Panzer Losses a bit too high?

[AdmiralHalsey]

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This is not even the end of turn 3 - The Division has been undefeated, and while it has been engaged in heavy combat it seems... Excessive that it should be reduced to a whole twenty running panzers. I'm not saying I wouldn't expect losses - Even considerable losses.

But this division has less running tanks than a Stug Battalion.

[Bamilus]

Really hard to assess without knowing what battles its been in. I can tell you using your panzer divisions against Soviet tank/anti-tank units, regardless of how much CV you have, will shred your tanks. Also, note that a majority of your tanks are damaged, not destroyed. You can see that in the "Damaged" column. Your TOE is 47% currently but if you include damaged units it's at 67, which is low for this stage of the game but overall not that low. You've definitely been using your panzers to fight too much, however.

In my anecdotal experience I havent found the rate of tank loss to be excessive, especially not in the early game. In reality most divisions were down to aingle digit numbers of working tanks by December 41z and I have much more than that in my game vs the AI on normal.

I would really recommend not attacking with your panzers unless absolutely necessary. Even if you attack non-armored unit, the combination of using lots of MP + fighting will eat up the reliability rating of the panzer elements.

[SigUp]

ORIGINAL: AdmiralHalsey

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This is not even the end of turn 3 - The Division has been undefeated, and while it has been engaged in heavy combat it seems... Excessive that it should be reduced to a whole twenty running panzers. I'm not saying I wouldn't expect losses - Even considerable losses.

But this division has less running tanks than a Stug Battalion.

I think you've been riding the division too hard burning it out in the process. 5 battles fought plus well over 90% fatigue is a lot. Just for reference purposes, the total number of battles that all the panzer divisions in 1st Panzer Group fought by the end of turn 3 in my current game is 3 and the highest fatigued division is at 42.

And I think the AFV losses are on point in WitE 2. Historically the German panzer divisions did burn out during the course of Barbarossa. For example, Guderian's panzer group prior to start of Typhoon reported 256 combat ready units across 5 panzer divisions and one panzer flame detachment (before arrival of replacements released for Typhoon). That's less than the strength of 2 panzer divisions at the start of Barbarossa.

[HardLuckYetAgain]

Also attacking specific type terrain with PZ's or specific type units cause extra tank losses. Have to really be careful where and what you attack now.

[MechFO]

Most of the damaged tanks will feed back into the general pool. Lost for the unit at the moment but not lost overall. You can see this in the Logistics report.

[GloriousRuse]

Looking at that screen on a phone, it looks as if you’ve been running the 11th panzer hard and putting it up wet. CPP is at 1, fatigue is at 97, five battles in three weeks, and no doubt spending every week in enemy territory and advancing through enemy territory while the nearest railhead is over 120 miles to the west. The game is still pretty forgiving on maintenance for overland moves, but not THAT forgiving.

I think you’ll find that you face the real German dilemma. The blitzkrieg can explode off the starting blocks, but after a few weeks fighting formations need to decide if it’s time to rest and recover those units for a new lunge, or keep pushing on as your strength fades. Any unit you feed into nearly a month of constant attacking battles while advancing hundreds of miles isn’t going to be in good shape. The good news for you is that while the weather holds and your logistics catch up, you have a decent chance of bringing the units back up to snuff. Not where they were, but way better than now.

As a note, it pays not to redline your units without cause. They enter a spiral where every action gets more costly, making it harder to recover them, making every action more costly...you get the idea. A moderately burnt out unit might just need a week of rest, or even a “half week”. A trashed unit may take three weeks or more to get back in trim. My guess is 11th panzer has been leading the charge hard and fast, and crossed the redline some time ago.

[Sardaukar]

Those fatigue numbers tell that this "heavy metal band" has toured harder than even most heavy metal music bands could...

