Spending Soviet AP in 1942: CapandGown mirror match

[JoeLewis]

453k casualties mainly come from the large pocket last turn around Stalino.

[JoeLewis]

Wider view of the defenses. Two scratch armies formed under Moscow MD and Moscow Defensive Zone due to lack of available Army HQs. The transferred armies – one from NW, Leningrad, and Volkhov Fronts – are making their way down but only one could be railed into position. Cavalry Corps and Tank Corps stationed to the east w/ Guards Rifle Corps to the North for digging and for the main future line of defense.

Moscow factories all railed out.

[JoeLewis]

Asking for trouble by defending between Tambov and Lipetsk here.

Cavalry Armies will build tertiary lines on the Moksha and Vorona Rivers for fall back positions. Tank Corps will fall in behind them since they are useless when assigned to STAVKA. They are awaiting a tank army HQ.

Far too many tanks in this game. Two tank brigades per army AND 20 tank corps. Plus, each cavalry corps has 3 tank battalions per. That is both ahistorical and makes your army too heavy on your vehicle drain.

[JoeLewis]

I pulled back the Southwestern Front, but as it turns out next turn, I left the Southern Front too far exposed. I didn't think there was enough armor close enough to pose a serious danger ... but I was wrong!

The need to constantly pull back makes me wonder about the utility of building prepared defenses too far in the rear. It is tough to balance keeping units in the front and units digging in the rear, especially since newly rebuilt divisions with low morale and experience usually suck at construction.

[JoeLewis]

3 more infantry divisions surrounded in the Donets Basin. Can’t help it. However, I am a fan of the light screen 1-2 hexes in front of a river position. These position are very hard to encircle and eat up a lot of MP while covering your digging positions on the eastern side of the river.

You see that the Don – Volga fortifications to the east don’t always decay all the time.

[JoeLewis]

Start of Turn 56
-The Germans continued to focus on one major spearhead for at least one more turn.

AP Spending:
20 for 1 x Rifle Guards Corps
25 for 1 x Tank Army HQ
1 for airbase
2 for reassignment
4 for a Finnish fort
8 for new plane squadrons - mainly fighters and transports, since there is a shortage of IL-2 bombers. Apparently, CapandGown captured Voronezh's plane factories from Bitburger back in 1941.

[JoeLewis]

Casualties remain heavy due to elimination of pockets from the previous turn. Now the entire army is out of pockets! Any time you can spend 1-2 turns out of major encirclements is a win for the Soviets, esp. in 1942 where losing guards divisions and rifle corps can really hurt you as you try rebuilding your army.

[JoeLewis]

Lots of recon but the front lines remain solid and it doesn’t look like my opponent has noticed (or perhaps he did notice and expected it) that three full field armies have moved southeast of Moscow.

More rifle divisions are pulled from Finland and sent to Murom east of Moscow. I like to walk divisions that are under 45 morale for Soviet national morale and keep them on REFIT so they gain better morale and experience walking on the rail.

It is not until Turn 63 that CapandGown tries a major offensive in the northern area. Is it a mistake for the Germans to focus too much on one massive spearhead?

[JoeLewis]

Look at how many casualties it takes when a panzer division is in the lead of an attack. They lose 470 men, 9 guns, and 8 AFVs as well as time and space. I lose 470 men and 16 guns. The Soviets will always win this kind of war because your weaker divisions are draining the MPs and manpower of the Germans’ best units. In the meantime, you bide your time with rifle, cavalry, and tank corps in the rear. It is July 1942 – you are not ready for an open plain battle with the Germans, and any sort of concentration like that will just get more of your best units encircled. You can afford to retreat a long way still. I will be more aggressive once or if we reach the Volga River, by which point the German flanks will be very badly stretched. They do not have enough infantry to adequately man their entire lines this way nor push the spearhead forward.

BTW the Soviets did the same thing in 1942 in real life once Case Blue started. The strength of the German spearhead – with just 2 tank armies, mind you – reached all the way to Grozny and Stalingrad while the Soviets pulled back and bided their time. Granted, they did launch a major attack in the north with Operation Mars, but right now I am content to just wait out the "summer Germans."

[JoeLewis]

Stalingrad Front (green) evacuates the Tambov defenses. These men have abandoned a lot of defenses and towns without a fight, but so what? We control Rostov, Moscow, and Leningrad still so manpower is not a worry right now. In addition, we have avoided big pockets two turns in a row, kept the panzers in front of us, and have 5-6 lines of defenses north and east. South is more vulnerable so it is evacuated.

3 x tank corps and 3 tank brigades move north to join 1st Tank Army, which becomes available next turn. 3 new rifle divisions arrive and are on the banks of the Volga River.

