Trappen treat v2 - Bonners (SU) vs Reconvet

[Reconvet]

With 1.05beta out it's time for Bonners to do to me what I was able to do to him, and we agreed on a restart with him directing the defenders of the Rodina and me misguiding the other guys. Bonners is welcome to post his insights any time, I hope this will evolve into a joint AAR.

Settings:
Trappenjagd (full campaign)
Fog of war - on
Pbem protection - on
High command rules - on
Dismissal defeat rule - on
Axis minor rules - on
c&c rules - on
All other rules off

Well then: Cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war.


By the way please note that the properly uniformed dog on the left side definitly seems to have more bite than the other one, and I hope that this will last into winter. [:D]

[Reconvet]

Turn 1 - May 12 1942

Slow start for my Crimea campaign. I'll try to reduce supply flowing into Kerch and Sewastopol for a few turns first, so I didn't do any fancy ground attacks. I want to keep my 11th Army in good shape for tougher objectives in june/july.

[Reconvet]

Luftwaffe CO has to make an appearence at high command to explain the bomber losses at Kerch. [:@]

[Reconvet]

Soviet Turn 1

Seems like Bonners took in my doggie comparison as a minor provocation. What I interpreted as a lap dog turned out to have pitbull qualities. What a first turn the Trappen-soviets delivered!

Watch in awe and try to feel what I felt on opening turn 2 and watching the combat reports. There is a reason why I had to divide Bonners attacks into two pics…

[Reconvet]

And part two of Bonners attacks:

[jonny211]

I feel your pain Reconvet, particularly with the capital ships armed with frickin laser beams moored up at Kerch. It's a shame there are no torpedo armed JU-88's available, only level bombers.

[Reconvet]

ORIGINAL: jonny211

I feel your pain Reconvet, particularly with the capital ships armed with frickin laser beams moored up at Kerch. It's a shame there are no torpedo armed JU-88's available, only level bombers.

The anti-ship capabilities of Axis bombers do seem to be misrepresented in DCCB for sure. There was a reason after all why in history the black sea fleet hardly ever left harbour, and why the germans were able to make the jump over the Kerch straits without fearing a naval threat for their supply lines there... I'm really dreaming of a game combining the air and naval game from WitP-AE, the OOB details and map size of WitE with ground combat/prestige/logistics concepts from DCCB. Well, hope dies last. [:D]

By the way my turn 2 airraid on Kerch was way less bloody. I had more fighters available for sweeps, and fresh KG bombers reduced the facilities to zero while only losing 5 LB. Parking AAA ships in a damaged port seems to suck out their readiness, which should have an impact on their air defense capabilities. Turn 3 was mud, so no further airraid experiences yet.

[wallas]

Supply will force the soviet fleet to port. I have noticed its very expensive to use it in terms of supply, so why mine is docked.

[Reconvet]

Turn 2 - May 14 1942 / Weather: Clear

The map below shows Bonners turn 1 moves (red of course) and my turn 2 actions/reactions/panic moves in yellow. Yellow arrows pointing west/south are not - repeat NOT - to be mistaken for cowardly routs, but heroic moves to utterly confuse the red hordes and ultimately destroy Stalins formations with any means available (which may include lethal cramps after prolongued laugh attacks due to axis planning failures).

To the situation I had to swallow after opening my turn 2:
I have to admit that I had underestimated what the red army is capable of, early in Trappenjagd. I really had given Bonners an easy time early in our first match (well, mud in turn 2 there wasn't very helpful to encourage soviet attacks all across the map...). In this one he has dished out and taken about 10k casualties. Now I had quite a few holes to plug, some I had to leave open. South of Kharkow I traded space for time. My Romanians there took quite a beating, their spirits are down by 4%... Good thing about that is that I can delay building the necessary HQs for them a bit.

My two tank divisions near Kharkow were sent to the east bank of the Donetz river. I will fight to deny him the railline Balakleja-Kharkow to supply his 6A and to keep a bridgehead on this side of this major river. Nice open panzer terrain once/if I can assemble the necessary forces to exploit it, which means Bonners can grab more real estate elsewhere in the meantime. Worst case scenario is that I might have to bury several german divisions while trying to hold Balakleja, I can't be sure that I'm not biting off more than I can chew there, and I will have to swallow more losses than I'd have to if I had retreated over the river towards Kharkow.

