Support squads - actively managed or?

[joel9507_slith]

I may be missing something, but I don't see any way to control support squads directly.

Is there more to it than reducing manpower usage and hoping they get created automatically and somehow wind up in useful places and quantities?

[Balou]

1. you can assign them or send them to other HQs at the cost of 1AP each.
2. you can have them transfered by adjusting the support levels of HQs (for free, except for pioneers)
3. as far as the Axis is concerned: you don't have to create them, they appear as reinforcements.
4.

Is there more to it than reducing manpower usage

???

[joel9507_slith]

Ah, the confusing terminology. What I think you're describing is support 'units' and there are tools to manage those

The support 'squads' are different. The game describes them sort of implicitly, and you can see how many you have and how many are required at a given unit/HQ/airbase X as "Support/Need" numbers listed on the right side of the unit windows.

What I don't understand is what you can do to unit/HQ/airbase X to change things if they are short of support squads there.

Though it's not explicitly mentioned, I'm guessing support squads get made up from whatever men aren't used for other stuff (refitting, replacements, new support units, etc.) so that the extras get turned into support squads and handed out by algorithm. So if things calmed down on the front so refitting and replacing slowed, and you weren't creating new units to soak up the manpower, there'd be more men to make support squads from for the entire army, and eventually unit/HQ/airbase X would get some more.

Or, hopefully I missed something and there's a more specific way to increase support squads where needed.

[Denniss]

The support squads are distributed by the normal replacement engine. It tries to send out only that many support squads to fill the unit's needs up to the maximum setting in the unit's OB. Distributing support squads may be limited by the maxTOE setting of a unit although I'm not 100% sure on this.
Support squads in HQ/airbases are limited by the maxTOE setting for sure (as they are the major component there without local support need).

I have made several test with modified campaigns (extra manpower and armament) and saw a hell lot of support squads added to units - it seems filling support need in units has a high priority for units in normal mode and in/near the frontline.

[morvael]

Since air hq will only help it's attached airbases to deal with ground elements (AA guns, 14 support squads per airbase max), not planes, I start to think that it's safe to reduce them to 50% max TOE (air hqs, not air bases).

[gingerbread]

Hmm, this could impact the Air leader rolls - not sure which ones though.

[morvael]

Even if there would be no lack of support squads in the HQ (support need 0) and the air bases would not take more? For sure the TOE MAX can be then decreased to lowest possible without affecting leader rolls, but what value is that (90%? 80%?) I don't know.

[gingerbread]

I was thinking about:

(From: 250k Armements/ 447k manpower stuck in pools during summer?)

ORIGINAL: Joel Billings
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There is a rule that HQ's have a harder time to make admin rolls when they are short of support (the less they have versus their TOE, the worse it gets).
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But I don't know what admin rolls are done for air bases or air groups.

[morvael]

Ok, let them rot there uselessly. It's not that I'm lacking in support squads in the pool...

[Denniss]

But support squads in active pool do not block manpower best used in low-TOE combat units. Unless air combat is very important for you I'd say reduce their TOE a little
And yes, I do think Air HQ should send a limited amount of it's support squads to attached air bases

[morvael]

From the German perspective yes, from the Soviet (1.5M MP in pool) not too much.

I'd prefer having those support squads help airbases to deal with planes.

[joel9507_slith]

Thanks for the suggestions.

From what I gather, the support squads do the repair work and help the admin rolls for the air leaders (which I think again only have to do with fixing planes) and that maps in with what I found.

I had a bunch of bombers in bases that weren't getting repaired - lots of damaged and 'reserved' planes in the air groups - and it turned out that was because I'd ignored the support squad needs when putting units in bases, and ended up with too many planes for the bases' support squads to handle. What I did was reduce the bomber units in each airbase to get the support squad requirement down to where it could be met by what was available. After I did that, the planes got fixed.

I will try the TOE setting for the airbase and maybe the Air HQ to see if I could up the squads and maybe get a couple more bombers into those bases. It's not worth starving the front (Feb '42 - Russia) but I'd like to keep the planes active if I can.

[Denniss]

Better keep air bases at 100% - you need every support unit to fix your a/c. Reduction in Air HQ may be worth testing.

[morvael]

Yes, air bases at 100%, at least Soviet ones.