Factory Evac and Industrial Planning in 1.08
Posted: Fri Apr 03, 2015 12:57 pm
These ramblings are an attempt to update Walloc's excellent evacuation guide and try to rethink Soviet economic planning under the 1.08 patches.
First in terms of specialist factories, I think the obvious changes are:
Aircraft
I've come to a new view about level bombers. All things being equal, you will have supply problems and if so these are hard to make substantial use of. My view is now to do minimal evacs of the Il-4 and Pe-2 factories at Moscow. I think the Pe-2 factory at Kazan will produce all you really can use.
The lend-lease A-20 that you gain a lot of in 1942 can do as your LB of choice, not least this won't cost you supplies for production.
Other planes have changed their upgrade paths and this has some bearing.
So the LaGG-11 that starts at Taganrog in the end becomes a Yak-3. I'm not sure that the intermediate LaGG models are of much use but the end point is valuable. Make sure you get 1 point out before the Germans arrive.
The La-GG factories are now all in the north around Gorky. Can't see any reason to evac these and then they become the rather nice La-5/La-7series.
Yak-1, there is a batch of these around Saratov/Engels. One factory is in the open fields of Tatischevo and this might be worth moving very early so it is safer in case of a serious German attack in 1942.
The advice to move the Il-2/10 plants from Voronezh early is valid. Overall much less lost production and a short gap in your numbers in 1941 is not really that significant.
At Moscow, as before get out the Li-2/Li-2VP, Il-10, Pe-2r/Pe-3 as you can. All valuable.
A big change is the two Mig-3 factories. You now need these for 50% of your long term Il-2 production but be careful over how you move them. Not only do the factories convert to Il-2 production in Jan 1942 but they also reset to 1 regardless of existing size. On that basis unless you are going to lose Moscow leave them till Jan 42 and then move a single factory of each. The Mig-3 is useful in 1941 so no point losing production.
As before you can leave the Su-2s at Kharkov.
Armour
Leningrad – the KV factory is essential for the later game IS series. The T-50 becomes another source of T-34s so both need to be pulled out but can be relatively limited. Leave the BA-10 as it is of no long term use.
Kharkov – make sure you pull something. Ideally as much as possible but you will have T-34 shortages in 1942, surpluses in 1942-3 and then shortages (as your losses mount) late game in any case.
Moscow – T40 as before the main use of this is as the basis for the Su-76. Move a little late in 1941 (unless Moscow is at risk).
But the main change in 1.08 is strategy around the generic factories.
My personal view is to try and rescue every truck factory I can. To retain operational movement in 1942 and 1943 you need both domestic production and lend-lease.
However, the main change is in terms of the relationship between HI and arms pts. With lower production multipliers you need more HI. How much is hard to guess, but some ratios and observations:
In 1941 each operating HI unit will produce 500 supply. Each Arms pt unit will take around 40-45 supply units to in turn produce 5 arms pts. Overall it looks a bit as if production takes up around 35-40% of total supply production and arms production seems to be around 40% of this total.
So my understanding is if all you wanted to do was use HI to produce arms pts, you need a ratio of 1HI:4AP. Any more AP cannot be operated in the long term. But you need say 60% of all production going to the army (ammo, unit supply, digging defences), so the ratio between HI and AP has to be lower. In effect 40%*40% of all supply production feeds into AP, so that means of the 500 supply from each HI point, you can only use 80 for arms pts – in other words each HI factory can only supply 1.6 Arms Pts factories.
On that basis, my guess is you need to evacuate a ratio of roughly 1 HI:2 AP (being cautious here as arms pts are so important).
Equally you may need to squeeze other production aspects to maintain supply to key production. I personally am starting to set air production in 1941 at around 70%. The 1941 planes are not that great and the VVS is severly hampered in 1941 in any case - this is another reason not to want to save too many Pe-2/Il-4 ... there is no point producing what you can't use so this is a prudent long term saving of both rail cap and industrial production.
At some stage, operational or production need will mean you need to run down your supply stocks. But in the long term you need to plan on a balanced budget.
The unknown question is how much HI/Arms Pts are needed to supply an effective army. My rough guess at the moment is 200 HI is a safe position. Much less and you'll need to make tricky choices, much more is probably unrealistic in PBEM given other demands on rail capacity in 1941.
