jubjub (Soviet) vs HYLA (Axis) '41 Grand Campaign

[GibsonPete]

Thank you for your tips on river defense. It has given me something to consider. You are right about drop tanks. A useful tool for the Axis and a nasty surprise for the Soviets. I am enjoying this AAR.

[jubjub]

ORIGINAL: GibsonPete

Thank you for your tips on river defense. It has given me something to consider. You are right about drop tanks. A useful tool for the Axis and a nasty surprise for the Soviets. I am enjoying this AAR.

Glad to hear it! Yeah it's a lesson I won't forget soon lol

[jubjub]

T2 Counterattacks

Pretty hilarious result against some Romanian infantry regiments, so I thought I'd share it. The attacking units in the first battle is isolated too.. Just goes to show that the Romanians need special treatment.


No other attacks besides some minor probing.

[freeboy]

re basing during gm turn phase who knew ???
thank uuu for the aar

[jubjub]

T2 OOB and Losses


This is our EOT OOB, which includes units in transfer. So we're a little low at the moment, and we need to desperately get that number up. Hopefully we can get over 3 mil by T5, but that might be a stretch against my current opponent...


Our forces in reserve will start ballooning to 500k+ over the next couple of turns as we receive half strength reinforcements to the reserve, so it's important that I work to keep this number down and get boots on the ground.


Also, to note, a lot of the Luftwaffe has gone to the reserves. Unfortunately, so have the axis allied air forces

[jubjub]

Housekeeping

* Panzer/motorized count: 11 AGN. 8 AGC. 8 AGS. This pretty much accounts for all of them, and these numbers should be pretty accurate. I am expecting to be surprised with units in the south, as there's just too many VP's to only send 8 south imo..

* Note that these designations denote more or less their position on the map, and not the actual command they're attached to.

* Command Points: All of the CP was used to make Western and SW Fronts assault HQ's T1/T2, and the remainder went to making depots. We'll start replacing our nincompoops next turn.

* Delete as many artillery regiments with the wrong TOE as we can. (See M60's AAR on how to do this)

* Everything is set to supply priority 3 except armies without full TOE's. Priority 4 really tanks MP when the trucks are still low.

* Locked HQ support levels, and transferred stragglers to STAVKA.

* Send low morale/xp (<40) artillery to the reserve. Start refitting high morale art in reserve.

* Not much to do in the air phase this turn. Upgraded a couple of air groups, but we're really waiting until turn 5 or 6, when the group size comes down.

* Move low supply units adjacent to airports and transport them supplies. Not as many that need it this turn.

* In addition to refitting high morale/low TOE infantry, I've started refitting 2-3 tank divisions on the map in high supply areas. Hopefully these convert to the 41b TOE.

* Organize HQ's. In general, I'm avoiding changing HQ as much as possible this turn in the assault HQ's. Everywhere else, we're trying to optimize our chain of command as much as possible with our high TOE armies.

[jubjub]

Turn 3 OOB and Losses


Turn three sees the Red Army rebound in strength on the map, although most of these newly deployed men are sitting in Moscow and need to make it to the front. There's also ~150,000 men trapped behind enemy lines. Losses this turn aren't so bad, but that will probably change next turn as the pockets are liquidated. As predicted, hundreds of thousands of comrades arrived in the reserves this week to get outfitted with rifles and vodka. Some of the 16 rifle divisions I'm refitting in the reserve won't get their full TOE in things like mortars or artillery. On map refits will probably be pretty starved for ground elements as well this turn, but it's more important to get soldiers out of the reserves and on the map ASAP.


Leningrad finally started spawning militia units, which can be used to plug the holes until better divisions arrive. If anyone knows if there is a schedule for militia troop arrival, I'd really like to see it.


There's a common theme so far from the German high command. They are intent on surrounding units and prioritize this objective over a more rapid advance in some areas. At this point, STAVKA is mostly trying to avoid large-scale encirclement and infiltration, and is willing to trade a few divisions for time.

