Brief Encounter, Telemecus (Axis)

[Zorch]

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

Something flying was missed though

Advanced ground-air communication increased the effectiveness of ground support missions.

[Telemecus]

Turn 1 End, Admin Points Spend

29 admin points spent on turn 1 - 1 point carried over to turn 2.

(Edit: original screenshot had an error which has since been corrected)

Note: Reassignments costing zero points are not listed here.

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: Zorch

Does n't Lauren Bacall know when three is a crowd?

[56ajax]

Secondly recon was used where possible to raise all enemy airbases to detection level 5. This included ones like 22DBAD (near Zaporozhye) which is not visible in the opening turn of the scenario - but which you know is there from scenario data. It also included airfields which I knew I was not going to bomb. But all airfields on detection level 5 will be on detection level 4 next turn and can easily have their detection levels raised again.

Under the current version airfield detection decays from 5 to 3 next turn. (Other units can go from 5 to 0).

[56ajax]

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

Turn 1 End, Admin Points Spend

29 admin points spent on turn 1 - 1 point carried over to turn 2.

Are you able to explain your rationale for these reassignments? For example why reassign 2 Inf divs to a Army rather than an under strength corp under that army? Assuming I am reading it correctly.

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: 56ajax
Under the current version airfield detection decays from 5 to 3 next turn. (Other units can go from 5 to 0).

You are quite right. And it is not even a change since the version of this game - that is what it was on then.

When it comes to these air matters you are probably the only one who knows this! So I will have to credit yet another learning on the air war to you!

I suppose strictly speaking what I was doing every turn was topping up the detection levels of every airbase so that I knew it would never be invisible next turn, and getting it to five for those I would bomb or want to know about the airgroups on the airbase. And this doctrine would work in just the same way after the change.

Do you know when the change was made. Please do not say before 1.08 as that would mean almost the whole time I have been playing the game I have been playing the air war with the (slightly) wrong game mechanics in mind!

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: 56ajax
Are you able to explain your rationale for these?

Happy to! Should say though I noticed some errors between that list I originally posted of reassignments and what was the end result. This was because of the unusual held results at Brest Litovsk and Kovel mentioned in post 6 which meant I had to rejig the plan around in that area - but for some reason forgot to update the spreadsheet. So I have edited post 22 with a corrected version of the reassigns. It should not change the gist of the question though.

Model to I corps: Eventually I will want Model to be commanding I corps when it leads the attack over the Neva to capture Leningrad. However there are two reasons to bring it forward to turn 1. Firstly I am prioritising a fast capture of Leningrad so that AGN has enough time to turn south and help to Moscow. For this I want I corps to be going into the battle for the first time on the Luga on turn 4, which means they need to be at Pskow on turn 3 and north of the Dvina on turn 2. Rather like catching connecting trains or flights, if one is missed the whole thing falls back. So I want I corps to be starting every turn with 16MPs, or as close to that as possible. Having Models initiative and admin ratings for the next three logistics phases will help to achieve that. Also as I will be appointing von Kluge to OKH this turn, I need to appoint Model first to avoid the AI (possibly) choosing to replace von Kluge at 4th army with Model.

von Kluge to OKH: In spite of von Kluge having many great ratings, they are basically wasted in the heavily overloaded 4th army. I will try to do all of the combats of 4th army first before making this change to take advantage of the little benefit he gives nevertheless. But for 4 admin points von Kluge will be giving his full 9 morale rating with no range or command capacity penalties over 936 units under OKH, rather than his other ratings severely penalised by range and command capacity penalties over 4th army. For reasons explained in post 562 here tm.asp?m=4250683&mpage=19 I would no longer do this on turn 1. von Kluge's high political does means his corps commanders can be changed for far fewer admin points. So if I was to do this again I would not move von Kluge until I had first replaced the corps commanders below him that I wanted to see replaced.

7th Infantry reassigned to I corps: See penultimate paragraph in post 3. Also this reduced the command capacity overload on 4th army and AGC.

