GC41 Exalted tests the axis allies

[exalted]

Turn 111
Not much exitment but there is a lot of slow movement taking place towards Pskov which is still in something of a panic, contracting and eventual retreat at orel and so on. The big question is how many soldiers is one vp worth? Should I pull out at a small time bonus or try to get all of it. Hard decisions that could end up costing if I'm too greedy.

Turn 111, Northern Front...well I don't know but we killed a corps at least.jpg (280.26 KiB) Viewed 1908 times

Not much news but I surrounded a inf corps that broke through the line and actually killed it so yay for the northern armies. Meaningless bombing seems to have moved to Narva area.

Turn 111, Central Front...slow retreat...who much suffering is one vp worth....jpg (402.01 KiB) Viewed 1908 times

The question of how much to milk orel is the big one here after that we are falling back to the wooded / river areas in the west.

Turn 111, Kharkov front...the fun front.jpg (381.15 KiB) Viewed 1908 times

The fun front as it is known, 17th army and 1st pzArmy still maul the soviet and make any actions costly, 1st pz will probably eventually have to go into the stalino defense as there are a few turns left there and it might collapse but so far I'm liking this aggressive defense around Kharkov.

Turn 111, Southern Front...all is well....jpg (398.15 KiB) Viewed 1908 times

Looks good but a single battle even worse two of my larger stacks moved or and outflanking in the south would be very complicated to deal with as there is basically no decent reserve in this area. Would have to pull in a corps or two of the 1st pzArmy if it starts to unravel.



In general I'm struggling with keeping TOE up to decent levels outside some elite formations and the ongoing casualties will soon force me to disbind some units. Will be hard to decide on the first germans but probably luftwaffe is in the running maybe some construction units.

[exalted]

Turn 112 - 113
Not much happens but I continue to re-arrange my armies for some kind of stability. I kind of feel like the soviets attacks are getting weaker at least in some sectors maybe the loss of Orel means the AI re-focuses its efforts.

Turn 112, Not much news so whole front for once....jpg (265.97 KiB) Viewed 1864 times

Situation at turn 112. Need to retreat a lot in the center over the next few turns, both to keep losses to a minimum and because I need neater lines which allow focusing infantry in other places.

Turn 113, Order of Battle.jpg (132.21 KiB) Viewed 1864 times

Soviet army is at a new low point so perhaps this is actually working out, my manpower reserve is also at a historic low so perhaps both sides are getting exhausted.

Turn 113, Orel Sector...retreat one vp short but that isn't worth loosing a couple of divisions for.....jpg (414.54 KiB) Viewed 1864 times

Gave up the last bonus victory point for Orel as I wanted to keep my army intact, could probably have gotten the point at a cost of 2-3 infantry divisions but would it have been worth it I think not...

[Stamb]

since you are so late in the game, can you check what supply priority AI is using?
you can see it in soft factors and then compare with your troops

[exalted]

Turn 114
A bit more excitement as a soviet offensive south of stalino that I've been expecting for a while kicks off.

Turn 114, Northern Front...actually looking good....jpg (306.12 KiB) Viewed 1860 times

Pressure has moved away from Pskov southwards so perhaps I'll keep the city for a while, was able to counter-attack some so it feels good.

Turn 114, Central - North, retreat from Orel...is torture....jpg (494.15 KiB) Viewed 1860 times

Not much interesting here a retreat from Orel requires counterattacks or getting pocketed. Once I can administratively move the front backwards I'll retreat 4-5 hexes or so to actually re-arrange the lines and get more troops to free up some panzer and pzgrenadier divisions for Pskov, Stalino defenses.

Turn 114, Central - South, 17th army holds the front if barely.jpg (374.65 KiB) Viewed 1860 times

17th Army is still my most powerful formation and makes the area around Kharkov a dying ground for the soviets, but I keep retreating slowly especially now that 1/3 of 1st PzArmy has been redirected towards Stalino to help the rumanians.

Turn 114, South Front, expected collapse of Rumanian south not as bad as expected....jpg (414.2 KiB) Viewed 1860 times

Rumanians got moved in a series of battle while some actually held, heroic efforts where involved and unlike my defense of Rostov this time they preform more or less as I would expect. Some losses some wins why the difference I can't tell and the battles looks ordinary both victories and losses. 1st Pz Army sent about 7 pzDiv's to shore up the hole in the lines left by the Rumanians we can probably hold a few more turns. Maybe even keep the time bonus down.

[exalted]

since you are so late in the game, can you check what supply priority AI is using?
you can see it in soft factors and then compare with your troops

Looking at it they seem to be mostly 4-3 with a few 2.

