Alpha AAR - A year at the front with Field Marshal Noob

[ComradeP]

I find it especially doubtful that Army Group North should be so easily pushed back in this game when it has Leningrad nearby as a major port to draw supply from. This, indeed, is a very good reason for taking Leningrad in the first place. Aren't Helsinki and Leningrad ice free during winter?

The Gulf of Finland freezes over on most years, with a layer of ice of some 8 to 16 inches on average. Both in the Winter War and the 1941-1942 winter, there was a significant amount of ice on the Gulf of Finland. Helsinki could be reached by ice breakers with limited difficulty. Leningrad? Not so much. It required and requires lots of ice breakers to stay operational in a severe winter. In 2003, ships were locked in port for a long time.

The Soviet Union didn't have any ice free Baltic ports. Currently, due to the Soviets capturing Koenigsberg and Russia keeping control of the city, Kaliningrad is the only Russian ice free port in the Baltic Sea.

[Flaviusx]

Well, even having Helsinki available would help, and supplies could be railed from there to the front relatively easily. Is the Finnish rail net broad or narrow guage? Even if it were the latter, that still gets you to Vyborg or so.
 
Seems to me if Leningrad falls and AGN digs in behind the Volkhov, it should be in pretty good shape to weather the blizzard.

[karonagames]

@Flaviusx. I've only had to survive 4 turns - there are still 8 turns to go! Seriously though, I have always felt that the First Winter was going to be the subject of much debate, as there are only so many game mechanics that can be adjusted to simulate the unpreparedness (is that a real word?) of the Wehrmacht to deal with a winter that was worse than usual Russian winters. As in my answer to ComradeP, the mechanics being used are Morale and Unit damage. There are no additional logistics penalties other than the Motorised MP cost that increases due to the blizzard, but this applies to both sides.

I don't think Logistics were the main cause of the Wehrmacht's loss of combat power, other than their inability to supply the troops with the right clothing and lubricants. They had enough bullets, what they didn't have were machine guns that could fire the bullets in temperatures of -40C, or troops that were physically and mentally able to cope with a temperature that dropped to previously unheard of levels or deal with an enemy that was more than happy to fight in these conditions.

Everybody needs to reserve judgement until they see the 1942 summer offensive start line that I achieve,and the relative strength of the 2 Armies before deciding if the First Winter is "overpowered". There are 1 or 2 surprises in store.

AGN has lost the fewest hexes so far.

[karonagames]

I have decided to jump ahead three turns to the end of January, as the next 3 turns follow a similar pattern. It snows, the soviets attack, it snows, the Axis lose ground or hold ground depending on the availability of reserves, it snows, etc. etc.

So here is the Situation in AGN sector at the start of turn 33:

[Flaviusx]

I'll wait and see.
 
For the record, my bias leans Soviet. So if it starts to look a bit over the top to me, then...
 
Logistics, so far as I am concerned, was the main cause of the breakdown in 1941. The Germans had the supplies to winterize their troops...they just couldn't get them forward. The clothing certainly existed and was stuck in an ungodly traffic snarl hundreds of miles behind the front. The entire German front line more or less was out of supply once the blizzard hit. As they fell back their situation improved markedly (and the supply situation of the Soviets became strained itself as they moved away from their own forward bases.)
 
 

[karonagames]

Start of turn 33: AGC has been pushed back 70 miles from Moscow.

[karonagames]

Start of Turn 33: Kaluga will probably be evacuated this turn. There will be some hard fighting around Orel.

[karonagames]

Start of Turn33: Don't think I will stick my head into the Noose at Kursk.

[karonagames]

Start of turn 33: Kharkov should hold for a couple more turns.

[karonagames]

Start of turn 33: The front in front of Ztown is bending but not breaking - so far.

[karonagames]

Front Line End of January 1942 North:

[karonagames]

Front Line end of January 1942 South:

[karonagames]

I'm going to fast forward to mid February. I need to speed things up a bit, as I am about to start another 1941 campaign test to see what impact all the recent code changes have had - and there have been a ton of them.

End of Turn 35: I still think AGN is holding OK

[Flaviusx]

Hmmm.
 
All things considered, that front line looks reasonable after all.
 
Do you have a strength/losses screenshot?
 
You're still left with the issue of how to get this to work on challenging and up. I personally don't care too much about this, since I intend to switch to PBEM once I get a handle on the game at normal, but...

[PyleDriver]

Bob how many units were shattered or surendered (they go back to Germany for rebuild)? If they are low your doing fine, and a earlier spring offensive will take place...

[karonagames]

XXVI Korps is the farthest North - here is the TOE summary - most units are at 63-65% TOE. You should note that I have set their Max TOE to 75% as I want to build up AGC and AGS for 1942 before AGN.

[karonagames]

Hi Jon: On normal settings the AI is not using the MP it is getting to set up "mini-pockets" that will cause shatters and possibly surrenders, on challenging the rumanians shatter when they are sneezed on, and in my last test I think GAIA created 2-3 pockets that shattered 4-6 divs. A human in PBEM will obviously do better, but as you know we need a lot more PBEM testing especially for the blizzard: here is the unit loss report:

[karonagames]

End of turn 35: I managed a small counter attack to straighten the line in front of Moscow:

[karonagames]

End of turn 35: Using reinforcements, I have managed a strong defence of Orel with double stacked divisions on the flanks and reserves in a defence in depth set up.

[karonagames]

End of Turn 35: Not as strong a defence at Kharkov, but it is still holding: