Wargammer of the Year Attempt #1

[larryfulkerson]

Here's the T9 front lines and I've moved about half a dozen units already, mostly in the north.

[larryfulkerson]

Past experience has taught me that the hexes in the territories between the rivers
is low supply most of the time and the going is slow and there's less thn twenty
Soviet units in that area, probably, so I'm thinking of following the rails in that
area to co-join at D-town and thus seal all those Soviet units in a large pocket
and then mop it up with the tired divisions leaving the fresh ones to further
adventures.

[larryfulkerson]

It's the 20th of July and I'm only now getting close to Kiev. I'm way behind
schedule. I think. I think I'll include Kiev in the light screen I'm going to
put on this AO just because I don't want heavy losses taking the city. I'd rather
get some Germans on the east side of Kiev first anyway.

[larryfulkerson]

This is the NW sector of the front lines right now. Origionaly I was gong to skip
going to Leningrad but then I got a good look at what the Soviets were defending
with and thought maybe I could push them over. So I'm taking the fight to the
Soviets and it's going well so far. I'm debating whether or not Elmer will send
some more units into the AO. If he does I'll be eyebrow deep in enemy units.

[700851McCall]

Leningrad is an essential prize I think Larry.

Look at the benefits you get

1) Reduce Soviet production
2) Free up some Finnish troops
3) Finnish can now go anywhere and you can move by rail into Finland if they ever need shoring up.
4) Shorten your front line
5) Dig in behind the river with infantry and you can move 4th Panzer group in its entirety to the attack on Moscow. That helps a lot as it gives enough Panzer units to rotate them in and out and keep the offensive going without pause.

The earlier it falls the quicker you can divert those tanks to 'Typhoon'.

Anyway just adding some grist to the mill.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: 700851McCall

Leningrad is an essential prize I think Larry.

Look at the benefits you get

1) Reduce Soviet production
2) Free up some Finnish troops
3) Finnish can now go anywhere and you can move by rail into Finland if they ever need shoring up.
4) Shorten your front line
5) Dig in behind the river with infantry and you can move 4th Panzer group in its entirety to the attack on Moscow. That helps a lot as it gives enough Panzer units to rotate them in and out and keep the offensive going without pause.

The earlier it falls the quicker you can divert those tanks to 'Typhoon'.

Anyway just adding some grist to the mill.

You've twisted my arm. I'll see what I can do about grabbing Leningrad. Thanks for posting that list. I needed to
see that bad boy to make up my mind.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's the front lines in T10 before I have moved anybody.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's a spot NE of the marshes near Gomel and as you can see the supply levels are
okie dokie except when you cross the river. So I need to fill up my units with
supply before I cross the bridge. I've got to watch the supply levels to make sure
I don't wander into an overextended area.

[larryfulkerson]

This is the combat results of the first combat round and I'm thinking it was successful
overall. I've eliminated a lot of the Soviet units I had surrounded and now that a
lot of the mop up's are terminated the advance can continue up to the point where the
supply levels won't support it.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's what it looks like around the Smolensk area right now. I've arrived at the
river and now the problem is getting across the river without a lot of losses. I've
jumped across in the south and I'm thinking of rolling up the Soviet line going
north along the river opening all the crossings for the other troops or at least help
them getting across the river.

[MikeJ19]

Larry,

Great stuff. I love how you push rapidly forward. I need to remember to check about supply and being overextended.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: MikeJ19
Larry,

Great stuff. I love how you push rapidly forward. I need to remember to check about supply and being overextended.

I'm resting the units so that their supply level hovers around 50% but other than that everybody is in a footrace with the Soviets to cover as much territory as possible before they can build MLR's that can stand up to repeated attacks. The Soviets start the game with only a few units at the front and maybe 400 units of all types in the rest of the country and each turn they get bou cou troops and equipment and I need to get to the front lines with my guys before his reinforcements can show up in appreciable numbers because when that happens they can build stacks of units and defend better than ever. Then the Axis advance stops and the toe-to-toe warfare begins. Then is when the artillery duels happen and the troops turn into cannon fodder, ala WWI. The game becomes boring and tedius. When that happens I'll study the front lines enough to find the weak spots and concentrate most of my CS on just a few units and wear them down enough for the LCU's to force a hole there. It takes several turns. Repeat as needed.

[larryfulkerson]

So I'm moving units and I've come to the AGN HQ unit and I noticed that it's range
is only 1 still so I took a look under the hood and discovered that it's got no tubes
for it's allotment of 170mm guns. So I took a look at the inventory to see why there's
no 170mm guns and it says that we're not even going to start building them until T80
and now that I've looked it up I have a vague memory of having looked it up before.
I need to write myself a note about this or I'll end up doing this procedure again.

[larryfulkerson]

I completely forgot about the new home rule about using ant units for recon and
blocking retreats, etc. and drove some MP's out into the field to do some recon
and convert hexes and try to find the Soviet units. I needed a low-cost unit to
drive out that way and the MP's were handy and form follows function and off they
went. I'll fix it next turn.

[larryfulkerson]

I found another HQ unit that is missing some of it's tubes and in this case the
newly-built equipment is being incorporated into the units as fast as they are
being built. It's too bad that there's no way to substitute the 122mm gun's in
the units with a different model gun, a model of gun of which there's bou cou on
hand numbers for. There's sufficient 150mm ER gun for our needs as well as other
types that could substitute for the 122mm gun's.

Also, I'd love a way to move pilots from one squadron to a Ready Reserve and then
to a different operating combat squadron with a different plane type. That way I
could match my best pilots with the best planes and get better performance overall.

And that would be really nifty to be able to do the same with tanks and tank commanders.

[larryfulkerson]

I'm starting tu run up against the river crossings near the territories and this is
the one at Kiev. I have hopes of getting across the river near here somehow. A crossing
this far south would help a LOT.

[larryfulkerson]

There's a place down south where there appears to be a huge hole in the Soviet lines
and I'm about to drive the Hungarians through that hole just to see what's out there.
I'm thinking there's more Stalin Line in there, it's just not visible yet. My theater
recon value is, I think 10% so naturally to see it I have to be adjacent to it except
for some few exceptions.

I'm going to follow the Hungarians with some regular leg infantry to back them up and
to bail them out when they find trouble they can't handle.

[larryfulkerson]

Here's what's going on near Kiev looking south. I don't want to get anybody too far
into the territories because the supply is low, but rather I'd like to see if I can
build a huge pocket with the Soviets inside it so I can destroy a lot of them at the
same time.

[iwolfhound]

I don't think 122s are built. I believe they are captured.

[larryfulkerson]

ORIGINAL: iwolfhound
I don't think 122s are built. I believe they are captured.

According to the inventory I'm building 5 of them per turn so I'm guessing
that's about right if the Axis side is capturing them. Good catch. Thanks
for posting.