D-Day to the Ruhr

[sPzAbt653]

More units of Devers AG arrive each turn, but the supply level in this area is only 5 so nothing can be reasonably done except slow expansion until German resistance is met. With the storm over and supply in the Brittany area restored, more units can be shipped into that area.

[sPzAbt653]

Oh boy, if I bring in any more units I could trigger the Critical Supply Point. This won't affect the Supply Level, but it means I will only be able to supply one Army Group at a time [controlled by the player]. I don't want that to happen yet so I won't bring in any more units for a little while. I need to clear out this pocket and capture St. Nazaire, and the Br/Can units need to capture Normandy and Cherbourg. I think I have enough units for those tasks, plus in a couple days on Sep. 15th Brest will go from a 25% Supply Point to a 70% Supply Point, which will be much welcomed.

[sPzAbt653]

Elmer in the Pocket - not going quietly. These are all attacks he has made just this turn from units out of supply within the pocket. He's taking more losses than I so I guess it is helping me out.

[sPzAbt653]

Sep. 18, 1944 - the date when the WAllies dropped on Arnhem, which is at the Gold Dot. I'm a little behind! The pockets around St. Nazaire are gone and I'm leaving the three US AB Div's to clear out St. Nazaire itself while the rest of the US forces start heading east. The Br/Can units have started moving northeast toward Cherbourg and Caen. In the Blue Box, Devers AG is held up by lack of supply and lack of units, plus German resistance including the 11th Pz Div with some Pz Bde's.

[sPzAbt653]

Time to have a cigar ! Where there were levels of 12-15 there are now levels of 38-43. The Canadians are turning the corner at Avranches, while everybody else is filling their canteens and ammo pouches and the Br are moving NE while the USA is moving eastwards.
The next improvements to supply will be gained thru capturing minor ports, followed by a slight increase when Marseilles in southern France becomes fully operational in mid-October, followed by the final increase when Antwerp is operational.

[sPzAbt653]

One of the nice features new to TOAW IV is that ships now take damage and can be repaired. This cruiser has taken a few hits while battling coast battery's and is down to 82% effectiveness [noted in the Green Circle]. By parking it in a port it will repair, reaching 100% eventually.

[sPzAbt653]

Ok, I've hit the 'Breakout' events [in this case the 'Ernee Trigger']. I don't see anything that reduces supply other than ev84 which reduces the Radius from 8 to 2. That will have an effect the further you get from repaired rail lines, but that is intended. My Supply Level is still quite high, actually very high compared to historical levels. The Bradley HQ does withdraw, but three more arrive to take its place. One Supply Unit withdraws, but two more arrive to take its place.
So there is nothing in the scenario that causes supply to drop at this point. If you have bad supply I can only guess it is due to lack of repaired rail lines or bringing in too many units.

[sPzAbt653]

Here is what my supply looks like even at the farthest point from my Major Port. Of course, it drops quickly the further it gets from an intact rail line [see next post], but that is intended.

[sPzAbt653]

Like this. Maybe this is what you are referring to. Br Armoured elements have run off towards Caen, and they have terrible supply now. This is because the WAllies had planned for a controlled and phased advance from the beaches, and their supply system was set up for short advances. The historical breakout and pursuit was completely unplanned for and destroyed the supply tables, but Ike thought it was worth it and called the shot. So the same thing will happen in the scenario, if we make the same call.

[lubecknj]

I didn't even have 1 or 2, it was just the supply signal and some of them were not even half white half blue...my breakout trigger also happened way east of that though. The Brits had cleared Normandy and were pushing towards Le Havre and the American forces had already reached Paris and were kind of holding off on advancing farther, waiting for the Brits to finish clearing Normandy to maintain a somewhat cohesive front line.

I think I had just pushed so far so fast that I was well beyond any repaired rail lines and was just beyond the point of supply. Going to have to hold in place till I build up the rail lines.

[sPzAbt653]

The Br/Can troops have cut the Normandy peninsula, and the US troops in the center and south are moving eastwards. As we saw in some of the previous posts, the WAllies supply is no good away from the rail lines. There is one Rail Repair unit, and the WAllies get six possible repairs per turn. That's not enough to keep everything in good shape, so I need to concentrate on one area. I think the priority would seem to be Cherbourg, even though I get nothing for it I don't want to have to leave any units behind watching German garrisons, so eliminating resistance around Cherbourg will allow me to eventually continue the entire advance toward Germany. The alternative would be to bring in more units and concentrate supply and movement eastwards, but that would trigger the Critical Supply point which would allow me to only supply one Army Group at a time, and I don't want that to happen yet.
The Germans had formed a decent line in the middle of the map, but with open flanks and swarming enemy units it couldn't hold there. There are also scattered German units, usually at important roads junctions which is a pain. Each of these requires a surround to eliminate, because otherwise they just retreat all over and never disappear.

[sPzAbt653]

Every now and then you might notice a location with a date, because during development we tracked the historical advance rate by placing the date when locations were historically captured on the map. Most of them have been removed but a few still remain. I fell pretty good that I am only two weeks behind in this area. But I'm still way behind in the northern areas.

[sPzAbt653]

Reduced Supply ? Winter Weather, arghh ! Not what I need, but what can we do. Supply Level went down by 12 also, from 54 to 42. All of the units moving east are at 0 anyway, so no reason for concern.
I will mention that after about turn 100, the News Summary's stop popping up on their own, so you have to check them manually.

