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Okay, have played thru a year and a half of 41 GC as Axis.

Things in game I still have not used:

1) Fortified Zones
2) HQ Build Up
3) Range limiter for air commitment to Air Bases
4) Merging of units
5) Air Transfer
6) Air Drop (of unit, I have used Air Drop of Supplies and Fuel)
7) Naval Transport
8) Amphibious Assault
9) Bomb City
10) Toggle to Night Mission
11) Motorize a non-motorized unit
12) Attached/Detached support to a Location (i.e., AA to a city)
13) Relocated an HQ
14) Switch a Fighter Bomber mission mode (figher/Bomber)
15) Switch an aircraft to/from Night missions
16) Changed allowed replacements/upgrades of units
17) Look at a city detail window
18) Returned a construction unit to its HQ
19) Conducted an "Air Superiority" Mission (as described in the manual)
20) Played by email.

Do you find there are many features you never use? Is it a matter of me learning nuiances, or is there a lot of chrome you can ignore?

Most of features listed are very usefull if used right way. I would say that against AI you propably dont need any of these but against good human opponent you get decimated if you dont know how to use many of these features.

ORIGINAL: Jakerson

Most of features listed are very usefull if used right way. I would say that against AI you propably dont need any of these but against good human opponent you get decimated if you dont know how to use many of these features.

Especially the last one [;)]

I played '41 and '44 campaigns to conclusion against AI, and not used:

3) Range limiter for air commitment to Air Bases
4) Merging of units
5) Air Transfer
6) Air Drop (of unit, I have used Air Drop of Supplies and Fuel)
8) Amphibious Assault
9) Bomb City
10) Toggle to Night Mission
11) Motorize a non-motorized unit
12) Attached/Detached support to a Location (i.e., AA to a city)
13) Relocated an HQ
14) Switch a Fighter Bomber mission mode (figher/Bomber)
15) Switch an aircraft to/from Night missions
19) Conducted an "Air Superiority" Mission (as described in the manual)
20) Played by email.

Basically, I lack in the Air Force and SU departments a lot (too much micromanagement for my tastes).

As the Germans I don't believe you have an amphib assault capability. If you're not using it as the Soviets (in the Black Sea) then you're doing yourself a big disservice.

If you're playing as the Germans without HQ buildup then you're also making a mistake. As the Soviets it's not worth the trucks.

Taking the original list, here are some ideas, soltely from the Axis side.

1) Fortified Zones  - I come and go on these. Because they take 4 AP I tend not to use them but they are very good for helping to create fortified lines, sitting there and digging. Might also be useful for covering ports in the Black Sea against Soviet invasions but suspect they would be defeated. Critical use? probably during 1942 summer while panzers advance, use them to build your line.

2) HQ Build Up - Essential, Can't win vs human without it. Most recently it has been crucial to me surrounding Moscow in Turn 17. Limits on range make it something which works towards the latter 1/2 of summer blitz. Doubt you could succeed in a breakout in 1942 without it either but those are rare.

3) Range limiter for air commitment to Air Bases - yep not used this either. I am slack at managing air game.

4) Merging of units - late in the war and even then the lack of German units means it is probably not a good idea. Once used it vs AI when was getting close to decisive victory so didn't need to worry about longterm.

5) Air Transfer - very useful when you have a quiet front and want those planes somewhere else but my main use has been to shift JU-52s from north to south to improve supply drops around Turns 10-12, and the other way when I wanted to air drop paras in snow turns.

6) Air Drop (of unit, I have used Air Drop of Supplies and Fuel) - used twice. Once as part of successful snow offensive to cut off Moscow; once as part of snow offensive to cut off Crimea. In most games, where you don't have such successes, the Germans don't use it.

7) Naval Transport  - Riga gambit (check out the AARs), but also been using it in Black Sea successfully after a campaign which saw me take Caucasus. Used it to pull out when I started losing.

8) Amphibious Assault

9) Bomb City - to damage the port at Kuessare (a town north west of Riga) -- see AARs.

10) Toggle to Night Mission - tried once to bomb with my night bombers. but yes, can't say this matters to me

11) Motorize a non-motorized unit - once did, regretted it. Better to use railroads.

12) Attached/Detached support to a Location (i.e., AA to a city) - detached AA late in the game in vain effort to stop 10000s of KV1s

13) Relocated an HQ - not done it...I let soviet armour do it for me

14) Switch a Fighter Bomber mission mode (figher/Bomber)

15) Switch an aircraft to/from Night missions - yes, did this to try and use regular fighters to reduce partisan supply drops. Doubt it made any difference

16) Changed allowed replacements/upgrades of units - nor me.

