WW1 Style Grinding

[K62_]

I don't know how you can make a judgment based on the lack of AARs showing something like this.

Given the lack of AARs of anyone successfully countering this strategy, I'd encourage you to try and play a game as the Soviets against someone like Vet or HYLA that are highly proficient at this and see if it's as easy as just building some more defenses.

Hmm, could we have a prime time match with AAR coming up? Say it's so!

HLYA has stated that well-design defenses would help against grinding.

I agree that it would be easier to show than tell in this case as defenses need to be custom built based on terrain, logistics and troops available. If there is an Axis player out there who is skilled with this strategy and thinks they can overrun all defenses with it, I'd be happy to take the Soviets against them, as long as they commit to playing through to the end of 1942 no matter what.

Alternatively I'm also happy to take over a server game where the Soviet player is doing okay in late '41 or early '42 but fears they will be ground down in the summer.

[DeletedUser1769703214]

I don't know how you can make a judgment based on the lack of AARs showing something like this.

I'm basing it on the fact that, in both this forum and Discord, I haven't seen anyone successfully defeat a skilled Axis player for maybe 8 months. Even when the Soviet player was highly skilled and fully understood the mechanics involved and actively worked to play around them, it didn't make enough of a difference.

Maybe there's some 4D chess move to counter this that we haven't theory crafted yet, but the consensus at the moment seems to be that the game is almost impossible to win against an Axis player above the skill level needed to execute this playstyle.

Given the lack of AARs of anyone successfully countering this strategy, I'd encourage you to try and play a game as the Soviets against someone like Vet or HYLA that are highly proficient at this and see if it's as easy as just building some more defenses.

Hmm, could we have a prime time match with AAR coming up? Say it's so!

K62, in so many words "may" have a match with me once the OB update come out later this year, since that is what I am semi waiting for but not a necessity any longer on my part.

In my JB game I feel that I was on the road to stopping the 41 offense. But a tragic accident happened to my wife that deviated that game from continuing. If the Devs could resurrect it I would be more than happy to continue if JB wanted to too.

In a nutshell 41 for sure and most of 42 the Soviets have their hands full and "open TB's" is "NO" friend of the Soviets. Granted the problem is still there but open TB's exacerbates the problem big time.

I am more than willing to play either side if anyone wants a serious game with AAR's.

[DeletedUser1769703214]

Given the lack of AARs of anyone successfully countering this strategy, I'd encourage you to try and play a game as the Soviets against someone like Vet or HYLA that are highly proficient at this and see if it's as easy as just building some more defenses.

Hmm, could we have a prime time match with AAR coming up? Say it's so!

HLYA has stated that well-design defenses would help against grinding.

I agree that it would be easier to show than tell in this case as defenses need to be custom built based on terrain, logistics and troops available. If there is an Axis player out there who is skilled with this strategy and thinks they can overrun all defenses with it, I'd be happy to take the Soviets against them, as long as they commit to playing through to the end of 1942 no matter what.

Alternatively I'm also happy to take over a server game where the Soviet player is doing okay in late '41 or early '42 but fears they will be ground down in the summer.

You can't get around the grinding, it is going to happen and the Soviets are going to take losses. The goal therefore is wearing out the Germans while trying to preserve your forces. Not an easy task at all, damn near impossible in current state if adhering to certain ingrained doctrines. The defense layout, at least the one I have used in WITE1 and NOT the one I am using in my current game would be necessary to stem the tide. Would it work, not for certain since there are many things you have to do to make this work. I.E. disbanding almost everything, TOE micro manage, defense layout in depth with a certain CV value behind the line (not the typical big up front CV). Most people are not going to do this and want to enjoy a typical game. So it is at an impasse for many. Should it be address? Yes. Here is what I think are the big 4.

Here is what is hurting the Soviets at the moment;

1. NO reserve movement on hasty attacks. I said that the day it happened that this was huge. Germany just hasty attack until the cows come home and nothing the Soviets can do about it.

2. The predictor for combat. Yup, the predictor IS random but once you play this game long enough you know what is going to work and what is not, especially without reserves coming in on hasty attacks.

3. The penalty against the Soviets are a bit too high in 41 & into 42 in combat. Many times after an attack the division is either an empty shell or running around with 69 men jerking each other off trying to find friendly lines. In WITE1 the penalty lasted until Sept I think. But in WITE2 the it seems to be permanent. Make it hurt the Soviets until say Sept/Oct 41 and maybe again April -Aug 42 but just thinking out loud.

4. The command penalty until the end of the year is painful.

There are many others but that is what is coming to mind real quick for me.

I could go on but I will stop there. Can the Soviets defend? Yes, but you better damn well know what you are doing against a good German player.

[K62_]

Here is what is hurting the Soviets at the moment;
1. NO reserve movement on hasty attacks. I said that the day it happened that this was huge. Germany just hasty attack until the cows come home and nothing the Soviets can do about it.

Agreed, this allows the Germans to get through the first line of defense a little too easily.

TOE micro manage, defense layout in depth with a certain CV value behind the line (not the typical big up front CV). Most people are not going to do this and want to enjoy a typical game.

This is probably correct.

You can't get around the grinding, it is going to happen and the Soviets are going to take losses. The goal therefore is wearing out the Germans while trying to preserve your forces.

You're not going to win on the section of the front that takes the grinding. The objective there is to prevent a massive breakthrough while keeping your total losses limited. But the loss ratio on that section will be horrible, maybe up to 100:1. So obviously if the Soviets do nothing else and just passively take the grinding they will lose the war of attrition.

But here is where a little bit of math comes in. Let's say on one section of the front the Germans are inflicting 100,000 Soviet casualties each turn at a cost of only 1,000 German casualties. But on other sections of the front the Soviets counter-attack with well organized assault fronts and inflict 30,000 German casualties at the cost of "only" 60,000 Soviet casualties.

This seems horrible... until it isn't. The total loss ratio is 160k:31k or about 5.3:1. The manpower multiplier ratio in 1942 is almost 7:1, and the Soviets almost certainly have more manpower centers. So the Soviets are actually winning the war of attrition if only they keep it bloody for both sides.

And the key to doing so is to play historically as though Stalin is breathing down your neck and forcing you to feed all your men nonstop into the meatgrinder!

[DeletedUser1769703214]

Ya, the Soviets have to attack, because this game is all about attacking. I attack Infantry because they are an easier target, in my opinion, than the Germans PZ/Moto since their experience is much higher. Against a good German I would even DA front German units with a single Division or multiple Divisions to sap MP's, ammo, fuel, etc.

[DeletedUser1769703214]

You can't get around the grinding, it is going to happen and the Soviets are going to take losses. The goal therefore is wearing out the Germans while trying to preserve your forces.

You're not going to win on the section of the front that takes the grinding. The objective there is to prevent a massive breakthrough while keeping your total losses limited. But the loss ratio on that section will be horrible, maybe up to 100:1. So obviously if the Soviets do nothing else and just passively take the grinding they will lose the war of attrition.

You can "not" passively sit and take it. Have to be aggressive even to the point of failure on attacks to sap resources. Now having said that you also don't want your units running around like firemen every time someone lights a match.

[RedJohn]

Here is what is hurting the Soviets at the moment;
1. NO reserve movement on hasty attacks. I said that the day it happened that this was huge. Germany just hasty attack until the cows come home and nothing the Soviets can do about it.

Agreed, this allows the Germans to get through the first line of defense a little too easily.

TOE micro manage, defense layout in depth with a certain CV value behind the line (not the typical big up front CV). Most people are not going to do this and want to enjoy a typical game.

This is probably correct.

You can't get around the grinding, it is going to happen and the Soviets are going to take losses. The goal therefore is wearing out the Germans while trying to preserve your forces.

You're not going to win on the section of the front that takes the grinding. The objective there is to prevent a massive breakthrough while keeping your total losses limited. But the loss ratio on that section will be horrible, maybe up to 100:1. So obviously if the Soviets do nothing else and just passively take the grinding they will lose the war of attrition.

But here is where a little bit of math comes in. Let's say on one section of the front the Germans are inflicting 100,000 Soviet casualties each turn at a cost of only 1,000 German casualties. But on other sections of the front the Soviets counter-attack with well organized assault fronts and inflict 30,000 German casualties at the cost of "only" 60,000 Soviet casualties.

This seems horrible... until it isn't. The total loss ratio is 160k:31k or about 5.3:1. The manpower multiplier ratio in 1942 is almost 7:1, and the Soviets almost certainly have more manpower centers. So the Soviets are actually winning the war of attrition if only they keep it bloody for both sides.

And the key to doing so is to play historically as though Stalin is breathing down your neck and forcing you to feed all your men nonstop into the meatgrinder!

The axis can grind everywhere there's mobile units, though, which is to say all 3 sectors. I think I mentioned it before but the only place the axis really struggle is leningrad, because properly defended it's very hard to hit more than a couple of hexes each turn with the overwhelming force concentration required to yeet units.

Causing 30k casualties in a turn in 41 to the Germans is next to impossible against an experienced player. Part of the effectiveness of the strategy is none of your units are vulnerable to counterattacks. In a recent game I'm playing, the Soviets didn't get a single counterattack off until I decided to attempt a thrust from tula upwards to Moscow. My forward 2 panzers weren't stacked and were on individual hexes, leading to the Soviets counterattacking and routing them due to amassing a couple hundred thousand men.

Needless to say, had I been vigorously implementing the strategies of vet or the like then this wouldn't have happened and my panzers would be nice and safe ready to cause another 40k casualties with 2 attacks.

In 42 you have more options, absolutely, but again this strategy basically kneecaps the soviet ability to counterattack in 41. It's simply not possible to achieve any more than very isolated attacks against a Germany playing cautious, and there's zero reason to overextend if you play the way we're describing. With proper CPP, supply and positioning, your only real risk is making a mistake somewhere and opening yourself up to an attack or two at worst. By the time 42 arrives you have very little guards, because you've gotten no attacks off and are relying on historically formed guards. Meanwhile the German player, having maintained their supply throughout winter owing to their experience and skill, has a completely fresh wermacht and potentially has sent the panzers home for Christmas so they've suffered little in terms of attrition.

As thistle tea said, I think we're more than happy to be proven wrong but from what limited games I've seen it's been a decisive soviet loss each time.

[Thistle_Tea]

You can't get around the grinding, it is going to happen and the Soviets are going to take losses. The goal therefore is wearing out the Germans while trying to preserve your forces. Not an easy task at all, damn near impossible in current state if adhering to certain ingrained doctrines. The defense layout, at least the one I have used in WITE1 and NOT the one I am using in my current game would be necessary to stem the tide. Would it work, not for certain since there are many things you have to do to make this work. I.E. disbanding almost everything, TOE micro manage, defense layout in depth with a certain CV value behind the line (not the typical big up front CV). Most people are not going to do this and want to enjoy a typical game. So it is at an impasse for many.

These seem like good tips all around and while I do think they would help, I'm not convinced they are enough to offset this. You mentioned that you were on the path to stopping JB in your game, however, that game ended VERY early in 1941 and it's really 1942 that mangles your army. Moreover, JB has a far more aggressive playstyle than the stricter "grinding" type playstyle we see from you and Vet, and let's not forget that you are among the absolute best players, the fact that you winning on the Soviet side was even in question in a bit insane.

Admittedly, I am not super aware of all of the micro-ing you are referring to so I'm not really in a position to try it (unless you're an absolute sweetheart and decide to do a write-up on how to execute these techniques), but from the sound of the techniques you are suggesting, they sound like the sorts of things that will give you maybe a 10-20% boost, not something truly radical.

I am also especially skeptical of the impact of building more fortifications, the Soviets can't actually build that many forts before the spring of 1942 when the offensive begins, even with maxing out your fort units and deploying all your engineering SUs; and in the 8 turns that it takes the Germans to get through April and May, you can expect most of what you've built to be gone at which point you have 14+ turns of savage grinding with hasty fortifications and mostly clear terrain to look forward to. Even if you were to have say double the forts you'd normally have, the Germans have so many pioneer battalions that you basically do not have forts on whatever segment of the front they choose to attack.

I feel like there are additional issues beyond what was mentioned. Yes those four factors mess you up on the Soviet side, but there's also factors like the fact that the game was balanced around a certain approximate proportion of guards units which you will never ever have against an axis player that knows what he's doing. You won't organically build any guards until late 1942 most of the time.

There's also the issue of supply. The game's supply was balanced around a certain level of LW use, but skilled axis players send all the bombers to TBs and get an additional 30-40% supplies to their ground units as a result, this enables a mind-boggling level of stockpiling for the winter. It's common now for the German player to have bright green supply across the entire front for basically the entire winter.

But even if that wasn't the case, I don't think it is good for the game for this to be the meta way to play Axis. It's much less fun, interesting or interactive to play against and feels a lot more like how playing against a very high-difficulty AI feels when compared to HvH games with a more conventional axis playstyle.

