Someone explain to me again why CV is reduced for isolated unit?

[fbs]

ORIGINAL: wulfgar

The trick is not losing your supplies in the first place. In the case of Bataan good order was maintained and they retreated into a natural fort that couldn't be out flanked. Their front line got to defend against those attacking from the front.

That's correct, but they hadn't access to supplies. The rule in the game is that if you can't path to a supply source in under 100 MP, you're isolated (doesn't require an actual encirclement). Bataan peninsula was not a supply source (they were low on supplies from day 1), so from the game's rules they should be a wash-up in 1 or 2 weeks. Instead, as you perfectly explained, in real life it's not lack of access to a supply source that makes troops a wash-up.

This is from James Dunningan, "How to Make War", p. 460. "A nonmechanized army requires only 15 to 30 pounds of supply per man per day. Every 1,000 tons of supply keeps 100,000 men in combat for a day. If one rail or road enters an area occupied by 100,000 troops, it must be cut for more than 95 percent of the time to have any effect. And it must be cut for a sustained period, because military forces stockpile supplies when they have a chance... Units without supplies can still fight, but at greater cost in casualties. As the Chinese in Korea and the North Vietnamese in Vietnam demonstrated, it is possible to take more casualties in lieu of using ammunition and still stand off a better-supplied force. In Korea it was found that with twice the manpower taking twice the casualties, the Chinese were able to match better-armed and better-supplied UN units... The key point is that adverse effects of reduced or no supply are gradual. Troops can continue to operate in those conditions for weeks or months. How is this so? Call it the Use What You Got rule of supply: when troops are well supplied they profligate. When times are lean so are expenditures. When supply dries out for any reason, expedient methods are found to get by with less. History is full of examples."

I think the most immediate factor in an encirclement is really morale.

[wulfgar]

That's correct, but they hadn't access to supplies. The rule in the game is that if you can't path to a supply source in under 100 MP, you're isolated (doesn't require an actual encirclement). Bataan peninsula was not a supply source (they were low on supplies from day 1), so from the game's rules they should be a wash-up in 1 or 2 weeks. Instead, as you perfectly explained, in real life it's not lack of access to a supply source that makes troops a wash-up.

The question is, was the B's of Bataan's combat capability reduced by their disposition?

I'd say yes, they didn't have the combat capability they would have had if they had full supply lines.

As for the two largest encirclements of Soviets in 1941, once pocketed they lasted about 10 days. But if they had a position that could be defended from outflanking, then they might have been able to last much longer.

[AFV]

The only pockets I see last longer is when its mud, or perhaps the first turn. Otherwise, in my experience, they do not last longer than 1 turn. Is this not the experience others have?
 
This certainly hits the nail on the head:

ORIGINAL:  redmarkus4
A big part of the problem is the fact that in WitE cities don't seem to generate supply.  If a surrounded city generated slowly reducing amounts of supply each turn, then:
1. You'd be more likely to defend them.
2. The enemy would be more likely to attack them.
3. Pockets around a major city would hold for longer.
4. The overall realism of the game would be enhanced.

 
 

[PMCN]

The city doesn't even need to generate supply it just needs to send out that supply to the units in the pocket.

The Germans were routinely pocketed in the winter. This is how they stopped the 41-42 offensive, by turtling up in any place that offered shelter from the weather. Atomic Games Veliki Luki game mentions that they had fortified the city in prepartion for the winter and included supply stockpiling.

I'm not convinced the CV reduction means diddly but there is no need for it. A unit in a pocket should simply be cut off from supply and the normal rules for lack fo supply should take effect. There was no indication of mass panic by either side due to being cut off. The whole Minsk pocket was a nightmare for the germans in 41 as the screen of panzer forces were routinely getting assaulted by scratch forces of the exfiltrating russians. How long any particular pocket lasted in week long game turns is hard to say but most probably lasted 1-2 weeks...but they also would have been attacked in that time, not just some weak probe by a bde or something. Otherwise its not like the shoot their guns into the air in celebration every night or something.

