Girshwin (GER) vs. colberki (SOV) [Two Beginners, colberki allowed]

[Girshwin]

I've sent off turn 4, but am holding off commenting on my extravagant plans as my opponent is now welcome to read/comment. I will now stay 2-3 turns behind the game. Both of us commenting on the AAR may be helpful as it is a learning experience. Hopefully once he sees the full glory of my moves he will despair and not realize my panzers will be running out of gas. Except for the the HQBUed ones which I will try not to disclose. [:)]

Noted, I will make sure to keep cities garrisoned.

[colberki]

STAVKA is keen to avoid a T6+ game ending pocket N of Smolensk as in the recent Michael T/Sillyflower game.
If I survive until December 1941, I will try to I try to implement Charlie's Red Army 2.0 for 1942 with a few tweaks of my own.

[Girshwin]

ORIGINAL: colberki

STAVKA is keen to avoid a T6+ game ending pocket N of Smolensk

Who said anything about large pocket NORTH of Smolensk? [:'(]

[Girshwin]

Turn 4 (We are on turn 5 in the actual game.)

In the north, the panzers are low on gas so approach the Luga line cautiously. I am deciding whether to go straight for Leningrad or try the right hook around lake Ilmen. The lake crossing doesn't seem too heavily defended, but it will take Pioneers to cross those rivers...

In the center, I use all of my panzer corps to punch straight for Smolensk, cracking his fort line. My goal this turn is to leave next turn open to several pocketing options if he does not retreat. Two corps are gassed up in preparation for the offensive next turn.

In the south, my opponent still seems to be running instead of fighting. I am surprised Odessa is not more heavily defended. However, recon shows that both Kiev and the entire Dnepr line are heavily defended. I think I will need to pull up the infantry before I can have a chance to crack it.

[Balou]

ORIGINAL: Girshwin

In the north, the panzers are low on gas so approach the Luga line cautiously. I am deciding whether to go straight for Leningrad or try the right hook around lake Ilmen. The lake crossing doesn't seem too heavily defended, but it will take Pioneers to cross those rivers...

Right hook: that's no tank country east of Lake Ilmen, so I suggest you select experienced/high morale inf divs and high profile corps leaders to support your mob divisions. And put lots of heavy artillery in those corps, since when you really pocket Leningrad, you will need (apart from pioneers) firepower to flatten fortifications.

[Girshwin]

Turn 5:

On turn 4, the Finns were having a lutefisk celebration and forgot to move, but this turn they advance to the Lake Janis line.

In the north, I opt against the right hook around Lake Ilmen because I haven't devoted a lot of resources to Army Group North and I am worried I will get stuck. LVI and XXXXI panzer corps approached Leningrad. Thankfully, I could cross at the north end of the Luga, where it looks like the defenses are thinner and the terrain more friendly to panzers. My goals are to avoid the swamps as much as I can. I don't think I will pocket anything at the Luga line but hope to break into the fort line to make the rest of the line untenable.

In my game vs. the AI, I took Leningrad by crossing the Volkhov and taking the border ports. That seems more difficult vs. a human opponent, so I will potentially try and cross the Neva with brute force. I understand that there is also a strategy where you bomb the port down, but that it is risky and you can lose a lot of planes if the opponent sets up flak.

In the south, I don’t fight. My opponent has chosen to save his forces and is defending the Dnepr in force. I try to move as many infantry as I can close to the river for a bridgehead next turn. My understanding is that infantry is much better at attacking across the river than tanks, so next turn I want to be able to set up stacks of infantry for a prepared attack. I try not to move my tanks much, except for moving the tanks near Kiev south and as close to the rail line as they can go, so that they can pick where to exploit next turn. It seems like a large portion of his strength is near Kiev so I don’t think I can take the city without much pain and heartache. My other tank corps are idling near Cherkassy and in cities for now.

The best for last: I am very proud of this pocket. I know that destruction of the Soviet army is the German’s #1 goal, and that pockets are normal for experts, but this came off well. It is the first real pocket since the rush at the beginning. Gassing up the panzers last turn came off well, and I was able to surround Smolensk, breaking the line above and below it with massed infantry. By my count I have 3 panzer corps and 12 infantry corps, so a significant portion of the German army is here in force. I expected to get only the pocket around Smolensk, but found that I had panzers left (one was in reserve at Vitebsk and I believe had 50 MPs) and was able to attack the Dnepr line from behind, allowing 2 divisions in the 4th Army to come behind.

