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How have the changes worked out so far for everyone? I've just experienced them for the first time and one of the two instances have led to a slightly odd result...



Originally I did not intend to assault Leningrad, however two factors changed my mind about it. The first one was the approximated displayed CV which was rather low, and the second factor was the assurance that even if the attack had failed, there would have been no retreat losses for the attacker. Especially because of this factor I decided to 'risk' it, loaded 1st Panzer with a couple of flak SUs (from jubjub's thread) and an engineer SU, and proceeded with the attack.

Now admittedly it was against a coastal artillery division and a probably weak mechanized division. But at the same time, Leningrad was not isolated and there was a level 3 fort in the hex on top of the heavy urban terrain type. RNG rolls might have also played a factor here. So could this be considered an extraordinary and isolated case or has taking urban hexes become easier with too few incentives not to attack?

If someone from the dev team wants to check the combat simulation under the hood, it's the server game against mind_messing.

I am glad that i am not the only one who is making reports about it.

No retreat losses in case of a failed attack is a big mistake.

This is my example:


What will prevent attacker from attacking next time? Answer is nothing.


So its just a matter of time when any city will get to fortification lvl 0. Even Sevastopol with lvl 5 fort.
I will borrow this image from a loki's AAR:


After such an attack defenders can forget about lvl 5 fort forever.

I would be not surprised if it is possible to take Leningrad in StB campaign with direct attacks.
Attack, reduce fort lvl. Repeat.
Almost no reasons not to attack as losses are super low.

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Also it is quite funny for me that there was no pazner losses in a Jango's example. Not even 1 tank was lost despite attacking into double dense terrain with a mines around.
Did they turned from a complete useless machines to a death machines now, as people described them, when i was asking about them in wite 1?

For what I can see Jango simply faced no meaningful resistance.
A mechanized division with no AFV and I strongly suspect an amount of these defending troops were damaged already and unable to fight - as if a unit was battered, and found shelter in Leningrad.
I cannot see how it's surprising, that a weak formation buckles in.

For what concerns Stamb - my take is that it is better a 'siege' warfare, where TIME is the currency, than to have urban hexes being impregnable strongholds.
The Germans took Stalingrad by spending time in urban warfare / frontal assaults, while the Russians were fuelling troops there across the Volga. And de facto Stalingrad was in German hands. That is probably the most prominent example on German side of a city being taken by frontal attack. Soviets seized plenty of cities by storming them.

Also - the numbers depicted there are the 'dead'. As per, destroyed stuff. All the damaged stuff is under the radar in these screens.

In general if the Russians (in that example) hold on for 3-4 turns of frontal assaults, and that the Germans are to invest 9? 12? divisions in frontal assaults, for Smolensk or so - that's a HUGE Soviet victory in terms of time and effort.

Am I saying the Urban Business is fine? I do not know, I'd rather experience it myself firsthand a bit before to speak better on the topic. But at least by what I see it right here, it does not seem broken.
Beforehand it was a very binary business. Succeeding or pretty much having a weeping tragedy crippling 1 entire army with 1 failed attack. Which was over the top.

AlbertN wrote: Fri Apr 22, 2022 1:32 pm ...
Also - the numbers depicted there are the 'dead'. As per, destroyed stuff. All the damaged stuff is under the radar in these screens.
...

its not, at least for my example with Smolensk
I showed details.

1805 men dead per 9 attacking units
its oly 200 men per division

and 8195 damaged elements / 9 units = 910 elements per division
Its very low.

Some might say, hey but it is August 1941, Germans should be rocking on a battlefield. True.
The thing is that it will be the same in 41, 42, 43. If they get to a Moscow they will be able to repeat same tactics. And I can not give Moscow cuz it is NSS.
Game treats all urban hexes the same. And all heavy urban the same.

Also no retreat losses means that attacking side completely ignored losses that it should take for crossing a river.
So panzers just get to a city, lost some in a battle, and successfully swim to the other bank of a river...

While defenders were looking at them and saying: "come here next week, cheers"

I decided to run a couple of tests.
The good thing is that i was not able to take Leningrad without isolation.

Even when it had lvl 1 fort.

But there is another problem.
This is an example of attack against lvl 3 unisolated fort. So far so good.

And this is attack with even less forces only after 1 turn (1 week of isolation) Why 1 week of isolation leads to such a drastic change in results? There is more than enough supplies in a Leningrad.
I know that there are additional penalties applied when hex is isolated. But i dont think that only 1 week of isolation and defenders should lose an ability to defend.

am i the only one who find such results strange?

Stamb wrote: Wed Apr 27, 2022 8:32 pm I decided to run a couple of tests.
The good thing is that i was not able to take Leningrad without isolation.

Even when it had lvl 1 fort.

But there is another problem.
This is an example of attack against lvl 3 unisolated fort.
no isolation.png

So far so good.

And this is attack with even less forces only after 1 turn (1 week of isolation)
2.png

Why 1 week of isolation leads to such a drastic change in results? There is more than enough supplies in a Leningrad.
I know that there are additional penalties applied when hex is isolated. But i dont think that only 1 week of isolation and defenders should lose an ability to defend.



saves.zip

I like how the germans where weaker the second time put performed much better because of this binary isolated debuff.