A city with supply in the city should become the supply source for all units in the pocket. When that runs out then things should go rather quickly but otherwise it should take combat to reduce the pocket. Though in 41, a typical low morale, crap experience rifle division isn't going to put up a fight anyway. But it would stop people doing crazy stuff like exposing all of southern germany and whatever because they know the russians can't do anything.

[MechFO]

ORIGINAL: Paul McNeely

The city doesn't even need to generate supply it just needs to send out that supply to the units in the pocket.

The Germans were routinely pocketed in the winter. This is how they stopped the 41-42 offensive, by turtling up in any place that offered shelter from the weather. Atomic Games Veliki Luki game mentions that they had fortified the city in prepartion for the winter and included supply stockpiling.

I'm not convinced the CV reduction means diddly but there is no need for it. A unit in a pocket should simply be cut off from supply and the normal rules for lack fo supply should take effect. There was no indication of mass panic by either side due to being cut off. The whole Minsk pocket was a nightmare for the germans in 41 as the screen of panzer forces were routinely getting assaulted by scratch forces of the exfiltrating russians. How long any particular pocket lasted in week long game turns is hard to say but most probably lasted 1-2 weeks...but they also would have been attacked in that time, not just some weak probe by a bde or something. Otherwise its not like the shoot their guns into the air in celebration every night or something.

A city with supply in the city should become the supply source for all units in the pocket. When that runs out then things should go rather quickly but otherwise it should take combat to reduce the pocket. Though in 41, a typical low morale, crap experience rifle division isn't going to put up a fight anyway. But it would stop people doing crazy stuff like exposing all of southern germany and whatever because they know the russians can't do anything.

+1

The current rule where being in pocket means one is immediately rendered helpless doesn't make sense. Effects should increase with time and depend on available supplies.

[Redmarkus5]

ORIGINAL: AFV

The only pockets I see last longer is when its mud, or perhaps the first turn. Otherwise, in my experience, they do not last longer than 1 turn. Is this not the experience others have?

This certainly hits the nail on the head:

ORIGINAL:  redmarkus4
A big part of the problem is the fact that in WitE cities don't seem to generate supply.  If a surrounded city generated slowly reducing amounts of supply each turn, then:
1. You'd be more likely to defend them.
2. The enemy would be more likely to attack them.
3. Pockets around a major city would hold for longer.
4. The overall realism of the game would be enhanced.

1-2 turns max is my experience, except vs. the AI (on AI 110%, Human 100%) when it sometimes ignores a few pocketed units and moves on.

[Redmarkus5]

I agree with most of the above. A couple of additional thoughts/observations:

1. With Sov AI on 110% I note that units in the Minsk pocket move WEST on Turn 1. This seems rather ahistorical and I would suggest that the game logic for out of supply units should be something along these lines:
- Check supply status
- If 'out of supply' then check for closest 'in supply hex' (which may be an isolated city, if that game design change were also to be made)
- If unit CV/Morale/Other combined factors are >n, then more/attack towards the closest in supply hex.
- If unit CV/Morale/Other are <n, then dig in/surrender based on a random chance factor.
This represents break out attempts by the higher quality Soviet and Axis units and results in pockets 'walking' east or west as they did historically, rather than taking themselves deeper into trouble as they do currently in the game.

2. Cities in real life have a couple of functions:
- They produce supply in factories and processing plants
- They store supply in warehouses
- They are the transport hub for the network that moves supply about the local area
So, a city in a pocket continues to produce supply from raw material stocks for a period, then it continues to distribute previously manufactured/processed supplies from storage for a longer period, finally slowing to a trickle. It also facilitates the movement of said supply, again for a given period. Encircled cities and units should therefore 'wither on the vine' rather than suffering sudden death as they do now.

[Redmarkus5]

A further thought on the significance of Bataan and Stalingrad in relation to how long isolated units survive.

