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RE: Situation December - 12/15/2010 9:04:07 PM   
karonagames


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quote:

Do the soviets also suffer attrition? How do you see that?


They do, same rules as the Axis, but If think the casualty summary you see is always after their attrition has been calculated. Around this stage of the campaign I would guess that they are losing 25,000 to 30,000 men per turn.

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RE: Situation December - 12/15/2010 9:07:09 PM   
karonagames


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From: The Duchy of Cornwall, nr England
Status: offline 		For a first try, you are doing extremely well - way, way better than I did in my first try! Your winter preparations sound like they are they best you can do in the circumstances. You do have some re-inforcements in the pipeline, and the first couple of turns of Soviet attacks should show where they are needed.

< Message edited by BigAnorak -- 12/15/2010 9:08:30 PM >

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RE: Situation December - 12/15/2010 10:08:22 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		Well, those fast growing soviet numbers are making me nervous. when I saw my truks sinking into the mud by thousands every turn I thought it was batter to stop and start digging.
My front line division have a combat value of only 4 now even though all my troops are about complete. I don't like to suffer casualties. so I tried not to be reckless exceopt in the first few turns when there was a wild panzer rush.

Fort levels are going up, and there are a few reinforcemnts on the rail.  I'm sending them maainly to the centre at the momenT. I have some reseves in the North and south.
AGC need some reorganisation as the panzers where at the front when I called the offensive off. I'm gradually replacing them with infantry. Rumanians and friends also provide good numbers, and average troops are better than no troops.

The red army is already two million men stronger than at its lowest point. Looks like Untergefreiter von Snafu ins going to keep shovelling for a while to keep warm.
I was thinking about switching to the soviet side to see how it works, but getting the soviet offensive will also be interesting. So I'll keep with germans for a while.
Or maybe it woulb be interestiong to switch this game to pbem and see how a human would do but I don't know if it's possible.

So far the situation is looking rather realistic  and the AI is doing a reasonable job so I'm expecting some serious german ass kicking to start soon........

I'm going to need all those troops.


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Post #: 93
Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/15/2010 11:22:52 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		Well, The AI lauched its first turn of winter offensive and it's been well, awfully painful.
losses were 122000 for the AI.

Some places which had time to dig resisted well others did not. So I have a big number of holes along my lines.
I'm not quite sure as to what to do next and how to handle that. However my defensives dispositions were not complete with many troops not yet properly deployed and units not yet put in reserve mode.

A few more turns of such a bashing and the German army will be gone.
Ouch.

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Post #: 94
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 12:57:07 AM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		however, I somewhat neglected a number of dispositions and especially the placing of reserves. Also need to get a look at leaders, support units, and air force more in detail.
I might redo the last turn which I rushed abd whereI neglected plenty of the preparations to see how much this would change. Playing too many turns in a row is not good as you end up screwing many things :)
I think a little manual reading is in order now.

Anyway looks like the AI is up for some serious human as kicking. So I'd better take it seriously, if I don't want to see the red army in berlin for summer 1942.

Basically here my defenses were made of a continuous line a divisions entrenched with a fortified zone in each hex and some minor allies added up in the South.
I have a few extra infantry divisions  and siome armour that I can make use of. I'm going to make a few experiments  with defensive tactics.

At the gates of Crimea the Rumanians did fairly well in entrenched positions.
So after experimenting various offensive tactics I'm going to have a go at the defense.


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Post #: 95
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 1:31:23 AM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		An other dumb question about reserves.
As I was attackind I did not go very much into the matter.
What happens if you put your frontline units in reserve mode?
Do they support each other?
Is it a bas idea as they will expend all their ammo and will soon be reduced to throwing snowballs at T34?

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Post #: 96
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 2:45:01 AM   
Flaviusx


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Status: offline 		Any unit in an enemy zoc is prevented from acting as a reserve.



< Message edited by Flaviusx -- 12/16/2010 2:51:35 AM >

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Post #: 97
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 10:45:47 AM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		Ok.
Going through the battles I noticed that although my dispositions were rather similar all alonfg the front, one german infantry division and a fortified zone results varied quite considerably against quite similar soviet assaults.

One of the corps that did badly was transfered was transfered from 17th to 6th army the previous turn.
Some divisions were moved around and with the bad weather conditions they may have been aversely affected.

There was also less air support during the later soviet attacks.

