DEPLETED Units

[Poncekilat]

Hello everybody,
I've been playing Wite for several years, I've done over 4500 hours on the first game. I am just starting on Wite2.
I took part in the big campaign with my comrade.
In October 41 I was in Leningrad, I captured 95% of the Crimea, capturing Sevastopol and major ports,
Kursk, orel Kharkov was German, and I was going to take Stalino.
But winter has come.
My SOUTH army has gone into DEPLETED status, and it's a disaster.

war is over.JPG (307.85 KiB) Viewed 1489 times

All the armies that I transfer from the center group to the south pass one after the other in 'DEPLETED' status.
I lost almost all of the South and Center panzer groups.

dpleted.JPG (212.21 KiB) Viewed 1489 times

I don't see how I can stop the Russian offensive.
Can you tell me what happened?
The deposits were present, the ports were repaired?

I moved the 'Deplete' units to the rear to reinforce, but that wasn't enough.
Do you have an idea?
Thanks for your help,
Poncekilat

[shuaiqigezi]

Your army supplies are terrible. I guess the railway transportation you repaired is not enough.Note that dual track rail can carry 250% more freight than a single track rail line.If you don't mind, please upload your southern railway route map together.

[carlkay58]

Not enough depots at high enough priority. You should have the forward depots at priority 4 and about two or three depots back at priority 4 too. This depth allows the further back depots to store some supplies when it can that gives you a cushion for the bad weather or turns that the supplies are not flowing as well as they should.

Double rail lines are best as mentioned above. But you do not have a depot in Kiev or several other large railyard cities.

[rocketman71]

I'm facing a similar situation in my campaign. Has a couple of general questions regarding depots (still a bit puzzling for me). I was under the impression that priority 4 depots don't send freight forward to other depots closer to the front, but rather directly to the units. Is this not correct? I have also seen, in a thread I can't remember, the recommendation to even lower the priority of the depot closest to the front to 2. Furthermore, it seems a bit haphazard which depots store freight and which don't. I can't see a predictible pattern. Wonder why depots far from the front store freight when units at the front i screaming for supplies. Double-rail is yellow, but still should be able to push all available freight to the frontline units.

[loki100]

In the main, depot priorities are pretty simple (or perhaps, best advice is to keep it simple till you really have a grasp).

So in 1941 as the Axis, have the front 2 depots on a given rail spur at #4
then mix 2/3 back about 15 hexes from the front (3 if is a large airbase nearby)
then a 4 on a depot that has a very large (>2) railyard
then 0,1,2 back to the NSS

The key is if you want a depot to act as a store and then push freight to front line depots it has to be able to access rail cap nearby.

In that model drop the deep 4 back to 2 every 4-6 turns (again situational but this broadly works) and you'll get more freight into the immediate combat area.

If you give up offensive actions on a given spur, drop depot priority to 3 AND drop unit supply priority by a level (say to 2).

Come 1942 as the Axis or more generally as the Soviets. 2 banks of pri 4 within about 6 hexes of the front line, then 2/3 (same criteria) back to a cluster of large 4s (Minsk, Kyiv are great for this), then 1,0 back to NSS. Exceptions, whereever you cluster your transport planes (pri 4), if you predigging defensive lines (again 4 till they reach at least level 2)

Always keep an eye on the demand side, drop supply pri to avoid unmet demand -you ain't going to get the freight and all you do is shed trucks looking for it

[rocketman71]

In the main, depot priorities are pretty simple (or perhaps, best advice is to keep it simple till you really have a grasp).

So in 1941 as the Axis, have the front 2 depots on a given rail spur at #4
then mix 2/3 back about 15 hexes from the front (3 if is a large airbase nearby)
then a 4 on a depot that has a very large (>2) railyard
then 0,1,2 back to the NSS

The key is if you want a depot to act as a store and then push freight to front line depots it has to be able to access rail cap nearby.

In that model drop the deep 4 back to 2 every 4-6 turns (again situational but this broadly works) and you'll get more freight into the immediate combat area.

If you give up offensive actions on a given spur, drop depot priority to 3 AND drop unit supply priority by a level (say to 2).

Come 1942 as the Axis or more generally as the Soviets. 2 banks of pri 4 within about 6 hexes of the front line, then 2/3 (same criteria) back to a cluster of large 4s (Minsk, Kyiv are great for this), then 1,0 back to NSS. Exceptions, whereever you cluster your transport planes (pri 4), if you predigging defensive lines (again 4 till they reach at least level 2)

Always keep an eye on the demand side, drop supply pri to avoid unmet demand -you ain't going to get the freight and all you do is shed trucks looking for it

Thank you, good advice. I had missed that I could have prio4 at large railyards far away from the front. I also didn't know that trucks were used even if there is no freight to pick up.

[Poncekilat]

Thank you for your answer, here is my railway network!

reseau féré.PNG (9.01 MiB) Viewed 1349 times

[Poncekilat]

I don't know if I should trust automatic deposit management.
I do not understand why in leningrad, I have so many deposits near the fights

leningrad depot.jpg (209.2 KiB) Viewed 1347 times

In the south, a lot of deposits that I created have disappeared

depot sud.jpg (180.92 KiB) Viewed 1347 times

[Poncekilat]

I had set the priorities of the deposits manually, but I have the impression that the automatic management does not help me.

Should I use automatic management?
Should it be cast at the start of the turn or at the end?
Some launch the management of deposits at the beginning and at the end?

Thanks for your help!

[loki100]

actually the AI does a really good job at depot management. I totally revised my approach after studying what it did and realising how effective it was.

can you improve on this?

yes of course, but really only if you know what you are doing, and even then initially keep it similar to the layout above. There is quite a bit of whinging from some players who try all sorts of ultra-clever layouts, actually mess up the system, and then complain they didn't get the result they wanted.

[Poncekilat]

Thank you for your answer, loki100