Any comments/obvious mistakes?
(sorry this became a bit of an essay)
First in terms of specialist factories, I think the obvious changes are:
Aircraft
I've come to a new view about level bombers. All things being equal, you will have supply problems and if so these are hard to make substantial use of. My view is now to do minimal evacs of the Il-4 and Pe-2 factories at Moscow. I think the Pe-2 factory at Kazan will produce all you really can use.
The lend-lease A-20 that you gain a lot of in 1942 can do as your LB of choice, not least this won't cost you supplies for production.
Other planes have changed their upgrade paths and this has some bearing.
So the LaGG-11 that starts at Taganrog in the end becomes a Yak-3. I'm not sure that the intermediate LaGG models are of much use but the end point is valuable. Make sure you get 1 point out before the Germans arrive.
The La-GG factories are now all in the north around Gorky. Can't see any reason to evac these and then they become the rather nice La-5/La-7series.
Yak-1, there is a batch of these around Saratov/Engels. One factory is in the open fields of Tatischevo and this might be worth moving very early so it is safer in case of a serious German attack in 1942.
The advice to move the Il-2/10 plants from Voronezh early is valid. Overall much less lost production and a short gap in your numbers in 1941 is not really that significant.
At Moscow, as before get out the Li-2/Li-2VP, Il-10, Pe-2r/Pe-3 as you can. All valuable.
A big change is the two Mig-3 factories. You now need these for 50% of your long term Il-2 production but be careful over how you move them. Not only do the factories convert to Il-2 production in Jan 1942 but they also reset to 1 regardless of existing size. On that basis unless you are going to lose Moscow leave them till Jan 42 and then move a single factory of each. The Mig-3 is useful in 1941 so no point losing production.
As before you can leave the Su-2s at Kharkov.
Armour
Leningrad – the KV factory is essential for the later game IS series. The T-50 becomes another source of T-34s so both need to be pulled out but can be relatively limited. Leave the BA-10 as it is of no long term use.
Kharkov – make sure you pull something. Ideally as much as possible but you will have T-34 shortages in 1942, surpluses in 1942-3 and then shortages (as your losses mount) late game in any case.
Moscow – T40 as before the main use of this is as the basis for the Su-76. Move a little late in 1941 (unless Moscow is at risk).
But the main change in 1.08 is strategy around the generic factories.
My personal view is to try and rescue every truck factory I can. To retain operational movement in 1942 and 1943 you need both domestic production and lend-lease.
However, the main change is in terms of the relationship between HI and arms pts. With lower production multipliers you need more HI. How much is hard to guess, but some ratios and observations:
In 1941 each operating HI unit will produce 500 supply. Each Arms pt unit will take around 40-45 supply units to in turn produce 5 arms pts. Overall it looks a bit as if production takes up around 35-40% of total supply production and arms production seems to be around 40% of this total.
So my understanding is if all you wanted to do was use HI to produce arms pts, you need a ratio of 1HI:4AP. Any more AP cannot be operated in the long term. But you need say 60% of all production going to the army (ammo, unit supply, digging defences), so the ratio between HI and AP has to be lower. In effect 40%*40% of all supply production feeds into AP, so that means of the 500 supply from each HI point, you can only use 80 for arms pts – in other words each HI factory can only supply 1.6 Arms Pts factories.
On that basis, my guess is you need to evacuate a ratio of roughly 1 HI:2 AP (being cautious here as arms pts are so important).
Equally you may need to squeeze other production aspects to maintain supply to key production. I personally am starting to set air production in 1941 at around 70%. The 1941 planes are not that great and the VVS is severly hampered in 1941 in any case - this is another reason not to want to save too many Pe-2/Il-4 ... there is no point producing what you can't use so this is a prudent long term saving of both rail cap and industrial production.
At some stage, operational or production need will mean you need to run down your supply stocks. But in the long term you need to plan on a balanced budget.
The unknown question is how much HI/Arms Pts are needed to supply an effective army. My rough guess at the moment is 200 HI is a safe position. Much less and you'll need to make tricky choices, much more is probably unrealistic in PBEM given other demands on rail capacity in 1941.
Any comments/obvious mistakes?
(sorry this became a bit of an essay)