The resulst was some modified comabt values of between 80 and 120 for some divisions and modified CV of about 30 for others a few hexes down the line. I suppose there's also some random elements thrown in in the soup and it's the combination of many factors.

So it's time to learn the art of surving a soviet winter counteroffensive as I suspect a human player will pull some some nasty tricks out of his fur cap :)


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Post #: 98
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 11:44:41 AM   
karonagames


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From: The Duchy of Cornwall, nr England
Status: offline 		You have to accept that units will retreat, which is why I will be interested to see if you think the fortified zones are a worthwhile investment - personally I never used them.

In the north the terrain will help you, and often the SU cannot occupy a hex they push you out of. You should re-occupy it even though you will not be entrenched. AGN should expect to lose 3-6 hexes.

In the Centre, the terrain helps a little bit, but you should expect to lose 6-10 hexes.

The south is a problem as the terrain is all clear, and if the AI gets lucky with its die rolls it can do double attacks which really hurt. You could lose 10-12 hexes. If you are forced to commit the Axis Allies, the front can collapse, which is what happened in my first game. If it goes bad, try building "hedgehogs" around Ztown and Dtown. If they get threatened with Isolation, you might want to use HQ build-up. I can't confirm it works as well on defence as it does when attacking, but anything is worth trying if it gets desperate.

Low CVs might mean low ammo. Work on your supply line to these units and/or top them up with supply drops ( don't use AI supply drops as it is not working properly).

You should check out my Field marshal noob AAR. When you get to March there is a chance to regain some lost ground. In the south I managed a good pocket which repaired a lot of the damage the Reds did to me in the south. The trick is maintaining enough combat strength to be able to counter attack

< Message edited by BigAnorak -- 12/16/2010 11:46:36 AM >

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Post #: 99
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 11:47:40 AM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		I found the captured equipment.
I'm a bit disappointed at the numbers, especially withe numbers of units that surrendered. I think this should be be toned up somewhat.

I may be wrong but from what I understand the Germans captured and used large numbers of soviet artillery.
so a few hundred guns captured seems to be on the low end. Yet I'm capturing some stuff. So it's more a matter of adjusting the thing to a more reasonable level. I suppose someone must have the actual numbers somewhere :)

For exemple only 36 76mm AT guns captured does not seem quite correct. I would have expected a couple of additional zeros to the figure.

How about Russians that served as auxiliaries in the German army? How are they handled. Large numbers ended up as labourers later in the war, so mostly support squads. But this freed up german troop for frontline service. I think the overall figure was well into the million range, so that's not an insignificant matter.




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< Message edited by Arstavidios -- 12/16/2010 11:57:22 AM >

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Post #: 100
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 12:24:51 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		Well, it looks like leaving fortified zones can be costly.
Each time you lose a hex you lose the whole 1800 men. so all along the front this may mean massive losses.
12 hexes lost this turn means 12 fortified zones disappeared. They also soak up a lot od admin point if you cover the whole 100 + hex of the front.

However in many places the soviets just bounced on my lines, and it seems the places they broke through were because I messed with units moving them around in the blizzard.

some of my corps were mixed up, so I swpapped divisions moving them around rather than reassigning them to a corp which would have cost me some AP.

I seems that most divisions that broke down were in that case as they either had just moved around or were not within reach of their HQ.

also I had not deployed reserves.
I played the few last turn in a bit of a rush and left mant of these details by the side. I want to see if a properly set up line makes much of a difference.

If I manage to get beeter results against the AI, it would be interesting to see how a human soviet player would do. :)

Those parts that had been properly set up seem to have done quite well.

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Post #: 101
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 1:53:06 PM   
ComradeP

 

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quote:

For exemple only 36 76mm AT guns captured does not seem quite correct. I would have expected a couple of additional zeros to the figure.


Keep in mind that the figures are all, in a way, relative to what's still available for the units after the equipment is possibly used by vehicles. For example, Marders also use Soviet guns.

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Post #: 102
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 2:03:43 PM   
karonagames


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From: The Duchy of Cornwall, nr England
Status: offline 		The AI will bounce off for a couple of turns, but she is probably reducing fort levels. By about 6 turns of attacks she will start making dents. In one test, I held a line in front of Moscow for 6 turns but she got to Rzhev in 4 turns!