I also formed a new army w/ my rifle guards corps in the north. The rear areas are manned by the three new field armies from Northwest, Leningrad, and Volkhov Fronts. In addition, Western and Kalinin Fronts both have extended east w/ armies. I would be worried about stretching so far out if I wasn’t confident in my defenses in the center.

Overall, I was very happy with this turn. 1942 feels so much more painful than 1941 because your army is getting stronger but just isn't there quite yet so you have to let the Germans control much of the initiative. The fact that CapandGown's army is at 4 million strong w/ 5,000+ tanks is another reason for much of my caution.

[CapAndGown]

Some responses from your esteemed opponent:

post #3
1) Moscow was not evac'ed because it didn't need to be. The Germans got no closer to Moscow than the Volga east of Rzhev. They then backed off into their winter quarters. This left plenty of time to evac those factories should the need arise.

post #5
2) Bitburger noted during his winter offensive that his experience seemed to show that tank battalions were causing more casualties than motorcycle regiments, so he started building tank battalions. I did not know about all the tank brigades. Planning too far ahead, IMO, though perhaps he was trying to absorb all the tanks rolling off the production lines. I would think that all these tank units would start to create a strain on the vehicle pool. At any rate, I too would not have built that many tank units.

3) Tank armies are nothing special as far as I can see. They offer a +1 roll to admin rolls for motorized units. That is cool for movement, supply and replacements, but does not impact combat power directly. Guards armies also offer a +1 roll for admin for non-guards units. (Of course, I doubt there are any guards armies at this point.) Plus they have a command capacity of 21. Nor were Tank armies available at the time you took over the game.

4) One reason to assign tank corps to Stavka at this point in the game is because they are still basically unusable. Their experience is low so they probably still need to train up, plus their TOE is so small that they offer almost no combat power. If used for exploitation (which seems unlikely at this stage) they have no defensive power. Might as well let them sit well behind the lines and train.

post #6
5) Stavka is a useful place to leave units assigned to while they are training up and before they get assigned to front line armies. In my Soviet game, when divisions on the front line get destroyed, I have divisions currently assigned to Stavka that have been trained up go join the army which lost some of its divisions during the current turn.

post #8
6) I agree with your decision to take those brigades off the front with the Finns are replace them with forts. Doesn't seem particularly gamey to me. This is precisely the kind of use the Soviets put fortified regions to.

post #11
7) "Is it too gamey to build defenses this far in the rear over the winter?" I hope not! [:D] (See my Soviet AAR)

post #29
8) "BTW the Soviets did the same thing in 1942 in real life once Case Blue started. The strength of the German spearhead – with just 2 tank armies, mind you – reached all the way to Grozny and Stalingrad while the Soviets pulled back and bided their time. Granted, they did launch a major attack in the north with Operation Mars,"

Some commentary on this:
The Russians did launch lots of offensives during the spring and summer. They launched several attempts to close off the Demyansk pocket and encircle the Rzhev salient all through the summer. It wasn't call the Rzhev meat grinder for nothing. They also tried to relieve Leningrad. And off course, there was the disastrous second battle of Kharkov which cost the Soviets 125k casualties right where the Germans were about to launch case blue. Even their retreats in the face of the panzers during the early stages of case blue seem to have been local decisions, not directives from Stavka. Certainly, by the time the Germans reached Kalach Stalin had had enough and issued the famous "Not one step back" order. Plus, after the Germans reached Stalingrad the Soviets launched numerous failed offensives from the north to try to break the siege.

Thus, I would not say the Soviets "bided their time." If anything they were--as always in 41-42--too offensively oriented, at least for the capability of their troops.

Also, Mars happened almost simultaneously with Uranus.

post #30
9) You, Bitburger and others mention Rostov a lot. Not sure why. It is the gateway to the caucuses, but as a population center it is matched by Tambov, Stalingrad, Voroshilovgrad, Voronezh, Tula, etc. Doesn't seem all that special to me. (Of course, I will grab a population center if I can![:)])

[JoeLewis]

Thank you for the commentary.

I think squeezing out every possible advantage from the tank corps is very useful and pushing the tank corps to Tank Armies assigned to STAVKA frees up your mobile Fronts.

I am going to have to start building rifle brigades throughout the fall and winter so that the army can transition to rifle corps in 1943. I just don't think the 3 division rifle corps is very efficient and wastes a lot of manpower. Of course, building another 100-150 rifle brigades is also wasteful in terms of AP, but you can keep those rifle brigades at minimum TOE and just use them for merging purposes. Yes, that may drag down your morale and experience a bit in your new rifle corps.

[JoeLewis]

Start of Turn 57 - an unfortunate encirclement but at least far from any major areas.

[JoeLewis]

Defenses are still strong in this area. 2 cavalry armies, a full guards corps army, and 3 newly arrived armies to provide in-depth reserve. Major counterattacks will be needed soon to soak off German movement points.

