Winter War

[dhucul2011]

A couple of questions for this thread:

1. USSR is at war with Rumania. Germany has sent in peacekeepers. I have noticed that USSR units cannot attack hexes that contain only German units. Is that correct? Germany can park a unit on Ploesti and Bucharest and thwart the USSR?
2. Can German air defend against USSR air at all?

[paulderynck]

1 is a reported bug and likely means players should agree not to send Peacekeepers until it gets fixed. (Yay Warspite! [:)]) Except maybe you can attack a Peacekeeper if it's stacked with a minor country unit - I forget if that's been tested. Then you'd have a work-around for now.

2 - By the rules German air can only defend German Peacekeepers. They can't intercept ground strikes solely against the minor country units, they can't intercept strat bombing against the minors' oil and/or factories, or port strikes solely against minor country units.

[AxelNL]

ORIGINAL: dhucul

A couple of questions for this thread:

1. USSR is at war with Rumania. Germany has sent in peacekeepers. I have noticed that USSR units cannot attack hexes that contain only German units. Is that correct? Germany can park a unit on Ploesti and Bucharest and thwart the USSR?
2. Can German air defend against USSR air at all?

1. that is a bug which still needs to be fixed....

[Joseignacio]

ORIGINAL: Orm

ORIGINAL: Joseignacio

ORIGINAL: Orm

If USSR is aware that there can be German units sent to Finland and prepare for it then there is usually no real trouble with peace keepers in Finland. Or that has been my experience anyway. Not that we have see USSR claim the borderlands that often. But this is more because of the US entry penalty for the DOW than the difficulty to conquer Finland.

Tell it to my mate. I had two GE corps in my TRS and AMPH and 1 div in a cruiser. And he did. In the first turn of the game! I sent later 2 more corps and some planes and it was all the same, he went on.

Finland is very weak even with the poor USSR forces in 1939. And the air superiority of the RU is overwhelming.

So how did it go? How long did it take? And how was the losses distributed? The end result?

Ok, I staid at Lappland because I knew that if I lost it he could put 5 units there and combine them in any attack to the hexes north of Helsinki as the hexes from Borderlans fall one after another.

He had 2 rolls for each of his airplane + art for ground strikes but the hex is Woods and the climate was rain, so it was all 1s.

Don't remember whether he flipped one of my units but he was able to retreat me and take the hex.

From then on, he has been attackiing my stacks with like 7 - 8 units, plus air and naval support, which is pretty bad for me.

However, the GE peacekeepers plus the Finnish, plus one GE fighter have been able to hold till (IIRW it's) apr/may. However, we have had to gather around Helsinki and we probably cannot resist much more.

We are using 3D10, so the last attack he made, with a +9 was with real bad odds. After he had to flip 3/4 of his units I counterattacked with all finnish (like 4, I built one) except HQ to Lappland on a +9 too!!! and almost kicked him away. That would have changed all that war. No more attacks of 8 units against 2, but only 3 against them max.. Or X (from USSR) to 4 in Lappland. He would have been dead.

So, unless this repeats again, which is still posible, the Finnish future is doom. I only have one blurred photo of the last situation and, as you can see, Helsinki is already at risk (1 hex adjacent occupied). No Lappland shown but 5 URSS units there.

The big difference came with Zhukhov, which is a winterized unit, armor, high value, 5 reorg value (+3 in combat, white print (bonus in the 3D10 apart from Winter bonus).

Previously, it costed GE like 12 bp (all inf damaged or destroyed plus building one finnish IIRW) but USSR lost as many points in inf, plus 4 off points, plus inf HQ, plus several fighters and ALL BOMBERS (ranged 11, 17 if you remember) with many of their pilots.

It seems I will lose it but just the cost the URSS is paying and cannot afford is worth it.

I have to say that the USSR player, usually very measured, lost his temper when he saw his campaign, designed to "humiliate" me for going to Winter War instead of ceding land, was not going to be 1 or 2 turns but maybe one year, and with heavier losses, so he endangered more than usual his planes and land attacks with poor odds. And with those poor odds, I had good luck (for once!!!) that he rolled low a couple of times.Not a good idea to try to force through my fighters with unescorted bombers (because his fighters were previously aborted).

