Operation Barbarossa - Alpha AAR

[critter]

Looks great...What do the black slashes on the Russian units mean?

[Lannes]

Thanks elmo it's very interesting.

A question in how many laps for take Riga ?

Sorry for my bad english.

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: critter

Looks great...What do the black slashes on the Russian units mean?

The black slashes with the "R" on them designate routed units.

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: Lannes

Thanks elmo it's very interesting.

A question in how many laps for take Riga ?

Sorry for my bad english.

Not exactly sure what you are asking. This is turn one so if by "laps" you mean turns then it fell on the first turn. If you meant how many attacks then I had to make one attack to force out the defenders.

[elmo3]

Army Group Center (AGC) is led by Fedor von Bock.  It consists of 2nd Pz Grp (Guderian) (light blue), 4th Army (von Kluge) (dark blue), 9th Army (Strauss) (green), 3rd Pz Grp (Hoth) (light green), and Luftflotte 2 (Kesselring).  One operational change I'm considering is reassigning XXXXVI Pz Corps to Army Group South.  That will only happen if I decide to go for the larger encirclement with AGS described above.  If we go for the more modest pocket then that corps will stay under Guderian and move toward Minsk.

Opposing AGC is the Western Military District of Dmitrii Pavlov consisting of 3rd Army (V. Kuznetsov), 10th Army (Golubev), and Western Air Command (Naumenko), and some of the 11th Army from Baltic MD mentioned above.

As you can see in the screen shot 9th Army and 4th Army sliced southeast and northeast respectively to create a large pocket that has trapped much of the Soviet 10th Army and parts of 3rd Army as well.  The 3rd Pz Grp was able to drive through and capture Vilnius (just north of the screen shot) and Minsk while 2nd Pz Grp took Brest Litovsk easily and pushed aside all resistance from there toward Minsk.  A few divisions of 2nd Pz Grp are off the southern edge of the screen shot. The pocket we created looks solid and I see no way for the Soviets to break out, so they are doomed next turn.

[Lannes]

Ok 1 turn for take Riga ?

[cantona2]

Already been probably answered in the main forum but whats the time scale per turn? 1 turn to take Riga must mean maybe a week per turn? As to the rail hexes, are these converted automatically are do pioniere units meed to be used?

[elmo3]

The first turn is only 4 days.  This is essentially part of the special first turn surprise rules.  All other turns are a week long.  So yes, Riga can fall on turn 1.  The Axis gets 5 FBD (rail repair) units that are manually controlled by the player.  In addition HQ's can send out construction battalions to help convert or repair rail hexes.  The player does not control those units.

[Neal_MLC]

Concerning the pocket, what sort of supply issues/effects (other than annhilation) will the Soviets suffer if they are unable to break out? Do they jus disappear or will their values be steadily reduced? if so at what rate?

This AAR is such a tease...

[Neal_MLC]

One other question... where does supply originate Berlin/Moscow or the appropriae map edge?

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: Neal_MLC

Concerning the pocket, what sort of supply issues/effects (other than annhilation) will the Soviets suffer if they are unable to break out? Do they jus disappear or will their values be steadily reduced? if so at what rate?

Units without a supply path will become isolated in their next Logistics Phase so there is no immediate effect during my part of the turn. After that they will suffer morale effects, low supply effects, and be unable to build forts greater than a value of 2. If they are routed or shattered they will surrender instead. Isolated non-combat units suffer double retreat attrition. So they don't just disappear but they will be hurting.

This AAR is such a tease...

My plan is working then ... [;)]

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: Neal_MLC

One other question... where does supply originate Berlin/Moscow or the appropriae map edge?

You need a functioning rail line to your respective mad edge.

[Zort]

Does Riga (and other baltic ports) become supply sources for the German once captured? Can you start rail conversion from riga even though the rail is not connected to Germany?

[elmo3]

Army Group South (AGS) is led by Gern von Rundstedt.  Subordinate units include 17th Army (von Stulpnagel) (brown), 1st Pz Grp (von Kleist plus XXXXVI Pz Corps attached by me) (red), 11th Army (von Schobert) which is off my screen shot to the south, 6th Army (von Richenau), and Luftflotte 4 (Loehr).

AGS is opposed by the Kiev Military District commanded by Kirponos and consisting of 5th Army (Potapov), 6th Army (Muzychenko), 12th Army (Pondelin), and Kiev Air Command (Ptukhin).

We decided to try and create the huge pocket so 1st PzGrp gets some added support on loan from Guderian.  As with the other Army Groups the infantry is charged with blowing the defenders away from the border so the panzers can roll through unhindered into the enemy rear areas.  Let's see how they did.



As you can see from the shaded hexes we just managed to create the very large pocket around Lvov, trapping thousands of Soviet soldiers.  Unfortunately this pocket is not as secure as the one created by AGC.  In fact it looks more like swiss cheese.  We'll see what the AI does about it shortly.  One more thing to do before ending my turn is to set some units to Refit.  Refit is off by default so you need to turn it on for those units that you want to get priority for replacements.  Nothing to really see with that so I'll go ahead and do it, then end the turn and post some more shots after the Soviets react.  My intelligence officers assure me that the Soviets have been crushed by our opening onslaught.  There can't be more than a few armies in reserve so we should have little trouble brushing them aside and getting to Moscow and beyond in the new couple of turns.  [8|]

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: Zort

Does Riga (and other baltic ports) become supply sources for the German once captured? Can you start rail conversion from riga even though the rail is not connected to Germany?

You can trace supply through a port. How effective it is depends on the level of the port and distance involved. If you want to manually start repairing rail from a port like Riga you need to move an FBD unit there or rely on an HQ to start converion with it's construction battalions.

[elmo3]

OK the first turn is over and here are the ground and air losses for both sides:





The Soviets were not able to break out of either pocket so they will be taking even more significant losses next turn than they did on turn 1.  I'll probably work on turn 2 later today and post more tomorrow.

[Capt Cliff]

How do the above loses reflect what historically happened? About same? More or less?

[bosbes]

Wow, nice graphics! Are these actual in game pictures?[:)]

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: Capt Cliff

How do the above loses reflect what historically happened? About same? More or less?

Sorry, I don't have any loss numbers for the first few days. And I don't believe the Germans made the kind of pocket I did around Lvov. So my numbers may be low right now but we'll see once those pockets are reduced.

[elmo3]

ORIGINAL: hoe ist?

Wow, nice graphics! Are these actual in game pictures?[:)]

All screen shots are from the game.