What I can't really read are Bonners intentions south of Kursk. My forces facing his 21A are quite weak, and he may have been tempted to bash on some german and hungarian regiments there. Afaik the soviet player should get no offensive minor orders this soon, so this real estate can hardly be worth fighting for. But maybe this is a pure attrition strategy, a low-risk preemptive strike on divisions which might bite him harder later on if they are left intact.

[Reconvet]

As for the air war:
What I did around the Crimea you can see on the pic below, my Kerch bombing was less painful than the turn 1 version, and in this supply phase not many sandwiches will be able to pass to Bonners boys west of Kerch.

Up north my Stukas were busy demolishing bolshevik tank formations, my fighters didn't encounter red ones, and my levelbombers supported my counterattacks. I had the dilemma to either use my KG there for busting bridges or for ground attacks, and I had to set priorities on (re-)gaining several hexes that seemed rather important to me.

[Reconvet]

Soviet Turn 2

Bonners continues his brutal onslaught on most parts of the front north of the Crimea. Medics in front line hospitals have reported multiple cases of terrorized victims mumbling about Ragnarök...

[Reconvet]

Nope, that was not all of it. Way too many battle records flowing in for just one report this turn...

[Reconvet]

Turn 3 - May 16 1942 / Weather: Muddy

You may have noticed on Bonners 7:8 attack that a red "1 PR" has popped up for Woltschansk. Yep, OKH seriously expects me to grab this village in a front region where my thin troops are near the point of getting totally destroyed and where Bonners 28A still has significant fresh reserves and plenty of artillery. OKH might assume that I do have some panzer divisions in reserve, but any Axis player preparing to cut off the soviet armies placed within the Izium salient is forced to commit those reserves elsewhere… So let's just pretend the order never arrived and blame the Hungarians for not taking this village, even if this won't prevent the loss of 10 percent of the overly generous amount of prestige points that Axis has at the start of the scenario.

Italian tragedy:
Opening my turn 3 showed me the damage Bonners turn 2 attack did to my Italians. I have no idea why they took so many casualties in just one defensive battle. Low initial italian morale may be an answer, but the soviet divisions there seemed to have very low readiness, so I didn't send a german regiment into the italian hex. Due to these losses Italian spirits fell to 28 because so few Italian soldiers are on the map this early in this scenario. Worst thing is that axis minor replacements only start to really kick in at 75%, so I won't be able to use my pasta gourmets for at least 3 months. Seems a bit harsh that just 1 attack can cause such a catastrophe. If I ever play axis Trappenjagd again then the Italians will be pulled offline asap.

[Reconvet]

Balakleja:

This town on the Donetz shore southeast of Kharkow has been declared a fortress. I half count on having it cut off for a turn, with some chance that I may lose several regiments there. Good thing that I have some steel cavalry in the vicinity, or I would have had to pull back there. Not to say that I'm sure that Balakleja can be held, this might end up being my worst decision so far.

Well, here are my mud wrestling efforts on my turn 3:

[Reconvet]

And a map with strange symbols and arrows everywhere except the Crimea - my 11A was not inclined to attack through mud.

[Reconvet]

Have I weathered the red may-blizzard or is it just the eye of the storm?

[Reconvet]

Turn 4 - May 18 1942 / Weather: Clear

The air war over the Crimea shows no sign of losing intensity, on the contrary. I think Bonners must have brought south most if not all his fighter formations. Two of my fighter sweeps and an airfield raid met strong interceptor resistance. This cleared the skies for my Kerch bombers, but the red airforce seems intent on trying to protect the sea supply lanes to the Crimea, so I have to prepare for a prolongued air war around Kerch.

My KG bombers have already suffered significant losses, and when they get caught by interceptors plus get pounded from the AAA ships docked at Kerch they take hight losses and bad readiness hits. So I already had to bring down more fighter groups and KG reserves, which will be sorely missed up north where my grunts will have to fight without levelbomber hex softening support. One important pillar of Blitzkrieg tactics is lost until Kerch is mine, and this will cause me ground losses in the meantime which I wouldn't suffer if Bonners just parked his air force in Siberia. The return on investment for his fighter losses will be cashed in up north on the ground.

Anyway, here is what happened in the skies over the Crimea in my turn 4:

[Reconvet]

In the skies up north my Stukas keep terrorizing soviet tanks:

[Reconvet]

On the ground I'm starting to hit back, now that my lines have stabilized a bit and I'm confident that Bonners won't reach Kharkow.

[Reconvet]

And a map with the situation after my T4.