Soviets - build quality or quantity?

[gwgardner]

In one of my PBEM games, I've always built the best Soviet infantry possible. Should I instead have built '39 troops continuously, and allow the system to slowly upgrade them?

I'm in '42, and only getting one upgraded infantry built a turn.

[AlvaroSousa]

The Soviet strategy is one of balance.

Do you build some crappy corps early for speed bumps?
Do you save up for Armies? They come when at war or 1942.
What is the ratio?

Or maybe you save up and only build armor. Then you will have a lack of ground forces but better armor.

Generally I stall the Germans as the Soviets with the crappy corps. Then when they are about to be destroyed I sell them, get the money, and build armies. Basically reforming them. I would also hold off till after the Winter War to buy land units. I lean on building armor for the Soviets since they get plenty of Armies forming. Depends really on how strong a 1941 Barbarossa is. Of course I don't know where the balances are because there is a lot of strategy in how the Axis do and how much support the Allies give you. The Western Allies should be shoving everything they can in your ports for help with Lend Lease.

[Flaviusx]

Always build quality when it comes to rifle armies. You risk falling behind hopelessly in tech if you wait to upgrade them once they are on the map due to the need to replace losses. There's no short cuts here, imo.

You also have literally two dozen reserve armies that come in at 39 assault. It's going to take a while to upgrade those, never mind new builds.

Infantry *is* your quantity build already, so making any further economies here is not recommended. It may be necessary to crank down the tech for expensive armor and mech builds and tech those up later, and this is ok because you don't have so many of these units. But the Soviets can afford more or less to buy 1 rifle army a turn at full tech with points to spare. You really cannot have enough rifle armies.

So far as rifle corps go, I see no point in upgrading them. They are all either going to die or be disbanded. By the end of 41 you should have none of these left, except perhaps as port garrisons in Leningrad and the Caucuses. They have no business fighting in the front line. Even fully teched up they can hardly stand up to heavy combat. If you still have any of those past 41 in the line, disband band them and use the freed up production to buy rifle armies instead.

Contrary to Alvaro's advice about avoiding buying units until winter, I do not think the Soviets can afford this. You will not be able to stall a good German with just rifle corps alone.

Winter is for saving points towards buying mech and armor and air and goodies like that. But during the summer? Buy rifle armies and buy them in bulk on the very first turn of Barbarossa with as many points as you can save up before that happens. It takes 4 turns for those to arrive. And when they do, you will be very glad, because they you will need them. You won't have many speed bumps left after two months of panzers stomping all over them.

[AlbertN]

I believe Alvaro means the Winter War vs Finland.
That's when the Soviet troops 'upgrade' from 25 experience to 35, thus they come in the map stronger.

I at least wait for the 35 Experience upgrade before to build any Soviet unit unless it's air.

[Flaviusx]

Well, in that case, yeah. No land builds before you get the experience bump from Finland. I misread this.

[AlvaroSousa]

I also didn't mean buying corps. Those are the crap start units. In CEAW they are all the Garrison units in the front line. They aren't that much worse but shouldn't be reinforced

[AlbertN]

I actually reinforce the few damaged corps, once the army experience is higher. These are the designated garrison for the ports of the Black Sea though.
And for a while the Soviets have manpower to trash - at the start.

The ones already 20/20 are the speed bumps to be deployed upfront. I've still to determine if it may be wise to upgrade them or not tbh as they can hold grounds a bit better and thus 'speed bump' more efficiently. But I am not sure if the investment is worth the result. But the difference multiplier in fighting a 2-3 strong unit vs fighting a 1 strong unit is quite nifty.

[Michael T]

I have an entirely different Soviet strategy. One which will remain secret until I finally get to play the Russian Campaign as allied. Maybe this time around I will get there. I would be very interested to see if anyone could make a guess at it.

[Flaviusx]

Well, I can think of a couple of others worth trying.

1. Buy lots of cavalry.

2. Buy lots of mountain corps.

There are problems with both of these, but they might be interesting to check out. Cavalry is highly vulnerable to air due to a lack of AA, and it is 20 point unit and can't take a lot of hits. But, on the other hand, it is fast. And cheap. At 41 assault tech and 35% experience, they will hit 4 points, which is not terrible. You'd eventually want to replace most of this with other units, though.