17) Look at a city detail window - Need to check out the industry and other goodies you want to destroy

18) Returned a construction unit to its HQ - essential. as the snow in 1941 draws near, stop all those units building railroads and return them to HQs, then assign downwards to Armies and lock the HQ. They will then dig forts. Leave a few to do railroads but 75% to forting.

19) Conducted an "Air Superiority" Mission (as described in the manual) - got me on this one.

20) Played by email. - do it quite a bit

I have never put a unit in Static mode, other than to harvest APs, which is kind of artificial. I just don't see the point in it.

Same for Motorizing Units. I suppose there is a very limited circumstance where railroads are not available, but hasn't happened to me yet.

Another not on this list is Air Transport. Not sure why I would need to Air Transport a unit (not para drop, but base to base). Haven't tried flying a unit OUT of a pocket, maybe that's a use.

MERGING of units is one way the Soviets can keep the 1941 Winter Offensive going. You can merge a brigade into an UNREADY division, and PRESTO, it's READY. That costs you a unit, so you have to be selective, but I used this to keep units fresh.

ORIGINAL: Q-Ball
Same for Motorizing Units. I suppose there is a very limited circumstance where railroads are not available, but hasn't happened to me yet.

I think this is mostly for German 41 to get reinforcement divisions units faster to front when railroads are still broken. This could pay out if its very important to have more troops to exploit some new opening in frontline.

I have used this to catch on rest of panzer division with infantry divisions so my deep penetrating panzer division can have more support.

For Soviet side there is not utility for this feature as most of cases Soviet advance so slowly that they can keep up repairing railroads with pace of advance pretty easily. Also wasting vehicles for this is not good as Soviet need all extra vehicles they might have supply and build more troops. If Soviet have more vehicles than they need its better to build extra mobile troops with them than waste them for not mobile troops motorizing.

ORIGINAL: majeloz

2) HQ Build Up - Essential, Can't win vs human without it. Most recently it has been crucial to me surrounding Moscow in Turn 17. Limits on range make it something which works towards the latter 1/2 of summer blitz. Doubt you could succeed in a breakout in 1942 without it either but those are rare.

HQ Build Up - Gets you lots of supply and full MPs, right. Seems okay, but essential? Does it do more than I realize?

ORIGINAL: majeloz

18) Returned a construction unit to its HQ - essential. as the snow in 1941 draws near, stop all those units building railroads and return them to HQs, then assign downwards to Armies and lock the HQ. They will then dig forts. Leave a few to do railroads but 75% to forting.

How do you know those construction units will work on digging in by returning them to the HQ? They are controlled by the AI.

I can not see how you can conduct an "Air Superiority" Mission even after checking through the manual several time.  I found the section in the manual but it did not describe how to conduct a manual mission.

ORIGINAL: jamesm

I can not see how you can conduct an "Air Superiority" Mission even after checking through the manual several time.  I found the section in the manual but it did not describe how to conduct a manual mission.

Directly from the manual:
16.3.3.5. Air Superiority Missions
There is no separate mode for conducting a mission consisting of fighter air group units attempting to engage enemy air group units in air to air combat. Players can approximate this type of historical operation by setting up a manual bombing mission and deselecting bomber air group units so that only fighter air group units conduct the mission. Bomb airfield missions against air base units will usually be the most effective application of air superiority missions.
Note that in a situation where fighters are available and in range, but no bombers are available, players will be unable to set up a bombing mission since the computer won't allow a mission if there are no bomber air group units to initially include.

ORIGINAL: Gargoil

ORIGINAL: majeloz

2) HQ Build Up - Essential, Can't win vs human without it. Most recently it has been crucial to me surrounding Moscow in Turn 17. Limits on range make it something which works towards the latter 1/2 of summer blitz. Doubt you could succeed in a breakout in 1942 without it either but those are rare.

HQ Build Up - Gets you lots of supply and full MPs, right. Seems okay, but essential? Does it do more than I realize?

ORIGINAL: majeloz

18) Returned a construction unit to its HQ - essential. as the snow in 1941 draws near, stop all those units building railroads and return them to HQs, then assign downwards to Armies and lock the HQ. They will then dig forts. Leave a few to do railroads but 75% to forting.

How do you know those construction units will work on digging in by returning them to the HQ? They are controlled by the AI.

HQ build up: assume your panzers are close to the end of the supply chain and are getting less MP and less combat power (remember, ammo supplies too) - suddenly, via HQ buildup they move and fight harder and further. yay! It is essential.

