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Also, hopefully you can get trucks back into the Panzers that you sent to reserve... Keep in mind that to have any chance of doing that, you apparently have to leave them at a NSS (Berlin) for a while after you deploy them before they can get trucks, rather than just sending them into Russia after deploying them.

ORIGINAL: Beethoven1

You have been doing a good job, the best job of any Germany player in the StB scenario I have seen so far anyway, and as such it is interesting to read your take on it.

It is interesting that you also attacked the Kalinin salient. That seems to be a common running theme, that sooner or later Germany will do something there if the Soviets don't watch out for it. Although you didn't do it right at the immediate start, you came back to it later.

Yes, the single rail line between V.L. and Rzhev is very important. When you were making your incursion into the north/west side of the V.L./Toropets salient, did you consider trying to attack from the other side at the same time at all? Could that have been at all feasible?

Also, I note that you seem to have evacuated from Demyansk at the beginning. How much do you think doing that is responsible for how (relatively) well you are doing, and how much worse do you think you would be doing if you had not done that?

I was considering attacking from the other side, but the point of doing that would be to encircle the units inside the VL salient. Even with the SS units I got, I still wouldn't have enough infantry to consolidate the encirclement. I decided that stopping the supply to VL is good enough.

The withdrawal from Demyansk has helped, but at most I think it has put me only a turn ahead of how I would be doing if I didn't withdraw so early. This is because Tyronec himself withdrew majority of his forces at the Demyansk salient so we both ended up freeing up troops.

ORIGINAL: Beethoven1

Also, hopefully you can get trucks back into the Panzers that you sent to reserve... Keep in mind that to have any chance of doing that, you apparently have to leave them at a NSS (Berlin) for a while after you deploy them before they can get trucks, rather than just sending them into Russia after deploying them.

I really don't know when trucks are shed or not from a unit in a reserve. I have panzer units in the reserve with all the trucks they still originally had. However for the ones that do, I still send them into Russia ASAP; you don't need to even be on the NSS to get trucks, you just need a lot of freight. So a super depot I have at the front will be enough for to restock them. Perhaps making them arrive from the reserve on a NSS is better, I don't really know, but I don't really think the benefits are extremely large compared to just sending them to the front right away and getting vehicles at the front.

If Tyronec is reading this right now, I wonder if you actually had any indication of whether or not I was building up my units for an attack here. Just want to know if what I'm saying is actually working right.

Most of the time I can't see what you have behind the front line. I think once we get to summer I will do some recon and maybe see more then, have just decided to save the aircraft until then.

ORIGINAL: Beethoven1

It is interesting that you also attacked the Kalinin salient. That seems to be a common running theme, that sooner or later Germany will do something there if the Soviets don't watch out for it. Although you didn't do it right at the immediate start, you came back to it later.

For this point, I only launched an attack there because he left his flanks guarded by single rifle divisions. Even at the beginning of the scenario launching the attack to encircle the divisions there aren't worth it for the Axis. The Soviet player should just ignore it and continue trying to cut off the rail line to Rzhev. Watch as the axis struggle to use their panzer divisions to take out rifle divisions in fort 2+ and light woods/heavy woods. The axis may bag a Soviet army, but if you manage to cut off Vyazma since all german armour in the area is committed to an offensive, you end up bagging over half an army group, 13 VPs and an improved logistical situation.

I have question :
Would it make sense to withdraw to the oder / Alps Line in 1943 ?
The Soviet player would have to repair 100 hexes or more of rail for one line and the axis supply lines would be right at home , the front would be shorten considerably aswell , you would lose Romania and it’s units but eh Romanian s

Other than the fact that you'll lose from Sudden Death rules...

I thought after reaching the 575 VP mark you cant lose from sudden death as axis ?

Technically it's Soviet sudden victory but the end effect is the same.

ORIGINAL: YorStein

I have question :
Would it make sense to withdraw to the oder / Alps Line in 1943 ?
The Soviet player would have to repair 100 hexes or more of rail for one line and the axis supply lines would be right at home , the front would be shorten considerably aswell , you would lose Romania and it’s units but eh Romanian s

And the Soviets would just break through that line in 44/45, possibly 43 in some points in the north.