Your suggestions would go a long way in helping out the Soviets and might actually make this manageable, but I think it would be healthier for the game for us to see a WitE where a more aggressive playstyle is considered meta.

[DeletedUser1769703214]

Ya, both RedJohn and Thistle have extremely valid points very well written and at this point have been proven beyond a shadow of a doubt. The losses are too darn high. The penalties "have" to be lowered sometime in the fall of 41 to make the game more enjoyable.

I know there was a post on this a long time ago on this, at least I think there was.

[K62_]

I appreciate the lively debate and have done my best to provide advice based on both historical tactics and my own experience with the game. However, at this stage, I feel that our conversation may not progress further without concrete action.

I've previously offered to play Soviets against someone who believes the game balance is broken for the games that make it to '42, or to take over a game to demonstrate my perspective. I still firmly believe that the issue we're discussing is more about differing strategies rather than a flaw in the game, but I recognize that we may not see eye to eye without real gameplay evidence.

As such, I'm willing to continue this discussion only if we proceed in one of the following ways: either implementing the suggestions I've made in an actual game and analyzing the results, or setting up a game where I play against someone holding the opposite view.

If these options don't appeal to you, I understand, but I believe that continuing to debate without tangible proof will not lead us to a resolution. Thanks for all the detail on the topic, and please let me know if you're willing to take this to the actual game.

[DeletedUser1769703214]

For the record K62 plainly state your position.


(I read your posts and think I know what you are saying, just want to make sure )

[DeletedUser1769703214]

I will assume your position K62 is the game is fine. Status quo all the way baby in current rendition, but the player needs to re-examine their ground doctrine

I will assume others believe that the Germans can grind to a win no matter what.

So, IF I take a game as Germany to champion the cause against K62 as Soviets what are the specifics well laid out on the tests?

[K62_]

I think the game is balanced enough in '42 provided people vary their strategies according to their opponent etc. The test would be that the Axis needs to win the war of attrition by frontal assaults. We can discuss how to define that. One way would be to compare the total men on 1/1/42 and 12/31/42 and check that the Soviet army has decreased in size by at least 10% and the German army by no more than half the Soviet percentage. Thoughts? The Germans can also win by sudden victory, to prevent the Soviets from just abandoning everything, and Axis allies are not counted.

My preference would be to take over a game that is just heading into '42, just to eliminate the wild card that is the '41 campaign. But I'm good with starting from scratch too. For house rules I would say the usual things that people do these days (no temp moto, no airdrops, restricted naval invasions, open TBs). Just to make things faster I would suggest adding something that reduces the tweaking of the air war, since it takes a lot of time and it's not very relevant to the test. Maybe only recon and ground support after T1?

[DeletedUser1769703214]

Does anyone have a game out there that we could take over to test this out that is in early 42? Not my style but more than happy to contribute for an answer

[jubjub]

Does anyone have a game out there that we could take over to test this out that is in early 42? Not my style but more than happy to contribute for an answer

See the attached.

[K62_]

Does anyone have a game out there that we could take over to test this out that is in early 42? Not my style but more than happy to contribute for an answer

See the attached.

This save looks good to me, if HLYA is still up for it. Thanks!

[Thistle_Tea]

This save looks good to me, if HLYA is still up for it. Thanks!

Very exciting! Can you guys do an AAR on this, either here or on a discord? I would love to see the Soviet mindset and approach to tackling this strategy.

[DeletedUser1769703214]

Does anyone have a game out there that we could take over to test this out that is in early 42? Not my style but more than happy to contribute for an answer

See the attached.

Thank you Jubjub. Nice seeing you back. I will download this afternoon and take a look at the German side since I have a slew of things to do today

[DeletedUser1769703214]

Does anyone have a game out there that we could take over to test this out that is in early 42? Not my style but more than happy to contribute for an answer

See the attached.

This save looks good to me, if HLYA is still up for it. Thanks!

Thank you K62. My Fridays and Saturdays a packed so was not able to look things over. I thought I was going to have time last night but fell asleep, lol. Today I have more things to do so won't be able to look over until late afternoon.

[DeletedUser1769703214]

This save looks good to me, if HLYA is still up for it. Thanks!

Very exciting! Can you guys do an AAR on this, either here or on a discord? I would love to see the Soviet mindset and approach to tackling this strategy.

I will do one from the German side, but you are really looking for the Strat from the Soviet side. I heard if you send $150 US (dollars) to K62 he would do an AAR . That is "per" person reading K62's AAR