Stalin's fired, I'm in charge! III 1/2- Tullius (Soviet) vs Marquo (Axis)

[TulliusDetritus]

ORIGINAL: Flaviusx

I haven't tried this out yet but I'm thinking doing the following: creating ghetto "sapper armies." That is to say, sweep up all those loose rifle brigades under the excess army commands, and dump a ton of construction assets into those armies. Then use these to dig in during the winter.

That seems a brilliant idea [:)] It would sort of simulate the 10 Engineer Armies the STAVKA created (and disbanded in 1943, I think) to prepare defensive positions -absent in the game, or abstracted: the RR you create [:(]

I'd like to use the brigades as fighting units, but I need those defensive positions. We are not talking about Atlantic Walls or Maginot Lines, absurd when you think about the tank and the airplane. I'm thinking about the defensive dispositions every army in WW2 adopted. I only want a fort level 1 or 2, that might (or not) buy me one turn here and another turn there [8D]

[TulliusDetritus]

My maths were not that wrong. Now I have 53 Guards Rifle Divisions. I will need them! [8D]

And by the way, Marquo is annihilating like 2 divisions per turn (the shattered thing). We can't have that! [:@]

[TulliusDetritus]

Oops, and looks like I finally gathered all the divisions I need (the Strategic Reserves thing): 98 [8D] But in fact 1) you have to add the rifle divisions of the 1st Guards Army and the other divisions which didn't arrive yet [8D] Anyway, part of these divisions will be assigned to the second level of reserves: the Front Reserves.

Anyway, some Fronts already have reserves assigned (I did that this turn):

Volkhov Front: 2 x Rifle Divisions (maximum) + 1 x Tank Brigade
Northwest Front: 3 x Rifle Divisions + 2 x Tank Brigades
Western Front: 3 x Rifle Divisions
Bryansk Front: 3 x Rifle Divisions + 1 x Tank Brigade
Southwestern Front: 3 x Rifle Divisions + 2 x Tank Brigades

So in fact, if my maths are correct I need 1 RD (Leningrad), 3 RD (Kalinin), 3 RD (Southern), 1 RD (Caucasus, in Crimea) = 8 more rifle divisions are needed for the Front Reserves. Plus the tank brigades (2 per front except Leningrad and Caucasus).

Soooo, I really have lots of hordes [:D]

[M60A3TTS]

How much if any are you overloading your fronts?

[TulliusDetritus]

ORIGINAL: M60A3TTS

How much if any are you overloading your fronts?

Well, reorganization is not finished so I really can't tell. They will be overloaded, that's inevitable.

Well, right now:

Leningrad: 34:72
Volkhov: 61:72
Northwest: 85:72
Kalinin: 89:72
Western: 103:72
Bryansk: 103:72
Southwestern: 70:72
Southern: 79:72

The most overloaded, in the place where I was concentratiing forces, to protect Moscow that is.

[TulliusDetritus]

Anyway, here you can see the front now is starting to look more "rational". As you can see, a thin frontline. Inevitable if you want to have Strategic Reserves. You can't have both. And of course I have what the Soviets had (lots of reserves). I am not inventing the wheel, I merely imitate the Soviet doctrine [8D]

As for the screenshot, reorganization is not complete yet, and I am talking about the fronts you see.

EDIT: in fact, some arrows are missing, I think. The Kalinin front has to cover parts of the Western AND Northwest Fronts if I am not mistaken. I have to check. I had calculated the whole thing.

[TulliusDetritus]

In fact, the Leningrad Front needs 3 Rifle Divisions, therefore I will send them. A quiet place but still...

[randallw]

Good for you on planning to fight it out for Moscow. [:)]

[TulliusDetritus]

ORIGINAL: randallw

Good for you on planning to fight it out for Moscow. [:)]

Well [:D] During a long trip I did in 2009 (Siberia, Russian Far East, Mongolia, China), I was on a train from Vladivostok to Harbin (Manchuria, China). We were only 4 guys in our wagon (myself, two Dutch and one French). I was smoking next to the door of the wagon, then one of the Dutch guys appeared... he saw me smoking, he saw the many fire extinguishers on the gound next to me, looked at me and just said: "they don't take any risk..." [:D]

The same can be said about Moscow. I don't take any risk [:)]

I didn't miss my opportunity. Here are the bloody fire extinguishers from that slow train from hell: 30 hours to make around 400 km (but a nice stop in the first Chinese city after the border: we drank looooots of beer, that it's true) [8|]

[gingerbread]

Probably there is a regulation that there must be 25 fire extinguishers on the train. If they are kept together, it much easier to count them.

[TulliusDetritus]

ORIGINAL: gingerbread

Probably there is a regulation that there must be 25 fire extinguishers on the train. If they are kept together, it much easier to count them.

