Alpha AAR - A year at the front with Field Marshal Noob

[ComradeP]

In post 297, there are 6 hexes with a German unit/German stacks that are coloured as being under Soviet control.

Could you perhaps post some screenshots with strength figures visible so we can see what 3 months of recovery time did for the Wehrmacht?

[karonagames]

1st year unit losses. The axis avoided losing units in encirclements the only units lost were support units that were used in counterattacks from reserve. Don't know enough about SU losses to comment.

[Flaviusx]

Soviet losses are right on the money. They actually would've been significantly ahead if not for your very effective March counteroffensive.
 
 
 

[karonagames]

End of first year OOB: Overall the Axis have 300k more men then the historical benchmark (lower losses), but the Soviets had 1,000,000 fewer than historically. Although the loss of Leningrad put a big dent in their manpower resources, this should have been compensated by holding the Donbas cities. As a result the conversion rates of raw manpower into fighting men has been adjusted down for the Axis and up for the SU for the next test. The amount of population evacuated to the East when population centres are captured has also been increased. The number of guards units created is slightly out of sync, but no changes to the rules for their creation will be in place for my next test.

[ComradeP]

Your aircraft losses are quite low. Although every historian seems to present different figures, your losses cover what the Luftwaffe lost in 1941 according to most figures, which means you have the same losses up to late June 1942 as the Luftwaffe had up to around December 1941.

Your cavalry squad losses do seem to be surprisingly high, considering how few cavalry formations the Wehrmacht had left in 1941.

[Flaviusx]

Yes, given that the Soviet losses are close to historical here, the Red Army ought to be somewhere near 6 million.

I don't know if the German manpower needs any adjustment. They are ahead of the game mostly because you didn't go nuts prior to the blizzard and overextend yourself. That 300k manpower cushion is just smart play on your part for not driving the Wehrmacht to the ground.

Also, in a PBEM situation I'm willing to bet the German losses would be somewhat higher.

[karonagames]

Year End production report. This is the stuff that Pavel goes over, and leads him to tinker with his production formulas, I know there has been a major re-vamp of production for the new test I am about to start,but I do not know the details. The most obvious anomaly is the huge number of trucks I have in my truck pool (over 250k more than historically). This is the major reason why I can't continue into 1942, as I would never have a supply shortage caused by lack of trucks. After detailed analysis all we could find was that "something" happened around turn 18, and instead of losing 4,000 trucks a turn, the axis were gaining 20,000 for 5 turns then 5,000 per turn for the rest of this test. This did not happen on the version of the game released after this test, but we still don't know what the "something" was, so I will be keeping a close eye on truck numbers during my next test.

[Flaviusx]

When did you connect the Finnish rail net to the German one via Leningrad? Maybe that caused the truck thing.
 
 

[ComradeP]

Did you perhaps capture large quantities of Soviet trucks? Prior to turn 18, your pool and the required trucks/turn fluctuate greatly but that might be due to not attacking all across the front, or attacking all across the front.

[karonagames]

@ComradeP and Flaviusx. Thanks for your comments. We do need a lot more PBEM tests, but they are so much slower than testing against the AI.

Well folks, that's it - a whole year at the front. Hopefully you can see why the game is still in alpha, but that the testing that is being done is helping get it closer to beta and into your hands. The designers do look at everything the testers post, and changes are made. I hope I have shown that GAIA can do a good job - I am still amazed by her withdrawal in front of Tula - she saved at least 30 divisions with that move.

As Field Marshal Noob, I think I am getting closer to losing noob status, but I continue to make mistakes - my rail network was ok for an attack on Moscow but bad for surviving the blizzard. I still need to balance out resource allocation between AGN and AGS, and I still need to fine tune my logistics and C&C decisions. And every army needs to have at least one motorised or cavalry unit attached.

Could I/should I have got Moscow?

[karonagames]

Re: trucks. We looked at all that - the capture of Leningrad, captured vehicles etc., but none of it checked out. It is a mystery, but we have not recreated it, and until it can be re-created it is not officially a bug. It is a shame because I would have liked to have carried on into 1942.

