Central Front, turn 22-32:
Well, I'm breaking the format since Norther Front no longer exists. Anyways, the following happens between turns 22-32
With the first soviet defensive line now being completely crushed in every direction...well apart from Odessa...the soviets were struggling to build a new one. Especially since the fighting went on as my forces continue to push for Moscow. I had by now concentrated most, if not all, artillery units in Moscow, which gave my forces some punching power. On top of this, majority of panzergrenadier and panzer division were concentrated here aswell.
The plan was simple, just push through and capture Moscow. There were no encirclements planned, the goal was to push back or destroy every single unit the soviets placed in the line. This would force them to place even more units there...simply destory line after line through constant attacks.
Of course, my casualties were not gonna be light...but the prize would be worth it.
So, on turn 22 I set out to carry the first round of attacks, as I said until now there had been mostly spoiling attacks. I didn't of course commit all my forces yet, I left some infantry and armor in reserve for the future turns.
But anyways, the first round of attacks were succesful, as the enemy resistance was crushed everywhere it was met. Of course this kind of fighting, 4-8 rounds of combat per turn, burns out the defending as well as the attacking units. And at this point I didn't really have anything left to rebuild my units with...all my heavy rifle squad replacements went to reconstituting destroyed units...
Turn 22:
The results were as planned, the enemy was forced to reinforce Moscow, and I would simply crush the next line again. At the meantime my units were also advancing along the Volga river. However, I did not place any significant units here, I simply wished to gain good positions for the winter.
The enemy had pretty much nothing in here, since everything here was going to the defence of Moscow. A few divisions and regiments were guarding bridges.
Volga river, turn 23:
A small opportunity to expand the attack east represented itself on turn 23, but I decided not to do this. Although the area was open, there was little to gain there. My target was Moscow, and I had to push there with everything I had.
I did capture the town of Ryazan though a few turns later, but withdrew from there once I had destroyed the industry.
Ryazan, turn 23:
The enemy pushed even more reinfocements here, but it only slowed the mighty axis war machine down a bit. I was still able to advance as I had planned, 1 or 2 hexes per turn all along the front. This even though there seemed to be at least 1 or 2 Soviet tank brigades in every hex.
Even crossing the Ugra river, which was in the way of the 'southern offensive' proved to be quite easy. All thanks to the massive firepower. However, casualties kept mounting..and while the soviet casualties mounted faster, and althought the had by this point lost quite a few industrial cities, they could still replace those casualties. I on the other hand found more and more units that had one third or half of their strenght left...but in full supply and readiness. Would this be a pyrrhic victory? Would the Axis war machine be able to regain it's former strenght?
Turn 25:
And as the forces grew tired, I threw in some fresh panzer while freeing up some other for rest. Also worth noting that at this point my artillery started to get crowded...I had some 9 hexes stacked full of artillery, and as expected they did quite some damage.
And while I still had fresh units to throw in, my enemy did not. Or so I thought, until I discovered that a couple of Guard divisions had arrived to the rescue of the city. Those would prove to be harder to kill than a full stack of other units.
Situation on turn 27:
The tank brigades were also quite difficult to handle, even more so as they begun to stack up. A rifle division backed up by a tank brigade could be defeated, but a hex full of tank brigades started to be a bit harder...since all they had left were tanks, and artillery is pretty much useless against tanks in TOAW.
This meant that my own tank units needed to give a few hard punches...which also ment they were gonna take some hard casualties.
Turn 28, 35th Panzer regiment...or what's left of it:
Meanwhile a bit north from Moscow, Vologda and Yaroslav that is, I decide to advance a bit as the enemy has no defences in the area. Also probaply worht mentioning that much further north, Archanglesk and Murmansk are completely cut off...they will be going once I can somehow get more troops there.
As I said, those guard division were a bitch to deal with. Even when so close to Moscow, one of them stops my advance for a complete turn. I manage to wear it down, but it wears my forces down as well.
Luckily I managed to destroy the Soviet Northern Front all those turns ago and the 8th Panzer Division which ha now rested enough to gain full supply and readiness is sent to the rescue. It should be able to make the final push.
On turn 30 thus, the city of Moscow finally falls. The enemy is unable to counter-attack with his worn out troops. I stop my offensive here aswell, and only do a couple more limited attacks.
And with turn 32 the mud arrives, and thus all fighting stops.
Situation at the end of turn 32:
See the panzer untis in that screenshot? Each stack is a separate division. And yes, one of those stacks only has a HQ unit and an Engineer unit left.
Now, since Moscow fell the Soviets got quite a few penalties. First of all their rail capacity fell to 6000. Which is excellent for me. They lost 20% production aswell(but still outproduce me...).
However, something I didn't actually remember happened aswell: Turks joined the Axis. While I do welcome the 5% increase in replacements...the turks I don't welcome so much. They will probaply be more of a burden really. I figure I have to send 10 or so divisions there to build up a strong enough line.
Also, I discovered a bug...tha Axis Bonus tanks are set to arrive by event 500...I used that event to increase Soviet air shock...in the vanilla FitE it is not used. So thus, I now have some 750 Panthers sitting in Berlin. The Soviets also gained some bonus fleets thanks to this.
No biggie though, we just let them sit there...funnily enough though, I don't even have any untis that could receive panther as replacements.