He is a good player but very fortunate, and he counts on fortune too much, to complement his poor odds in risky attacks. This time no.

[Joseignacio]

The previous situation:

[Orm]

Thank you for sharing. [:)]

USSR could lose some units by knocking out Finland but so many and expensive bombers hurt USSR to much. But you do seem to have a fun campaign. [:)]

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: paulderynck

1 is a reported bug and likely means players should agree not to send Peacekeepers until it gets fixed. (Yay Warspite! [:)]) Except maybe you can attack a Peacekeeper if it's stacked with a minor country unit - I forget if that's been tested. Then you'd have a work-around for now.

2 - By the rules German air can only defend German Peacekeepers. They can't intercept ground strikes solely against the minor country units, they can't intercept strat bombing against the minors' oil and/or factories, or port strikes solely against minor country units.

warspite1

At the risk of sounding like a right contrarian, I am afraid its not yay warspite1. I have just tested it - not an exhaustive test its true - but I tested a number of naval/air and land situations in Finland.

The naval situation seemed to be okay - a Russian bomber found Finn and German ships and aircraft at sea. Only the Finnish ship was attacked.

A German bomber could not ground strike a Soviet unit - the Finnish bomber could.

The Soviets could land attack a stack of Finn only and a stack of mixed, but could not attack a German only stack.

Now I might not like the rule, but it is pretty fundamental to play for reasons discussed in the posts above. This should really be fixed before netplay....

[Centuur]

It's a messy rule, multiple states of war. But it is needed, to prevent exploits.

And on Finland: sure it is difficult to capture due to the lakes and winter weather. However, the USSR needs the area as breathing space. But never start a winter war.

It's quite simple: make sure you got the USSR fleet at sea, with a TRS loaded with a unit and a ship loaded with a division for an invasion. Get the whole airforce in the area to make sure you can ground strike any unit you want to ground strike. Make sure you've got quite an army at the border with Finland and finally: claim the Borderlands early in either the May/June or the July/August 1940 turn in an impulse with fine weather.

If Germany declines, the USSR is in force in the area, and forces a defense in Helsinki due to the invasion threath. The USSR should be able to walk into Petsamo in the first turn if Finland doesn't put a unit in it. And finally: the fleet, together with the airforce cover the coast line which is the line of advance for Zhukov and Co. towards Helsinki. The puny Finnish airforce can't stand up against you attacks.

Sure, Germany can put a couple of units in Helsinki to aid the Finns, but that means taking naval or combined impulses by Germany and usually, those units are needed elsewhere at the time (France...) and can't be withdrawn easily from that area...

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: Centuur

It's a messy rule, multiple states of war. But it is needed, to prevent exploits.

And on Finland: sure it is difficult to capture due to the lakes and winter weather. However, the USSR needs the area as breathing space. But never start a winter war.

It's quite simple: make sure you got the USSR fleet at sea, with a TRS loaded with a unit and a ship loaded with a division for an invasion. Get the whole airforce in the area to make sure you can ground strike any unit you want to ground strike. Make sure you've got quite an army at the border with Finland and finally: claim the Borderlands early in either the May/June or the July/August 1940 turn in an impulse with fine weather.

If Germany declines, the USSR is in force in the area, and forces a defense in Helsinki due to the invasion threath. The USSR should be able to walk into Petsamo in the first turn if Finland doesn't put a unit in it. And finally: the fleet, together with the airforce cover the coast line which is the line of advance for Zhukov and Co. towards Helsinki. The puny Finnish airforce can't stand up against you attacks.

Sure, Germany can put a couple of units in Helsinki to aid the Finns, but that means taking naval or combined impulses by Germany and usually, those units are needed elsewhere at the time (France...) and can't be withdrawn easily from that area...

warspite1

I've read this quite a lot. Do people not play with the AMPH rule generally?

