Matrix Games Forums

T006 Soviet Centre

Supreme Soviet Commander
...encirclement at Smolensk is unacceptable. It threatens Moscow considerably. The German encircled all defensive position in and around Smolensk. If we loose those encircled armies, we loose the whole defense of Moscow...reinforcement wont arrive until a few turn... and it will weaken our two other fronts... All rear area troops are being re-deploy to Moscow.

We also need to discuss the eventuality of Moscow falling. I dont want anyone freaking out. If it happens, we will retreat and hold new defensive position. And we will wait, for winter is coming !

Repeated furious attacks are made against the encircling Panzers to try to break in to the pocket.

Looking back I am thinking this was the key moment in 1941 - and the Soviet position in the center is not good.

T006 Soviet South

Soviet South Commander
AGS is not progressing too fast. Allowed me to send some units to 10 hexes behind the front on refit to build morale. Expecting them back on the line next turn if AGS starts to hug the Dnepr in preparation to get across.

Soviet South Commander
Bit disappointed with all paratroopers disappearing... What are they doing there around Pavlova?! They need to screen the Dnepr to delay AGS further or you need to rail them to centre sector to help out there. Now I was forced to evac Dnepropetrovsk industry.

Giving control of the airborne troops to the air commander is making for lots of co-ordination problems.

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

And the damage at Osinovets takes a jump up

A few things to notice here ...

It is quite possible to put air power over Osinovets on turn #2.

The Germans are using JU86E-2's. These platforms are quite expendable and are stuffed in airgroups set to withdraw. So, their loss is no big deal. (The JU87 Stuka's are quite a different story). The German's are halfway to the goal of 70% (which after the Logistics phase would be the required 67% to shut down the port.) using these air platforms.

The flak is only (68) 37mm in this case It would be expected that the Soviet's in the future would be stuffing this area with hundreds of 85mm and 37mm flak guns. The losses would be considerably higher. It would behoove the German player to recon and find the rout with the least amount of flak and move staging bases so this route is taken.

There are a maximum of 3 airbases that could be stacked on Osinovets. I would assume they wold need a range of 40 to defend the hex? Would that mean that at least the adjacent hexes could be swept? The Soviet's had 50% required to fly in this picture so it was quite easy to ensure no Soviet fighters would respond to our calling up Osinovets ..

T006 Soviet Air

Why is the Dnepr Bend closer then Kiev?

This game, like many others, sees the Axis getting closer to the Don Bend than Kiev even though it is so far away. One team question is why does this happen? Some of it is just Soviet forces retreating to a major river line for defence. The Axis prioritising the industry of the Donbass is another reason. But I think the real reason is shown by the red lines on this map.

The red lines depict paths from Poland to Dneproretrovks or Odessa only on clear hexes without crossing any rivers. In movement point terms they are much closer to Poland than Kiev is. If the map was distorted to make distances on the map equivalent to movement points needed to get there, then Kiev would be far to the east of Dnepropetrovsk. For this reason I think motorised forces naturally end up closer to the Don Bend than Kiev quite quickly.

Kiev definitely is closer to your starting point north of Lvov then Dnepropetrovsk, hex or MP wise. Not sure what you mean there.

ORIGINAL: EwaldvonKleist
Kiev definitely is closer to your starting point north of Lvov then Dnepropetrovsk, hex or MP wise. Not sure what you mean there.

I was using creative licence - trust you to be precise! [:D]

OK correction - Dnepropetrovsk is much closer MP wise than you might think given how many hexes away it is.

Happy? [:D]

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

ORIGINAL: EwaldvonKleist
Kiev definitely is closer to your starting point north of Lvov then Dnepropetrovsk, hex or MP wise. Not sure what you mean there.

I was using creative licence - trust you to be precise! [:D]

OK correction - Dnepropetrovsk is much closer MP wise than you might think given how many hexes away it is.

Happy? [:D]

A good point about map distortion. Will WitE 2.0 make any non-cosmetic map changes?

I have always wondered why the hexes in the WITE map have longer sizes in the North-South direction. They are elongated N/S. So it's a shorter distance counting hexes N/S as opposed to E/W. Does anyone know why the hexes are elongated and not perfectly hexagonal?

ORIGINAL: Michael T

I have always wondered why the hexes in the WITE map have longer sizes in the North-South direction. They are elongated N/S. So it's a shorter distance counting hexes N/S as opposed to E/W. Does anyone know why the hexes are elongated and not perfectly hexagonal?

My guess is that it permits to fit the unit counters in height without making them too small for reading and stuffing all the info in.

ORIGINAL: joelmar

ORIGINAL: Michael T

I have always wondered why the hexes in the WITE map have longer sizes in the North-South direction. They are elongated N/S. So it's a shorter distance counting hexes N/S as opposed to E/W. Does anyone know why the hexes are elongated and not perfectly hexagonal?

My guess is that it permits to fit the unit counters in height without making them too small for reading and stuffing all the info in.

This is a problem of maps with hexes. The corner of the unit sticks out unless the hex is big.

Other games seem to solve this issue without undistorted hexes. Like 99%.

ORIGINAL: Zorch

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

ORIGINAL: EwaldvonKleist
Kiev definitely is closer to your starting point north of Lvov then Dnepropetrovsk, hex or MP wise. Not sure what you mean there.

I was using creative licence - trust you to be precise! [:D]
OK correction - Dnepropetrovsk is much closer MP wise than you might think given how many hexes away it is.
Happy? [:D]

A good point about map distortion. Will WitE 2.0 make any non-cosmetic map changes?

The thing that really surprised me was to see how the WitE2.0 map is projected from so far to the North. You can see this for example in one of the maps in the WitE2.0 thread here. Baku is horizontally higher than Rostov!

For information only - attached turn 7 Axis team allocations

T007 Axis Karelia

T007 Axis North

This is not looking good for Uncle Joe & company. Mud can't come soon enough.

ORIGINAL: Telemecus

T007 Axis Karelia

The big difference maker here was the use of SU’s. Especially SU’s set to withdrawal. There is no way we break this line without the disruption caused by the additional firepower assigned to HQ’s. Also the attacks did not suffer any penalties from cross HQ attacks. Finally, the Soviets did not commit any SU’s up here. Now it is Katy bar the door.