Oil

[tyronec]

According to TIK (and I highly recommend his videos on youtube; Courland pocket, Battlestorm Stalingrad and many many more) Germany had stockpiled oil before the war and ran out during the Autumn of '41.

As a result when it came to Fall Blau the offensive was stop/start, they were never able to maintain sufficient continuity of advance to do enough damage. Blitzkrieg was effectively over. Then as the war progressed the German war machine became less efficient and was unable to make best use of their equipment. Tanks running out of fuel and being abandoned, pilots not fully trained and so on.

His view is that Axis had two possibilities to win the war in the East.
One that the Soviet political system would collapse. That is modeled in the game through the VP system and a sudden death victory. We could debate the actual VPs but the system is there.
Two, that Axis would take the Cacausus, restore the oil wells and thus reinvigorate their war machine while crippling the Soviet one.

It seems to me that oil supply is not really modeled in the game, in the normal course of events Axis may be short of supplies at the front but the actual oil resource is not scarce. For me this is the biggest missing in the game, if it is really one of the most critical factors as to why Axis lost.

Yet it looks like a lot of the work has been done to monitor oil usage. Is this something where oil usage has just not been balanced right OR would it require significant work to have it implemented and working.
Or maybe my analysis is not agreed with.

[cameron88]

Yeah I'm currently playing multiple 1942 Stalingrad scenarios with 3 people, and I'm attacking with every motorized/armored unit i have at the start across the entire front, aswell as infantry. I'm also bombing with my entire airforce as Germany (much of it moved from other theatres), and my oil and fuel supply is actually going up every turn, so it's pretty badly modeled in my opinion aswell. However unlike war in the east 1, war in the east 2 has unrealistic armored combat, where Germany takes under 2:1 tank losses in many battles, which didn't happen, basically ever in the war against the Soviets. So they need to clean up that if they are going to realistically simulate Germanies fuel and oil deficit, otherwise there's little point of playing Germany, because not only do your armored formations feel paper thin and weak, but they would actually be useless, because they wouldn't even move more then 10 hexes due to lack of fuel.

[Jango32]

The Germans didn't run out of stockpiled oil or fuel by the autumn of 1941. The situation was more complicated than that due to several reasons, among them the shifting priorities for the army trains (for example there were periods where most trains came filled with ammunition and not any fuel supplies), conflicts between the various parties interested in expanding their power base over the war economy that led to very pessimistic reports and also (for 1942) a significant reduction of operational trucks to send available fuel to units (from the 600 000 initially sent east to support Barbarossa, to approximately 400 000, maybe more because I think there were a few thousand more sent throughout 1941, because of 100 000 lost and 100 000 being repaired in early 1942). There is no question that available fuel stocks were significantly smaller and had to be rebuilt, which meant that only Army Group South's general offensive could be sustained, but it's not as dramatic as the existing stocks running out completely in autumn 1941.

I've zipped some relevant pages from Germany and the Second World War volumes V/I and VI into this WeTransfer link https://we.tl/t-qHezbKTRYp.

I'd say that the only possibility to win the war in the east for Germany is represented by 1941, and how much damage is inflicted on both the Red Army and the Soviet Union's capacity to rebuild its losses. To that end I think Axis players in WitE 2 need to have a very successful campaign in 1941 to either win outright in that year or cause so much damage that in 1942 it's a mopping operation of remaining VPs.

[AlbertN]

Germany did now swim in oil - that is for sure.

But they were not having issues til mid '44 when Ploesti was getting bombed and fell to Soviet hands, and when the W.Allies also made a deliberate campaign against the Synth. Fuel plants.

That is why the German army has tons of infantry divisions and horse towed stuff.

Now with that I think -oil- should matter in a relative measure that implies your Panzer Division that needs to relocate from Leningrad Front to Kharkov does so via train, and not by racing through roads due to admin movement. That's another tale.

But I thought the Fuel Supply for Axis drops gradually downward - I never bothered to check in '41, but it seemed to me that the stockpiles go down, and down, and down.

