A tale from '42 - AlbertN vs MSAG

[AlbertN]

T54 - End of June 42

The Soviets retreated here as well - rightfully so. They hammered me, had their 'victory' and now pulled back to safer spots.

A single turn of isolated units smashes their morale pretty much and thus their fighting capability drops sensibly.
A go for Stalingrad is probably out of questions and the oil seems non relevant going by other threads.

But at the same time if I stop any operation here and retreat at the Rostov-Don line... the Soviets will just pour all their excess forces elsewhere.

[Stamb]

Great AAR. I also noticed that sometimes my fighters do not intercept enemy transport planes. Maybe they are out of available miles to fly?

[AlbertN]

@Stamb - When you assign Air Superiority directive the planes should account for that.

I had a quick exchange of mail with MSAG (who is a very responsive player!) and he told me he already experienced that as he tried to put AS up in previous situations but it seems the AS function does not criss-cross at all with the Air Supply missions.

I also asked him about the status of Voronhez and he told me the location has 25k freight stocked, and he is sending over 500 a turn (I'd merrily trade the Ju52 for these Li2 as they seem to have 3-4 times the cargo capacity of Ju52 at this stage!)

Now - did the AGN part around Leningrad and there is both decent and bad play on my end here.

The good play is that I managed to get to interrupt another railroad going to Leningrad. Since apparently this is a game about Moving Freight from NSS to where it is needed, would a single rail path to the north suffice to supply all the stuff that is in Leningrad adequately?
I assume not. But somehow I feel the Soviets here have no supply problems in general exactly as they can ship in and out troops from reserves. - Til will tell.
That part of the front was lightly manned by the Soviets though, they had units but they were weak and scattered quickly despite being in thick woods.

My bad play? A panzer division too bold. I have grown glutton and wanted to try to cut some enemy big formations. (It drops morale for them too like a hammer just by being isolated). But alas the Panzer division moved in, unable to move out and ... dang 2 units present instead of the 1 I thought. I expect that Panzer division to be hammered savagely and hard by the Soviets their turn. Since there is no way a Panzer Division alone will withstand attacks from 3-4 hexsides all the SU's of it have been withdrawn with post haste!

[AlbertN]

With utmost chances I ought to read some on how to disable a NSS or reduce it.

Nonetheless! As good news Kalinin was seized. I saw a potential opportunity (a gamble so to say) with 2 Rifle Divisions and the fortified zone. But nominal value of 95ish!

I mobilized the big guns, as per Siege Artillery, attached SU's in abundance for what was possible - including Italian Assault Engineer that seem to be able to be deployed up there as well (and that funnily enough had a Hit per Element superior to German Pionere squads). The Luftwaffe was called in cause as well even if I noticed after previous turn bloodshed Bomber Morale dropped sensibly.

On the other hand the 12th Infantry Guard Corp gave a bloodied nose to my German panzers trying to straighten the line in front of Moscow.

To the south as the Soviets retreated and as there has been a grand effort and exhaustion here - I will let my own forces to rest (besides Panzers are kind of sapped in combat power) and potentially shuffle some to be ready to face a counterattack.

[AlbertN]

Voronhez seems a too though nut to crack. Yet.
After Kalinin lesson (which was quite a bloodshed for the Germans too) I believe I'll need to wait to reposition the siege guns for Voronhez and work on more AA to be attached to the divisions. Right now the AA at hand is ... Italian! (A bunch arrived for the Italian corps. I swear there is more Italian AA battallions here than in Italy).

But I assume the non 'East' theather units are simply non polished. Pretty confident many Italian units are absent simply because not being relevant for the game exactly as Croats and Bulgarians are not in the Balkan box.

In the while instead of storming now Voronhez I can set the 11th Army to rest and build CCPs. To have 200+ CV at nominal value ... I wonder how many divisions are there. But I think MSAG also put a HQ in the City-Fort this time.

[AlbertN]

T55 - Southern Dances

The relatively weak probes of the Axis armoured forces are rebuked with smart use of Cavalry Divisions.