However, there is one weak spot in the Smolensk pocket, which I circled in the close-up picture. I have concern that units could potentially rail in close to the weak spot, where they only have to win 1 battle against a regiment to open the pocket. Thankfully, the strong local mech/tank units are inside the pocket.

The Germans have good morale and the quartermasters send home shipments of boots and winter clothing, because what could go wrong?

[Girshwin]

Close up of the Turn 5 pocket:

[colberki]

Soviets are near collapse on all fronts. I think Axis is looking on track for 1941 house rule of automatic victory condition when Leningrad, Moscow, Voronezh and Rostov are all captured during Barbarossa!

[RKhan]

The pocket is well done. I was surprised your opponent stuck around after last turn.

[RKhan]

ORIGINAL: colberki

Soviets are near collapse on all fronts. I think Axis is looking on track for 1941 house rule of automatic victory condition when Leningrad, Moscow, Voronezh and Rostov are all captured during Barbarossa!

I would say the Axis are only ok in the south, and you can probably recover after the Smolensk pocket.

With beginners it is impossible to tell what will happen next. They are my favourite games to play. Keep fighting Comrade!

[Girshwin]

Bad news for STAVKA coming next turn (6) in the South. Major props to my opponent for soldiering on after a tough early start. I think there is time to even out, and with us just starting with PBEM games, either of us could still make a huge mistake (relative to each other's skill levels, I am sure we would both be crushed by an expert) and not realize it until several turns later. It could also be that with mild winter and no 2:1 = 1:1 the house rules are stacked against STAVKA.

[Girshwin]

Turn 6: A grind, an advance, and a breakthrough

Not much action in the north, the Soviets begin to grind through the massed ranks of Soviets. I don't have a lot of infantry here- I chose to send most of my infantry toward Moscow. Is this a good strategy or will it bite me later?

In the center, the tanks break through a weak line and spread out. I'm not sure if this is an effective formation, but I like it because it looks like giant jaws coming to eat Moscow. Thankfully, the railhead is getting close, having gotten an advantage from running through the Baltic Rail Zone as long as it could. Versus the AI I spread my infantry all over the front, in this game I am trying to concentrate the infantry to follow the spearhead instead of attacking all along the line. However, recon shows a much stronger second dug in line near Moscow...

The south is where the real action is this turn. Last turn, 2 panzer corps rested and 1 panzer corp moved south from Kiev to near Cherkassy. My rail line runs through Ukraine so I figured the farther south I keep the panzers, the more gas they recieve. It looks like the bulk of the Soviet defenses are still around Kiev, including many tank divisions as can be seen in the picture. I choose Hex 82, 97 for a breakthrough point, because it can be potentially attacked from 3 sides and doesn't seem especially strong. Stacked infantry and air support put in hard work and the first tanks are able to cross the river. I form a three hex wide breakthrough. Thankfully, after the breakthrough is completed I have a full panzer corp to work with, and I advance toward the Desna river. There are only a few Soviet units behind the main line to clear away, and the elite Das Reich and L.A.H. SS Motorized Division have enough MP to force units near Kiev to cross several ZOCs or the major river to be able to escape. They are all yellow, so I assume the Soviet units won't get many supplies next turn. I am trying to learn how to do pockets by watching other AARS, and I notice that the expert players leave a buffer of converted hexes, so that I what I did near the north of the pocket. My tanks are now near the edge of their supply line but it seems a small price to pay for so many units.

If readers have any advice or notes about what we could do better or things that look funky, I would appreciate it, as I am trying to figure out both the German and Soviet strategies.

[RKhan]

A very impressive performance for a first time Axis player. It is hard to see the Soviet side recovering from this second large pocket. Also, the CV of the Soviet stacks at Leningrad is not high enough to slow you down much.

To remove white space in Paint use "crop."

[rainman2015]

Aren't your advanced forces, notably those east/southeast of Smolensk and those now encircling Kiev (and even the ones in the Dnepr bend in the south) hopelessly at the very end or past their supply line max, especially now the panzers exploiting towards Moscow and east of Kiev?

