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Hi,

I am starting an AAR on my current Operation Blau game against ubudeco. While we have quite a few active 41-45 GC AARs on the forum, there are none covering an scenario - for those who don't own WiTE yet, yes it has scenarios, and yes there a bunch more being developed - or the summer-autumn of 1942 - the pivotal point of the struggle between the Soviet Union and the european Axis powers.

This is my second game against him, we're playing in parallel an Operation Typhoon game, and the second time I play this scenario against another person, the first is still ongoing against sitito - hi sitito [;)]. So I am by no means an expert on WitE: see my post titled "Across The Volga" on the Tech Support section for a good laugh. I invite anyone to comment/make questions/criticize my style of play, getting feedback is one of the points of making an AAR. I don't know if ubudeco will be starting his own AAR - if he isn't I think he will be as open to receive advice as I am.

The AAR starts at the beginning of Turn 2: I didn't take any screenshots from Turn 1 and playing on the server has the downside that you can't reload previous turns to review them.

ubudeco opening moves weren't as murderous as the ones by sitito in my previous game. In that game when I opened turn 1 I found that two thirds of the Red Army west of the line Voronezh - Voroshilovgrad - Rostov had been tightly encircled. In this game the Axis has failed to encircle any substantial forces, which is going to be very bad for him. However he managed to clearly defeat the South Western and Southern Fronts, battering several armies.

My moves were done according to the basic (and classic) idea of luring the Axis forces deep into the steppe and counterattack whenever and wherever the Red Army can achieve overwhelming local superiority:

• SW Front was reorganized around the 9th, 38th and 57th Armies. The plan is to fall back towards Stalingrad with these three armies, which will be taking positions along the northern side of the Don bend and will be eventually transferred over to the just arrived Voronezh Front. The 28th and 21st armies, whose units have been decimated, routed and/or dispersed were taken to the safe side of the Don and put into Refit mode. They will be transferred by rail to the vicinity of Stalingrad to recover and become the Southern Don bend reserve.
• Bryansk Front forces (13th and 40th Armies, 3 tank corps and 1 cavalry corps) have fallen back to defend the approaches to Voronezh. The two armies suffered heavy losses on turn 1, but I am confident that with the help of favourable terrain, incoming reinforcements and lack of objectives beyond Voronezh, I will have stalled his advance by Turn 4.
• Southern Front forces (24th, 37th, 12th, 18th and 56th Armies) were deployed to defend Voroshilovgrad and cover the flank of Rostov. While there are quite a few Armies in this front, most divisions are depleted or very green.
• 47th Army and several units attached to Northern Caucasus Front relieved the 56th Army from its positions in and around Rostov. I think this is a move which won't be available in 1.02 - and perhaps rightly so. It allows the Soviet player to contest very strongly Rostov, which is the logistical key to the Caucasus.

I was expecting ubudeco to try to encircle Voroshilovgrad - and bag the 24th and 37th armies - so I deployed the 57th Army (1 Tank Corps, 3 Tank Bde, 1 Mot Inf Bde and 1 Rifle Div) east of Voroshilovgrad to be able to open up a escape route for Southern Front units.

[center]
Overview at the start of Turn 2.[/center]

Looks like my opponent forgot to garrison properly his rear (partisans had a crazy week around Lvov).

I see fours axis of advance:

[center][url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/49883807@N03/5303767370/][img]http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5087/5303767370_59eb16dd02.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/49883807@N03/5303767370/][b]Turn 2: Northern Sector[/b][/url][/center]
• A full Pz Korps has attacked straight at Voronezh. The 16th Mot Div, 24th and 9th Pz Div are at the gates of Voronezh after defeating the screen I had left covering the direct approach (2 Rifle Divs and 1 Rifle Bde) with even losses. The Korps tried to unsuccessfully assault Voronezh being repulsed by the defenders (1 Gds Rifle Div, 1 Rifle Div and 1 Rifle Bde) which were being supported by two nearby Tank Corps. He did a hasty attack - judging from the CVs - into heavily defended urban hex... but the élan and esprit de corps of the panzertruppen averted a disaster, suffering losses of about 1,000 men and 20 tanks.
  
