RE: Pocket and kill isolated vs shatter/rout now
Posted: Wed Mar 07, 2012 3:17 pm
ORIGINAL: pompack
ORIGINAL: redmarkus4
ORIGINAL: Mehring
My Axis opponent is using a tactic which I think specific to 1941. He has made two sizable pockets over the summer and used inf regiments and Rumanians to hold them. I have, since September, been desperate to finish their supplies and destroy them before November so most units will reform as shells. My opponent will do nothing to help me.
Upside if successful, he will face less divisions later, downside, he has, I think, wasted an opportunity to take Voronezh and Lipetsk, even Tambov in the summer and destroy more industry. I think he's been too clever.
That's an interesting one! Refusing to kill the enemy in order to prevent the spirits of his dead soldiers from flying east and once again taking on human form!
Yet another example of how players develop weird and wonderful exploits in response to weird and wonderful game design choices...
Yes but ...
To get back to the original question, the answer depends on whether you want the living bodies (not the dead spirits) of the Russian soldiers infiltrating east to be reincorporated into available manpower.
Options (Totally ignoring the cheesy strategy option)
1. Clean up the pocket immediately
a. Advance to the east resumes quickly
b. While many Soviets are killed or captured, most end up "disabled" and eventually return as manpower points
2. Surround the pocket for one turn and then clear
a. Some units tied up on pocket duty
b. Surrendered Soviets NEVER return as manpower points
While the Soviets can always use more AP, they will not (usually) win or lose based upon lack of AP. However lack of manpower in the midgame is a killer. So I always go for containing the pocket with minimal forces and then reducing it as quickly as possible on the following turns. Just my opinion.
This is the way I usually play the game as the Axis (although I don't claim to be an expert). Reducing the Soviets manpower is paramount in 1941 in my opinion