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OK I'm gonna tackle Directive 21... with some personalized thingies

D21 afficionados will notice some differences between the official release and my private mod, which is gonna stay in-house and is in no way meant as criticism on Steve and Rick's superb design

The changes I made are purely my take on some aspects of D21 and include: ...

-D21 team's latest changes to Leningrad arty activation turns are included
-Map changes... for a future update Rick kindly included some suggestions I gave for map adjustments.
-Soviet PO tracks adjusted to work with the map changes
-Changed icon colors to the schemes I'm used to in my eastfront mods, keeping in mind the schemes needed for D21 withdrawal events
-Germanized Axis OOB naming
-Added an HQ in the Turkish and in one German fomation
-Formation Support levels: All Germans on Free or Force depending on formation size.. Finns on Force, other Axis minors on Army
The Red Army support settings remain the same but use of brown as the basic unit color may increase co-operation levels.
-Lowered proficiency for the LW Feld Divisions by 5%
-Romanian 5 Grupul starts with 24x He-112 (no replacements, but will receive Me109), unit enters on turn 4
-No late war 128mm guns in the Axis static units starting line-up...

And then there's this one in order to take away some freedom of decision making to the Axis player...
-"The Hitler Factor": Additional optional house rule ...
During certain time frames in the winter Axis units will not be allowed to voluntary disengage or retreat in order to get more hexes between them and the enemy, EXCEPT for units which occupy a non-bridged river hex.. Those units may attempt to move behind the river. Furthermore, encircled units may not attempt to break out, they have to hold or improve their positions. This represents Hitler's insane orders to hold ground, no matter what.

OK as I never played FITE or D21 in depth it's best to come up with some kind of general outline of what I wanna achieve.

Let's start with phase one.
Plan Marcks may be my best bet of dealing the Ruskis a decisive blow in 1941.
AG Nord will simply clear a path to Narva and dig in. Its panzers will then transfer to AG Mitte for the northern attack on Moscow
AG Sud will try a dash to Kiev, destroy all rezistance there and then converge on Moscow.
The weight of the attack will come from a reinforced AG Mitte which cannot be allowed to be diverted
11th Army and the Rumanians have to take Odessa and seal of the Crimea

The Hungarian and Rumanian air units will only be used sparsely as they will be needed to fill the gaps later on when a bunch of LW units withdraw.

The Finns attack towards their stop lines and I'm not gonna waste too much energy on Murmansk

Good Luck with that, Sil!

Methinx that the Sud pzrgrpn might be a bit late, LOL!

Hey Sil:good luck dude.  So um.......how do you plan on coordinating the convergence on Moscow?  I've found that the push to Kiev took longer than I had planned and that the push toward Leningrad is hampered by low supply levels.  Also, I gotta say I admire a guy who plans ahead with so much detail(s).  My plans usually fall apart due to unforseen events on the ground.  I like D21 and am also playtesting it like you so I'm gonna follow your AAR faithfully if only to compare our results etc.  Thanks for this effort and please don't leave out things you think we might not want to know about.  I'm a big detail(s) person.  Thanks ahead of time.

Hmm yeah, the manoeuver with AG Sud is a risky one... 

Hmm nervousness in OKH... Maybe I can take an old alternative off the shelf... It proved to be successful in my WiR days
tm.asp?m=923602

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

My plans usually fall apart due to unforseen events on the ground. 

Oh I don't doubt that I'll mess up along the way[:D]

I revised my plan. Done away with AG Sud's wide swing. The panzers now will transfer to AG Mitte while no further advances are planned in the south, except for the Crimea later on.

It is based on an old post in the WiR forum by "Poopyhead"

[font="Courier New"]In 1941, the German player must waste everything , but time. Attack, attack, attack! Your goal is to tear out the Russian’s rib cage and throw it on the Bar-B. As such, my northern Panzer Army only clears a way to Leningrad and cuts its supply line. Taking cities from starving defenders is why God made infantry. I quickly redirect the Panzers to Moscow. Similarly, the southern Panzer Army should only clear a way to Kiev and then head north on the east side of the Pripyet Marshes (the minor Axis panzer and motorized units, I recommend you make stay in the south and secure that flank). Eventually, all of the German Panzers are going to steamroller their way to Moscow. I don’t care about the weather, either. Fight right through the winter. Smash your way into Gorki and collect your Iron Cross with Diamonds.[/font]

A few comments on your plan: A direct assault on Kiev is almost suicidally costly, the best way IMHO is a double envelopment from the north and south, or else you are going to pay dearly. 11th Army is going to need some help to break into the crimean peninsula as it tends to be heavily defended, also the Ai tends to build a line at Pskov that requires some weeks to flank and reduce. Lastly, and this is to me the biggest reservation I have with this plan, is that AG norths panzers are goint to cross ismply horrible terrain in order participate on the attackon moscow, and will be in atrocious shape when the get there. As such I advise you to rail them to AGC location where they will cross over plains and not forest/swamps.

Uh-oh, there's not even a single German unit on Russian soil... work caught up with me.[:@]

OK turn 1 completed
It's important not to get bogged down in fighting the border guards with my fast units and first rate foot soldiers
I tried to bypass and surround enemy positions where possible and use security units to take care of them
The Luftwaffe has been pummeling enemy airfields.

I shifted two Pz Div's from AG Sud to AG Mitte to put extra weight on the drive towards Moscow. To compensate for that, reinforcements like the SS Polizei Div will be assigned for duty south of the Pripet marshes

Here's the movie of the frontier war
One of the top priorities, Brest-Litovsk, has been taken care of.

For the statistics gurus... Some Axis figures I wanna keep track of and update every 10 turns or so


[font="Courier New"]DIRECTIVE 21
------------------
Tanks include StuG and PzJ, no self-propelled artillery

Date----------Tanks----Trucks/Horses---Aircraft--Supply--Repl%--VP


21 Jun 1941---4869-----20704/7045------3589--------46-----100---750/2250

24 Aug 1941---4221-----19677/7728------3355--------37-----100---1273/2250[/font]

I hope those numbers represent how many you have on hand and not losses.  LOL

ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson

I hope those numbers represent how many you have on hand and not losses.  LOL

On hand Larry[;)]

ORIGINAL: Silvanski

OK turn 1 completed
It's important not to get bogged down in fighting the border guards with my fast units and first rate foot soldiers

Silvanski, How many rounds had this turn???

ORIGINAL: fulcrum90

ORIGINAL: Silvanski

OK turn 1 completed

Silvanski, How many rounds had this turn???

3 rounds

ORIGINAL: Silvanski

ORIGINAL: fulcrum90

ORIGINAL: Silvanski

OK turn 1 completed

Silvanski, How many rounds had this turn???

3 rounds

not too much...hope that you get a good advace rate!! Thanks for you AAR

I'll post screenies of some key areas.
Here's the Minsk area at the beginning of turn 5. I'm in a good position to cut off the city and make a quick dash to Borisov.

These first turns are organized chaos but I'm making good progress. I managed to eliminate several Soviet pockets during turn 4

Here's a movie from the start till the end of turn 4, when the Romanians joined in.

Here's the minimap at the start of turn 7.
I made good gains, a mad dash actually, with units advancing 1 to 3 hexes apart in order to convert as many as possible in a short timespan.
But the soviets are starting to wake up and organising holding zones. I'm gonna go a bit easier in this turn, consolidating and not pushing the fast units too much. They need to recover a little bit.

Here's the situation south of the Pripet marshes on the approaches to Kiev

The center, eastof Minsk... Vitebsk can be isolated. Mogilev seems well defended