These Cavalry divisions are pratically non existant combat forces with minimal CV (under 1) but are perfect to harrass enemy advancing columns, and are Morale killers.
To start a turn isolated it makes the morale plummel by a lot and it takes several fights to bring it back up.

And Germany cannot stop by and encircle at this stage in general.

[AlbertN]

T55 - What it takes to Encircle

Ontop of what you see there was also the LAHSS division in the 'empty' hex, that was relocated to the West this very turn by scripted transfer.

I am quite confident that MSAG could have potentially broken that encirclment at own cost of exposing his own troops. It was a 7-7 Russian division the one encircled, and my SS divisions after having moved had 5 or 6 CV themselves so German mighty elite being inferior than your generic Russian division that stays put and is well rested.

I merely believe MSAG evaluated favorable to lose 1 division and keep the bulk of his forces ready and rested for my next moves in the sector (Which is not far from the further south cavalry dance of the previous post).

[AlbertN]

T55 - Voronhez

I am litterally experimenting here. I evaluated to have the HQs around but not adjacent (a good general died just by being adjacent to Voronhez with the HQ... without being attacked or else) but the Flak does not count for the combat it seems so I must go back to hug the City for massive flak fire.

The HQs there are loaded with flak but it does not seem to have fired a single shot; and neither the Italian AA assets that have been attached to the divisions around Voronhez.

I'll keep bombing Voronhez with planes in moderate amount of visits as I and MSAG agreed not to spam a target with Ground Attack (Unit).

The Soviet shyed an attack on the Hungarian Armoured Divisions but they're beefed up by German SUs inflating their combat value.

[AlbertN]

T55 - Leningrad sector

Paid the price for my foolish advance with the Panzer Division, but I was expecting a more massive pounding.
A good half of these panzers lots at Czech panzers that I noticed being very prone to get destroyed in grapples!

On the other hand the Soviets came to hug the 'snake' of mobile forces that pointed to the north, bringing also a heft amount of Corps sized units. The divisions are of the '1' strong type but I assume they're there to keep me busy in the plan of a larger severing of the snake tail!

[AlbertN]

Leader Stuff - Confusing for me...

Now I've lost another (average) leader ... the HQ was not adjacent to the enemy (it is visible above east of Voronhez).
The HQ was not bombed.

Partisan interdiction not present in the hex ...

I am not sure what is killing German leaders ... earlier the HQ were hugging Voronhez for flak.

The replacing of the 3rd Panzer Army HQ is another thing I am not getting. Of X victories they got the 'defeat' by the hand of a guard corp and suddenly there must be some either Ratio or Treshold of Wins / Losses that mandates replacing. I had Guderian replaced earlier during Soviet Winter '41 but that was due to the 2nd Panzer Army getting mauled and suffering defeat after defeat.

The 3rd Panzer Army just seized Kalinin and is in general on the advance. Probably someone in a bunker wanted Moscow already and was not content with the speed of the advance.

[AlbertN]

T55 - National Morale Plummet?

This may be a bug, I just doublechecked even on the Live Manual and it seems to me that this should happen at September and not at July '42. Even living manual says it should be at September '42 and not July '42.

But German National Morale dropped by 5 all around...

Think I'll save up to server and stop for now after making a post on the Tech Forum.

[loki100]

ORIGINAL: AlbertN
...

Opinion 2: That is something that goes both ways but I deeply preferred the WITE1 approach to morale and movement - and I believe Admin Movement should not be viable when too close to the enemy. Given I'll benefit of that as well, that infantry from the south is to march by that armoured corp and deliberate attack it, I think... but in general Admin Movement paired up with 'getting to the enemy' allows grand sweeps and maneuvers, and to attack easily and cheaply even with units that are miles and miles away. That, teaming up with the fact to move offroad has the same cost no matter the troop quality makes some operational ordeals ... iffy. - I firmly believe that Admin Movement should not be enabled if within 3 hexes of the enemy or so; and adding it as one of the T1 special rules for Germans, that ignore that penalty. That way hit and run attacks or sweeping maneuvers are not that doable anymore, and movements points are more relevant if at the frontline. Then by all means, if someone's marching in the rearlines, they should be perfectly able to use Admin Movement all the way down from point A to point B.
...