Pity there is no option to issue Pervitin (German military methamphetamine)...[8D][:D]

[dudefan]

i remeber someone brought up the question if fatigue really matters.... did somebody do some testing? CPP seems to be really important, but fatigue is alway kinda high and hard to avoid... does it make so much of a difference?

[Bamilus]

ORIGINAL: dudefan

i remeber someone brought up the question if fatigue really matters.... did somebody do some testing? CPP seems to be really important, but fatigue is alway kinda high and hard to avoid... does it make so much of a difference?

I did. The problem is the different impacts of fatigue are spread out among different sections in the manual. Ill try to consolidate and post a summary here.

[dudefan]

That would be cool thx

[Mehring]

You've caned the division for three weeks and lost about 70 tanks, assuming none have been repatriated for major repairs. Excellent, maybe we'll have to fight the war like in history, with hundreds of hopelessly under strength formations.

[Bamilus]

ORIGINAL: dudefan

That would be cool thx

Posted in war room https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=5000967

[Hanny]

ORIGINAL: AdmiralHalsey

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/ ... nknown.png

This is not even the end of turn 3 - The Division has been undefeated, and while it has been engaged in heavy combat it seems... Excessive that it should be reduced to a whole twenty running panzers. I'm not saying I wouldn't expect losses - Even considerable losses.

But this division has less running tanks than a Stug Battalion.

You may find this of interest.
http://www.dupuyinstitute.org/blog/2016 ... n-and-now/

In game you have run the Div hot for 3 weeks, resulting in high out of commission AFV rates, you now have 60 AFV, but only 20 in service i dont have the game so assume the game has a roughly correct start strength, the Div actual TOE for June 22 lists:

11th.
44 Pzr II
24 37mm + 47 50mm Pzr III
20 Pzr IV

Total 135, however 10 weeks later in Sept it was reduced to 21 Pzr III and 4 Pzr IV, its historical weekly loss rate was therefore 11 AFV lost a week, in game your getting double that per week, prob due to them moving from ready to damaged, and from there back to the general pool rather than being written off in combat.

Ona related note, German planned for normal wastage,of 1% manpower lost a day with zero enemy contact, 3% if in contact, AFV out of service rates for a major effort were tabulated at 30%, if you in game did 5 of these, your in service rate is almost exactly the same as German planners predicted. 135 minus 5 loss rates of 30% is 20 in service.

[SwedenJens]

I try to avoid attacking with my armor units to minimize loses but they still have a lot of operational losses only to movement in enemy territory. Some tank types seems to break down more than others because of the reliabilty level. The P38 for example breaks down at a ridicilous rate (which I guess is historicly correct). Not even using full MP can cause 50% to go unready. But I don't know what to do with the information really, some units have them and I guess those units will lose them either through movement or battle.

Now on turn 14 (september) it's more common than not that my armor units end the round with 80-90 fatigue level because I just can't see how it's possible to keep the advance speed required to avoid a sudden loss if you don't?

[Denniss]

Panzer 38t was actually known for exceptional mechanical reliability. So if see lots of them break down from moving then something is wrong.

[SwedenJens]

Panzer 38t was actually known for exceptional mechanical reliability. So if see lots of them break down from moving then something is wrong.

I'm sorry, it was the P-35 not the P-38 that broke down for me.

[Searry]

I think Panzer losses are fine but soviet tank losses rather high.

I think preserving your Panzers for important fights is super important. They make the big moves so I try to not spend them in other than pure stomping battles. You gotta think if you need to use your panzer for this battle or not.

[Joel Billings]

Soviet losses were 20k AFVs in 1941 and almost 100k during the war. Are you seeing higher losses than this?

[Denniss]

mechanical reliability of the 35t was OK in summer but lots of problems in winter yet many survived

[Nix77]

ORIGINAL: Joel Billings

Soviet losses were 20k AFVs in 1941 and almost 100k during the war. Are you seeing higher losses than this?

The AI seems to get it's armor destroyed quite historically, I had 30k (-41) / 90k (-45) losses in an AI vs AI game.