255 and 267 Infantry reassigned out of XXIVPz of 2nd Panzer Group: I phrase it this way as the big issue is not where they are reassigned to but what they are reassigned out of. The picture below shows XXIVPz corps HQ at the start of turn 1 (v1.11.03 but I assume unchanged or changed little since v1.11.00)



Schweppenburg has great ratings - but you might as well subtract four away from them given the command capacity overload. Similarly Guderian, in spite of his abilities, might as well not be there given the command capacity overload of 7. Similarly Army Group Centre is very overloaded and OKH is too far away. Bottom line is all of the units in this corps HQ will not be passing any ratings checks (except morale) at any command level unless something changes. The infantry divisions will eventually have to be moved out of a Panzer corps eventually anyway. Doing it now means all of the command overload on XXIVPz corps is gone, you will also be helping the rest of 2nd Panzer Group and even everyone in Army Group Centre as well. This is why I prefer to make any combats with these two infantry divisions and then reassign them before using any other units of the 2nd Panzer Group during the turn.

As it happened in this game I assigned 255 to XVII in 6th army as that was the HQ which optimised its logistics. My original plan was to assign 255 and 267 to 6th army as that HQ would be optimum for its supply, and to keep options open for the next turn as to which corps I would then assign it to (for free). Because I had to rejig the plan I left 267 in OKH which is not optimal, but at least leaves options open as to where to assign it next turn - for now it is guarding pockets/rail lines so not critical.

With AGC and all its armies overloaded, generally infantry has to be reassigned to armies in AGN and AGS, such as 6th army which has spare capacity, if you are eventually going to see those command penalties disappear.

Gross Deutschland Regiment reassigned to 3rd Panzer Group: As infantry cannot quite close the Bialystock pocket I find it is better to use one motorised regiment rather than a whole division to finish the job. Having done that by turn 3 I usually find Gross Deutschland ends up in the 3rd Panzer Group area, so makes sense to reassign it to them for logistical reasons. 3rd Panzer Group has command capacity, and this reassign reduces the overload on 2nd Panzer Group. Also typically I put 900 Lehr in to a corps of 3rd Panzer Group, and if with the same corps as Gross Deuschland and three other divisions the whole command capacity is used. If the regiments are in different HQs, typically their HQs will have one point of command capacity left spare.

290 Infantry reassigned out of LVI Pz Corps: Infantry cannot keep up with the Panzer HQs in summer so will need to be reassigned anyway. Already on turn 1 the other units are on the Dvina and the HQ is playing no part in the supply of 290. However with the reassignment of two panzer divisions to LVIPz it would be one division overloaded in command capacity. So again to help the other motorised units in the same corps, the reassignment of this infantry division out is brought forward.

7 Panzer Division and 20 Panzer Division reassigned to LVIPz Corps: Both of these divisions have ended up north of the Dvina with other units of the 4th Panzer Group just near Daugavpils. The other units of XXXIX Pz corps are north of Minsk. If the HQ was to try to straddle that whole front they could at most supply three of its units, and the HQ would have to be placed in between them where it could be displaced. It would also have to be placed further from rails. On the other hand LVIPz Corps HQ has command space (once the infantry division is reassigned) and its HQ would be placed perfectly to supply 7 Panzer and 20 Panzer division anyway. I am planning to send these two division north towards Leningrad, so XXXIX Pz HQ trying to straddle these units would only get worse over time. Reassigning them now also means the command overload on AGC is reduced, AGN has space. In other games you will see a corps of 3rd Panzer Group is sent north. In this game instead I have done almost the same thing just by reassigning two Panzer divisions.

ORIGINAL: 56ajax
For example why reassign 2 Inf divs to a Army rather than an under strength corp under that army?

Part of the explanation is that one was assigned to a corps - but did not update the previous spreadsheet screenshot I uploaded - oops! [:)]

But the question remains valid for the other infantry division and for what I had originally planned on. But I would say this is an intermediate step before I do assign them to a corps which I still intend to do so - and which I can in future turns for zero points. This is only temporary. For this turn keeping it in a higher HQ keeps my options open until I see next turn where the unit and corps HQs will be - rather than having to spend points reassign next turn if I get it wrong. It can make sense to keep a unit in an army command directly if the army HQ is also in supply range but closer to rails for logistical reasons. And so long as the army HQ is within 4 hexes of the unit (if I read Morvael correctly) then it will suffer no ratings penalties, and only a very slight reduction to the chance of ratings success by having one less level in its chain of ratings checks.