The game needs less hardcoded binary debuffs! It needs less hardcoded binary stuff overall!!

exactly

you can have 60k freight in a hex, and then it is just isolated and destroyed

so there is binary system
not isolated - you are fine
isolated - you are dead

it is actually denying usage of forts

because with recent changes it is probably impossible to take urban/heavy urban (not sure about a port, but they are rarely a hexes that provide interest) in direct attack vs 3 units there
so why would you even use forts?

Stamb wrote: Fri Apr 22, 2022 12:28 pm No retreat losses in case of a failed attack is a big mistake.

What will prevent attacker from attacking next time? Answer is nothing.


So its just a matter of time when any city will get to fortification lvl 0. Even Sevastopol with lvl 5 fort.
I will borrow this image from a loki's AAR:


After such an attack defenders can forget about lvl 5 fort forever.

I would be not surprised if it is possible to take Leningrad in StB campaign with direct attacks.
Attack, reduce fort lvl. Repeat.
Almost no reasons not to attack as losses are super low.

Don't believe this is entirely the case. Each one of those attacking German Infantry Division took a big punch to the face with a reduction in morale from a failed attack. It is very hard to recover morale losses for Germany on the eve of the '41 Winter.

Without reading the AAR, I can assure you the Germans also suffered tremendous disruptions and a big expenditure of supplies / ammo for a failed attack. Attacking forces would see their CV cut in half (or more) as a result.

And knowing where Sevastopol lies in relationship to Germany's 1941 rail network, those losses in supplies / ammo are difficult to replace. (even a successful attack requires 1-2 turns to recover from and regain a notable percentage of their previous CV)

In the AAR, did they attack the following turn? When did Sevastopol actually fall? (honestly have not read it)

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 8#p4989958

on t23 another attack, not sure if city was isolated or not
t24 isolated and taken

I found and was reading....

Anyway, Sevastopol was isolated across both turns. Also most ground conditions were snow so regained some mobility. In the end a massive air commitment actually paid off (and the weather improving this week) with the early capture of the city.

It was isolated for at least 2 turns. Which would have required a lot of naval interdiction to pull this off. I tend to believe the Soviets could have countered this if they had wanted.

But I had forgotten about the neighboring port on the Crimean coast, which does help with alleviating some of the supply issues there.

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So, it took a total of 3 attacks by the Axis to take Sevastopol. At least two of those attacks were when Sevastopol was fully isolated.

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Historically, I don't believed the Axis were able to sustain this level of naval interdiction to completely isolate Sevastopol.

In contrast, the Black Sea Fleet was bringing in reinforcements through Luftwaffe attacks. On 12 June the cruiser Molotov and destroyer Bditel'nyy brought in 2,314 soldiers, 190 tons of ammunition and 28 artillery pieces. The Luftwaffe turned its attention to these convoys. On 13 June it sank the transports Gruzyia and TSch-27, patrol boat SKA-092, motor boat SP-40, five barges, and a floating crane. On 15 June another 3,400 soldiers, 442 tons of ammunition, 30 tons of fuel and 12 tons of provisions reinforced the Soviet positions.

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After 2 failed attacks, the moral of those German Divisions has been rendered to mediocre at best.

Personally, I am still neutral on the subject until I see more data. But I don't think this particular example really helps.

Anyway, Sevastopol was isolated across both turns

I think it is Soviet turn and Axis turn
Which is actually 1 turn by game terms

DarkHorse2 wrote: Sat May 07, 2022 6:24 pm ...
Personally, I am still neutral on the subject until I see more data. But I don't think this particular example really helps.

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 1#p4991401
at the bottom you can find saves with Leningrad
and try to attack it with/without isolation

and you will see that 1 turn of real isolation = surrender for defenders
irrelevant if they have stockpiled supplies or not
which just not make sense

any chance isolation penalties might be looked at?

Leningrad is nothing to do with isolation as such. What happens there is by the time the Germans can isolate the place (assuming its not been lost off the march in Oct 41) then there is no stored supply in the local depot. This is fairly easy to test.

As such its a case of the defenders have only the supply in the combat formations, so one, maybe two attacks leaves them completely out of ammo = very low CV.

By contrast, a well supplied city that is isolated can fend off a number of attacks and it takes time (and a bit of planning) to get them to degrade to the point where its easy to take.

So there are two very different situations - isolated and low (no) supply and isolated with decent supply - that, not surprisingly, have different dynamics

to prove my point that isolation penalties are too harsh i made a test:
https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/view ... 1#p4991401

TL DR
one turn of isolation with any amount of supplies is equal to a death

and this is the main reason why people do not try to defend Odesa and Sevastopol
because what is the point to put 8 divisions there if they will just surrender with ease
it is a waste of troops

@Jango32

WOW. You took Leningrad in Aug 1941 (turn 7) with just one Panzer Division?

I really feel like your specific combat example is more about the AI not properly garrisoning Leningrad than anything else.

it is/was vs human