Mountain corps are strong and excellent on the defense and fairly priced in terms of production. About equal to a rifle army, for a 30 point rather than 36 point unit. They are a little slow to build, but this isn't an issue if you plan around that.

But they take up 60 logistic points. A Red Army composed largely of such units is going to hit its cap fairly quickly. That said, they are a stopgap measure until you get rifle armies proper in 1941.

My recent opponent already tried out the all in on mech idea, and I don't think it works. Too many mech is going to be very difficult to repair on a Soviet budget. Indeed, I am strongly tempted to disband the mech the Sovs start off with due to its garbage experience levels.

[tyronec]

Always build quality when it comes to rifle armies. You risk falling behind hopelessly in tech if you wait to upgrade them once they are on the map due to the need to replace losses. There's no short cuts here, imo.

You also have literally two dozen reserve armies that come in at 39 assault. It's going to take a while to upgrade those, never mind new builds.

Infantry *is* your quantity build already, so making any further economies here is not recommended. It may be necessary to crank down the tech for expensive armor and mech builds and tech those up later, and this is ok because you don't have so many of these units. But the Soviets can afford more or less to buy 1 rifle army a turn at full tech with points to spare. You really cannot have enough rifle armies.

So far as rifle corps go, I see no point in upgrading them. They are all either going to die or be disbanded. By the end of 41 you should have none of these left, except perhaps as port garrisons in Leningrad and the Caucuses. They have no business fighting in the front line. Even fully teched up they can hardly stand up to heavy combat. If you still have any of those past 41 in the line, disband band them and use the freed up production to buy rifle armies instead.

Contrary to Alvaro's advice about avoiding buying units until winter, I do not think the Soviets can afford this. You will not be able to stall a good German with just rifle corps alone.

Winter is for saving points towards buying mech and armor and air and goodies like that. But during the summer? Buy rifle armies and buy them in bulk on the very first turn of Barbarossa with as many points as you can save up before that happens. It takes 4 turns for those to arrive. And when they do, you will be very glad, because they you will need them. You won't have many speed bumps left after two months of panzers stomping all over them.

Would be helpful to see this kind of information, and a lot of the other stuff like the experience bump, advice on protecting air unit, anti-partisan strategy... in a players guide. Not thinking so much for those of us who have been reading the forum for the past few weeks but more for new players.

How about it one of you guys who has played through the game a few times ?

[gwgardner]

Need a mod where coastal fortifications could be built in any clear hex.

[AlvaroSousa]

ORIGINAL: gwgardner

Need a mod where coastal fortifications could be built in any clear hex.

No mod for that. If you did this people would be filling the hexes. OR they wouldn't be buying them. It would be worth the cost or it wouldn't. It would be an absolute decision point.

[gwgardner]

ORIGINAL: Alvaro Sousa

ORIGINAL: gwgardner

Need a mod where coastal fortifications could be built in any clear hex.

No mod for that. If you did this people would be filling the hexes. OR they wouldn't be buying them. It would be worth the cost or it wouldn't. It would be an absolute decision point.

Strictly a player mod, not something I'd request from you. But probably open to abuse, for sure.

[gwgardner]

My opponent in a PBEM, me as AXIS, has followed a strategy of infantry builds and continuous fallbacks. Preserves the lower quality troops for cannon fodder at a later point. He has a two-deep line now, just out of reach of most of my rapidly advancing infantry. The overall effects: I do gain territory, but much of it is poorly supplied. My armor can blast holes, but the infantry is not quite close enough to fill in behind, so the armor has to hold back. I am two hexes away from Moscow, late August, at the very extremity of supply.

[Jim D Burns]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx
By the end of 41 you should have none of these left

I disagree, they are great for city garrisons or to guard against para drops. Using a rifle army guarding a city 3 - 6 hexes behind the front lines is too expensive. Save whatever corps survive and use them to guard your rear from para drops that try and turn a manageable two hex breakthrough into a deep breakthrough that grabs undefended cities and unhinges your entire front line.

Don't build more than you start with, but don't simply disband the ones that survive 41, you'll find lots of things to do with them that would be a waste for a full army.

Now if you're at or near your logistic cap, then sure, but in 41-42 keep em on map. You only get half their cost back if you disband them and breaking down an army to get two of them after disbanding the early ones seems too expensive early game when you need every large unit you can get on the front lines.

Jim

[AlvaroSousa]

I meant for front line units. Garrison the East Coast of the Black Sea is fine for them.

