Headquarters

[garydj]

Hi

I'm another newbie. I'm trying to work out what value there is in having multiple levels of headquarters. I'm playing the Soviets in 1941, but I think the same issue would come up for the Axis. The Soviets have corps headquarters, army headquarters, front headquarters and STAVKA in 1941. Most of the corps headquarters disappear over the course of 1941 and the army headquarters become the prime frontline headquarters. What use are front headquarters? Should I put my best generals in army commands and ignore front headquarters? Is it any different having my army headquarters report to STAVKA than having them report to a front headquarters? Grateful for all views.

Cheers

Gary

[Bozo_the_Clown]

No, you can't ignore fronts because there are leader rolls for all level of headquarters. Put generals with good admin values in Fronts. Put generals with good mech/infantry ratings in armies. Disband Corps headquarters. They disappear anyways but if you disband them early you get a nice increase in manpower.

[hfarrish]

Not sure I would spend the APs to disband Corps HQs...APs are a very precious resource to spend on something that auto disbands within 4-5 turns anyway. As far as Front HQs making sure armies are well organized and led is more important, but if you have the APs and leaders to properly organize the Fronts, go for it.

[morvael]

With the new patch there is a penalty when you attach units to a "too high" HQ.

If the direct HQ of a non-HQ unit is an Army HQ then +2 is added to roll range (so a Random(10)<leader's skill becomes Random(12)<leader's skill).
If the direct HQ of a non-HQ unit is an Army Group/Front/MD HQ then +4 is added.
If the direct HQ of a non-HQ unit is a High Command HQ then +6 is added.

Exceptions:
There is no penalty for being attached to Soviet Army HQ starting on or after July 1st 1941.
There is no penalty to morale and admin rolls for support/construction units.
There is no penalty for HQ units (including airbases and FBD/NKPS units).
There is no penalty for AI units.

So you need to keep those Soviet Corps HQ for the first two turns, in June 1941. Also, it wouldn't be wise to disband German Corps HQs late in the war.

[STEF78]

ORIGINAL: morvael

With the new patch there is a penalty when you attach units to a "too high" HQ.

If the direct HQ of a non-HQ unit is an Army HQ then +2 is added to roll range (so a Random(10)<leader's skill becomes Random(12)<leader's skill).

I didn't notice it

Which patch modified this point?

[morvael]

It's part of bug fix 22. The detailed description that I made about roll changes on the private forum did not make it into patch notes, as they were probably not enough "user friendly". I am free to talk about the details, though. Enabling and refining this rule was one of the biggest changes, though it does not affect those who do not try to abuse command chain rules (since first HQ is exempt from range penalty, units attached to STAVKA with Zhukov, were having a better chance to pass their rolls, than units attached to full, proper, chain of command with worse commanders as the first in line).

[STEF78]

I feel very concerned about that. In my game against Schascha (as GHC) I've disbanded some corps HQ, may be 5 to 8, to get better reserve activation)

How will this new rule impact my defence?

[morvael]

I'm sorry this caught you mid-game, but I firmly believe in the change, as it promotes historical approach instead of gamey tricking previous rules. Of curse it was fault of the rules, that they were being open to abuse. Try to pack those corps you have remaining to the max, so you will be able to use command limit they provide to minimize penalties. At this level the penalty is not critical, a skill 6 army leader will still have a 50% chance to pass the test under new rules (out of the original 60%). Also, smaller (brigade and below) units have bonus to initiative rolls so you may use that to counter the problem.

[STEF78]

Thanks

I followed Pelton's advices and it was fine till end 1943.

Unfortunately, I'm now short of AP.

I will look close at this point

[swkuh]

Anything that minimizes gamey and promotes historical is worth having. But, as I play the "history" and not the game as much as I can I wouldn't have noticed.

Thanks for the analysis anyway.

@ Gary, I find the corps HQs for Axis at least are a good place to lock in support units. (Suits my gaming style, but may not be the best.)

[garydj]

Many thanks for all the comments. Now I have to figure out how to use the air units.

Cheers

Gary

[Gabriel B.]

ORIGINAL: morvael

I'm sorry this caught you mid-game, but I firmly believe in the change, as it promotes historical approach instead of gamey tricking previous rules. Of curse it was fault of the rules, that they were being open to abuse. Try to pack those corps you have remaining to the max, so you will be able to use command limit they provide to minimize penalties. At this level the penalty is not critical, a skill 6 army leader will still have a 50% chance to pass the test under new rules (out of the original 60%). Also, smaller (brigade and below) units have bonus to initiative rolls so you may use that to counter the problem.

unfortunatly for the axis there is no benefit to promote leaders this way :

Manstein , Heinrici, Model would get stuck as corps comanders instead of leading armies .

Without the penalty , 11th, 4th , 9th army realy benefit having them in command .

[morvael]

That depends wheter you want a few crack corps or an overall efficiency increase for several corps. High level rolls require good leaders.

[Gabriel B.]

No , it does not .

There is no point in replacing Kluge with Heinrici, or Straus with Model, unless you can place divisions directly under army control without penalty.

The only reason I did place them in command of armies, was to have those divisions benefit from their mech / infantry ratings because the initiative/admin were similar. As result 4 corps slots ended up with less than optimal leaders.

[morvael]

But when the corps leader will fail his roll, the roll is made by the next leader in the chain of command, going up. So you still use their high ratings. That way a good leader higher in the chain helps to cover failures of all his subordinates. However, one can't use one very good high level leader to directly lead hundreds of units from hundreds of miles away.

[morvael]

Basic example:

three corps leaders, skill 2; army leader, skill 6
chance to make a roll by units in each corps: 0.2+0.8*0.3=0.44
average: 0.44

three corps leaders, skill 2, 2 and 6; army leader, skill 2
chance to make a roll by units of "2" corps: 0.2+0.8*0.1=0.28
chance to make a roll by units of "6" corps: 0.6+0.4*0.1=0.64
average: 0.40

in second case you have one good corps, but on average this configuration is worse than the first

[morvael]

The penalty for army-level attachment is still small (2), so in case of 2 or more skill point difference, you can still use your corps-less config.

[Gabriel B.]

ORIGINAL: morvael

The penalty for army-level attachment is still small (2), so in case of 2 or more skill point difference, you can still use your corps-less config.

I do not use a corps-less config , i just trim the number of corps to a minimum .

36 german corps is what i use, 3 per army, 3 divisions each .

the rest of the divisions are atached directly to army HQ's.

[morvael]

With very good (7-9) army leaders I still think you are not losing too much efficiency. Why not use larger corps for infantry divisions?

[Gabriel B.]

ORIGINAL: morvael

With very good (7-9) army leaders I still think you are not losing too much efficiency.

It is not a matter of losing efficiency but lack of benefit to sack Kluge or Straus, i did it because of the historical flavour, but the logical thing was to keep Model and Henrici as corps commanders .Now , with a penalty added at army level , I will definetly keep them.

I have found that with 36 corps ,I have enough leaders with 6 admin skill to fill out the infantry corps slots and keep the 7+ leaders for panzer corps or armies .

ORIGINAL: morvael
Why not use larger corps for infantry divisions?

3 works best for me.