And, how did you both attack across the Dnepr in the south AND exploit that far in one turn? You must have done a HQBU and had full MPs and had infantry doing the attacks, so that the panzers didn't use any MPs attacking, or MPs in moving across the Dnepr into an enemy ZOC (which zaps a huge number of MPs).

And of course, Leningrad is a dead duck, just a matter of when.

Randy

[Girshwin]

Rainman, I wasn't expecting to be able to make it that far. I was originally planning just to establish a beachhead, but found out after the initial attacks that I still had panzers remaining.

I think several factors contributed to the breakthrough- the FBD from Rumania has been headed directly to Cherkassy, meaning that the railhead wasn't that far away. Also, several of my panzer divisions had been resting near cities/had withdrawn last turn to be closer to the railhead. It's not shown in the picture, but the Soviet forces in the breakthrough area were significantly weaker than the forces near Kiev along the river, and were not stacked together. Also, fortuitously, this area which was relatively weakly defended also was right where I had concentrated the bulk of the panzers.

One Panzer div arrived near Cherkassy on Turn 3, so the area was converted early and panzers saved gas by only advancing through friendly territory if they could (I tried to copy this from Michael's AAR.) Several panzer divs were close to 50 MP if I recall. I'm not quite sure, but I think 2 panzers crossed the river and attacked the remaining areas. After these first couple panzers the others were free to advance. I also bombed the breakthrough area as much as I could. Finally, when I cross rivers I try to have a bunch of pioneers, and I have tried to attach 2-3 SUs to panzers and mot divisions when I can to make sure they get the bonuses.

As to the center, I have been HQBUing heavily and I have multiple FBDs. If I recall, Turn 7 will show that STAVKA retreated to the main Moscow line, but the tanks do not have many MPs.

That's my best explanation. Someone with more experience may be able to say more about which of my reasons were significant or not.

Attached: Turn 7's Moscow wall after German moves and recon. The Moscow line looks tough! I'm sure a real general would shake his head at the German mishmash of divisions.

[Girshwin]

Turn 7: Rest and Regroup

In the north, solid progress is made through the line. I shifted some forces from near Novgorod to the east breach. Both OKH and STAVKA seem to have made strategic decisions not to heavily commit to the Leningrad theater.

In the center, I pull back a panzer corp for an HQBU, aside from a few tanks which convert hexes for the infantry. I have a lot of divisions here.

In the south I close the pocket and consolidate forces, pulling as many tanks back as I think I can afford, aside from the few converting hexes. The tactic of pulling most panzers back to regroup after a pocket while advancing with a few to speed next turn's advance seems to be successful so far. I also note that while my heavy concentration of forces on the west side of the Dnepr near Kiev means units are slow going to reach the new front line, it also most likely contributed to my opponent keeping many of his best troops in place on turn 5.

I don't know what Soviet capability for counterattack is (especially since we are playing with no 2v1 = 1v1, which I am sure heavily benefits my advance, as the light winter rule will soon) but my opponent in general seems to prefer retreat to successive defensive lines instead of retreating with some forces while hugging my tanks with sacrificial units, or leaving token forces behind in dense terrain to slow the Germans down. It would take a more experienced player than me to say if it would be wise to leave more units in a forward defense or to counterattack, but I also seem to have an advantage in that I can concentrate the bulk of my forces, while a few Romanian divisions trundle slowly toward Dnepropetrovsk and Zaporozhye, where they are facing a large number of soviet units digging in. My plan so far has been to break the line in one spot in the center and south and force a retreat, while having minimal forces along the rest of the front. It may be that attacking the Romanians would lead to another German pocket, but I have been living in fear that my opponent attacks and isolates my weak areas of advance.

Regardless, my opponent is fighting with house rules stacked against him and I commend his perseverance despite that.

[Girshwin]

Turn 8:

AGN makes a good advance toward Leningrad, pocketing three weak unit; 2 more were in the pocket but I accidentally routed them out.

Very little fighting in AGC, the Soviets have pulled back to their main Moscow/Kursk/Kharkov line and the Germans advance. The Panzers have a lot of gas but decide to save it for a turn when the infantry can provide the initial punch. One fully gassed Panzer division heads south to convert a wide swath of territory for the infantry in the center.

In AGS, infantry finish off the large pocket near Kiev. The Soviets fully abandon the Dnepr in the south and the infantry also advance.