Ps. For what concerns Tik in general I like the guy - but he forwards his opinion based on tomes he read, and while I do agree oil is important and Fall Blau oil objectives made more sense than 'go for Moscow'...

Last but not least - GAMEPLAY comes always in mind to me. That always need to be accounted in the balance factors.

[tyronec]

The Germans didn't run out of stockpiled oil or fuel by the autumn of 1941. The situation was more complicated than that due to several reasons, among them the shifting priorities for the army trains (for example there were periods where most trains came filled with ammunition and not any fuel supplies), conflicts between the various parties interested in expanding their power base over the war economy that led to very pessimistic reports and also (for 1942) a significant reduction of operational trucks to send available fuel to units (from the 600 000 initially sent east to support Barbarossa, to approximately 400 000, maybe more because I think there were a few thousand more sent throughout 1941, because of 100 000 lost and 100 000 being repaired in early 1942). There is no question that available fuel stocks were significantly smaller and had to be rebuilt, which meant that only Army Group South's general offensive could be sustained, but it's not as dramatic as the existing stocks running out completely in autumn 1941.

I've zipped some relevant pages from Germany and the Second World War volumes V/I and VI into this WeTransfer link https://we.tl/t-qHezbKTRYp.

I wasn't able to view these documents.

Are you saying that although the '42 offensive had two Panzer armies instead of the 4 used in '41 that the Germans were able to to keep them sufficiently supplied with fuel ?
Even if that were true then there is the question as to why Axis only attacked with AGS in '42, was oil an issue. In the game I expect most players will be using all of their motorised forces and a good bit of the Luftwaffe.

[Jango32]

I've made two links now, hopefully one will function.

https://mega.nz/file/S5Mi3T6S#6MP6-TzHE ... FBxpleSmIQ

https://we.tl/t-x9qF3RVn8X

My understanding of the situation is that the main culprit was lack of transport capacity owing to the number of vehicles lost and vehicles still being repaired. Mineral oil stocks in January 1942 were still above 1 million tonnes, and these would increase by the time summer came.

[loki100]

ORIGINAL: tyronec

The Germans didn't run out of stockpiled oil or fuel by the autumn of 1941. The situation was more complicated than that due to several reasons, among them the shifting priorities for the army trains (for example there were periods where most trains came filled with ammunition and not any fuel supplies), conflicts between the various parties interested in expanding their power base over the war economy that led to very pessimistic reports and also (for 1942) a significant reduction of operational trucks to send available fuel to units (from the 600 000 initially sent east to support Barbarossa, to approximately 400 000, maybe more because I think there were a few thousand more sent throughout 1941, because of 100 000 lost and 100 000 being repaired in early 1942). There is no question that available fuel stocks were significantly smaller and had to be rebuilt, which meant that only Army Group South's general offensive could be sustained, but it's not as dramatic as the existing stocks running out completely in autumn 1941.

I've zipped some relevant pages from Germany and the Second World War volumes V/I and VI into this WeTransfer link https://we.tl/t-qHezbKTRYp.

I wasn't able to view these documents.

Are you saying that although the '42 offensive had two Panzer armies instead of the 4 used in '41 that the Germans were able to to keep them sufficiently supplied with fuel ?
Even if that were true then there is the question as to why Axis only attacked with AGS in '42, was oil an issue. In the game I expect most players will be using all of their motorised forces and a good bit of the Luftwaffe.

they kept one Pzr army in the Smolensk/Rzhev sector as they needed to fend off Western Front, something few Soviet players emulate. Its pointless in that you will pay a high price not to take something that will fall easily come 1943 but historically it cost the Soviets around 1m men but pinned most of OKH's resserves.

The issue in the south wasn't so much oil availability but delivery. There are reports of abandoning vehicles in the Caucasus to put the fuel into a few remaining ones.

As argued elsewhere, if you know what you're doing the logistics system is prob too generous - so while we have a problem with Soviet power in 1941 its worth bearing in mind the game could easily tip the other way?