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Post #: 103
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 2:33:17 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		Winter is going be long for sure.
Here are a couple of combat results from the same area.
First one held second one not. I don't know if the fortified areas made a difference or not.
second division was weaker and faced a much stronger soviet assault.

What buggers me is the difference in the final combat value that was achieved in those combats.
It seems I screwed somewhat in the case of the second division which I think did move during the german turn whereas the first one did not, though I'm not 100% sure. Otherwise it's more or less the same story, terrain army, supply lines.

Looks like the troops that broke had similarly final combat values in the 30s whereas others that held easily had combat values of 80 or 100 + At first glance I would guess moving the divisions around in the blizzard seriously reduced the effectiness of the units.

There may be many other possible factors including bad die rolls. But I'm trying to understand what's going and how to use the troops efficiently, and how to screw things up which I am already good at doing without any help






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Post #: 104
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 2:43:50 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		Meanwhile down in Crimea the Rumanians perform well even though, the soviets might not have been in good condition.




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Post #: 105
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 2:50:23 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		Mutiple attacks on the same unit seem to wear down troops quite fast though. with final combat value at 136 for the first round 78 for the second round and 68 in the third round in an other fight.

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Post #: 106
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 2:56:24 PM   
karonagames


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From: The Duchy of Cornwall, nr England
Status: offline 		oops wrong thread sorry

< Message edited by BigAnorak -- 12/16/2010 2:57:15 PM >

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Post #: 107
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 2:56:50 PM   
ComradeP

 

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Status: offline 		One of the things you'll really start to feel in the winter is the Soviet +1 bonus to odds if at least 1:1.

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Post #: 108
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 3:15:28 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		What does the bonus do?

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Post #: 109
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 3:34:02 PM   
BletchleyGeek


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Status: offline 		Manual Page 214:

quote:

Note that for the Soviet player as attacker, if the actual modified CV ratio is greater than 1:1, due to Soviet attack doctrine, one level will automatically be added to their side of the ratio. For example, a 1.5:1 ratio will become 2.5:1 for determining the winner. This means that the modified CV ratio displayed for Soviet attacks will either be less than 1:1, in which case they lose the battle, or 2:1 or greater and they win the battle.


and the "designer's note" in page 215:


quote:

The Soviet ability to force a retreat at a 1:1 modified combat ratio may seem a huge advantage, but remember that the attack doctrine that allows this also normally results in lower final CV due to more exposure to defensive fire causing additional casualties. Also recall the multiplying impact of fort levels on defensive CV and the fact that engineer ground elements can reduce man made fort levels during the battle. For the Soviets, getting those sappers in action is the only way to reduce fort levels if the defender is not forced to retreat and can make the difference in reaching the elusive 1:1 ratio.


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Post #: 110
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 4:18:12 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		thanks.
looks like I'm in for some serious manual reading.
Things getting in regularly. I'm now having a look at leader and it looks like many of could be replaced by much better ones.
Also starting to look at the support units.
I think I've wasted quite a few administrative points so far and I could have much better overall leadership.

What are the important factors for leaders in higher hqs?
I suppose Combat factors may not be that important for Army group leaders or higher except for the units the control directly which are not that many. How about army HQs?


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Post #: 111
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 4:46:16 PM   
karonagames


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Status: offline 		re leaders, the corps commanders will probably be more effective with higher infantry/mech ratings depending on type. Initiative influence reserve activation and support unit activations.

Higher HQs influence MPs with Admin and initiative.

The armies and corps that have the "must gain/must hold" objectives probably need most of the "7+" ratings you can give them.

< Message edited by BigAnorak -- 12/16/2010 5:00:07 PM >

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Post #: 112
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 10:44:22 PM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		An other turn done
So I tried to patch the holes and restore my line.
However the soviets keep pushing and losses are heavy. almost 200 000 men this turn. I think most of the men were lost to the blizzard.
North or South are more or less holding so far, with the holes contained. centre is starting to show signs of blowing appart.
So a general withdrawal might be considered.

I only have a little other 2 000 000 men ready in the german army that's one third of the army out of action in addition to the losses, two weeks into the blizzard.
I had put some forces in reserve mode but nothing happened. So I guess Von Fubar is at work again. Any idea on what I'm doing wrong? I turned some units in reserve mode. Some where adjacent to units attacks and had not moved for turns tet no one seems to have moved.
So linear defense does not seem like a good idea. Looks like the only thing to do is to run the blizzard turns and and count the surviving noses once mud comes in.
however i'm quite sure I'm messing things up seriously here.

