Micheal T (Ger) vs Kamil (Sov)

[janh]

Ouch, that hurts. I recall someone arguing a year ago that going for the Lvov was forgoing bigger chances- this probably what that would look like.

Did Michael rail that Panzerkorps south? It didnt make it all the way via Rovno and Vinnitsa, right?

I hope your southern front will recover from this before Michael reaches for Kursk and Kharkov. Thumbs up! The south isn't good defensive terrain with the Djenpr breached usually easily anyway, but with AGN being still far from Pskov and apparently not committed to Leningrad, you have a big chance there. With LG held, the Wehrmacht's left flank would be in trouble by 43 latest...

[juret]

coool ags opening

[carlkay58]

That is close to the Sapper opening, except his opening closes the pocket on turn 3 in Odessa without the Southwestern Front being activated before that and isolated without the ability to do anything about it.

[Peltonx]

Again why do you people insist on fighting MT in the south.

Its 20+ disasters in the south and still people keep fighting forward?

The next person that fights MT should simply rush all forces to the front the first 4 turns then surrender, lol

Its like watching the same rerun of X-files over and over.

You could have made it easyer for MT, BUT I doubt it.

[Flaviusx]

And this is why the Soviets run, run, run away nowadays.

The Lvov opener continues to produce stupidities in ever more elaborate ways. All 4 border Fronts gone in 2 turns.

I flatly refuse to PBEM anymore because of this. It just defies my suspension of disbelief. That the game can go so badly awry from the getgo like this is pretty sad and I dearly hope this is the first thing that gets fixed up in 2.0. Everything else follows from this and is why it is impossible to get anything resembling a historical 1941 campaign in PBEM.

[Ketza]

Flavius they always ran. Well most of them anyway [;)]

[delatbabel]

"Why do people insist on fighting" -- remember that the Saper variant of the Lvov opening sees the entire of SW front encircled before it activates. It's a bit hard to run or rail out units that have zero movement points.

"And this is why the Soviets run, run, run away nowadays." -- and yet several people want to put additional restrictions stopping the Soviets from running in the first summer. We've already seen what happens when they don't run.

[Flaviusx]

Ketza, no running is necessary if SW Front starts off against an unreinforced AGS. Lock that in, and you can start doing things with the VPs to prevent runaways.

As things presently stand the entire opening turn is ridiculous and leads to grossly ahistorical play in every PBEM game. It just keeps getting worse and worse as folks optimize the opening and the inevitable response to that is for Soviets to run more and more.

1941 is flat out broken for PBEM. Has been for a very long time. No game ever develops historically thanks to this preposterous dynamic driven by the first turn; everything just snowballs from there. None of this is believable to me, not the running, nor the opening. But there it is. The whole thing needs to be redesigned from the ground up.

[delatbabel]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx
Ketza, no running is necessary if SW Front starts off against an unreinforced AGS. Lock that in, and you can start doing things with the VPs to prevent runaways.

As things presently stand the entire opening turn is ridiculous and leads to grossly ahistorical play in every PBEM game. It just keeps getting worse and worse as folks optimize the opening and the inevitable response to that is for Soviets to run more and more.

1941 is flat out broken for PBEM. Has been for a very long time. No game ever develops historically thanks to this preposterous dynamic driven by the first turn; everything just snowballs from there. None of this is believable to me, not the running, nor the opening. But there it is. The whole thing needs to be redesigned from the ground up.

I agree with what you're saying, including "1941 is flat out broken for PBEM" and "grossly ahistorical play", however in terms of exactly what needs fixing I think I'm a bit left field.

