Operation Nordlicht - Leningrad 1942

[LLv34_Snefens]

I'm back!

Operation Nordlicht - Leningrad 1942 Version 1.0.2

The Siege of Leningrad and the Battle of Demyansk Pocket and Ramushevo Corridor Autumn 1942

• Date: August - November 1942

• Location: Leningrad, NW Russia

• Scale: 2.5km/hex, Battalion/Regiments sized units

• Length: 75 turns

Designer: Stefan Overgaard Kristensen (Snefens)

TOAW IV (Version 4.1.40)
:: PBEM ONLY ::

Nordlicht Operations.jpg (435.71 KiB) Viewed 214 times

While it's possible to follow the historical path, each player is free to decide their own objectives during the game for bigger rewards but also higher risks.

[LLv34_Snefens]

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND:

11th Army had captured the fortress of Sevastopol on the Crimean peninsula by July 1942. This army, along with heavy siege artillery, was to be sent to Leningrad, where several offensives were being considered by the army group following the freeing up of forces after the destruction of 2nd Shock Army in the Volkhov salient.
Some of the plans considered were the destruction of the Oranienbaum pocket, the elimination of the Pogoste pocket, which was the bulge formed by the 54th Army in the Lyuban' offensive, and finally the ultimate capture of Leningrad, known as operation Nordlicht. In the end the decision was made to concentrate on Nordlicht before diverting to the other operations, in order not to dilute the few available forces.

STAVKA, well aware that the Germans were planning an offensive in the Leningrad region in the late summer, sought to do a preemptive strike. First by trying to fully encircle II. Korps at Demyansk again, tying down German forces with a number of attacks over the summer, while they were rebuilding 2nd Shock Army. Mid august Leningrad Front attacked from the west across the Neva River by the Tosno River, as Volkhov Front was still building up forces for the offensive from the east.
This was finally started on Aug 27th, still not having fully completed it's preparations. While the crossing of the Neva River gained little more than some tiny bridgeheads, the 8th Army penetrated deeper into the German positions from the east. Reinforced by the 2nd Shock Army, the Soviet forces reached 7km away from severing the corridor. In this situation some of the forces ear-marked to the Nordlicht operation was needed to reinforce the defense in order to prevent the collapse of the front, thus postponing the operation indefinitely. The reinforcements allowed a counter-attack by the German 11th Army, once again striking at the root of the Soviet penetration.

By the end of September the front lines had been restored and the 2nd Shock Army had practically ceased to exist for the second time in less than a year. At Demyansk the Ramushevo corridor was also able to be widened by the Germans, but the attack on Leningrad never materialized before 11th Army moved away from Leningrad on November 21st, to stop the Soviet breakthrough at Stalingrad.

AGN-1942Aug27.jpg (1.55 MiB) Viewed 210 times

[cathar1244]

Thank you for publishing this. Looks like a huge amount of work went into the scenario.

[Telumar]

Wow thank you for your work, looks very good! I see you used your Operation Neva map (played this religiously against the PO).

So only PBEM. Do you plan to add a PO in a future version?

[LLv34_Snefens]

Slightly eastward extended and thinning out the amount of towns, but other than that it's the same as the Neva map yes.

No plans for PO, unfortunately. I started out trying first to see if I could just get it to hold the starting frontlines in a defensive stance, but my initial attempts gave very poor results at that, so I just binned it and concentrated on PBEM, which is the only thing I play anyway.

I finished an earlier test version with my brother (him as USSR). Quite an interesting game. He started out by opening up the Leningrad corridor and a running VP-bonus (Vega), as I was trying to save up forces to eliminate the Oranienbaum pocket (Bettelstab).
He was really putting the pressure on at many places (Rigel and Sirius), but I still managed to surprise him and open up the southern shoulder of the Ramushevo corridor (Winkelried) and secure the supply situation in there.
It ended in a draw, but with him ahead about 50 VP. (Need 100 VP for a marginal victory)

NordlichtGIF.gif (7.19 MiB) Viewed 175 times

[cathar1244]

Stefan,

I'm curious as to the design effect sought by placing invisible badlands hexes in the deep water of Lagoda ?

[LLv34_Snefens]

It's a leftover from the Neva scenario that took place in frozen conditions, where I wanted to prevent movement by motorized/tank units across the ice.
There is included a graphic mod for the badlands in the zip-file that should mask them out, so I just let them be, in case I was gonna extend the scenario into winter conditions.

Since partisan units actually have amphibious ability added to allow them to traverse flooded marsh, I also added alpine terrain underneath lake hexes to prevent them from entering those. Again masked out with a graphic file.

[Telumar]

Slightly eastward extended and thinning out the amount of towns, but other than that it's the same as the Neva map yes.

No plans for PO, unfortunately. I started out trying first to see if I could just get it to hold the starting frontlines in a defensive stance, but my initial attempts gave very poor results at that, so I just binned it and concentrated on PBEM, which is the only thing I play anyway.

Ok I see. In Operation Neva the Soviet PO worked reasonaly well, but that is a different scenario (especially clear to me now as i went through the sce doc for Nordlicht )

I finished an earlier test version with my brother (him as USSR). Quite an interesting game. He started out by opening up the Leningrad corridor and a running VP-bonus (Vega), as I was trying to save up forces to eliminate the Oranienbaum pocket (Bettelstab).
He was really putting the pressure on at many places (Rigel and Sirius), but I still managed to surprise him and open up the southern shoulder of the Ramushevo corridor (Winkelried) and secure the supply situation in there.
It ended in a draw, but with him ahead about 50 VP. (Need 100 VP for a marginal victory)

Interesting. The Vega Option your brother chose (opening up a corridor to Leningrad) looks like a good choice for the Soviet player for the running VP Bonus which could offset costs for additional reinforcements.