[sPzAbt653]

Overview. St. Nazaire continues to be mopped up by US Para's. The US 1st, 3rd and 9th Army's are slowly moving east, the lead units can only move 5 hexes per turn due to low supplies. This won't match Patton's rate of advance, but it doesn't concern me design-wise as the flip side is there is no way to simulate the WAllies sitting at the German border from Oct-Feb as they did historically. We'll see how that plays out later.
The British and Canadians continue to clear out Normandy. In the far south Devers Army Group is immobile due to lack of supplies and troops, but two more French divisions have arrived so things may start moving down there.
You can see a lot of German units [Red Dots] around the German border and Rhine River as they scramble to improve the defenses there.

Huge Map eh ? Thanks to the great map maker Rick [TPOO] for this map also. It actually originally extended all the way to east of Berlin, but sadly it had to be cut down when the Victory Conditions were altered. The Russians were also in the original OOB for the April 45 push on Berlin, but also had to remove them. It was too ambitious a design and it just didn't work well.

[lubecknj]

Seems like you've run into the supply issues I was experiencing.

Out of curiosity how did you choose where to establish potential landing spots?

[sPzAbt653]

The main source for potential landing spots was Ike's 'Crusade in Europe'. He outlines the potential main landing areas, with pros and cons of each. He doesn't specify beaches or pinpoint locations, just the general area. So from there we went to any source for beachbunkers, because if the Germans put a bunker complex somewhere, is was because they feared a landing at that location. Also used Google Earth, although that is least reliable as they are present day images, but a little help in a pinch. The first early inspiration for multiple alternate landing sites came from Avalon Hill's Fortress Europa boardgame.

Someone with boots on the ground in 1944-45 would be the best source, but those are not really available.

[sPzAbt653]

The last enemy holdouts behind my lines are a strong group based on the 243rd ID just north of Caen. They have a weak Supply Point at the Hillman Bunker Complex [under the 2-4 unit] that has withstood several weak attacks, but I am getting ready to make a strong effort. If you aren't familiar with Hillman, Google it, it is an interesting story.
In the good news, the WAllies now have an 80% Supply Point at the south map edge. Bad news is it is far from being connected to any rail lines of use.

[sPzAbt653]

Overview, and decisions. Well ok, the war is over, but the Germans won't quit. So I've got to take thr Ruhr Industrial Region in order to eliminate their ability to resist. First I need to start bringing in more units. By comparison, if I had stayed to the historical schedule for bringing divisions to the continent, I would have twenty more than I do now. But if I bring in more units, I will be hit with the restriction of only using one Army Group at a time. To remove that restriction, I need to get Antwerp operational. So the priority is Antwerp.
For now I have pulled up to the Seine and paused for a couple days to get better organized [the diagonal north-south line with the concentration of blue dots]. Once the Brits have cleared Caen, they will advance to the Somme River [Gold Blob]. Then I will start bringing in more units, which will temporarily immobilize the 21st and 6th AG's, but then the US 12th AG can advance slightly forward from the Seine and head south to link with Devers 6th AG and the 80% Supply Point there. Rail Repair is currently in the Caen area, and will proceed down to Paris and then south to the 80% Supply Point link.
At some point after that, Supply Priority will switch to 21st AG for a drive to Antwerp. Then to the Ruhr! We'll see what develops along the way, for there are still Germans fighting and we shouldn't discount them totally.

[lubecknj]

Seems like a good source. That said I wonder if the reason Ike didn't discuss any sites closer to Brest is because they never planned on it because they figured it was just too far away to begin the campaign. Your campaign seems to be falling short because you're having to hold back because of supply. You spent a lot of time dealing with the Brest peninsula at where it starts because that's where the landing zones are...but what if they landed closer to Brest?

I'm also not sure the supply distribution is accurate. You've got Mulberry supply points on Brest only giving 45 supply, but the point of Mulberry was to provide an ad-hoc deep water port on an open beach so that ships coming from the US could go directly there and not tranship through Britain. Somehow Calais is a better Mulberry point than Brest.

Like I said before I really really really enjoy this campaign but it seems you're running into the same supply issues as I am on my longest play through so far, and I think the supply scenario you guys crafted, while extremely interesting and well thought out, is just a tad too punishing for the Allies.

[sPzAbt653]

Closer to Brest was not an option because it was outside the reach of most of the WAllies fighters at that time. In hindsight it didn't matter much, but even going to the sites that are available at the northern base of the peninsula is questionable due to 5,000 ships sailing past the Channel Islands undetected. But as a What If scenario, it is included.

Quiberon Bay on the south coast of the peninsula was included because it was where Ike wanted to make a secondary landing, and if Cobra had failed this may have happened. But as a primary landing it was an unfeasible location.

If you are going for Brest, the optimum tactic is to go for it all out in the first few turns. Drop Para's there, send Armor there, bomb the heck out of it, send the navy there. I did none of that in this game.

Don't know what you are talking about concerning Mulberry's and Brest. There is no Mulberry location at Brest. The one I am using is at the St. Malo beach, and there is a location 16 hexes further west from there. While the historical Mulberry's would not have made such a journey [they were not designed to], if Brittany had been the target it is reasonable to assume there would have been different designs.

Appreciate you giving some critique and don't want to discourage you at all, kkep it coming for sure, but you haven't played the thing thru, we have maybe 40-50 times. This wasn't a one design and done situation, there were many changes along the way to get it to jive with TOAW's system. As the player sure we don't like it, but neither did Patton or Bradley or Montgomery. This was more a war of supply, the Germans were only in the way.