really well written and presented - and good to see another 1941 GC into 1942.

there is a solution to the problem but most Axis players don't use it. Simply run a broad based GA-interdiction mission in the key sectors. I ended up doing this a lot in an otherwise badly flawed (by me) 1941 GC and it worked. My opponent confirmed it largely deprived him of admin movement on the key sectors.

now you have to guess where your spearheads will be - prob easier in 42 than 41 - but you don't need to divert much. A few Ju-88 air groups with that load of 50lb bombs will do the job (in the main with interdiction more weapons - even low calibre - are better than fewer but heavier).

I think Axis players have over-looked the value of interdiction missions, since you can rarely get much it seems pointless but it can add up.

[Gunnulf]

Cutting that railine to Leningrad and leaving him just one might not gift you the city, but it will reduce his ability to sustain a counter-offensive from here in winter. If nothing else it will focus his attention and if you can expand these heavy wooded areas with at least a road heading back this will be tough to shift. You probably want to move infantry up here soon though as armour fighting Rifle corps in heavy woods will be expensive for you as best I would think, if not disasterous if sustained. Looks like you have had a busy campaign so far. Pretty terrifying that there are enough Guard corps already to number one the 12th!

[MSAG]

Hi,

AlbertN was so kind to invite me to this AAR to present my side of the story.

So without further ado ...

SUMMER 41
It was my first H2H game in WITE2. I did not know what to expect really. Usually while playing Soviets my priorities are to stall the Leningrad offensive and to defend Moscow. South comes third. That worked … to a degree. Axis abandoned the Leningrad offensive (for a time) and focused on the South.
My opponent is very offensive minded and he was generating breakthroughs and bagging scores of my units every turn. My forces were melting … fast. It was very difficult to watch. None of my plans really worked. Forces were disappearing faster than I could mobilize them. Enough to say that I managed to reach 4M on map mark only in early 1942.
But somehow, I persevered. The Soviet army absorbed massive losses (from what I have read in other AARs the losses were above average). And still could go on.

What I think I did wrong
(1) I should have defended more the cities and especially urban hexes. I used to treat them on par with, lets say, Heavy Woods hexes. Spending even 100K troops to defend Kharkov, Kiev or Dnepropetrovsk even for 1-2 turns (and getting 100% railyard damage) is worth it during the summer 41.
(2) I kept the units at 100% TOE during the first 5-8 turns. The forum wisdom is that 100% TOE units fight better, which seems to be true. However (1) a lot of units during the first 10 turns of the game have very low morale & break anyway with massive losses and (2) with Albert’s playing style I run out of reinforcements (both manpower and HW). So after turn 10 I had majority of my Rifle Divisions not on 14K men + 230 guns but on 7K+60. So in retrospect I think I should have prioritized the high morale units to keep them at 100% and probably merge/disband some depleted ones.
(3) I practically abandoned Rostov. It was around T15. Albert units were very low on supply. I could have defended it better. To my defence – the turns T15-T18 were the moment of lowest morale for me. I did not believe that I can defend ANYTHING.

What I think worked out right (or at least ok)
(1) I preserved (to a degree) my Tank and Mech Divisions. I kept them in the 2nd and 3rd line. They could fight and rout, but I wanted to avoid having the surrounded and surrendering. Rationale - keeping captured Vehicles (by Axis) as low as possible. I believe that the supply is a greatest weakness of Axis in 41/42. Vehicles affect the problem.
(2) I kept the top 8 morale divisions in reserve. In Moscow. Even during the most dire moments. So I had a bunch of ‘8=8’ units in November. Those units and newly created Cavalry Corps enabled my winter counteroffensive. (In retrospect, have I defended key urban areas – I would have had used them there).