I really like what you did with the Operations TOs. Difficult and interesting choices for both players which also will make no game look like another. A lot of bulges and salients both sides can go against.

One question that came to me as i was examining the various Operations Options - I have seen that Soviet supply around the Ramushevo corridor is very low. There is a (long) rail line running from Lyubnitza towards Staraya Russia which is in need for repair. The question is how long would that take.. also the section around Lychkovo would have to be taken under Soviet control first. How many rail repair units do the Soviets have? Sorry for asking but it's a pain to go through the whole OOB to find them...

[LLv34_Snefens]

Volkhov Front and NW Front both have two RR-repair units and Leningrad Front have a single, that either can be taken out if a land corridor is opened, or just sail it across Ladoga, so 5 in total. Fully fit they have about a 75% chance of repair, so if they are in place it can be done quite quickly.

True that the northern edge of the corridor is in bad supply state and like you've spotted the key for the Soviet player to remedy this is to free up the rail line. In the above mentioned game my brother had pushed me from all the rail line around Lychkovo by turn 10 and had a working line all the way to Pola river by turn 28, and that was while he also completed the Ladoga Line.

Edit: Volkhov not Kalinin

[Telumar]

Volkhov Front and NW Front both have two RR-repair units and Leningrad Front have a single, that either can be taken out if a land corridor is opened, or just sail it across Ladoga, so 5 in total. Fully fit they have about a 75% chance of repair, so if they are in place it can be done quite quickly.

True that the northern edge of the corridor is in bad supply state and like you've spotted the key for the Soviet player to remedy this is to free up the rail line. In the above mentioned game my brother had pushed me from all the rail line around Lychkovo by turn 10 and had a working line all the way to Pola river by turn 28, and that was while he also completed the Ladoga Line.

Edit: Volkhov not Kalinin

Thank you for the reply. Hm Pola river by turn 28 ok that is about halfway into the scenario.

You really got me studying the map and the situation evaluating which combination of Operations would be a reasonably good (the best?) choice.

And for the most important question: I would be inclined to take on a match of this, any side. Are you you available? Note that it's been years (!) since i went up against a human player the last time so i might be easy prey lol

[LLv34_Snefens]

Yes, I'm interested. Either side as well. You can just contact me through the e-mail in the documentation.

As for what is the optimal choices I can't give you an answer. I would say that the Soviet player should at least make an effort towards Leningrad, even if not selecting Vega. He could still get the running VP-bonus if he breaks through, and the 5VP locations count in any circumstances.
He is (somewhat) ready and the German player won't be able to counter in force for a couple of turns. He won't get much better conditions. But then again doing something unexpected, like railing the 2nd Shock Army to an entire different area might work as well.

Another point that I haven't put explicit in the documents, but if the Soviet player doesn't put at least a little pressure on Demyansk, the German player could just halt the supply flights into the salient and rely on minimal supply through the bottleneck, gaining his own +1 VP/turn. He would be overextended, but that doesn't kill you if you don't have to use supply defending.

As for supply to Pola. If you were going for it fully, I would expect you to be able to have supply to Pola before turn 15. You can start repair on the rail within you own lines right away, and so it's "just" a matter of capturing the 8 hexes the Germans have cut and repair them.

[Teufeldk]

Volkhov Front and NW Front both have two RR-repair units and Leningrad Front have a single, that either can be taken out if a land corridor is opened, or just sail it across Ladoga, so 5 in total. Fully fit they have about a 75% chance of repair, so if they are in place it can be done quite quickly.

True that the northern edge of the corridor is in bad supply state and like you've spotted the key for the Soviet player to remedy this is to free up the rail line. In the above mentioned game my brother had pushed me from all the rail line around Lychkovo by turn 10 and had a working line all the way to Pola river by turn 28, and that was while he also completed the Ladoga Line.

Edit: Volkhov not Kalinin

Thank you for the reply. Hm Pola river by turn 28 ok that is about halfway into the scenario.

You really got me studying the map and the situation evaluating which combination of Operations would be a reasonably good (the best?) choice.

And for the most important question: I would be inclined to take on a match of this, any side. Are you you available? Note that it's been years (!) since i went up against a human player the last time so i might be easy prey lol

Yeah, I had 3 RR units working on that railroad, and it still took forever, it seemed

[Telumar]

Yes, I'm interested. Either side as well. You can just contact me through the e-mail in the documentation.

As for what is the optimal choices I can't give you an answer. I would say that the Soviet player should at least make an effort towards Leningrad, even if not selecting Vega. He could still get the running VP-bonus if he breaks through, and the 5VP locations count in any circumstances.
He is (somewhat) ready and the German player won't be able to counter in force for a couple of turns. He won't get much better conditions. But then again doing something unexpected, like railing the 2nd Shock Army to an entire different area might work as well.

Another point that I haven't put explicit in the documents, but if the Soviet player doesn't put at least a little pressure on Demyansk, the German player could just halt the supply flights into the salient and rely on minimal supply through the bottleneck, gaining his own +1 VP/turn. He would be overextended, but that doesn't kill you if you don't have to use supply defending.

As for supply to Pola. If you were going for it fully, I would expect you to be able to have supply to Pola before turn 15. You can start repair on the rail within you own lines right away, and so it's "just" a matter of capturing the 8 hexes the Germans have cut and repair them.

Yes Vega is an obvious choice but then a lot of other options and possibilities for Maskirovka haha. I wonder how feasible Nordlicht would be especially if a Soviet player successfully establishes a land link to Leningrad first or while Nordlicht is going on.

So.. I sent you an E-Mail regarding a possible match just 5 min ago