[Beria]

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

You can see there that well over half the kills were by only four Stuka air groups - one of which was only a stab. So potentially those Stukas could kills thousands more!!?? You could only do this if the Soviet air groups were less spread out, or you found even better spots for the Stukas bases in the centre of gravity of these Soviet airbases to economise further on the air miles flown per kill. But it does look like you not only had enough, but many more times than enough to destroy everything to the west of that tac & dive bomber range limit. In the current version you would have to bring more Stukas to replace the nerfed Rumanian bombers, and you only have two airbases down there which might not have enough fuel and ammo. I doubt if you could replicate those results in v1.11.03?

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: Beria
You can see there that well over half the kills were by only four Stuka air groups - one of which was only a stab. So potentially those Stukas could kills thousands more!!?? You could only do this if the Soviet air groups were less spread out, or you found even better spots for the Stukas bases in the centre of gravity of these Soviet airbases to economise further on the air miles flown per kill. But it does look like you not only had enough, but many more times than enough to destroy everything to the west of that tac & dive bomber range limit. In the current version you would have to bring more Stukas to replace the nerfed Rumanian bombers, and you only have two airbases down there which might not have enough fuel and ammo. I doubt if you could replicate those results in v1.11.03?

I can describe what would be my reaction to finding that Rumanian tac bombers had been nerfed, and by far more than German air groups had been. I would air transfer more Stuka groups down to Rumania to pick up the slack which Rumanian tac bombers have left. If there was not enough fuel and ammo on the Luftwaffe bases for them and the level bombers, then the level bombers would be air transferred north.

West of that tac and div bomber range line shown in purple in the map there were no more targets but spare bombers. East of it there are many remaining targets and no spare bombers. So if new targets were created by nerfing Rumanian bombers west of the line it would make sense for the spare capacity to take it. The level bombers on the other hand would have just as many other targets elsewhere further north and east of this line.

I have never started a game on v1.11.03 so guess others will have to make a judgement there. Whether tac & dive bombers would still collectively be potent enough to zap everything west of that line anymore would be a good question.

ORIGINAL: Zorch
Advanced ground-air communication increased the effectiveness of ground support missions.

Duck Whistle - or Dog Whistle?

[Zorch]

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

ORIGINAL: Beria
You can see there that well over half the kills were by only four Stuka air groups - one of which was only a stab. So potentially those Stukas could kills thousands more!!?? You could only do this if the Soviet air groups were less spread out, or you found even better spots for the Stukas bases in the centre of gravity of these Soviet airbases to economise further on the air miles flown per kill. But it does look like you not only had enough, but many more times than enough to destroy everything to the west of that tac & dive bomber range limit. In the current version you would have to bring more Stukas to replace the nerfed Rumanian bombers, and you only have two airbases down there which might not have enough fuel and ammo. I doubt if you could replicate those results in v1.11.03?

I can describe what would be my reaction to finding that Rumanian tac bombers had been nerfed, and by far more than German air groups had been. I would air transfer more Stuka groups down to Rumania to pick up the slack which Rumanian tac bombers have left. If there was not enough fuel and ammo on the Luftwaffe bases for them and the level bombers, then the level bombers would be air transferred north.

West of that tac and div bomber range line shown in purple in the map there were no more targets but spare bombers. East of it there are many remaining targets and no spare bombers. So if new targets were created by nerfing Rumanian bombers west of the line it would make sense for the spare capacity to take it. The level bombers on the other hand would have just as many other targets elsewhere further north and east of this line.

I have never started a game on v1.11.03 so guess others will have to make a judgement there. Whether tac & dive bombers would still collectively be potent enough to zap everything west of that line anymore would be a good question.

ORIGINAL: Zorch
Advanced ground-air communication increased the effectiveness of ground support missions.

Duck Whistle - or Dog Whistle?

[A21]

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

Also apparently the basis of our grammar lessons!

[Telemecus]

Turn 2 End, Ground Map

This time I am going to post the map with no description - I thought it would be interesting to see what you think first. How would you describe what is happening here?

[Crackaces]

Complete neutralization of a “one hex Pskov defense”

[EwaldvonKleist]

Thoughts: Breakthroughs through some standard defence points (land bridge, Pskov+the lake chain, Dnepr in the South). Pocket in the South has been broken as expected. Many motorised forces are in a logistical death zone, as you played with 1.11.00, the problem can be solved by HQ BU spam. The push southeast of Minsk and the tip of the Kiev spearhead look like they can be cut off.

