SCARZ (Axis) vs. AURELIAN (Soviet)

[Scarz]

AG Anton – All of what I presume was the Southern Front has retreated into the Crimea area. I am not sure 11 Army, with only two corps, can force the issue. I may need to send the third corps (XI) south the help, and it may even be necessary to send XIV Mot Corps.

[Scarz]

Almost forgot, the Smolensk Assault!

[Scarz]

Russian Destroyed Units this turn.

[Scarz]

Air War – I sent a bomber division back to the reserve, AGS (KG 54), in the hopes of saving some supplies. Next turn I will send one back from AGC. I am not sure this will work, but I am in desperate need of supplies to the front.

[Scarz]

TURN 12

Supply Situation: I am not sure of my progress has been so rapid that I have flat outrun the ability of the depots (taking into account their location) to supply the forward units, or if I have somehow screwed up the depot settings. I have not had this issue when playing against the AI, and so I suspect I have made an error at some point in the supply grid. Starting the second rail line, from Bobruisk toward Gomel, feels like a complete waste of time and the loss of the valuable FBD that could be in the Smolensk area. However, the single track line ending at Unecha just doesn’t seem to be bringing in enough to the units around Kursk and the southern line ending at Poltava isn’t getting enough northward to Belgorod.

The lack of supplies has given the Russians almost 4 weeks of time to consolidate and reorganize defenses especially in the Kursk area. While the panzers are getting a good rest, I can’t help but feel this pause will make things harder in the upcoming snow turns. I may be forced to accept that I have made the progress I am going to make in 41, and focus all my efforts at eliminating Russian units with modest territory gains while at the same time beginning to consider preparing for winter and where I intend to try and dig in.

[Scarz]

AGN – In an effort to screen off the Russian units on both sides of the penetration, I have been forced to break down divisions and allow regiments to hold in places. While this opens up potential targets for Russian counterattacks, I have little choice if I want to continue pushing north east past Leningrad.

Pre-Turn

[Scarz]

However, the defenses at Gorelovo and in Leningrad were fairly weak, so XXXXI Mot Corp attacked directly into the city. LVI Mot Corp’s 3 Motorized Division captured Mga with the help of I Corps (18 A), and isolated the city from the east, although Russian units will have little difficulty reestablishing a link through Shlisselburg. Totenkopf then wheeled back to the west and took possession of the city center. I left 8 Panzer inactive as a local reserve.

[Scarz]

AGC – XXXXII Corps finally took Smolensk, with light losses, capturing 37,480 prisoners and some 523 guns. Both AGC FBD’s are busy converting rail, one from Unecha to Bryansk and the second from Bobruisk to Gomel. Once the Gomel stretch is complete, I will send one of the FBD to the Smolensk area.

The Russians pulled back a bit northeast of Smolensk, and 9 Army moved into contact with the Russian main line around Vyazma and Zanozaya. 3 Pz Grp rested for the most part as 18 Motorized Division moved closer to Vyazma. 20 Panzer Division is in need of replacements with only 54 runners and was sent back to Vitebsk for refit. Both panzer divisions in LVII Mot Corps are equally, if not in more need, and were sent to Orsha to refit.

[Scarz]

In the 2 Pz Grp AO west and southwest of Kursk, a trickle of supply is finally arriving, but the mobile units and 2 Army are still too low to do much. While this long pause is probably hurting the chances at Kursk, and almost definitely ruling out a drive on Moscow, they both rested in place.

The XXXX Mot Corps arrived this turn and will be sent by rail to the Smolensk area where it will be assigned to 3 Pz Grp.

[Scarz]

AGS – FBD 1 completed the rail link between Kremenchug and Poltava and is now heading south to Aleksandriya to begin pushing the double rail link east toward Dnepropetrovsk.

6 Army continued its march east, clearing two final Russian holdout divisions at Lebedin. 17 Army, which is still virtually out of supplies held in place.

[Scarz]

1 Pz Grp is also still critically short of supplies, and held in place. However, the condition of the panzer divisions is much better than in the center. That said, both panzer divisions from XIV Mot Corps were sent to Kremenchug for refit.

[Scarz]

AG Anton - The Rum Railway Com completed the rail as far as Kherson, which will have to supply 11 Army as it tries to break into the Crimea. 4 Rum Army and 11 Army close in on the entrances to the Crimea, but cautiously, as they are low on supplies. III Rum Crops eliminated a lone Russian division holding out in the marches south of Nikopol. Finally, the Rum Cav Corps pushed east and focused on clearing the rail lines.

[Scarz]

Air War - I sent KG 3 (AGC) and KG 1 (AGN) back to the reserve in an effort to reduce supply consumption. I flew two recon missions in the north, one just east of Leningrad and one northeast of Velikie Luki (in the hopes the area is unoccupied and I can shorten the defensive line 16 Army is currently holding). Finally, I flew a recon mission over a large portion of the Stalino to Kramatorskaya area to see if a Russian line is forming in that area.

Losses – The Russians have passed the 2 million mark on losses, with 1.4 captured. Axis losses are also mounting with 199,800 men and 959 AFV’s lost.

[Scarz]

Summary of Game

I want to thank my opponent Aurelian, and everyone that read the AAR and left all the helpful comments. I would say that a game against a human opponent was a much different experience than against the AI and I enjoyed it.

While I believe I made lots of errors, and my opponent feels the same, I would say the most crippling portion of the game was flat running out of supplies. This had never happened when I played the AI, some of that being the rate of advance was much slower…but I feel like something was amiss with my depots and getting the supplies forward.