  [center]
  Turn 2: Central Sector[/center]
• Around Valuyki (114, 83) the 3rd and 23rd Panzer divisions attacked between the 9th and 38th Army, defeating several divisions and leaving 9th Army left flank badly exposed.
• The 14th Pz Korps attacked just north of Voroshilovgrad and defeated the bulk of the 38th Army. However the 22nd Tank Corps, which was 38th Army reserve stopped the German armor in a meeting engagement at (120, 88).
  
  [center]
  Turn 2: Southern Sector
  [/center]
• The 1st Pz Army mechanized forces attacked towards Rostov routing my screen, but being repulsed with substantial losses by 47th Army forces just arrived on the southern shore of the Don.

Looks to me that my opponent tried to achieve a major encirclement just north of Voroshilovgrad which failed (in my opinion, because the 3rd and 23rd Pz Divisions didn't act as a team). Although his plan seems to have failed, the 38th Army has been pretty much knocked out of action.

GL m8, gonna follow carefully this one.

Me too! Keep 'em coming!

ORIGINAL: sitito
GL m8, gonna follow carefully this one

ORIGINAL: Grotius
Me too! Keep 'em coming!

Thanks for the interest, but my opponent is playing this scenario in a way I find very "weird". I will try to give an update over the weekend [:)]

I have just sent this message over the Slitherine forums to my opponent

Hi,

it's a bit awkward for me to write this, but I think you'll find these links from Matrix Games forums very useful:

Operational Bootcamp (tutorial) by dlazov66
tm.asp?m=2649216

Panzer Puncture (or how to break through a solid line) by el hefe
tm.asp?m=2658948

Tip Thread (general tips) by bairdlander
tm.asp?m=2658000

I'm especially baffled by your moves on Operation Blau. Perhaps you're going to deploy some sort of German wunder-weapon but if not, I don't see what's your strategy there.

Please, don't take any kind of offense. WiTE is a wargame which looks easy to handle but that under that apparent simplicity lurks a nuanced and hard to master beast. I am willing to offer you a rematch on both Typhoon and Blau if you want to restart them. Or perhaps you'll prefer to continue and take them as "practice" games. Rest assured that I will do my best to handle the Red Army to the best of my abilities

Miguel.

Let's take a look at the reasons which led me to contact my opponent.

Turn 4 (7/18/42) SitRep
[center]

T4_Frontline
[/center]

I'm completely baffled by my opponent moves:

• He's completely failed to encircle any meaningful amount of Soviet forces west of the Don, allowing me to retreat the bulk of those forces behind the Don and towards Stalingrad in good order. He didn't either dash for Rostov, allowing me to setup there a substantial defense.
• He gave up on attacking Voronezh after 2xPzD and 1XMD from 4 PzA's met stiff resistance and received heavy losses. Apparently, from the info ellucidated from my air recon, he's left there just a couple Hungarian IDs, facing the basically intact Bryansk Front comprising the 13A and 40A.
• The infantry of the 6. Armee seems to be massing west of Boguchar, but I'm wondering if his intentions are to push eastwards or try to force a crossing of the Don. Not a good idea the latter, in my opinion, since he'll have to defeat the 9A, just transferred over to the recently arrived Voronezh Front. This army is backed up by my strategic reserves in the sector, the 60A and the 5TA.
• 6. Armee 14 PzKorps has pushed towards Boguchar, defeating a couple RDs, but suffering in the process losses higher than inflicted on the RKKA forces.
• The 4. PzArmee is nowhere to be seen.
• He's not pressing at all in the direct route towards Stalingrad. Perhaps the gap there in the German lines is supposed to accomodate 4. PzArmee.
• 1. PzArmee seems to be poised to frontally attack the position of the Southern Front - 12A, 18A and 56A - which are entrenched behind the Donets and Don rivers.
• Some slight pressure is being applied on the Northern Caucasus Front 47A which is defending Rostov. He's attacking there with the 13 PzD supported by a ID. That PzD lost half his afv's assaulting Rostov.

I'll wait for the answer from my opponent to my previous message. Perhaps I'm being overconfident, but as soon as I assemble the 1 TA, the 4 TA and the 1 GA, I should be able to assmble a powerful striking force which looks capable to inflict a very serious defeat on AGS...