Rebasing AC is just insanely expensive

[DarkHorse2]

I can rebase two AC units of Ju-111H-3Ts, to an airbase(17 hexes) with 1000+ excess freight available.
(load-outs not using any internal/external fuel tanks)

Yet, after they land, the airbase is now bone-dry.

That's it, they are done for the turn.

1000+ freight consumed for ....

These AC units had completely full fuel tanks at beginning of turn. Flew no miles before re-basing.

Their ranges are 42/52 hexes. So what happened to the rest of their fuel? Because after they landed, they sucked that destination dry of all of their freight stores - as if they consumed a full sortie of fuel just in the short hop. And should have landed with over 65% of their fuel remaining

This is an underlying flaw of current logistics model. Trivial operations like this that just excessively drain freight for no reason. And takes it out of play for subsequent turns for everyone else.

[AlbertN]

I believe the 'freight' gets converted into Air Support squads, relative AA manning the airbase, and supplies and fuel for the whole.

The system considers it having sent forward the necessary for the airbase.

During Summer'41 offensive pratically one has to airdrop airbase, rebase fighters, airdrop some more to create future fuel ... to provide some aircover from the Soviet Deathstars.

[DarkHorse2]

During Summer'41 offensive pratically one has to airdrop airbase, rebase fighters, airdrop some more to create future fuel ... to provide some aircover from the Soviet Deathstars.

Definitely agree with the above.

By 1942 though, when you think supply issues mostly resolved, you can barely find any excess freight south of Riga (excluding the Black Sea ports) to air-drop.

I honestly believe the AI handles freight delivery from North-to-South, across the map. By the time depot-to-depot shipments happen, nothing but crumbs left to be delivered for AGS.

[AlbertN]

I had similar issues and experiences I remember - when I was in Caucasus or about Rostov anyhow.

[jasonbroomer]

DarkHorse, try building two or three depots close to your airports and leave them on priority 4.

In ‘42 I’m finding that you need to build lots of depots near the front line and keep them on 4 to feed your offensive. Each depot may only get 1-2,000 but multiplication does the job.

Pulsing from an intermediate area also helps. Build a couple of depots around Warsaw say (or Lvov), set them all on 4. When they are full and you need supply at the front, switch to 0 and flush it down the line.

[AlbertN]

The flush is not controlled by distance. That's a problem.

You can see situatoins where depot that is full and goes to Prio 1 or 2 get Freight to anything that is higher in priority.
It means that say, you are stocking in Kiev, Minsk and Warsaw. Now it's turns of Kiev to go to 0... it can well send freight up to Minsk or even west to Warsaw if they're 4 and stocking up (because somewhen you want to drop them to 0 or 1 ).

[DarkHorse2]

DarkHorse, try building two or three depots close to your airports and leave them on priority 4.

In ‘42 I’m finding that you need to build lots of depots near the front line and keep them on 4 to feed your offensive. Each depot may only get 1-2,000 but multiplication does the job.

Pulsing from an intermediate area also helps. Build a couple of depots around Warsaw say (or Lvov), set them all on 4. When they are full and you need supply at the front, switch to 0 and flush it down the line.

Dude, I got tons of depots.

I have children with "depot" as their middle name.

I have 265 Depots in SU alone. I have so many, I turned over 1/2 of them off to force the freight to the front.

In the commander's report, the depots that have any freight are all North of Smolensk or a port on the Black or Baltic Sea.

AGS is just a wasteland.... with only a trickle of supplies going there.

WiTE2_Depot_Map.JPG (1.27 MiB) Viewed 740 times

WiTE2_Depots.JPG (314.39 KiB) Viewed 740 times

[DarkHorse2]

For completeness, here is the top half of the map....

WiTE2_Depot_Map2.JPG (1.31 MiB) Viewed 739 times

[DarkHorse2]

IMO, at this stage of the game, the bottle neck is at the NSS themselves.