[Centuur]

You can invade with a division from a SCS. If you do this somewhere around the southern coast in a free hex (not in ZOC of a corps), you get an automatic victory. Next turn, the unit on the TRS lands on the division...

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: Centuur

You can invade with a division from a SCS. If you do this somewhere around the southern coast in a free hex (not in ZOC of a corps), you get an automatic victory. Next turn, the unit on the TRS lands on the division...

warspite1

Why is it automatic? Because of the surprise turn?

[Centuur]

ORIGINAL: warspite1

ORIGINAL: Centuur

You can invade with a division from a SCS. If you do this somewhere around the southern coast in a free hex (not in ZOC of a corps), you get an automatic victory. Next turn, the unit on the TRS lands on the division...

warspite1

Why is it automatic? Because of the surprise turn?

Yes. Only a city hex or a hex in ZOC of a corps give the notional unit a combat factor in the surprise impulse.

[Orm]

I play with the AMPH option if it is my call.

USSR can invade on a minor port during the surprise with a division. Next impulse they can reinforce the division. If they plan to reinforce with a HQ then the division do not even need to invade on a port.

USSR do not need to send the ships to sea in advance since they will do a combined anyway. Unless the purpose is to intimidate the opponent.

[Centuur]

ORIGINAL: Orm

I play with the AMPH option if it is my call.

USSR can invade on a minor port during the surprise with a division. Next impulse they can reinforce the division. If they plan to reinforce with a HQ then the division do not even need to invade on a port.

USSR do not need to send the ships to sea in advance since they will do a combined anyway. Unless the purpose is to intimidate the opponent.

The USSR can only move 1 ship into the sea area each combined impulse if they are not active... So you need to be at sea before you can do this, especially if you want to be able to use shore bombardment.

[warspite1]

But what are the chances that that division will survive the next impulse for the land unit to land? the Finns may have to give up Petsamo but I would have thought they could cover most landing areas?

[Centuur]

No, they can't. If they cover the coast, you simply walk in with Zhukov and his army from the east (and that is quite a good army in the summer of 1940) and start killing lonely Finnish units. The Finns lack the number of corps to defend all...

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: Centuur

No, they can't. If they cover the coast, you simply walk in with Zhukov and his army from the east (and that is quite a good army in the summer of 1940) and start killing lonely Finnish units. The Finns lack the number of corps to defend all...

warspite1

Yes, its all about timing isn't it? My Winter War was a tad too early on reflection.... [:(][:D]

[AlbertN]

I am not sure it's worth to deny Finnish Borderlands with the Finns. The Germans can struggle to bring in troops in Finland, which are needed elsewhere probably.
Waiting the good weather seems wise anyhow, as Soviets pratically rule the skies over Finland.

I'd play safe and keep Finland alive for Barbarossa instead.

[Orm]

ORIGINAL: Centuur

ORIGINAL: Orm

I play with the AMPH option if it is my call.

USSR can invade on a minor port during the surprise with a division. Next impulse they can reinforce the division. If they plan to reinforce with a HQ then the division do not even need to invade on a port.

USSR do not need to send the ships to sea in advance since they will do a combined anyway. Unless the purpose is to intimidate the opponent.

The USSR can only move 1 ship into the sea area each combined impulse if they are not active... So you need to be at sea before you can do this, especially if you want to be able to use shore bombardment.

True. But since USSR is neutral the ships can not stay at sea during the return to base step. So every ship more than one at sea cost you one impulse of the turn before you can make the demand. I rather do it during the first impulse so I get as long turn as possible if there is a war. So shore bombardment is available from impulse three if you DOW on first and invade. On second you reinforce.

[Orm]

ORIGINAL: Cohen

I am not sure it's worth to deny Finnish Borderlands with the Finns. The Germans can struggle to bring in troops in Finland, which are needed elsewhere probably.
Waiting the good weather seems wise anyhow, as Soviets pratically rule the skies over Finland.

I'd play safe and keep Finland alive for Barbarossa instead.

True. But there is also the US entry cost for the USSR DOW and that play a huge part in the decision.