Triumph or Agony (1941 Russia) Boron (Reich) vs. Seille (Sowjets)

[xBoroNx]

I begin to like my mortar tank corps though. Wish i could do that with heavy tanks + mortars though [:)]

[xBoroNx]

Though we could not achieve our desired big pocket we at least have a smaller one in the center:

[seille]

The Germans did a very power ful attack in the center.
They nearly crushed my complete defense there.
 
Near Charkov the same, but i was able to eliminate one of the spearheads in my turn.
 
Unfortunately that are not my only problems actually. Boron broke my defenses in the street of Kerch
easily and also near Novgorod.

[xBoroNx]

We are replaying the game from turn 4 when my paradrop revealed the bug.

[jjdenver]

I'm not sure it's a bug. Couldn't some paras be dropped then the transports shot down on their way home? Why is it assumed that the transports are shot down all before they drop their paras?

[seille]

ORIGINAL: jjdenver

I'm not sure it's a bug. Couldn't some paras be dropped then the transports shot down on their way home? Why is it assumed that the transports are shot down all before they drop their paras?

Please look at the screen in question. The paras are showed as casualties.
I don´t think their dead bodies captured my airfield or destroyed my planes [;)]
And i don´t think any paratroopers should survive when their transports go down.
I´m 100% sure Vic will agree.
Or do any troops on cargoships survive in water when their transports went down ?
This thing is really bad for gameplay since this way the paras would ALWAYS arrive whatever
happens with the transport planes.

[JAMiAM]

ORIGINAL: seille

ORIGINAL: jjdenver

I'm not sure it's a bug. Couldn't some paras be dropped then the transports shot down on their way home? Why is it assumed that the transports are shot down all before they drop their paras?

Please look at the screen in question. The paras are showed as casualties.
I don´t think their dead bodies captured my airfield or destroyed my planes [;)]
And i don´t think any paratroopers should survive when their transports go down.
I´m 100% sure Vic will agree.
Or do any troops on cargoships survive in water when their transports went down ?
This thing is really bad for gameplay since this way the paras would ALWAYS arrive whatever
happens with the transport planes.

Well...maybe the phosphorus in the tracer rounds shot by your fighters, ignited the parachutes and the flaming dead bodies of the paratroopers then set ablaze the fuel depot at the airfield causing a massive explosion, and setting off the ammo dumps, destroying all the returning fighters as they were trying to land.

It's not any further fetched than being able to build bazookas by the bucketload and stuff your infantry units full of them in 1941...[;)]

[xBoroNx]

Now we reached turn 6 again in the replay and i do slightly worse than before. Lost a couple of light tanks unlucky, e.g. one tank corps vs. 1 single russian tank or vs. 15 russian rifles already at low readiness.

A rather big air battle occurs when i try to breach the smolensk line.

[jjdenver]

ORIGINAL: seille

This thing is really bad for gameplay since this way the paras would ALWAYS arrive whatever
happens with the transport planes.

Ok that makes sense - they should not always get through I guess.

[seille]

Russian turn 6.

First i want to explain why i asked for replaying these turns.
I had a good air defense int he center out of range of enemy ground troops
but protecting own ground troops. I had in mind Boron can either attack (and destroy) them
or attack my ground troops. Whatever way he would have gone he had to use all his fighters for the attack to
avoid getting serious losses by my defenders.
After he knocked out my whole defense by this bug i lost my only air defense and he was able to fly single attacks
whereever he wanted.

The bug and the loss of these oplanes had a too big impact on the russians to ignore it.

Ok, now the russian turn 6.

I attacked at two places.
North of Leningrad i attacked the most forwarded finnish coprs which moved closer to Leningrad defenses.
After artillery, ship and air attack i attacked by ground troops. I destroyed a artillery unit completely there
and crippled two infantry units with lots of expensive mortars.

Another attack i did in the center. Thought it could be successfull to attack the enemy armored spearhead which had mostly
mortar support. But the tanks has been very strong to fight them back. I took some losses, but caused a nice damage.
Took out several mortars and some tanks. Attacked from 4 directions. The picture shows some details.

[seille]

Imho a good attack. Even i lost 4 of my 5 tanks and a lot of infantry i got
3 german light tank II and several mortar II.

Here are the overall losses from my turn.

[xBoroNx]

The germans are indeed in trouble. Seille contests my air supremacy with a massive 21 fighter squadron. Thus he forces my airforce to counter them. So far Seille has not attempted to get air supremacy, so my fighters were still combined with bombers because imho they are more useful this way as long as your enemy doesn't seriously contest your air supremacy.

The air battle is a victory for the germans, but at the cost of no ground support this turn [:@]

[xBoroNx]

Overall a quite bloody turn. We took Kharkow and threaten Maikop. Sewastopol is also isolated and currently seiged.
Additional russian losses this turn not shown in the screenshot are 11 Fighter II and 10 light tank II. Overall a good turn, only in the naval battle with the leningrad fleet we had bad luck.

[seille]

Not much to report this turn. We tried to build up a new defensive line near Maikop
and moved back the defenders of Charkov. We also moved back the defense in the center (closer to Moscow).

Fought back the finnish attackers in the north trying to threaten Leningrad.
The German attacker is aiming for air superiority in the center. Seems he want Moscow [:)]

Soon the siberian reenforcements will arrive and the winter will start which will be a enormous help
for our badly shaken armies. We hopefully can save enough power to do some attacks during
the "offensive" turns then.

[xBoroNx]

Turn 8.

We regrouped our air fleets in the center and made one main fighter group. Though we had only slight numerical superiority, 26 vs. 19, we clearly win the air battle.

[xBoroNx]

Overall a bad turn for the germans though. The moscow defense is still intact and Seille got the Siberians. Also casualities for the russians have been rather low too. Seille only lost stuff worth ~94k production points, but he probably has about 115-120k production currently [:@]
Only progress that was made was that Maikop was taken.

[seille]

I did not do much this turn, so no screens.
Continued to buildup Moscow defenses.
Retook Maikop, but think i can´t hold for long (yet)
 
My Kiev army is nearly gone from the map, but that´s the price i´m willing to pay
for my upcoming offenses.
 
In the south i advanced to the crimea from north and started to block any land connections of the romanian army.
Next turns could be more interesting.

[xBoroNx]

Time to run .

There is already snow and next turn the annoying soviet winter offensive starts. AG North and Center flee. Ag South continues to attack but loses a couple of tanks due to bad luck .

Hopefully i somewhat survive the winter.

[seille]

My opponent is too pessimistic [;)]
So far he lost not so much material, but i hope this will change soon.
 
My soldiers want revenge and they want to attack !
Since the Germans are moving back all i do actually is to follow, but the offensive turn did not start
yet.

[xBoroNx]

The planned retreat continues in full order. Maybe we will indeed survive the grim winter without too much losses.

Sevastopol is taken and army group south still advances while AG north and center continue to flee eh orderly retreat.