Down in Crimea the Rumanians got plastered and had to withdraw. A third of the fortified zones I had build are gone, which adds quite a few casualties to the list. Maybe they should be used well behind the line to build a fall back line were you can safely withdraw your units.......

So except from not attacking the soviet union in the first place, any idea would be welcome.

I should also think about patching the game. Might help :)


< Message edited by Arstavidios -- 12/16/2010 10:46:38 PM >

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Post #: 113
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/16/2010 10:58:06 PM   
karonagames


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From: The Duchy of Cornwall, nr England
Status: offline 		The first blizzard you experience is always the worst! As long as your units are not routing and the Reds can't do double attacks, you just have to figure a way to maintain a line and not expose yourself to breakthroughs from Cavalry and tank brigades.

Depending on your leaders, roughly 1 in 3 of your reserve units should trigger. Are you seeing no activations at all?

I can take a look at a save if you like.

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Post #: 114
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/17/2010 12:20:39 AM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		I had a look at a the combat results. So maybe I just missed something. I did not watch the turn resolution itself.

An other turn

First blizzard is certainly the worst but if it lasts too long it will be the last.:)
AGC started withdrawing, some serious cracks along the line, losses keep mounting. Red army is now about twice the size of the german army which saw its numbers fall by over 700 000 men in less than a month.

many of those men should be disabled. A couple of infantry divisions dot caught along the front and are now isolated. It's going to be hard to reach them.

Trying to stand and fight does not look very promising so I'll keep withdrawing while I can still maintain some cohesion along the front.

So far the AI has proved a decent opponent and is giving me a sound beating right now, it's clearly trying to pocket some of my troops, and I'd better run fast although some unitswill probably get gobbled.

So far the outcome of the campaign looks pretty reasonable to me. other players may do better or worse, most probably better :)

I've not been doing any micro managing of support units, air units and leaders so far and there still many things which I'm probably still missing :)

So I'll see if the German army still is in recognisable shape when good weather comes in 1942.

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Post #: 115
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/17/2010 1:29:21 AM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		some partisans are also starting to pop up and making a mess on my railways. DSo I'm redeploying security units to the cities and some units are getting on the chase.

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Post #: 116
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/17/2010 9:52:20 AM   
karonagames


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quote:

I can still maintain some cohesion along the front.


Maintaining cohesion is the key. If you have to retreat to do it, so be it.

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Post #: 117
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/17/2010 10:49:47 AM   
Tokugawa

 

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Status: offline 		Can you post a picture of the front at the moment ?

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Post #: 118
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/17/2010 10:57:38 AM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		The two isolated german divisions were eaten up. I am withdrawing in the centre and South while I can still do it in good order. so I'm losing some ground but saving troops.
Some reinforcements are starting to show up un Germany. I'm leaving them there for now. Don't want them to freeze to death in the Blizzard. Many frontline divisions are now down to half strength. Most losses are disablement, and should come back but those men are not in the front line so better to run a few hexex by myself rather than be kicked off by the AI. I hope this may also disrupt offensive strength as they will have to run after me before they can hit me, so that's as much pounding saved. Fortified lines proved costly. with many men lost when they where overrun. I might have been a better idea to keep this men for after the blizzard., but then maybe this helped me absorb the first shock. In the North the lines are holding. I hope to maintain myself there.

Partisans messed up with my rail lines and the Rumanians are giving way down crimea, so that's to good reasons to retreat west. The question is how far. Smolensk or Minsk, Kharkov or Kiev
I'll see. Most important is to maintain the army in good shape, and by withdrawing I'm also shortening the front for the coming campaign.

I'll try a few counter attacks on the soviet spearheads in order to keep them honest. If there's no disaster striking the army should be in reasonable shape once the weather improves and men recover from frosbite. Meanwhile the whole AGC ant AGS are walking hospitals.

how long is it going to be before the two eliminated divisions come back?


< Message edited by Arstavidios -- 12/17/2010 11:00:58 AM >

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Post #: 119
RE: Soviet counter offensive starts - 12/17/2010 11:02:13 AM   
Arstavidios

 

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Status: offline 		I'll post some screenshots later today.

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Post #: 120
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