I usually try to have a level 4 depot as the closest depot to the various areas of operation. Of course I try to get this depot as far forward as possible. Then I have the depot behind the level 4 at setting 3, then the one behind that at level 2 and finally the one behind that at level 1. This setup seemed to work fine with the AI, but not so much here.

I wonder if some of the really far back larger rail capacity depots (Germany) should also be set at level 1 just to pull from Berlin. Berlin seemed to be sitting on a lot of supply. Also, none of the supply routes seemed to be overburdened (ie red), but I may be misremembering that…

Any thoughts on improving my depot and supply issues would be great and helpful.

[Aurelian]

This AAR got me excited to try again.

[Seminole]

ORIGINAL: Scarz

Almost forgot, the Smolensk Assault!

I think if the Australians were in charge of AGC they'd tell Kuntze he fought like a real...

The defensive CV utterly collapsed, but the city was saved by the ineptitude of the attackers.
I heartened to see the VVS as unanimously incompetent as I've witnessed. I think my future strategy will be to completely covet the good airframes until the winter offensive.

[Rosencrantus]

ORIGINAL: Scarz

Summary of Game

I want to thank my opponent Aurelian, and everyone that read the AAR and left all the helpful comments. I would say that a game against a human opponent was a much different experience than against the AI and I enjoyed it.

While I believe I made lots of errors, and my opponent feels the same, I would say the most crippling portion of the game was flat running out of supplies. This had never happened when I played the AI, some of that being the rate of advance was much slower…but I feel like something was amiss with my depots and getting the supplies forward.

I usually try to have a level 4 depot as the closest depot to the various areas of operation. Of course I try to get this depot as far forward as possible. Then I have the depot behind the level 4 at setting 3, then the one behind that at level 2 and finally the one behind that at level 1. This setup seemed to work fine with the AI, but not so much here.

I wonder if some of the really far back larger rail capacity depots (Germany) should also be set at level 1 just to pull from Berlin. Berlin seemed to be sitting on a lot of supply. Also, none of the supply routes seemed to be overburdened (ie red), but I may be misremembering that…

Any thoughts on improving my depot and supply issues would be great and helpful.

If my understanding of the logistics of the game are correct, freight stays in the depot if there is not enough SMP to move it forward. If you are creating depots roughly 4-6 hexes away from each other, and have the four most forward depots in that configuration, once you get deep inside the Soviet Union you will run into supply problems. This is because all the other depots in the rear are probably set to 0 and won't store any freight no matter what. What I do is this something like this:(obviously the amount of depots depend how far you are into the SU.) Berlin-1-1-1-1-2-2-2-2-2-3-4-4. If you leave the intermittent depots at a even a low priority, any freight without enough SMP to move forward gets stored in one of the in between depots, saving distance for the next logistics phase where they do not have to move as far as if they always just came from berlin. Look at the stored freight in the intermittent depots.

[Scarz]

ORIGINAL: Rosencrantus

ORIGINAL: Scarz

Summary of Game

I want to thank my opponent Aurelian, and everyone that read the AAR and left all the helpful comments. I would say that a game against a human opponent was a much different experience than against the AI and I enjoyed it.

While I believe I made lots of errors, and my opponent feels the same, I would say the most crippling portion of the game was flat running out of supplies. This had never happened when I played the AI, some of that being the rate of advance was much slower…but I feel like something was amiss with my depots and getting the supplies forward.

I usually try to have a level 4 depot as the closest depot to the various areas of operation. Of course I try to get this depot as far forward as possible. Then I have the depot behind the level 4 at setting 3, then the one behind that at level 2 and finally the one behind that at level 1. This setup seemed to work fine with the AI, but not so much here.

I wonder if some of the really far back larger rail capacity depots (Germany) should also be set at level 1 just to pull from Berlin. Berlin seemed to be sitting on a lot of supply. Also, none of the supply routes seemed to be overburdened (ie red), but I may be misremembering that…

Any thoughts on improving my depot and supply issues would be great and helpful.

If my understanding of the logistics of the game are correct, freight stays in the depot if there is not enough SMP to move it forward. If you are creating depots roughly 4-6 hexes away from each other, and have the four most forward depots in that configuration, once you get deep inside the Soviet Union you will run into supply problems. This is because all the other depots in the rear are probably set to 0 and won't store any freight no matter what. What I do is this something like this:(obviously the amount of depots depend how far you are into the SU.) Berlin-1-1-1-1-2-2-2-2-2-3-4-4. If you leave the intermittent depots at a even a low priority, any freight without enough SMP to move forward gets stored in one of the in between depots, saving distance for the next logistics phase where they do not have to move as far as if they always just came from berlin. Look at the stored freight in the intermittent depots.

Ok, that makes sense. Its similar to my 1-2-3-4 setup. So say 1-1-1-2-2-2-3-3-4 or something similar?

[Rosencrantus]

I usually do the two closest depots at 4 as sometimes for some reason having only a single level 4 depot doesn't funnel all the freight to that depot alone. It's hard to explain, you can try and tinker with this yourself really.

[Scarz]

ORIGINAL: Rosencrantus

I usually do the two closest depots at 4 as sometimes for some reason having only a single level 4 depot doesn't funnel all the freight to that depot alone. It's hard to explain, you can try and tinker with this yourself really.

Ok great, I will try that along with having more 1s, 2s and 3s in the chain.