Matrix Games Forums

Originally posted by Paul McNeely:
Nick, it was actually very common for the germans to concentrate their airforces on the most active HQs. As I said in one of the other topics they were generally always able to achieve local air superiority where they wanted it but always at the expense of conceeding it somewhere else.

I generally leave my Infantrie Armees with only a single fighter and a single ground attack group and give my Pz Armees 2 fighter, 2 stuka, and 1 bomber (or some combination of stuka and bomber that equals 3 groups...but I reserve my german stuka groups for my Pz Armees).

The only that annoys me is how to defend Polesti. There was a special air group HQ assigned to just that task with a couple of good fighter groups assigned to it (to the total surprise of the first allied bombing mission who were expecting second line pilots flying junk). But executing this in the game is darn hard since it seems to require using either of the Rummian Army HQs, the Hungarian Army HQ, the 8th Italian Army HQ or the 2nd German Armee HQ. None of which make any sense.

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Paul

Setup sounds good but i take a risk and put the Air units you allocate to Inf Armies with the Pz heavy groups to get the 7 groups per HQ. 3 Ftrs per HQ allows only rare loss of bombers when doing Int and AB attacks(unless the soviets have REALLY massed at one point).This is where i was overkilling it by having 4 Ftrs at an HQ.
In both my german games Ploesti has Rum 'X' HQ with two 150+ mixed fighter and 1 100+ Me109 (it's may/june '42 in both games so the ploesti group is to stop Sov attacks only)
What is important is to have at least 3 X 180 + FW190 groups of 95+ training in west front and 2 of the same in Italian front ready for start of allied bombing. If you put said large groups in those HQ's when they reach 88-90 training in east front combat then natural attrition in west and Italian fronts drives up training over several months till they get to 97-99. In repeated playtest of the start of allied bombing (6-8 turns) no bombs have hit german industry with those 5 groups in place.
(I give Svar the laurels for teaching me that one.)

Nick

Originally posted by Lorenzo from Spain:
A possible solution to the HQ́s mules:

I think it could be change easily the program, to allow only a change of HQ every turn. And more: a change of HQ must cause the unit will not can plot or attack. (In reality, a change of HQ signifies confusion). And cause a little loss of readiness of unit (may be a 10%).

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Good idea abut blocking the second HQ change. This was proposed a year and a half ago, but Arnaud said it was difficult (partly due to memory needs to track the change, I believe). Regarding plotting after a change, I think totally banning it is too much. With one week turns, this would overstate the confusion of a change. These type of HQ changes, which the Germans were great at but even the Soviets did frequently on the fly (I can document a number of instances in February 1943 where the Soviets did this both before and after Manstein's counterattack without major problems) would probably be more on the order of 1-2 days rather than a full week. Maybe random chance of the first two plots failing in this case, maybe 25% for each, with only one failure allowed, would make more sense?

TEST
(Attempt to bring back discussion group)

As the forum was cleared (I think), I ́ve synthesized the home rules in “Set of home rules to play PEBM”. And now, appears this topic again.
Well, I hope that there is general agreement whit these home rules, I tried to synthesize the general opinions, no only the mines. As you know, I always played with mules Hqs and multiple attacks against a single target.
I think the simplest way to avoid HQ mules is allowing a single change of HQ every turn.

Now I m playing as German a 1941 campaign against Josan, without using HQ mules nor multiple air attacks. We just finished the same campaign with HQ mules and multiples air attacks, so we can compare.
Results:
The Germans reached the gates of Moscow in the first week of... SEPTEMBER!? And Josan is a very very good player. Was no difference between the two ways of play. Two explications: 1) Historically, the German generals were incompetents, was so easy reach Moscow... or 2) There is something wrong in this scenario.
But without HQ mules, the units were with less readiness. And the HQ́s were in shortage of OPs, because now they must advance with the armies.
It́s necessary use not only the best generals in combat.
There is not too difference in using multiple air attacks. Now the Lutwaffe must be in multiple airports (to give air protection and support to advancing units), so when there is a important target, it receives multiple attacks (but now from different Hqs). May be will be a difference in others scenarios with better soviet fighters; but in this there is not. Sometimes is complicated remember if a target was or not was attacked.