If you compare what really happened in the summer of 1941 vs what actually happens in 1941 in most PBEM games, then you'll find that the real Soviet losses in 1941 were actually much higher than those suffered by most players. In turn, the actual Soviet replacements and reinforcements were actually much higher than the game provides. I don't believe that the VP system needs fixing to solve this, but it is a fundamental change that needs making. Hear my argument for a moment if you will:

* Historically, the Soviets didn't run as much as most Sir Robinovsky (myself included) players do. If they did they would have had much lower losses in 1941 than they really did, probably in line with what most players achieve in the game.
* If the game produces a historical level of reinforcements in 1941 *and* most Soviet players run, then the game will be a runaway (excuse the pun) victory for the Soviets in 1943 or at the earliest 1944. Facing a 12+ million man army isn't going to be fun for the Germans.
* If the game enforces "stand and hold" orders on the Soviets and doesn't increase the level of reinforcements to the historical levels then the game will be a runaway victory for the Germans by end of 1942. Trying to mount a winter offensive with a 3.5 million man army isn't going to work, and trying to hold the Germans at bay in 1942 with a 4.5 million man army isn't going to be any fun either.
* In reality, the level of Soviet reinforcements provided to the front line by RVGK was a certain amount of "panic buying" on the part of the Soviets in 1941. This was because they lost unprecedented amounts of men and material on the front line in early summer, far higher than had been envisaged by Stavka or even by OKW. So they dug deep into the Soviet manpower pool and produced, at an enormous cost to the Soviet peacetime economy, a huge number of replacements.
* I put forwards the view that if the Soviet front line units had retreated in good order and not lost vast numbers of men, then RVGK would not have had to dig so deep into Soviet manpower as they did, and in order to retain some semblance of balance in the economy would not have done so. No nation would risk doing so if it didn't have to -- Germany didn't until towards the end when they had to, Britain didn't, Australia didn't, and neither (really) did the USA or Japan.

So, in theory, either tactic should work. The Russians should be able to run, maintain their original troops but at the cost of receiving lower replacements into the manpower pools, or stand and fight, losing their up-front army but then expect a much larger troop commitment from RVGK at the cost of the economy.

The problem with building that into the game system is that the game system at the moment is hard coded to produce the reverse -- if you stay and defend your front line manpower centres (assuming you're successful, perhaps against a weak German opponent) then you will produce vast numbers of reinforcements and quickly overwhelm the German army. Conversely, if your army is demolished and your manpower centres get hosed then you won't be able to produce the replacements to get back into the war.

In reality the USSR had vast numbers of manpower reserves, not just numbers living in cities such as Kiev, but the agricultural population (of what was still essentially an agrarian peasant economy) and the huge population of districts such as the Caucasus region which could have been called on even if Kiev and Moscow both fell, but would they have done so if they didn't have to?



Now I'm not an economist nor a professional war strategist (and certainly not a communist economist, there wouldn't be much in the way of paying jobs for that these days) so I haven't looked at the numbers in detail, but surely within the game system there is room for some balance either way.

[loki100]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

Ketza, no running is necessary if SW Front starts off against an unreinforced AGS. Lock that in, and you can start doing things with the VPs to prevent runaways.

As things presently stand the entire opening turn is ridiculous and leads to grossly ahistorical play in every PBEM game. It just keeps getting worse and worse as folks optimize the opening and the inevitable response to that is for Soviets to run more and more.

1941 is flat out broken for PBEM. Has been for a very long time. No game ever develops historically thanks to this preposterous dynamic driven by the first turn; everything just snowballs from there. None of this is believable to me, not the running, nor the opening. But there it is. The whole thing needs to be redesigned from the ground up.

agree, in reality Kirponos managed an impressive fighting retreat back to Kiev that included a number of very bruising counterstrokes by all those powerful mech corps in the SW Front. The flaw was with Stalin's refusal to let SW Front abandon Kiev when it had been outflanked to the south.

I find looking at this new opening rather depressing. I know that any game has a tension between realism and players looking to win but this is taking pushing the rules to a limit. In many ways it would now be better to have a game start on say 25 June with the impact of the border battles already built in (and the German army groups committed), build onto that some sort of sliding scale of VP losses to force the Soviets to the real dilemna that faced Stavka that summer and the game comes back to a decent balance between realism and playing fun.

[KamilS]

Pelton

Again why do you people insist on fighting MT in the south.