Unfortunately, the increased emphasis further north has left the Southern Front vulnerable.

[JoeLewis]

This attack engenders a lot of emotion: rage, frustration, but also some relief. Sending so many mechanized units this direction means that Moscow is likely safe from a major attack for a few more turns. In addition, these units will need a few turns to recover their MP and fuel because of the distance from the attack and their proximity to the pocket.

Yes, this is not a good development especially since I did not expect an attack here. Most of the Donets Line is now kaput and we will need to use a lot of rail to reinforce the Don and Stalingrad areas,

Oh, we need to evacuate the Stalingrad factories, too!

[JoeLewis]

This encirclement made me wonder if I made a mistake transferring all those cavalry corps north to Saransk and abandoning Bitburger's well-developed fortifications on the Don Line.

\Even though the cavalry armies have not been committed and are just marching north and south, they are still free as a strategic reserve. Massive reinforcements are shipped to Stalingrad which is the next priority for reinforcements. I transfer a few armies back south to Stalingrad. Marshal Ney would be proud of me for just marching back and forth without fully committing to either major offensive.

Also, more tank HQs are being built to strengthen the tank armies!

[JoeLewis]

The Transcaucasus and Caucasus Fronts have to really extend to cover down towards Stalingrad. A light screen is put out to provide more digging time and space.

I made a mistake by not forming Guards rifle corps here and moving them north as soon as I started this game.

[CapAndGown]

ORIGINAL: JoeLewis

I am going to have to start building rifle brigades throughout the fall and winter so that the army can transition to rifle corps in 1943. I just don't think the 3 division rifle corps is very efficient and wastes a lot of manpower. Of course, building another 100-150 rifle brigades is also wasteful in terms of AP, but you can keep those rifle brigades at minimum TOE and just use them for merging purposes. Yes, that may drag down your morale and experience a bit in your new rifle corps.

A couple of ideas:
1) You just lost a couple of tank brigades. These are prime candidates for disbanding before they suck up any man power or vehicles. Any brigades that were recently reformed and still have low experience also would be good candidates for disbanding.

2) Instead of building rifle brigades how about this: you just lost like 11 rifle divisions that will return very shortly. Keep their max TOE at 20% and let them train up. Then when they have decent experience use them to make rifle corps. Basically, these low TOE divisions could be used as a substitute for brigades. (This assumes you currently have adequate unit density.)

[JoeLewis]

I think the idea of unit density is very interesting. Usually my Soviet armies are maxed out with 9 infantry divisions each for the 18 CP max. However, Bitburger's armies tended to have 8 divisions and 2 tank brigades. You could use those 8 divisions to form 3 rifle corps if you added just one more rifle brigade for a CP of 14. However, those tank brigades will likely be used in tank pure armies by 1943. So let's say you are at 12 CP with Bitburger's approach. You still have 6 CP to play with and you are wasting a spot for a rifle corps and maybe an artillery/rocket division later on. Soviet Armies are very important because of how big the army gets later on and the tendency to go over Front limits or just attach HQs to STAVKA.

Instead, if you build 4 scratch rifle brigades and attach them to those 8 divisions you can form 4 rifle corps for 16 CP and keep the tank brigades in those armies ... for now. Eventually I do like to put some type of artillery division or even a spare rifle division to fill out my armies.

The recently destroyed divisions are more valuable forming the basis for rifle corps since these divisions come back for free as long as you are sitting at 0 AP at the end of your turn. I have started building a few rifle brigades every turn and we will see how the army looks by the middle of 1943 as a result.

[CapAndGown]

I guess I wasn't clear. Here is a more complete process for making rifle corps on the cheap(er).

When these destroyed divisions come back they will be at 20% max TOE and assigned to Stavka. Leave them at 20% max and assigned to Stavka. They then sit in the rear training. When their morale and experience have gotten close to national morale (getting experience up takes longer than getting morale up) then those shell divisions can be assigned to an army where you have a couple of full strength divisions you want to use for a corps. This way they are not taking up any CP from an army until you are ready to make a corps. The Army needs 4 CP for the two full strength divisions. When you assign the shell division to the army that temporarily goes up to 6. But then you make the corps and it goes right back down to 4. It should take the same amount of time to train up a new rifle brigade as it does one of these shell divisions.

Any way, I thought it might be better to use those AP to make motorized/mechanized brigades.

Also, when I refer to unit density, I am talking about the number of units on the map, not where they are assigned. For instance, in my Soviet game I don't want any fewer units right now; my rifle brigades (which are all assigned to Stavka) are either maintaining or building forts. To free up rifle brigades for making corps, what I am doing is creating a fort unit on hex where I have a rifle brigade and the fort level is 3.10. Next turn, the fort level will have risen to above 3.10 and now I can disband the fort and the brigade can leave the hex to go join a corps since forts above level 3.1 do not decay.