[AlvaroSousa]

But I will note if you want a cheap garrison you can split an army.

[Flaviusx]

I save some of them for port garrison duty and noted this. But that's maybe a half dozen or so. The rest I eventually disband. I really would rather put that production into something else.

You can always split a rifle army in two in the rear if you feel you need to guard against para drops. But frankly, the best way to deal with such drops is to let them happen and destroy the paras if they drop that far back in the rear. As a German this isn't how I would use paras in the Eastern Front anyways. I prefer to use them to crack lines not deep drops in the rear.

[Chocolino]

ORIGINAL: tyronec

Always build quality when it comes to rifle armies. You risk falling behind hopelessly in tech if you wait to upgrade them once they are on the map due to the need to replace losses. There's no short cuts here, imo.

You also have literally two dozen reserve armies that come in at 39 assault. It's going to take a while to upgrade those, never mind new builds.

Infantry *is* your quantity build already, so making any further economies here is not recommended. It may be necessary to crank down the tech for expensive armor and mech builds and tech those up later, and this is ok because you don't have so many of these units. But the Soviets can afford more or less to buy 1 rifle army a turn at full tech with points to spare. You really cannot have enough rifle armies.

So far as rifle corps go, I see no point in upgrading them. They are all either going to die or be disbanded. By the end of 41 you should have none of these left, except perhaps as port garrisons in Leningrad and the Caucuses. They have no business fighting in the front line. Even fully teched up they can hardly stand up to heavy combat. If you still have any of those past 41 in the line, disband band them and use the freed up production to buy rifle armies instead.

Contrary to Alvaro's advice about avoiding buying units until winter, I do not think the Soviets can afford this. You will not be able to stall a good German with just rifle corps alone.

Winter is for saving points towards buying mech and armor and air and goodies like that. But during the summer? Buy rifle armies and buy them in bulk on the very first turn of Barbarossa with as many points as you can save up before that happens. It takes 4 turns for those to arrive. And when they do, you will be very glad, because they you will need them. You won't have many speed bumps left after two months of panzers stomping all over them.

Would be helpful to see this kind of information, and a lot of the other stuff like the experience bump, advice on protecting air unit, anti-partisan strategy... in a players guide. Not thinking so much for those of us who have been reading the forum for the past few weeks but more for new players.

How about it one of you guys who has played through the game a few times ?

Would be helpful to see this kind of information, and a lot of the other stuff like the experience bump, advice on protecting air unit, anti-partisan strategy... in a players guide. Not thinking so much for those of us who have been reading the forum for the past few weeks but more for new players.

How about it one of you guys who has played through the game a few times ?

Agree.

I learned from bitter experience a few "rules" that will look obvious to more experienced players.

- Never park your air units in open hexes in enemy territory - always on top of another unit. Sooner or later a partisan will pop up nearby and overrun your air if it is in the open.

- Garrison almost every town in Russia (including the ones without name on the map) - it strongly reduces partisan activities. Perhaps this is just the effect of the garrison ZOC unless there is a hidden abstracted garrison mechanic at work.

- If you don't garrison everything - at the very least you need to garrison production cities because they can become deployment centers for fresh Russian troops once overrun by partisans. (I am still not convinced of the realism of this deployment rule).

The unit effectiveness changes are a mystery to me and I don't know how you can learn about them without painstaking self-experimentation.

[Flaviusx]

ORIGINAL: gwgardner

My opponent in a PBEM, me as AXIS, has followed a strategy of infantry builds and continuous fallbacks. Preserves the lower quality troops for cannon fodder at a later point. He has a two-deep line now, just out of reach of most of my rapidly advancing infantry. The overall effects: I do gain territory, but much of it is poorly supplied. My armor can blast holes, but the infantry is not quite close enough to fill in behind, so the armor has to hold back. I am two hexes away from Moscow, late August, at the very extremity of supply.

That's a good strat but my answer to that as the German is to throw the kitchen sink at Leningrad.

There's not much room to runaway here, and there's enough ports nearby to keep the logistics up to speed while the rail lines get caught up. But it will be hard fight due to terrain.

If the Soviet fades into the interior in the center and south by the time your rail lines get caught up to this most of the summer will be over. You aren't likely to get Moscow in 1941 let alone Stalingrad. But Leningrad is just doable if you make a point of it.