I miscalculated and price I paid crippled my forces.

[Encircled]

Hells bells

Will they actually change enough in 2.0 to make it playable?

[KamilS]

T2 north & south (Soviet)


Withdrawal to temporary defensive position.

[KamilS]

T2 south (Soviet)


Destruction of southern mega-pocket is postponed by 1 turn. In the meantime I created pathetic defensive line on Dnepr.

[KamilS]

T3 north & centre (German)

Steady German advance.

I am getting concerned by spearhead heading towards Bryanks. My lines are paper thin and once Bryansk is captured I will face threat of massive encirclement.

[KamilS]

T3 south (German)


I will have to make decision here - risk more troops by defending Dnepr line or run away and jeopardise industry evacuation.

[Aurelian]

ORIGINAL: delatbabel

"Why do people insist on fighting" -- remember that the Saper variant of the Lvov opening sees the entire of SW front encircled before it activates. It's a bit hard to run or rail out units that have zero movement points.

"And this is why the Soviets run, run, run away nowadays." -- and yet several people want to put additional restrictions stopping the Soviets from running in the first summer. We've already seen what happens when they don't run.

Quoted for truth.

[smokindave34]

I'm impressed with both Michael T and Sapper's ability to get everything they can out of the logistics system and to come up with new and improved Turn 1 openings. With that said this is essentially an "I win" button for the axis......not sure how the Soviets make it past 41 after this. A lot of people are missing out on some great gameplay in '43-45 (for both sides).

[janh]

Wow, this looks really scary now. This type of opening is really most "victory efficient". Though this seems a bit unsound to have a rule holding the Rumanians and the 17th Army in the south fixed (for good historical reasoning), but then rail a Panzerkorps all the way there and start an aggression from Rumanian territory that its government denied. If so, then this would fit much better to an alternate campaign with no fixing and MP limits in place.

I don't think you can hold the Djenpr now, it can hardly be held nowadays with limited fort-building capabilities if the Axis arrives later and the Soviet is in better order. I guess I'd try to set up speed-bumps and get out what I can, and otherwise hold AGN and perhaps AGC back -- though after these losses, I don't spontaneously see what forces to commit really. Yet if, just if, you can force Michael to go into blizzard with a very unusually stretched flank and front line from somewhere S/W of LG, hopefully W of Moscow and whatever depth beyond Rostov/Stalingrad/Kharkov/Voroshilovgrad/Tula he may achieve, this may come haunting him? Perhaps.

ORIGINAL: delatbabel
If you compare what really happened in the summer of 1941 vs what actually happens in 1941 in most PBEM games, then you'll find that the real Soviet losses in 1941 were actually much higher than those suffered by most players. In turn, the actual Soviet replacements and reinforcements were actually much higher than the game provides. I don't believe that the VP system needs fixing to solve this, but it is a fundamental change that needs making. Hear my argument for a moment if you will:
...

Good arguments, and sound. The recruitment and production of course resulted from necessity as much as from possibility, but quite certainly Stalin hadn't kept recruiting if losses had been way lower in territory, men and material. Or probably would have even increased the paces (and the Allies their Lend and Lease) if it had been worse. It is the same with the Axis withdrawals, ToE changes and so on.
These causalities is completely missing in game, and this could be the lever to keep the balance in a GC under control such that it is playable at least into 44 with good chances for both sides for in most games, i.e. just not those that are ruined by poor tactics or only the worst of luck. It could limit the growth (rate) of the Soviets if they survived better by a cap (a function of date perhaps, enable it to grow beyond only slowly), as well as it could prevent German unit withdrawals in times of need, or ToE changes in times of surplusses etc. Hopefully they will implement that in WitE2, else it will run into the same "extreme games" that we sometimes see here. Else only two players playing quite historically can retain some "suspense of disbelief".

[KamilS]

T3 north (Soviet)


I hope diversions on flanks will slow Germans down and buy me enough time to create defensive line along swamps and rivers.