[jubjub]

Turn 3 Air Phase


Lots of recon flown by the Luftwaffe. VVS flew a few small interdiction missions in addition to a bombing run on 9th Pz. No air superiority missions from the Germans this week, although a flight of SB-2's was caught and blown out of the sky regardless.


VVS flew a couple of recon missions in the south to find lonesome panzer divisions. No luck this turn.

[jubjub]

Turn 3 Leningrad

It's raining in the north this turn and the next, and Axis tanks advance 7 hexes in the main direction of Leningrad, but 2 rows of hexes are retaken. Pskov is isolated and doomed for immediate liquidation on the historical date for 3 bonus points. The double rail line is currently not in any danger, and we want to keep it that way for as long as possible.


Reinhardt's XXXXI Motorized Corps takes Tallinn for the full bonus after two hasty attacks by Tokenkopf and 1st Panzer. Unfortunately, the 2 divisions in the city were pushed out of the city and isolated.

[jubjub]

Turn 3 Western Front


The motorized elements of Army Group Center/North bypassed the land bridge to the north. STAVKA is encouraged by this development, and expects the holy city of Smolensk to hold out for many weeks. As you can see, there was almost no resistance in that direction, as high command believes the terrain defends that axis of approach well enough. The hope is that these panzers become bogged down fighting in the terrain north of Smolensk. Veliki Luki is the only decent railyard in that direction, and it's surrounded by poor terrain. This move has never worked out in previous campaigns, but we'll have to wait and see before passing judgement.


GENM Lelyushenko commanded a counter-attack against 19th Pz division in an attempt to relieve the trapped units in the land bridge. While the attack just narrowly failed, 57 enemy panzers were incapacitated as a consolation prize.


High command is currently in intense deliberations on whether to continue to defend the land bridge and risk encirclement or fall back to Smolensk.

[loki100]

ORIGINAL: jubjub

...
Leningrad finally started spawning militia units, which can be used to plug the holes until better divisions arrive. If anyone knows if there is a schedule for militia troop arrival, I'd really like to see it.

...

rather predictably, they seem to appear in the reinforcement schedule:

[jubjub]

Turn 3 Ukraine Front


Limited gains towards Kiev and the bulk of the Southwestern Front, but PG 1 went around to the south - following the Yuzhny Bug river. I'm fine with that direction of advance since there's no double rail line in that direction. The main line to Kiev, Dneprostock, etc. goes through Vinnista, and the FBD should be within 8 hexes of my front line already. This means that any ground the Southwestern front can hold next turn will delay the FBD progress by almost a full turn (assuming the FBD is going that way).


Every time the FBD is delayed, it makes D-town and the other victory point cities that much easier to defend, so there's a big incentive to stay and fight. However, staying too long may allow a big encirclement from the south, and the fresh infantry of 6th and 17th armies are already within a few hexes of the main line. There also needs to be a decision made about Odessa this turn.


Southwestern front came into contact with the 60th motorized and Wiking SS divisions, bringing the total motorized/panzer division count up to 9 for PG1.


The Romanian armor division is left on the front line and punished. A broken out Romanian regiment looses to two isolated divisions and routs with heavy losses.

[jubjub]

ORIGINAL: loki100

ORIGINAL: jubjub

...
Leningrad finally started spawning militia units, which can be used to plug the holes until better divisions arrive. If anyone knows if there is a schedule for militia troop arrival, I'd really like to see it.

...

rather predictably, they seem to appear in the reinforcement schedule:

Doh! Thought I'd looked there in the past. Oh well.

[jubjub]

T4 OOB and Losses

Soviets take a beating this turn with over 180,000 men captured. There's been no big encirclements, but HYLA is extremely adept at manipulating retreat paths, so he manages to pocket pretty much everything that's not in the main line, whereas these units are normally routed or retreated back to my lines, or at least surrounded in a way where I can counterattack. As a result, I have almost no routed units that need refitting, and my on map units is at least 20 less than I'm used to. I'm figuring out how he does it, and adjusting accordingly, so hopefully these losses won't happen again.