There is only so much freight that is going to be release per turn from the cumulative NSS stores.

This seems to act as a global upper logistical cap.

I don't think it would make any difference if I turn on every depot on the map to 4. I think all that would do is just give no Depot any priority over another and they would all only get crumbs.

(although, it is an experiment worth trying...)

[kahta]

I think you are right, but there's also only so much freight that can make it through the rail system from the NSS to the level 4 depots down the line because of the constraints with the tracks.

[Stamb]

I think you are right, but there's also only so much freight that can make it through the rail system from the NSS to the level 4 depots down the line because of the constraints with the tracks.

when i was playing as an Axis i thought the same and then i was proven wrong
if you have depot at Stalino, for example, in `41 then it will get ~3k freight every turn
make super depot from it and you will get 5k-8k

another example
same depot at Stalino is getting 3k every turn
build 2 more depots nearby and you will get ~2k+ in each of them

if rail line is the only limiting factor then results would be different
this is just how logistics works

[Jango32]

You want as many depots as possible on priority 4 on the front line, with corps/armies on priority 3 or 4 (if not on the offensive). Both of these demand freight in the area. This can be coupled with pulsing freight from Poland into the Soviet Union.

The problem comes ahead when the logistics system decides to send freight stockpiled in Krakow not to the Lvov-Dnepropetrovsk double rail line, but north for example. Or not send it at all and instead the front line depots get freight from Berlin still, or German cities.

Only if at the start of the air phase you notice that the railway usage is above 5000 does it mean that the maximum amount of possible freight was sent via that rail.

[DarkHorse2]

I think you are right, but there's also only so much freight that can make it through the rail system from the NSS to the level 4 depots down the line because of the constraints with the tracks.

That may be the case as well.

I am playing around with moving my transport AC back to some of the NSS to help with off-loading and getting more of the freight released at the source. (experiment)

What is sad is, with current UI implementation that clears rail track usage during the logistics phase, you can't see where any rail bottleneck really exists. On my map, all rail lines are currently GREEN or YELLOW.

I would have thought they would have implemented a map overlay to allow players to select a pre-logistic phase view of the rail usage. (or at least to a point in time just prior to resetting the rail-line usage...)

[DarkHorse2]

I think you are right, but there's also only so much freight that can make it through the rail system from the NSS to the level 4 depots down the line because of the constraints with the tracks.

when i was playing as an Axis i thought the same and then i was proven wrong
if you have depot at Stalino, for example, in `41 then it will get ~3k freight every turn
make super depot from it and you will get 5k-8k

another example
same depot at Stalino is getting 3k every turn
build 2 more depots nearby and you will get ~2k+ in each of them

if rail line is the only limiting factor then results would be different
this is just how logistics works

Stamb, I made 2 Depots "Super Depots" last turn and it did NOTHING. (I was very surprised myself)

Also, keep in mind that "Super Depots" are not magic bullets, per se, but only bump the priority of the Depot they are located - thus starving other depots as a result. Although it may help draw some of the freight from AGN to AGS. (which may starve result in starving AGN )

Honestly, I just believe that there just is not enough freight being released and available on the rail system itself.

I may try again with "Stalino" or "Kharkov" which sits at the hub of major rail-line arteries to see if it makes a difference.

[DarkHorse2]

The problem comes ahead when the logistics system decides to send freight stockpiled in Krakow not to the Lvov-Dnepropetrovsk double rail line, but north for example. Or not send it at all and instead the front line depots get freight from Berlin still, or German cities.

I keep a close eye on which rear Depots are accumulating stockpiles and set them to '0' for a couple of turns until it is distributed to the remaining Depots.

I don't let the freight pool for very long, if it does occur. (yes, this obviously requires a level of micromanagement that I thought the game would not require...) But it has become of my turn ritual to pull up CRs of Depots, sorted by freight (NSS excluded). If I see anything above 5k not in air-transport range of the front, that gets set to 0 for a couple of turns.