I really can't tell given that we were not allowed (well, more or less, because yes, we visited the next wagon) to visit the other wagons. But I am pretty certain we were really few people (the 4 of us: tourists), then perhaps 8 Russians, and that's it [X(] That's all the people that left from Vladivostok (a weekly train, every monday). So in fact there were more fire extinguishers than people... [8D] In the last Russian station before the border perhaps 20 Chinese maximum boarded the train (they carried huge boxes). When I saw them I inmediately thought that in the Chinese border the Chinese guards would angrily tell them "you clowns, it's us who export! We don't import" [:D]

[TulliusDetritus]

[center]Turn 40[/center]
[center]19 March 1942[/center]

Well, I am starting to think that Marquo is trying some mind games [:D] Since the snow arrived -well, not exactly snow given that we use random weather- he's been mentioning Moscow every turn (on the emails that is). Moscow here, Moscow there blah blah blah... Basically to say that the weather is not allowing him to do some sort of offensive. Liar! He is concentrating his armored hordes in the south, does he want me to ignore these hordes? [:D] As if I could not see them!

One thing is certain, we are not scared by these many hordes and our weak forces there (given that I have pulled back lots of my forces he wouldn't bag a lot down there). Resisting is not my priority until summer, not even close. I can afford a lot of land.

[center][/center]

[TulliusDetritus]

Here you can see the many forces he is concentrating near Stalino. It's the biggest concentration of forces of the whole front. And by far [;)] I haven't moved. I will possibly be pulling back the forces in the south (Kalmius River thing). Not sure about the 3 cities. I guess they should have some sort of garrison. That might buy me a turn.

[Flaviusx]

Go easy on those fort units. IMO they are largely a waste of APs unless you're sure you can get to level 3. None of those places in the south are safe and you'll be lucky to reach level 2 with them before the German gets to them. Save your APs for other things. I personally wouldn't build any of them west of the Don in the south. Frankly, fort units kind of suck for the Soviet, they're a huge AP sink and only very rarely pay off.

[TulliusDetritus]

Yes, you have to be correct. I built way too many Fortified Regions. My plan was about brigades digging and getting level 2 forts. Some FR were planned though. But when I realized the very low construction value of the rifle brigades I was "forced" to create these FRs. And yes, I suspect I CANNOT afford them (armaments are low). And I am talking about the on map units. This is a trial error thing, indeed.

But if I well understood what you said some messages ago, brigades should dig a little faster now that blizzard will be gone.

Sooo, in Moscow area "I will not take any risk". And perhaps there won't be e-enemy offensive operations in summer. But this, I can't discard it (it would be a gross strategic mistake, pure adventurism). Here I will only disband the FRs when they manage to build forts level 4. As for the rest, I might disband them when I get to fort level 2. In some key places, I should need forts level 3, etc. Let's see what can be done.

[TulliusDetritus]

Anyway, Marquo only has one more turn. Then it's april [;)]

Look at the nice weather table:

11 out of 15 = I win
4 out of 15 = I lose

[TulliusDetritus]

Another thing perhaps worth mentioning. All the low morale units should be pulled back (therefore they would be part of the Strategic Reserves). I haven't paid attention to this when I gathered the 100 divisions (my mistake). I was sending people to the rear --like a psycho-- but without paying attention.

Look at this: the 55th Rifle Division, 50th Army, Bryansk Front. Morale: 30 [8|] The poor bastards statistics: 1 victory - 10 defeats [:D]

New directive: the low morale units, on the 20s and 30s will be minimum 10 hexes behind the front, to recover (in fact to train, in game terms). Rifle Divisions attached to Stavka (aka the 100 rifle divisions I have gathered) will replace them.

Now look at the 3rd Rifle Division. Many moons ago, perhaps like 12 turns ago, I had shown the unit: a truly miserable unit with morale = 24 if I remember correctly. I pulled them back and look now [8D]

[TulliusDetritus]

Well, first coordinated attack of the 2:1 era. Northwest Front Eremenko's 31st Army masses 9 rifle divisions and assaults a German infantry division. The hex was a no man's land hex that Marquo decided to occupy. And we can't have that! Blizzard weather by the way. No command penalties, all the divisions were ready. And I forgot to spam the unit before the attack with bombs from the night U-2VS squadrons. Oh well, bombs were not needed as they fled. Cowards!

EDIT: hehehehe, I hadn't paid attention. 45 enemy bombers showed up. 19 of them were shot down... I managed to put 79 fighters on the air, And 32 bombers.

[Flaviusx]

Don't put anything with less than 45 morale on the front if you can possibly avoid it. I think a lot of Soviets are not paying close attention to the morale of their units and are paying for this when snow hits. Low morale units suffer tremendous losses in battle, they have no business on the front line. They should be spending the entire winter training more or less. They can reinforce the front as the snows arrive and backstop your tired armies.

[randallw]

I suspect those fire extinguishers were collected by some railroad employee who is a secret hoarder.  Soon after the picture he probably showed up with a giant bag to put them in, then he jumped off the train with them ( his very own DB Cooper moment ).