Turn 115

Turn 115, North Front...probably going okay but surprise guard infantry corps make it hard to know....jpg (618.88 KiB) Viewed 1809 times

Defenses of Pskov are shored up and I think this line will hold for now, an unlucky attack on Pskov however and I loose 6 points yay . More worried south of Velikke Luki where it can certainly go wrong as the 2nd -3rd Pz Armies with friends are understaffed for the job.

Turn 115, Central Front...not much action but re-alignment of 17th army and retreat of the rest....jpg (350.59 KiB) Viewed 1809 times

Central front is a ongoing disaster but at least I'm retreating slowly so I don't see the soviets getting to Kiev anywhere close to on schedule. Won't have to defend that town to the last second and I guess I can soon ditch Smolensk as well is it turn 121 it goes to 0 points?

A few select attacks by 17th Army and 1st Pz Army around Kharkov but it is a delaying action to keep D-town unthreatened for another ten turns or so

Turn 115, Southern Front...actually bouncing a few soviets back....jpg (221.35 KiB) Viewed 1809 times

All the action in the south as the brave Rumanians now with German pz support hold another turn. Just a few more to go. Turn 119 I'm out of here regardless simply to let my forces rest a bit.

[exalted]

Turn 116
Another turn of scrambling for defensive positions in the center and limited counter attacks where it is possible. I get the feeling that my average TOE is slowly going down the drains. So I need mud or to disengage along a large part of the front to recover. While I can cycle units around Pskov and Stalino most other parts of the front are not dense enough to do so or well enough supplied that it would matter much.

Turn 116, Northern Front, starting to get a grip here but it is still a bit desperate.jpg (463.26 KiB) Viewed 1807 times

Pskov seems safe for now and slowly reinforcements are looking to fight off the thrust south-west of Velikkie Luki, which has me worried. Hopefully I can get all but a single corps of 2nd PzArmy in on the action on the next or the turn after that. Should be enough I hope.

Turn 116, Central Front, slow retreat is killing me....jpg (204.51 KiB) Viewed 1807 times

Unable to dislodge my spearhead retreating from Orel I was even considering abandoning the three divisions at the rear to surrender or rout but lets try for one or two more turns...but it is hurting me and these divisions are in a bad TOE spot and should be retreating far away by now.

My scattered forces holding the rest of the line are basically just playing for time until I can abandon Stalino and Smolensk to get more reasonable lines. Basically the soviets will breakthrough here if they have enough mechanized or tank corps to push but with the number of those I've routed recently I think they are very short on mobile assets.

Turn 116, Southern Front, Lots of action defenses are holding.jpg (477.96 KiB) Viewed 1807 times

Limited counterattacks to keep the way in and out of Stalino open for a few more turns, should hold one or two turns more without any problem after that I will probably have a breakthrough either north-west or south-west of the city that will be hard to contain.

Turn 116, 1st PzDiv makes high command proud....jpg (185.65 KiB) Viewed 1807 times

1st PzArmy's 4th, 6th, 8th, 12th PzDivisions and 25th Hungarian Infantry, 13th, 15th, 19th Rumanian Infantry counterattacks south of Stalino inflicting 10k casualties. Medals are being issued and all involved generals are given personal congratulations of Von Kluge in OKH. The attacks are part of a german strategy of overcommitting to any serious attack to inflict maximum casualties.

[exalted]

So ran turn 117 and started 118.
117 Felt pretty good a decent counterattack routing scores and destroying many guns.

Turn 117, Mostly more of the same except around Kharkov where the soviet breakthrough forces are routed soundly by 17th and 1st Pz Armies. .jpg (601.78 KiB) Viewed 1799 times

17th Army and 1st PzArmy made me proud the german still has teeth, so I weakened my flanks a bit nothing strange there.

Just seeing the turn 118 situation made me go like...well...that just ain't possible...and if I am to continue I'll have to have a serious conversation about abandoning Stalino and Smolensk with e-hitler...probably loosing divisions to encirclement in the stalino case.

Its probably that or re-doing turn 117...which I don't like doing...

Turn 118, So how much does the AI cheat.jpg (290.27 KiB) Viewed 1799 times

Well if I could do half those moves with my infantry I would have won that this war a year ago...

Not sure if I'll continue actually...the AI moved at least fifteen corps formations here and in another place in ways I can't possibly think are legal. Sure I've had moments of teleporting soviets before during this campaign that have been irritating but this one blatantly illegalry breaks my defense of Stalino and threatens D-town + Kiev...

The mechanized corps sure I expected something like that at least in the other breakthrough but infantry corps...well...either the move rules are very different for soviet corps (haven't played them in WITE2 only WITE1) or something is very wrong here...