However, since there's been no strong push, the progress has been pretty slow, especially in the south. This turn was a good one for panzer losses at least, although I would like them to be higher. Southwestern front has been stymied in that regard so far.


Not much happened in the air war this turn. Just a couple of interdiction missions north of Smolensk.

[jubjub]

Ukraine Shenanigans

Pocket 1 happened because I decided to attack the Romanian tank division of the mind that the main line would be on that river (Yuzhny Bug). Ultimately, as I was arranging the front, I decided the front wasn't strong enough to stick around and needed to hang them out to dry. I also thought I would get a counter attacking opportunity out of it, since they were only a couple of hexes from the main defense. Instead, HYLA pushes them away from my lines, where it's too deep to make a deliberate attack without getting stuck.


Pocket 2 was intentional on my part. The plan was to get units trapped around Vinnista, counter-attack to open the pocket, and delay his FBD 2 turns. Instead, the units get pushed away from my front lines so far that the tank divisions have no chance of attacking.

[jubjub]

Counter Attacks in the Land Bridge

A couple of heartbreaking losses in the land bridge. The turn 3 loss resulted in a couple of stragglers being eaten to add insult to injury. The top battle was only lost by a single CV [:@]

[jubjub]

Western Front - Beginning of Turn

A panzer corps is 100% committed to the path north of Veliki Luki. Once you've crossed the red line, there's no turning back. In past games, this has resulted in panzers getting stuck up there for no gain. I have a couple of armies of Moscow militia headed this way to head it off. At this point, the main concern is the encirclement threat in yellow and hanging onto Smolensk.


In hindsight, I should've reconned this area to see if anything else was coming down this path...

[jubjub]

Northern Front

No change in lines. No more reinforcements to this area until I see an effort, and the boys on the trains go to Northwestern Front to block the advance to Kalinin and the double rail. At this point, the area is over-defended, and we can pull high strength reinforcements from it.

[jubjub]

Turn 5

Ground Losses

Losses this turn are high enough to keep the Red Army's growth stalled. What's worse is that we already have 1 million men wasting away in POW camps [:(]




Air Losses

A 1000 sortie interdiction campaign is ordered over the woods east of Veliki Luki, which did not achieve it's intended goal in any sense. However, LRAC discovered dozens of divisions heading straight for Rzhev that STAVKA was previously unaware of. They also discovered a few hundred flak 88's attached to the units that gladly filled the sky with flak. The sacrifice of half of LRAC's level bombers was probably worth this intel, even though it leaves the air command as a shadow of its former self.





Western Front

Western Front had to be redeployed to meet the new threat, and unfortunately that meant abandoning Smolensk, as too many divisions have been captured, leaving too few men to cover the approach to the city. The soft factor shown is CPP, and it's red almost across the board despite being an assault HQ since turn 2. This is because units keep getting captured and marching around Smolensk. Redeploying turn 3 to cover the Dnieper, then retreating turn 4, and now having to redeploy again to the north, Western Front hasn't been able to sit and build preparation like STAVKA intends.


STAVKA is happy with the defense towards Rzhev, but fears encirclement of the western flank. It should be costly in terms of MP to surround however. With 20 motorized divisions in the area, it probably would've been wiser to pull back a little further.





Ukraine


STAVKA is fed up with units being surrounded in the area for no gain, and orders the formation of a continuous front, partly shielded by the Dnieper, and partly by the other tributaries. Several small attacks are ordered to smash some uppity Romanians and Hungarians. Hopefully we get more opportunities to do this in the future. Romanians in particular melt under any sort of heavy fighting. At this point, I was half expecting to get a reserve activation to save these units. We try to get as many units involved in the party to get started on guard status.

This sector of the map has a much more fluid retreat path (go east), more space, and has very high CPP units compared to the Western Front.



---

[M60A3TTS]

ORIGINAL: jubjub

Counter Attacks in the Land Bridge

A couple of heartbreaking losses in the land bridge. The turn 3 loss resulted in a couple of stragglers being eaten to add insult to injury. The top battle was only lost by a single CV [:@]

Looks like the VVS was idle here. No ground support. Might have helped if you could have swung it.