HEre's how to get diggers digging -- return construction units to HQ (usually Army group). Assign, using AP, to Armies within that Army group. Lock the SU assignment for Army HQ so they can't run away somewhere. Then, according to the manual, they speed up the fortification construction process for units in that Army if the army HQ is correctly positioned and the Corps HQs are correctly positioned.

18) You apparently never had a Romanian construction unit sitting on a mountain pass and blocking the way for the Hungarian mobile corps. [;)]

1) Fortified Zones - right now these are either marginally useful, or completely useless, depending on personal taste. Their primary use is to begin building forts somewhere immediately, and to maintain those forts when your real combat units leave, but they can sap manpower from units that could otherwise be used for reinforcements, and you need to disband them when combat is imminent because they'll always surrender when they lose, which loses the manpower and armaments forever.

Next patch, they might become more significant, since they'll be the only way to construct level 4 forts outside of cities.

2) HQ Build Up - These are mostly for the Axis, and mostly for 1941, since it lets you keep the offensive rolling just that much farther. Later on, neither the Germans nor the Soviets will really make supply-line-outrunning gains that will require its use.

3) Range limiter for air commitment to Air Bases - I've never used this myself

4) Merging of units - as the Germans, you'll sometimes want to split up your units into Regiments to cover more frontage, though the window is rather small, as by the time your lines are long enough to keep the extra units, you'd also be facing Soviet units strong enough to beat your regiments regularly.

As the Soviets, this is rather critical, as merging Divisons/Brigades into Corps is critical to transforming the Red Army into an offensive weapon.

5) Air Transfer - I've never used this myself

6) Air Drop (of unit, I have used Air Drop of Supplies and Fuel) - I've never used this myself

7) Naval Transport - I've never used this myself

8) Amphibious Assault - I've never used this myself, although this is a key part of the Riga Gambit (might be going away next patch) and can be useful for the Soviets in AGS by distracting the Germans via landings along the Black Sea coast.

9) Bomb City - this was supposedly overpowered on part of the Germans by allowing them to take out unhistorically large numbers of Soviet industry, but I don't know if it's been adjusted since release.

10) Toggle to Night Mission - I've only ever used this as the Soviets, who need transports in VVS airbases to be set to Night Missions to drop supplies to Partisans.

11) Motorize a non-motorized unit - I've never used this myself

12) Attached/Detached support to a Location (i.e., AA to a city) - I've never used this myself, although supposedly it's a way to help against the hordes of Soviet aircraft attacking Axis airbases.

13) Relocated an HQ - I've only ever used this as the Soviets to save HQs that were in danger of getting cut-off.

14) Switch a Fighter Bomber mission mode (figher/Bomber) - I've never used this myself

15) Switch an aircraft to/from Night missions - same as #10

16) Changed allowed replacements/upgrades of units - I've never used this myself, the only adjustments I do with regards to replacements is TOE percentages and Normal/Refit/Reserve mode.

17) Look at a city detail window - I've never used this myself

18) Returned a construction unit to its HQ - I've never used this myself. If you manage your SUs and SU-locking correctly, you should never have stray SUs anyway.

19) Conducted an "Air Superiority" Mission (as described in the manual) - I've never used this myself. I *have* attacked airbases, but never with pure fighters the way the manual describes.

20) Played by email - I've never used this myself

I had two front HQs cut off in a giant Leningrad pocket. Once their dumps were exhausted, I hit relocate and took the lumps or leader deaths so I could rebuild the Fronts/Leaders on my terms while my opponent would be busy for several turns reducing the sizeable pocket. Even one turn ahead of the Panzers doing it for you makes a difference as the 10,000 man HQs re-appear at a maintenance shack somewhere along a Siberian railway line amidst bemused stone age Russian Innu.

Fortified zones:
+ build some basic fort strength before you have a real combat formation in position
+ add some manpower to an otherwise too small occupation formation in a city or urban area
+ keep fortifications up even if combat formations have temporarily vacated the location

Their value in combat is small, though. I do usually disband them before the opponent can attack them.

Remember, fortified zones don't have to be such a manpower drain - set their TOE to a lower %

Good thread and good responses. I better cut and paste this stuff if I plan to play this game seriously. Thanks.

14) Switch a Fighter Bomber mission mode (figher/Bomber) - For the GE player, on Turn 1 just before I start my air raids, I switch all FB to Bomber mode. I switch them back to what they are trained as on the following turn.