[Apollo11]

Hi all,

ORIGINAL: BigAnorak

Well folks, that's it - a whole year at the front. Hopefully you can see why the game is still in alpha, but that the testing that is being done is helping get it closer to beta and into your hands. The designers do look at everything the testers post, and changes are made. I hope I have shown that GAIA can do a good job - I am still amazed by her withdrawal in front of Tula - she saved at least 30 divisions with that move.

As Field Marshal Noob, I think I am getting closer to losing noob status, but I continue to make mistakes - my rail network was ok for an attack on Moscow but bad for surviving the blizzard. I still need to balance out resource allocation between AGN and AGS, and I still need to fine tune my logistics and C&C decisions. And every army needs to have at least one motorised or cavalry unit attached.

Very nice Bob - congrats!!! [:)]


Leo "Apollo11"

[karonagames]

@ ComradeP. In post 297 I don't have hex control status switched on. I should have posted the end of turn 41 OOB so here it is:

[ComradeP]

@ ComradeP. In post 297 I don't have hex control status switched on.

That's odd, because some of the hexes do show the colour change (normally) indicating a hex captured in that turn, which is why I was surprised about the anomaly that some of those hexes still showed the Soviet hex control colour.

As to whether you should have captured Moscow: for me, 1941 would be all about securing the flanks (or protecting them if you're the Soviets). You captured Leningrad after a fight and didn't have to fight to capture Sevastopol, so you did a very good job from that perspective. You're basically holding the Crimea with Romanians, which frees up German units.

Moscow is, for all intents and purposes, just another city. It's a big one, certainly, but it's not something you should become fixated upon in 1941 in my opinion. You ended the year with fairly low ground losses in terms of infantry and equipment (your tank losses look fairly good too), a strong Luftwaffe and in a good position to launch a summer offensive (for example: you can now focus all your heavy siege guns on Moscow, and AGC's front isn't one big mess of bulges, salients and scattered forces).

All in all, you did a good job.

[SGHunt]

Excellent job - especially husbanding your resources during the blizzard!   I''m still not sure how you the whole regimental reserve works.  

You are now officially promoted from Noob, Herr Feldmarschall, but we know there are others lurking out there who are the real masters, just biding their time to strike... [;)]

[karonagames]

Leader portraits are starting to arrive:

[Duck Doc]

Excellent play & AAR, BigAnorak. Thanks much.

Just how effective or potent are the Rumanians & Italians in the game?

[karonagames]

@ Dale H: thanks for your kind words. On normal settings, the Rumanians and Italians perform OK if they are carefully handled. As you saw in my AAR, the Rumanians held the "neck" in the Crimea because they were well dug in, but the Italians fell back because they weren't. When GAIA weakened the front, the Rumanians were able to advance into the Taman. On challenging, the SU morale bonus, and the reduction of Axis allied morale just seems to turn them to glass. I don't know if this is something Joel wants to tweak. I think in Jon's Challenging" AAR he used them in the front line in short bursts, before taking them out of the line for R&R.

[SGHunt]

Jon also used them to cover the rear areas.   He garrisoned every city right across the South with allied infantry, and it seemed to me he reported much less partisan activity than in some other AAR's.   (I remember he had a whole Italian army (?) anchored on the Donbas cities, no doubt digging in, build up the fort levels, and providing a strategic defensive anchor).   

I liked the way you, O Large Coated One, deployed the Hungarian/Slovak fast divisions in the South.   My guess is they ended in need of some TLC, after their bold adventures and then the Winter?

Stuart

[karonagames]

Every time I play the campaign I come across problems that I try to solve in the next test, and getting into the Crimea has been a real problem for me in previous games, so the "Flying column" was my solution, which did seem to work well, but the consequence was that 2nd and 6th Army were desperate for motorised units to assist their advance on Kursk and Belgorod.

In fact I interrupted my "planning meeting" to write this post - I have been figuring out the allocation to corps and armies, and the lines of advance for all available motorised units to still get the Crimea quickly and make better progress in the Kursk/Belgorod region.

Sad isn't it?