If they are not please tell me.

[Stamb]

that is just another lvl of cheating

see you in pvp games

[exalted]

that is just another lvl of cheating

see you in pvp games

Might be the only solution

But I don't like that I take Pvp too serious and it is slow paced

[Stamb]

there are great players who flip turns quickly (not me!)
i can give you contacts in PM

[exalted]

there are great players who flip turns quickly (not me!)
i can give you contacts in PM

Thanks for the offer, I might take you up on it later but I feel that there is a lot of stuff that I really don't grasp in WITE2 yet. Maybe after another AI game at 100% just too make me feel good.

High Command flew into OHK to discuss the recent development and decided that even thought the Soviets obviously have advanced teleportation devices we aren't defeated yet and after shooting a livid e-hitler the generals started planning a pull back from Smolensk to Stalino to something we can actually defend. I'll give up some points but I'll hopefully get some time to reorganize and bring TOE up from abysmal averages. So next turn will come in a day or two but this makes it one hell of a turn to plan.

[exalted]

Turn 118-119
So collapse of Italy means I need to withdraw troops towards Italy and Balkans, most of the hungarians went into Soviet Garrison to free up germans for those theaters.

Turn 118, Northern Front, preparing for a counterstrike.jpg (253.1 KiB) Viewed 1730 times

Will attempt to take the fight to the Soviets in the southern parts...the logical thing here would be giving up Pskov and Tallin but logics and the german army plans in the east didn't have much to do with each other. So I'll fight for those two cities even If I rather would have wanted a line from Riga to Minsk or something.

Turn 118, Central Front, at last the spearhead can retreat and rebalance the armies....jpg (233.79 KiB) Viewed 1730 times

At last the center leaps back the idea is to establish a line from 9th Army to Kiev with Gomel as the main depot in the center, as it is already pulling huge amounts of freight that I can't get to some other places where I would like it.

Turn 118, Southern Front...well I'll probably only loose two hungarian divisions....jpg (651.25 KiB) Viewed 1730 times

So teleporting soviets simply win and break my lines, I could have blunted or possibly even cut off and destroyed one of those breakthrough but only at the cost of having a great deal trouble defeating the other side. Will pull back more to the prepared line and the thick river towards Kiev.

Turn 119, Front in all its glory...pulling back even more but at least units are recovering.jpg (406.32 KiB) Viewed 1730 times

I'm recovering and the number of fights are low, but I am loosing a lot of soldiers on the MAP as stuff is going to Italy, Balkans and Garrison.

My current goals are holding D-town and Zaporozhye for about 6 more turns then thinking about pulling back towards Kiev-Odessa.

Sevastropol is a problem however how am I going to hold it longer than Odessa without loosing troops, perhaps the Rumanians will make a brave sacrifice in a city fort...

[exalted]

Turn 120
So the retreat continues, and some things look up some not so much.

Turn 120, Northern Front, german mechanized forces surrounds and possibly but probably not pockets a lot of soviets....jpg (352.4 KiB) Viewed 1698 times

2nd Pz army surrounds about an army's worth of soviets. I'm quite sure this like all my defenses it will collapse eventually since I don't really have the power to stop the soviets anywhere they want to push.

Turn 120, Central Front, slow retreat and a few divisions ended up in a really bad position...damn.jpg (256.39 KiB) Viewed 1698 times

4th Pz Army is fucked due to my screw up last turn but it is hard to retreat with CV 1 german divisions.

Turn 120, Southern Front, looking good but the front is on the VP towns....png (1.7 MiB) Viewed 1698 times

South looks good really a wall of powerful divisions with great reserves...still they will eventually have to pull back but hopefully not until D-town is worth 0 bonus points.

[exalted]

Turn 121
Well that was a good and bad turn.

Turn 121, North - 2nd Pz Army bags a soviet army....jpg (238.6 KiB) Viewed 1695 times

2nd PzArmy actually defeats about 100k soviets but get pretty much worn out doing so and this front looks grim, keeping a the soviets on the right side of the river will be hard work.

Turn 121, Center - Bungled the retreat...cost a corps....jpg (229.07 KiB) Viewed 1695 times

As expected 4th Pz Army has five divisions isolated and once more temporarily broken out of the pocket, lets hope they rout out otherwise they are lost.

Otherwise kinda good looking for now with space to retreat.

Turn 121, South - Safe as houses....jpg (191.8 KiB) Viewed 1695 times

South looks good but the soviets are pushing towards 17th Army but so far we are strong enough to repulse any attack and bounce some corps each turn.

Sadly most of the axis allies have gone home and the next test of their ability will be holding the southern most part of the line here in a turn or three.