WINTER 41/42
My error #3 led to Axis overconfidence (which shows that in this game even the suboptimal strategies can have surprising upsides!). They started to move towards Stalingrad (as Albert told me later he planned to destroy the rail line to prevent Soviet buildup). So to my surprise I realized that the units in front of me are of very, very low CV & managed to catch his lead troops unprepared.
I was happy with the success of the push back in December. Both around Voronezh and along Stalingrad – Rostov rail line Axis forces were overextended and undersupplied. Still, the scope of the offensive was rather limited & local. All the winter the well supplied defence line from Narva to Kaluga was practically impregnable for me.
During Dec / Jan turns one could feel the reversal of the roles! A short period of successes allowed me to reach 4M forces mark.

Axis started to regain strength already in Feb 42 however. Their retreat stopped. On top of that both AGN and AGC started attacking – limited attacks at first started to gain momentum and morph into real offensives. Needless to say most of my best troops were busy south. The curse of (6k men -60 guns) divisions caught up with me. Even 3 div stacks in the heavy woods positions were giving ground, often with catastrophic losses! During March-April I started to loose ground again. In the sectors I thought were safe since fall 41.
I was happy to see the change of the weather. The pause caused by the mud season gave me some time to regain the balance.

SPRING 42
I used the pause to optimize my force. Started to form the Rifle Corps, culled my weaker units (disbanded 50+ divisions, perhaps more), benefitted from increased artillery production. In the first weeks of May I reached the 5M force!
In early May I was able to look into the future with some optimism….
TO BE CONTINUED …

[Stamb]

Great info from both of you. Keep going![;)]

[AlbertN]

T55 - Moscow Sector

Decided to march in and go hug the Soviets.

As a relevant note the Soviets did not held all the riverline but a hex in clear was left vacant.
The Model Corp launched an attack across the river in what seemed a not too strong position, but it revealed to have a Guard Infantry Corps (and a fortified position) in there that easily repelled the attempt at river crossing by 3 veteran German divisions with morale 80+ and arguably led by the best leader at hand and with Luftwaffe support in a deliberate attack.
As the National Morale dropped to 70 this turn, this defeat smoked a huge chucnk of the morale of the German forces, reducing some from well 80+ to 77 for one division. Dang! I feel that there is lots of work to get some morale up and then boom, one failure or isolation and the hammer falls if one is above the NM.

This would be also a rather precarious position for me too I feel, the river is a minor one, and the Russians have fat units by now. But I suspect MSAG would well content to keep that position til the winter comes and then once the river freeze... I am the one in open plains!

The 3rd Panzer Army makes some progress but the Guard Corps there are horrific. Germany won and caused a retreat but suffered pratically more losses (Soviets lost 1k extra men, but Germany lost the double of the guns). Definitely a phyrric victory.

The 'not too fun' aspect is that I am sure if it was not for air supply that is hardly intercepted the Soviets with utmost chances would have just attacked the next turn the fatigued and exhausted German forces and shoved them away way better.

2nd Panzergruppe has still to move and may dedicate some units as reserve for the sector. I feel the Soviets are still lurking with their Guard Cavalry and Tank Corps - but even there I feel I am the one who has to achieve something and risk. And MSAG will wait for me to commit panzers firsthand before to put into the fray his own heavy hitters.

Nonetheless Soviets are quite frustrating my offensives anywhere I turn the face except the 1 hex a turn slog toward Leningrad.

[AlbertN]

T55 - Voronhez

This sample of episode here can spell doom for my game because I just realized if I struggle so long to isolate Voronhez due to air supply that goes into the pocket, I will never get Leningrad isolated either at this stage.

Especially as Flak seems highly inefficient to destroy the immortal Li2 planes. (Someone made a post about it some time ago)

The Italian AA units have not even fired at them. At all!

Now I've got these, and there are more attached to the other units screening Voronhez ontop of the HQs being loaded too.
I've deliberately ran Air Supply all around Voronhez to supply the units with the AA.

It's like 6-7 turns that Voronhez now is encircled!

Also note how much Morale german units lose through winter - I just lowered from 75 to 70. So this unit had NM 75 til pratically now. It has 9 Wins and 0 Losses. It means it never got defeated in combat, routed or retreated or stalled. Morale loss are just due to Soviet Winter!