Infantry advance in the North it was all good openings achieve but 9th and 4th army advance are better then for other openings (e.g. tyrone's, HLYAs, mine) as you have prepared the path for the infantry at the cost of some unit kills (edit: I think the sacrify isn't that big after all).

Looking at the opening in the Centre-North again, I wonder how many units you lose or do not lose to rout-outs? You occupy quite a number of routing spots I like to keep open and attack extra stacks I leave untouched, like Kaunas. Your screenshots shows few units routed out but I am not sure what FOW clouds here or not...

[56ajax]

Thanks for your explanation of your re-assignments.

I put Kluge in OKH and it assigned Jodl to 4th?? army.

I certainly see the merit of re assignments, but for a bigger bang for your buck I locate all those commanders with a dismissal cost of 1 (and then 2 etc ) and where required upgrade to a better leader. Get a lot done that way.

Can I ask a question about attrition? (It was in one of the AARs you have referenced). You placed units against pocketed Soviets to hasten surrender via attrition. Attrition is a 2 way street - from memory it is caused by being adjacent to an enemy unit. Doesn't matter how many or how big, so imo the aim is to get a minimum number of your units against the maximum number of enemy units. Thoughts?

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: 56ajax
I put Kluge in OKH and it assigned Jodl to 4th?? army.

I think Jodl gets a really bad rap. Not the historical one but the game one. He has a really good morale rating. In older versions he had really bad everything else except political. So perhaps that is why some still shriek when he gets auto appointed to anything. His other ratings have been raised a bit in latest versions so he would not be such an appalling army commander anymore.

But it strikes me Jodl is perfect as an army group commander with his high morale rating - indeed for AGS where being so overloaded the other ratings do not matter anyway. Indeed I like to get Jodl into an army group HQ precisely to stop him getting an army command where his other ratings are important! Unfortunately his high political will mean he is first on the short list for any vacancy the AI has to fill.

Jodl does not have the rank to be an army group commander at first, I am not even sure he has the rank even to be promoted to army group command. But for some reason he always gets autopromoted to it anyway (scripted?). So perhaps another rule to have in mind is do not promote von Kluge to OKH until you first get Jodl into leader of AGS. Which means you need to first move von Runstedt somewhere else to get Jodl the auto promotion?

I can see Von Kluge's promotion to OKH being endlessly delayed now though ...

[Telemecus]

ORIGINAL: 56ajax
Can I ask a question about attrition? (It was in one of the AARs you have referenced). You placed units against pocketed Soviets to hasten surrender via attrition. Attrition is a 2 way street - from memory it is caused by being adjacent to an enemy unit. Doesn't matter how many or how big, so imo the aim is to get a minimum number of your units against the maximum number of enemy units. Thoughts?

May be worth pointing out which post of which AAR as situations can change when it is useful.

Generally I think attrition is something Germans/Finns want to avoid and Soviets want to see happen. Slovaks and Italians on the other hand I am quite happy to use for attritional purposes - and the Soviets should want to avoid tangling with over that. And for obvious reason you would want to avoid attrition of expensive equipment (tank divisions etc)

But yes if you have a pocket you want to reduce quickly, using Germans tactically to create attrition can help. There is a problem with trying to minimise the number of units you leave to attrition in that it occurs after your opponents phase. So they have a chance to mess up up any set up you are trying and go back to attriting the maximum number of units they can get to. So my guess is you can try to maximise the number of units your opponents has affected by attrition, but you are limited to how much you can minimise your own front line units from being affected by it.

[xhoel]

I am enjoying the AAR. The idea of "Infantry Balls" is interesting and makes sense, although the terminology should probably be changed

As to Jodl, I can say that I hate him as an Army commander. He is suited to command AGS but as an Army commander he is just terrible and will not help you at all, because of how low his ratings are (Inf 3 and Mech 3). I have him as commander of the 17th Army (thanks to the glorious AI replacement system) and will look to sacking him ASAP.

