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I will be battling against a newbie (Sabre1)...two n00bs...I'm not very good at this game, but thought it would be fun for people to see our mistakes.

I'll be playing the Soviets. He the Axis. He will have another thread for his AAR and we will not visit each others until the game is over.

It should be up and running sometime this week. I will post my first entry in the next day or two...Sabre1 might be a bit later, as I suggested he should do the tutorials before battling.

Looking forward to it. I was sorely beaten by a normal Axis AI...so that gives you an example of how bad my gameplay is. Also, I'm not a big fan of PBEM...so it will be interesting to play against someone else...someone human who could potentially make as many (or hopefully more) mistakes than I will.

Good luck Sabre1.

The Plan [&:]
Not sure about what to plan for…they all go to crap when the fightin starts.

Anyway…

21st Army has a limited AoA heading west towards Liptsey then north towards Bolgorod from turn 5.

Being as they are not permitted south, I will use them to take Liptsey and Bolgorod

28th Army, 38th Army and 6th Army all have AoAs to attack Kharkov. I will be using 28th Army to feint an attack to Kkarkov. This is the shortest route to Kharkov and may well be expected.

However, I will attack from the South using 6th Army. Hopefully He’ll be so busy defending the north, he’ll not look south.

If he moves units south to stop the attack on Kharkov from the south, then I will move 38th Army north, ready to support a possible breakthrough in the North. I’m hoping he cannot defend both areas in depth.

Meanwhile, I will have to make some sort of breakthrough towards Krasnograd. Simply to keep his troops away from the south of Kharkov…hopefully he will think my 6th Army will be attacking Krasnograd. For this, and it will be limited, I will use Army Group Bobkin

I’m limited in scope with Army Group Bobkin…so I cannot protect 6th Armys southern flank to any great deal…they’ll be on there own.

I have 2nd Cavalry Corps. They have good movement rates, so I will probably use them initially to head south west of Krasnograd before turning north...make him think I’m coming from there.

In the south east, I’m just going to have to try and hold on. Hopefully, I will be able to move troops southeast when I finished my feints.

My whole plane, therefore, relies on feints and an attack on Kharkov…that is my only aim. It’s all I’m after.

If the feints do not work…my plan is lost.

As this is a pre-battle plan, it will likely alter substantially during the course of the battle.

Turn 1 {North}
In the North, I’ve started my feints.

I’m compelled to say I’m not very good at playing the percentage game, often using the ALL UNITS attack button, and then trimming some off, only to suffer at the hands of the odds!

Anyway, in the far north, more of a distraction really, I’m attacking towards Bologorod with the 76th Rifle Div, 10th Tank Brigade, 297th Rifle Div and the 301st Rifle Div. I didn’t want to move any Artillery units north…I want to keep them for the “main feint”

To the east of Kharkov, I’ve started a slow assault towards the city. I started with bombardments of the defensive line in order to open a penalty free route through.

In the central section, I’m attacking with all units and made some good progress, but took some unnecessary chances and ended up weakening some of my divisions unnecessarily!

The 38th Army Assets (13th, 133rd and 36th Tank Brigades) have made good progress south west. (blue)

The 13th Guards Rifle Division (yellow) has made good gains west.

To the north of “the bulge” (green), the 227th, 175th, 224th, 38th, 293rd and 162nd Rifle Divs, supported by 4 tank brigades (84th, 90th, 57th and 6th Guards) of the 28th Army Assets may well swing north and head round the back.

I’m keeping the 5th Guards Cavalry Div, 6th Guards Cavalry Div and 32nd Cavalry Div (orange) at the rear, hoping to exploit a breakthrough. In fact, since the recon photo below was taken, I have moved them forward, but well behind the front lines.

Central and Southern flanks to follow

[8D] cool, love a good AAR...best of luck to both players... cheers

Well even if it´s true that you are not a good player (yet), your AAR is first class.[:)]
 

Thanks for taking the time to do an in depth AAR, Judge.

I don't own this nor any of the series as the colours and such make my eyes bleed![:'(][:D]

But I'm interested to see how it plays out and what you think as you go.... maybe I can wear sunglasses or something....

Judge,

A small bit of advice. Your artillery has a lot of Ops points. More than enough to move up in range, fire and move back out of counterbattery range. They will have more than enough OPs points to be able to move back up into range to fire again next turn. Try not to ever leave an artillery piece in the same hex it fired from, especially if that hex is within counterbattery fire range. Even outside of counterbattery range, if they stay in the hex they fire from they may be sufficiently well spotted to become a target for your enemy's airforce. You'll lose a lot less artillery pieces that way.

Thanks Hans...make sure you afford the same advice to Sabre1 as he is also a noob at this.

And thanks for your comments - all are welcome.

Seriously though, I have very little idea of how to play this game and, afaik, Sabre1 suffers the same...so this is very much a noob vs noob battle.

Update on the North
I’ve deployed some Partisans (yellow) southwest of Kharkov to make any movement south expensive. I’ve also deployed some Interdiction (blue) around my “bulge” (anyone who has seen pictures of me will have a laugh at that!). I’m trying to make movement south or east from Kharkov difficult and expensive.

I’ve also moved the 5th Guards Cavalry Div, 6th Guards Cavalry Div and 32nd Cavalry Div (orange) to the west

Turn 1 {Central}
In the Central region, I’ve spent most of my time knocking a great big hole through the German static defenses. There’s quite a gap now, and in the right place for Sixth Army to manoeuvre through.

During this attack and subsequent move, I destroyed the German 9th and 34th Infantry Regiments as seen in the recon photo below

As for movement, there is a big gap now, so hopefully my units will start pouring through. Green region shows no immediate enemy positions.

Red arrows show axis of advance.

Heading north I have 266th, 411th, 343rd, 47th, 253rd, 41st, 337th Rifle Divisions supported by artillery and 6th Army Assets including 5th Guards, 37th, 38th and 48th Tank Brigades

Heading west I have 103rd, 270th, 393rd, 248th, 343rd Rifle Divisions followed up by the 28th, 49th, 26th, 38th and 62nd Cavalry Divisions. These are being supported by some artillery assets (although the artillery was mostly used to destroy fixed emplacements) and Army Group Bobkin assets including 7th Tank Brigade and 1st, 2nd and 3rd Sapper Regiments.

I would liked to have directed some of these north, but they are enforced by the assigned Area of Operation for Army Group Bobkin.

Turn 1 {South}
I won't be doing much in the south. I've used artillery to attack some fixed emplacements to prevent the Germans having the extra defensive value of them if I have to attack. I suspect it will be a falling back manoeuvre in the south full of delaying actions.


That's my turn over. Tune into Sabre1's AAR for his view. Hopefully, he won't notices the MASS of mistakes I've made!! [:'(]

JD, You are going to get me in the mood to make a purchase yet. Even though I've about had my fill of WWII games!!!

ORIGINAL: Treale

JD, You are going to get me in the mood to make a purchase yet. Even though I've about had my fill of WWII games!!!

Exactly my thought too...I have previous SSG games w/ exception of BII and have enjoyed them all. I'm always pumped for a good WWII game, particularly the East front.

ORIGINAL: Wallenstein

Well even if it´s true that you are not a good player (yet), your AAR is first class.[:)]

Thank you for that kind comment.