ORIGINAL: YorStein

I have question :
Would it make sense to withdraw to the oder / Alps Line in 1943 ?
The Soviet player would have to repair 100 hexes or more of rail for one line and the axis supply lines would be right at home , the front would be shorten considerably aswell , you would lose Romania and it’s units but eh Romanian s

Romanian and Axis ally troops are actually very valuable. They supplement and augment the German units very well and battered formations can be used to prepare a defense line for your units to fall back to. Losing Romania also means the Axis loses all its oil and you'll probably have difficulty getting fuel for your army.

By the way, still planning to update this AAR but I am strapped for time and would rather continue my turns in the game than post. As soon as my schedule frees up expect to see this AAR rapidly update to our current turn (T20 or whatever it is in the future).

All I will say for now is that counter-offensives are fun [:)].





These are combats from just one part of the front (though they were the most successful).

By the way, can anyone explain why my fighters assigned to escorting GS aren't flying? I just have a few fighters patrolling instead. I posted on the tech support section awhile ago but never got a response.

ORIGINAL: Rosencrantus

All I will say for now is that counter-offensives are fun [:)].

....

By the way, can anyone explain why my fighters assigned to escorting GS aren't flying? I just have a few fighters patrolling instead. I posted on the tech support section awhile ago but never got a response.

yep, I'm having much the same impact with narrow counter-offensives on specific sectors

Not sure re the GS but a few mumbling ideas. First it looks ok, you are getting escorts in most instances and they seem to be doing a number on the VVS. Second, there are a whole load of quirks/features/use appropriate title in the auto-assign routines. I believe the sequence is something like send a few just in case, see what the enemy does, send enough to deal with the enemy (with a similar escalation on the other side).

Of course, as ever, all subject to leadership rolls etc.

So my guess is the patrols were generating enough to re-assure the auto-system that your GS was covered. You could try setting escort for GS to 200% but I'm never happy about twiddling with those settings as sometimes it creates more problems than it solves

Thing is I remember getting at least more than 40+ fighters on every GS mission before the escort bug occurred as long as I had the numbers for it which I do (I have around 80 German fighters in the area and for some reason only the 30 hungarian fighters are being sent out). I'm not sure about the quirks of auto assign as I micro every AOG myself during the air phase or you might be referring to how the actual fighters are divvied out once a combat starts. Leadership rolls should mostly be in my favour, Air Fleet 4 is under Wolfram von Richthofen with an air rating of 8. This is happening with all my GS missions, in the tech support thread I posted a combat with over 300+ soviet fighters and none of the 80+ german fighters in the area even appeared, my tactical bombers that had FW 190s and trained as bombers did the heavy lifting.

P.S As a specific example, most of those fighter escorts in those battles above were the hungarian fighter groups, not the German ones I had lying around.

P.P.S I think that I may have set the fighters on rest for that turn (T19) the 300+ AC combat happened, though I'm not sure how it explains the fact that on turn 20 when I turned them back on they barely flew.

It's been awhile, but now that the holiday season has started its time to continue this AAR.

T10 - January 21, 1943

AGA:

Managed to withdraw to the new defensive line and will hold from there until the Soviets manage to outflank me.

Stalingrad:

I air transport more troops out if he isn't going to seriously attempt to reduce the pocket.

Orel:

Front is holding well, and more units along with the SS divisions have arrived as reinforcements.

Southern Rzhev & VL:

The offensive I've been building up for is finally started. The line was left very thin around this area so a breakthrough was achieved. Expecting him to target the regiment SS units I left in light woods, though they still had a defensive CV of around 16 each from what I remember.

It would be really nice to even get one turn of isolation to force a lot of surrenders.

near Velikie Luki the rail line being cut also weakened his units in the area and I am able to improve my positions there.

Frontline Situation & Losses:

Not much to say aside from the fact that I'm holding alright for now, expecting that to change soon but I will hold for as long as I can.

Very interesting AAR with a far more aggressive German Army as usually seen.

I will be very interested to read Tyronec feedback on this first part of the campaign.