Bataan was always intended to be the last bastion in the event of invasion. Although preparations were not complete and more troops withdrew there than could be properly supplied, it wasn't a pocket in the sense of say Minsk or Kiev. Stalingrad, meanwhile, was a center of intense military operations for many months before it was encircled by the Soviets. Major Axis formations had their HQs and supply depots there or nearby. There were also two large airfields that could receive supplies and almost all of the Luftwaffe's lift capacity was employed for this.

The game doesn't model this well because higher HQs in-situ do not appear to build supply dumps of their own accord, as they would in reality. One part of the solution would be to extend the existing digging in logic so that when higher HQs 'dig in' they also build up a supply stock. This applies to all HQs and is distinct from a deliberate HQ buildup. They can then expend this stock EITHER, to attack, to defend OR over time, once pocketed.

Such an approach would mean that Soviet armies pocketed early on in the game would not have built up such a supply stock - they would be eliminated quickly, while armies pocketed later in the game, particularly following a period of inactivity, would be much better able to last a few turns, breakout, or hold until relieved.

The impacts on player technique would be immense - reserve armies, operational pauses, relief operations and breakouts, the need to fix a pocket in place by using part of the pocketing force on inner cordon duty, the list probably goes on.

[Mehring]

Redmarkus4, good suggestions. I thought HQs did perform this function of hoarding above their immediate needs but maybe it's another function that's in the game but not tweeked to a useful level.

Another suggestion I'd make is to allow manpower to leak from pockets and return to its nation forcepool according to the porousness of the encirclement distance from front lines, and all those other dialectical variables like relative morale and experience of each side. And HQs should go the same way as other units.

[DorianGray]

ORIGINAL: fbs

ORIGINAL: wulfgar

The trick is not losing your supplies in the first place. In the case of Bataan good order was maintained and they retreated into a natural fort that couldn't be out flanked. Their front line got to defend against those attacking from the front.

That's correct, but they hadn't access to supplies. The rule in the game is that if you can't path to a supply source in under 100 MP, you're isolated (doesn't require an actual encirclement). Bataan peninsula was not a supply source (they were low on supplies from day 1), so from the game's rules they should be a wash-up in 1 or 2 weeks. Instead, as you perfectly explained, in real life it's not lack of access to a supply source that makes troops a wash-up.

This is from James Dunningan, "How to Make War", p. 460. "A nonmechanized army requires only 15 to 30 pounds of supply per man per day. Every 1,000 tons of supply keeps 100,000 men in combat for a day. If one rail or road enters an area occupied by 100,000 troops, it must be cut for more than 95 percent of the time to have any effect. And it must be cut for a sustained period, because military forces stockpile supplies when they have a chance... Units without supplies can still fight, but at greater cost in casualties. As the Chinese in Korea and the North Vietnamese in Vietnam demonstrated, it is possible to take more casualties in lieu of using ammunition and still stand off a better-supplied force. In Korea it was found that with twice the manpower taking twice the casualties, the Chinese were able to match better-armed and better-supplied UN units... The key point is that adverse effects of reduced or no supply are gradual. Troops can continue to operate in those conditions for weeks or months. How is this so? Call it the Use What You Got rule of supply: when troops are well supplied they profligate. When times are lean so are expenditures. When supply dries out for any reason, expedient methods are found to get by with less. History is full of examples."

I think the most immediate factor in an encirclement is really morale.

I also think the keyword here is "nonmechanized" army.

The "Use What You Got" rule will only go so far for tanks, APCs, SP Arty, ...

One thing that I miss from other games systems is the attack bonuses attributed to attaching a unit from multiple hex-sides.

Perhaps this is somewhat abstracted to the out-of-supply mechanics ?

[gradenko2k]

ORIGINAL: DorianGray
One thing that I miss from other games systems is the attack bonuses attributed to attaching a unit from multiple hex-sides.

I believe the answer here is that with the scale of the game, the devs decided that a 10-km hex was large enough frontage that you wouldn't feel the tactical effects of a multi-hex attack.