I tend to appoint leaders with good Admin and high combat ratings as Army commanders. This doesn't mean that I will appoint Model there, but certain commanders with good ratings (eg 6-7) will do the job just fine. Cutting on the overload of the Armies as well as having good commanders will do wonders for the CV of your frontline units

[Telemecus]

Turn 2 End, North Infantry

ORIGINAL: EwaldvonKleist
Infantry advance in the North it was all good openings

I disagree on this one. Although infantry has got just as far, the volume of infantry is very different.

I have drawn in on the comparative picture of turn 1s a dark blue line for the infantry closest to Leningrad and a lighter blue line for the infantry following 1 hex behind them. The light blue line has about the same number of infantry. (I have assumed any units I cannot see in stacks in the comparison are all infantry). But the first line has 8 infantry divisions compared to 1 in the comparison. The rule of thumb I have is that if you add the number on the first line to half the number on the second line you will get the number of infantry divisions north of the Dvina on turn 2? If you follow this on to turn 2 of Brief Encounter, there are eleven infantry divisions north of the Dvina and also four on its south bank. My guess is the comparison would only have four or five infantry divisions North of the Dvina on turn 2. As the infantry ball moves northwards, by natural variation you will have more falling off. So starting with eleven north of the Dvina on turn 2 will mean a good number are at Pskow on turn 3 and so on. Starting with only four infantry north of Dvina on turn 2 will mean only a trickle at Pskow on turn 3.

ORIGINAL: EwaldvonKleist
Looking at the opening in the Centre-North again, ... You occupy quite a number of routing spots I like to keep open and attack extra stacks I leave untouched, like Kaunas.

Originally I used to clear out Kaunas as I wanted to repair the rail there on turn 2 - but that reason does not apply in this game. But I painted on the route of II corps and many of the motorised units. II corps contains many 90 or more morale units which I intend to reassign to L corps and join with I corps for the crossing of the Neva to capture Leningrad. If it was to go North of Kaunas it would have to cross a major river as well as either a minor river or swamp. Going south of Kaunas means crossing two minor rivers. The difference is it gets one hex further forward - and so leads on to the logic above about whether it will be in the vanguard of the infantry ball or not. But to have this fast path for II corps you need to clear out Kaunas and Kaisiadoris to its east. Similarly I have painted on the beginning of the route motorised units starting south of Kaunas need to take to get north of the Dvina near Daugvapils. This means displacing any routed units at Ukmerge too.

To misquote a misquotation by Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan (amended)
A hex here, a hex there, and pretty soon you are talking real distance

ORIGINAL: EwaldvonKleist
you have prepared the path for the infantry at the cost of some unit kills (edit: I think the sacrify isn't that big after all).

Looking at the opening in the Centre-North again, I wonder how many units you lose or do not lose to rout-outs? You occupy quite a number of routing spots I like to keep open and attack extra stacks I leave untouched, like Kaunas.

In as much as taking routing spots usually meant I waited until an airbase routed to one, so that I could bomb it and displace it again, this was not necessarily a bad thing. That corridor between east of Kaunas and the Dvina together with the Dvina itself became a paradise for overruning airbases multiple times. But overall I am not sure the numbers lost to rout outs were that different between Brief Encounter and the comparison. Bear in mind there is a pocket west of Memel and other places used for stacking routed units in such as Jelgava south of Riga that are not replicated in the comparison. One routing spot in Courland I would normally have left, but only flipped it as in this case simply no units routed to it. I can remember being disappointed at one rout not being herded into Courland as I expected. I think the major difference in rout outs comes more from the units further away from the border. For example the airborne brigades near Daugavapils. At this point I would say using several Panzer divsions to pin down a few brigades has a high cost to benefit ratio compared to what else the Panzers could be doing. But ultimately this is the key choice I find interesting - how much do you sacrifice immediate gains for potential future gains.

ORIGINAL: xhoel
The idea of "Infantry Balls" is interesting and makes sense, although the terminology should probably be changed

For me on the other hand that is just one more good reason to use the term! [:D]

[Note: Comparison is being made with Total War example turn 1 found here tm.asp?m=4601253]

[Bear1888]

amazing. at turn 2:

-pskov defense neutralized. The undoubtedly high quality units sough of pskov will have a hard time to get to Leningrad area in time.

-landbridge defense blasted away. Great to force the red army to abandon the dnjepr line in center.

-and dnjepr crossed in the south in turn 2! Never say anything like that.