[AlbertN]

I cannot fathom how a system that struggles to bring Panzers to a Panzer Division in Refit in Poland can be labelled 'generous'.

Then again - I've seen Soviets doing steamroller in Winter '41 and '42 all over the front (in AARs, not personally) - so there it is surely Generous with capital G.

[Joel Billings]

Fuel stocks in our test games do decline by late 42, and can then grow a little after that with increased Axis production depending on usage. We don't have much in the way of human player experience in how the games go when they go that long. We need to see saves for situations where you are not getting tank replacements. As far as we know nothing is special about this other than normal issues of freight, however there could be something going on with AFV substitution not working good enough if you have a lot of tanks in the active pool that are not going out because they don't match up with the tanks the units are looking for. We did not hear this complaint during testing, so really need to see situations like this. If you have a server game I can pull a save from, let me know and I'll try to take a look. Fundamentally on a lot of the issues being raised, please keep in mind that especially in 41, there is a steeper learning curve for the Germans than the Soviets, so it will take the German players longer to come up to speed. That was what I saw in testing. Many of the issues being raised, like that with Assault HQs can also be dealt with with house rules until we make changes to the code.

[AlbertN]

Not having that game on anymore - tried it twice, once Poland and once Romania. Tanks were not flowing in the divisions so just never tried it again as it equals to sit a Panzer division depleted of tanks but with all the manpower and guns for nothing.

If it is imputed to mismatching tanks - that I do not know alas. If I get a Panzer Division sitting on a Depot in Russia for a while in a game without getting tanks I can PM you.

[tyronec]

I've made two links now, hopefully one will function.

https://mega.nz/file/S5Mi3T6S#6MP6-TzHE ... FBxpleSmIQ

https://we.tl/t-x9qF3RVn8X

My understanding of the situation is that the main culprit was lack of transport capacity owing to the number of vehicles lost and vehicles still being repaired. Mineral oil stocks in January 1942 were still above 1 million tonnes, and these would increase by the time summer came.

Interesting reading. And a contradiction of what TIK says in his video which is odd because he quotes those books in his references.

[EddyBear81]

ORIGINAL: AlbertN

Germany did now swim in oil - that is for sure.

But they were not having issues til mid '44 when Ploesti was getting bombed and fell to Soviet hands, and when the W.Allies also made a deliberate campaign against the Synth. Fuel plants.

That is why the German army has tons of infantry divisions and horse towed stuff.

Now with that I think -oil- should matter in a relative measure that implies your Panzer Division that needs to relocate from Leningrad Front to Kharkov does so via train, and not by racing through roads due to admin movement. That's another tale.

But I thought the Fuel Supply for Axis drops gradually downward - I never bothered to check in '41, but it seemed to me that the stockpiles go down, and down, and down.

Ps. For what concerns Tik in general I like the guy - but he forwards his opinion based on tomes he read, and while I do agree oil is important and Fall Blau oil objectives made more sense than 'go for Moscow'...

Last but not least - GAMEPLAY comes always in mind to me. That always need to be accounted in the balance factors.

That's my understanding as well.

Oil was barely sufficient but it could supply what they had. Surely it limited the number of trucks, planes, etc. that the Germans could field in some way, but my understanding is that the problem was logistics, not lack of oil. Up until late 44, that is.

[Denniss]

As major oil importing nations most Axis nations had lots of excess refinery capacities after their entry into the war.
Romania was selling more an more oil to Germany thus why they had excess refinery capacity as well so the autumn 1943 Ploesti bombing did not do as much damage as the Allies expected. Just fire-up the idle refineries again while others were repaired.

With the allied progress in Italy they started to interdict the rail lines to harm oil and fuel transportation as well as mining the Danube to harm deliveries by shipping. The souhern sector of the East front was basically living off fuel mostly delivered from Romania.

They were often limited by available tank railcars as supply was always lacking as was their replacement rate.