways for me is the value of concentration. Axis army was concentrated where it wanted to attack and did not do any sideshows that may have weakened the prime thrust. Su management. I spent alot of time making sure engineers and artillery were where they were needed. This is key as forts seem to melt if you have proper su's deployed. Pockets came toward the end has 3 stacked hexes get surrounded. But most damage was straight up attack. Soviet cv's were in the 1 and 2 per unit range, mostly 1.

I was frustrated in the south the whole game. I felt my opponent dictated the pace. However, my 2 main goals: link up with AG center near kursk/orel and take stalino were all in reach. I think I would have taken stalino during the november snow turns but would not have held during blizzard. This game shows the importance of holding leningrad for as long as you can. Having 2 panzer corps from AGN and the entire 18th army arrive on turn 15 gave me weight to keep pushing through to Moscow.

Hope you all enjoyed this aar.

[randallw]

Opponent has surrendered?

[Peltonx]

ORIGINAL: vandev

Game seems to have ended at this point. Key takeaways for me is the value of concentration. Axis army was concentrated where it wanted to attack and did not do any sideshows that may have weakened the prime thrust. Su management. I spent alot of time making sure engineers and artillery were where they were needed. This is key as forts seem to melt if you have proper su's deployed. Pockets came toward the end has 3 stacked hexes get surrounded. But most damage was straight up attack. Soviet cv's were in the 1 and 2 per unit range, mostly 1.

I was frustrated in the south the whole game. I felt my opponent dictated the pace. However, my 2 main goals: link up with AG center near kursk/orel and take stalino were all in reach. I think I would have taken stalino during the november snow turns but would not have held during blizzard. This game shows the importance of holding leningrad for as long as you can. Having 2 panzer corps from AGN and the entire 18th army arrive on turn 15 gave me weight to keep pushing through to Moscow.

Hope you all enjoyed this aar.

Nice job. The south did not go that good because it really needs 4 more panzer divisions from center to really push hard.

The up side is you took the Leningrad/Moscow areas which can be held or you will be able to almost hold them then easly retake in Spring or by July at leastest.

The South during 42 summer is still a cake walk.

As long as you do not make the mistake of pushing past Moscow by more then 40 to 60 miles and move 80% of panzers to southern front during 42 summer you have and easy win.

Very good job grinding. About the only thing the SHC could and should have done was rail allot of Southern troops north. This would have made for a harder fight in center or Leningrad area.

Great job you did not need to mule or exploit the supply system in anyway.