The tanks in the south are on the edge of their supply line. I chose to only use 1 FBD in the south and it's coming back to bite me. Next turn, the plan is a big push either to the north or south of Moscow. I don't expect to be able to create a pocket but figure if I can break through the first main line of forts next turn the next turns will be easier.

[Girshwin]

Turn 9:

In AGN, only one row of hexes is taken, but 8 areas are assaulted, 7 successfully. Slow going but Leningrad should be cut off in a few turns.

In AGC, a heavy push toward Moscow. I thought a lot before making the decision to grind straight forward. South looked like better long term prospects (I'm looking to surround Moscow, not do a frontal assault) but in the short term would have involved having to push through a heavily defended river line with tanks. The CV in the north looked slightly higher than the CV in the center after recon. Time will tell whether this was the right decision.

My tactics were:

1.) Heavy bombing. I lost a lot of fighters but bombed many hexes twice. I should probably have moved my airbases, especially the fighters, higher, but was worried sending them too far from the rail line would render them ineffective.
2.) I tried to use deliberate assaults with stacks of infantry against the level 2 forts, leaving units in level 1 or open terrain for panzers whenever possible.
3.) I'm not good at it yet, but when I could I tried to sequences attacks so that the opponent did not have retreat options for some units, causing them to rout. This is a tactic I will have to work at.

Little action south of Moscow. My infantry pull up to Kharkov. I am saving up southern gas for a big push later. That said, STAVKAs long retreat seems to make a potential future pocket very difficult.

[Girshwin]

T10:

AGN: Fantastic movement near Leningrad. My objective this turn was the key Shlisselburg hex which separates Leningrad from the other Soviet forces. My twin objectives next turn are to take the hex to the east of Shlisselburg, which will allow me to make a deliberate assault on the backdoor with two units, and to drive up the coast a bit- my understanding is that taking the two Lake Ladoga ports on the west side of the Volkhov will reduce supplies to the the port of Osinovets, even though there is one more Ladoga port farther north. I believe that the level 2 fort on the backdoor is lower than usual, although I am not sure- in any case, I think I can take it. It only reads 18 strength.

The Moscow offensive also went well, but I got carried away and I think made a big mistake. I used most of my panzer movement to move through a series of enemy ZOCs and cut one of the Moscow rail lines. I take a number of spaces adjacent to Moscow, but realize too late that the farthest panzer hex is yellow and far from supply. They won't be getting much gas, and I didn't save any JU88s to resupply. So, a lot of ground taken but not many prospects next turn. I fail a large attack on the cavalry stack directly southeast of Moscow.

In the south, I attack isolated D and Z town garrisons, with Z town holding on. I focus my efforts on Kharkov, spending all of my panzer MPS to break through Soviet lines and cross both the Donets and Oskol rivers. However, these panzers are a bit of a paper tiger, as they have blown their gas reserves and cut the line in a place where the Soviets have ample room for retreat.

I'm starting to really regret not having 2 FBDs in the south, so one is being railed from the Veliki Luki area all the way back around Romania to join up with the railhead approaching D-town. I'm not really sure what it was even doing in Veliki Luki in the first place. Next game I will have a long term plan for the rail to make sure each turn counts.

[Girshwin]

Turn 11:

In AGN, I meet my goal of taking the hex west of Schlisselburg, and get close to the ports with the motorized divisions. I am considering trying to cross the Volkov and taking that last eastern Ladoga port, even though I know the terrain is swampy and requires crossing a major river.

Near Moscow, the Soviets have made a partial retreat. I cross the Moskva river in two places, and then attack the other river-adjacent hexes, to save the MP/high CV which I would have to face if I attacked directly across the river. Unfortunately, the LVII gets orders to compound it's mistake, and I end the turn with 3! divisions far from the railhead, with almost no MPs. The panzers do not have enough MPS to attack acoss the Klyazma river north of Moscow.

In the south, I close up on Kursk and move closer to the Stalino line. My opponent doesn't like to counterattack, so I am not worried here. I decide not to try and cross into the Crimea. My hope is to leave it weak and prompt my opponent overextending during winter as I have seen some other players do in AARs. My Rumanian airforce is sitting in Krivoi Rog. There has got to be a better use for them, but since I am not attacking with the Rumanians and am worried about trucks required if I move them ahead of the railhead, I leave them there. Do more experience players have guidance on how/where to place this air force?