[AlbertN]

T55 North

About end of movement / turn northern front. Here it is litterally push and shove for Germans.

And at least it seems to work to get ahead without getting massively counter-shanked in the process. Air supply helps here a lot as well. And interception (or lack of) is less significant as both here and in the Moscow sector I've proper fighters ready to escort.

My problem right now is that even if I encircle Leningrad I do not think I will be able to stop air supply to it. And as seen for Voronhez, no unit will be considered Isolated at all and they'll remain mightily combat efficient.

A single regiment could not hold the rail and I was not able to reinforce that hex without severely risking a cut off. So I kept some forces static - maybe in reserve! - and pulled the regiment back. The SS division attacked instead, and shoved away a weak division. I need more troops there - but I do not have more troops pretty much with a whole army sitting and waiting for Voronhez and the massed infantries needed for the Leningrad push and shove to the west.

[DeletedUser1769703214]

Feels like I just read the whole "War & Peace" book so far and we are only in 1942 ;-P AlbertN speaks & write English better than I do that is for sure.

Germans looking pretty good in this game threatening many different places.

Oh AlbertN? How you like the Italian Division in the Soviet Union ? ;-P (I won't mention what he said about his boys in a PM, Oooops, I mentioned it)

[AlbertN]

@Hyla - I've already manifest my dissenting with Italian and other Axis minors morale (ontop of feeling that German NM drops too much later on but that is for '43 onward) - and detailed elsewhere that it is a multiple hammering due to A) National morale low B) Poor leaders C) Poor equipment in quality D) Scarce equipment production to replace losses. Which renders minors virtually 'here to keep up trenches' unless used in overwhelming odds.

Right now I am doing exactly what Rommel did in Afrika, for what I can. Mix the minors with Germans. So for instance the Hungarian / Romanian / Slovak mobile divisions have mobile elements of the Germans (from the SS Mot. Brigades to machine gun battallions taken from other theaters to panzer battallions). I feel that helps them an amount, allows them to net some victories to pump their unit morale up. Which will translate in experience for a hopeful later return with interests for some battles til they get hammered.

T56 - Number Crunching

I know some folks fancy numbers.

All I can see here is that despite what I think to be a rather robust rail network, my units do not get enough supplies.

The 4th Panzer is ... definitely in a pickle considering where they're headed in thick woods and with non existant roads or almost...

I was thinking to have a decent grasp of logistics but instead here it seems the network is not really working properly, as the '41 penalty is relieved I expected to be able to ship a decent quantity of supply and not roughly 50% of what my troops need.

Trucks - that is another relatively alien factor for me. So supposedly I lost 3085 trucks this turn just due to freight shipping. BUT if I go down the production I am producting 3710 trucks a turn. So supposedly I am in positive for now at least til winter comes roughly. (It should only improve technically as my advance rate is less than my rail repair rate!)

OOB Considerations: The numbers seem promising but I somehow do not feel confident at all. Maybe it is due to my 'strategic objectives' that I gave myself for '42, that set me in the slog for Leningrad and to encircle Moscow - another seemingly impregnable bastion that do not get me to feel the difference. But ultimately I feel these numbers matter relatively little. The 4M of Soviets are better supplied in general, thus I assume recovering more fatigue quicker whilst the German formations are staggering and unable to do much in some sectors. BUT I think this is what keeps this game open. If there were 6M of Soviets on the map, I think it would be pretty much game over already for the Germans.

Also as I've read now MSAG writings of above, I suspect he did a heinous mistake for himself to have merged troops and disbanded formations - since Soviets have guards in % to number of troops (so the more divisions they've the better). And whilst I am not an apt Soviet player (I am not even a good German so...) a silly 0.X strong division at times soaks up movement and fatigues up a German unit instead of having it advance. - I've also seen Russian weak division rest and gain CCPs behind the lines whilst getting replacement and ... when they got to a decent ToE they also have 100 CCPs. But I could just be speaking from impressions - I only have 1 PvP Soviet game bagged with pre-arty patch and the German bailed out on me.