ORIGINAL: ComradeP
Your posts shows that you really need to play against a competent Soviet opponent to see that the situation you describe is highly utopian.
That will be your job in our game...[;)]
In the meantime, and in my opponents collective defense, I will say that none of them are incompetent. They possess varying levels of competence, and have utilized a variety of defensive techniques, none of which have been able to stop very similar breakthroughs throughout the summer and early fall of 1941. Therefore, I contend that your evaluation of "highly utopian" is in error.
When we resume our game, I am willing to be proven wrong, if you can manage it..[:)]
ORIGINAL: ComradeP
At the times when I am making a one hex breakthrough, there's a simple reason for it: German mobile unit hasty attacks suck, period. A Rifle division in a hex with 2=8 is in many cases going to stay in that hex, even if you bring a Panzer corps.
Occasionally, a 2=8 will stay in place. However,
properly outfitted Pz Korps stacks, with directly assigned SUs and GS-on, will pop them 9 out of ten times. Once retreated, then you are dealing with a 1=1, or 1=2, which will soon rout.
ORIGINAL: ComradeP
I'd really like to cause more casualties to, but I can't.
Why? Because Soviet units that are hasty attacked by mobile units rarely rout, usually retreat and usually don't suffer significant losses.
I beg to differ. Even if they don't rout the first time, they will after repeated retreats. In my opinion, this is where you're not taking advantage of your mobility and following up with the successive attacks.
ORIGINAL: ComradeP
Units that do rout usually recover and reappear in the line again next turn. You'll notice that there's usually a large pile of Soviet routed units near my breakthrough areas. At the start of my next turn, very few are still routed.
If your penetrations are deep enough, then you should be displacing the routed units further from your critical hexes. In any event, when they recover, they are usually at an unready status, and unable to both move and attack.
ORIGINAL: ComradeP
I'm facing a checkerboard or wall of units, and my mobile units (despite what their CV's might indicate) don't have the power to remove many of them from their hexes.
I've been facing the same thing, with a competent set of opponents, yet my results are much different. Why? We are playing the same game, so the obvious answer seems to be that we are doing things differently.
ORIGINAL: ComradeP
When the infantry attacks, the Soviets might suffer around 2500-3000 losses and the units might rout, but there are always more.
Indeed, which is why you absolutely need to leverage your superior mobility and firepower to multiply this effect as much as you can. There are always more...to attack.
ORIGINAL: ComradeP
A crossing like the one you made, at just one point, can fairly easily be contained. The speed with which you've advanced with limited mobile units just shows that your opponent has a thing or two to learn about defence in depth and maintaing reserves. Crossings in one area are generally a bad idea.
The crossing of the Dnepr cannot be contained with the forces that are available to him in the immediate area. I have reserves that will be *pouring* through the gap. Not dribbling through a one-hex opening. I have interior lines within the exploitation region and he has too much frontage to try to contain it. If he does not displace his lines, he will be pocketed on the following turn.
If the breakthrough was not supported by the northern attacks, then he might be able to *attempt* to contain it, but again, since he has the exterior lines to manage, it would leave me with the initiative to once again cut through and exploit on the next turn with my reserves. Giving him two such bulges to try to contain, will stretch his reserves too thinly, allowing multiple successive encirclements. Counterattacking my bulges will not lead to any result other than keeping his forces close to mine and pocketed, rather than escaping. I've left my opponent a one turn window of opportunity, to either abandon the Kiev pocket en masse, or face a certain encirclement closing on the following turn.
ORIGINAL: ComradeP
As for the second picture: punching two Panzer Groups through what seems to be a poorly held part of the front, without substantial Soviet reserves in the area is child's play as long as there are no protected natural defences in the way. Anyone can do that. A maximum of 10 pocketed divisions also isn't too great for an operation like that.
The objective here was not to pocket 10 divisions. The objective was to force a mass displacement of the enemy, peeling him off a set of natural defensive lines, with minimum casualties to myself. I did this through leveraging concentration of force, and mobility - two of the primary advantages that the Axis have at this stage of the game. I did this against a variety of defensive positions, against a competent player who was dug in, and defending in depth. Though it might not be child's play, it is certainly possible to repeatedly perform these types of operations as the Axis player in 1941. Even against competent Soviet play.
