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How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/14/2010 9:14:05 PM

jjdenver

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Hi,

I'm having a look @ Soviet side in campaign. There are bunch of corps/armies with no troops. I wrote another post to ask about this and the suggestion from a tester was to disband (I think wasn't clear) the corps, and to leave the armies hanging around in the rear to take new divisions that are formed (not sure if these form by manual action using AP's or by reinforcement scripts).

Can anyone comment further on this?

I also have another question about what fronts/armies will be added to the game via event/reinforcement. For example I have multiple armies between Moskva and Minsk that are attached directly to Stavka. Would it be normally advisable to try to create a Front HQ and attach these? Or to attach to an existing Front/MD like Western? Or to leave attached to Stavka? And will there be some game engine/scenario event that adds another front to run these later so I should just stay "hands" off for a few weeks until that happens?

Thanks for any insight.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/14/2010 9:32:15 PM

ComradeP

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Andy, Flavio and me could all write a book about it, and they'd be completely different, so keep that in mind as you get answers. There's no "best" way to organize the Red Army, as that depends for a great deal on your preferences.

I'm still trying to free up time to write guides, and they're progressing slowly, so instead of being available at the end of last week, which was my original plan, they should be available this week.

Without getting too specific (I can get as specific as you like, but I'd like to let others chime in too):

-The first thing you do is set aircraft upgrades to manual. CR screen>air groups>AC Change Mode>0/manual.

-The second thing you do, before moving, flying any missions, or attacking is place your entire air force in the national reserve, not to hide them for the entire game but to reorganize it. Move the air groups to air bases as you desire the next turn. Yes, it's a cumbersome process to select each air base and assign groups to it, but it's worth it if done right.

-Do not disband corps. They go away by themselves after a handful of them, and disbanding them is a waste of AP's. Flavio disagrees, but I'm at this point still not entirely sure why he wants to remove corps immediately, instead of wait 4 to 6 turns or so.

-Get your airborne brigades the heck out of dodge. When destroyed they don't come back. Stack 3 of them in a single hex and they have a decent construction value by Soviet standards, so let them dig. Only use them when you have the initiative, never let the enemy attack them on his terms. They are not to be used for a checkerboard defence, aside from possible as the final layer to give ZOC penalties when you're sure the enemy can't attack them.

-Keep units attached to STAVKA. Don't overload fronts. Keep in mind that as long as a unit or its higher HQ is directly attached to STAVKA, unit movement is free (reassigning STAVKA or OKH units doesn't cost AP's).

-Set the support levels of corps to 0, as well as the support levels of the non-frontline military districts. Keep in mind that, when set to 0, they'll still attract construction and engineer units, so you'll have to manually move those out again. If a corps or military district HQ has no support units, lock it.

-You could set armies to 0 support level too and concentrate everything at STAVKA. After that, put STAVKA on a train (rail mode) and tour the front. Attaching support units directly from STAVKA costs no AP's if you do it through STAVKA menu>click on support unit>in that support unit's information screen select the change HQ button>assign the support unit to a nearby HQ. Ranges for unit assignments have recently been made fairly generous, so you don't need to hug the actual frontline.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/14/2010 9:50:45 PM

Flaviusx

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I want to streamline my command structure ASAP, and disbanding the corps HQs frees up a lot of manpower to help flesh out combat forces. It also kicks out whatever support units are attached to them immediately up the chain of command to the army HQ.

This is a matter of taste, I will agree. Quite simply, I detest corps HQ. They're an eyesore and needlessly complicate my command and control. I want to get to armies ASAP and get my good leaders in those armies, and many of those start off assigned to corps HQs. Pieter and I disagree on leaders, which is part of the reason I suspect we do not see eye to eye on this corps issue.

The game is sufficiently complex and deep to allow for multiple solutions. There is no one answer and both approaches will work. You may even develop your own individual approach here.

So far as support units and HQs go: I mostly play with locked HQs and micromanage my SU attachments. I'm not particularly keen on the automated distribution system. I know exactly what I want to have in my armies and this system will not really give me the distribution I'm looking for. The only time I use it is to empty out the rear area commands of their support units and feed those to STAVKA. Once done, pretty much everything gets locked down.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/14/2010 10:12:32 PM

ComradeP

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I also lock down HQ's after setting them to 0 and after everything has moved out. I disband sapper battalions, artillery battalions and motorcycle regiments and the only support units I keep in armies are 4 artillery regiments, which is working fine in my games thus far. My AA regiments go to air bases at first and I disband AA battalions.

I don't disband corps HQ's because I don't like the idea of spending 2 turns of AP's on something that will happen automatically after a short turn, but I understand Flavio's point and reason why he does so.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/14/2010 10:58:37 PM

jjdenver

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Wow this post seems immensely helpful but quite confusing in a number of ways. I meant to quote a little of it but have ended quoting most of it for questions. So here goes.

quote:

ORIGINAL: ComradeP
-Do not disband corps. They go away by themselves after a handful of them, and disbanding them is a waste of AP's. Flavio disagrees, but I'm at this point still not entirely sure why he wants to remove corps immediately, instead of wait 4 to 6 turns or so.

Just to be clear - you mean don't disband Corp HQ's - and you don't mean don't disband corp combat units (not sure if Sovs even have any of these but in the Velikiye Luki scenario they do at least). Instead wait for corp HQ's to be cleaned up by some game script in 4-6 turns. Right?

quote:

ORIGINAL: ComradeP
-Get your airborne brigades the heck out of dodge. When destroyed they don't come back. Stack 3 of them in a single hex and they have a decent construction value by Soviet standards, so let them dig. Only use them when you have the initiative, never let the enemy attack them on his terms. They are not to be used for a checkerboard defence, aside from possible as the final layer to give ZOC penalties when you're sure the enemy can't attack them.

2 questions here. Stacking 3 units in a hex to dig in seems like overkill. Are you seriously suggesting 3 of these brigades entrench in a single hex instead of splitting them across 3 hexes to dig a line behind a river, etc?
2nd question is - do you keep these in the rear (with the gear haha) only to preserve them because they never can be rebuilt - or because you save them for some purpose later in the war like an actual paradrop?

quote:

ORIGINAL: ComradeP
-Set the support levels of corps to 0, as well as the support levels of the non-frontline military districts. Keep in mind that, when set to 0, they'll still attract construction and engineer units, so you'll have to manually move those out again. If a corps or military district HQ has no support units, lock it.

2 questions here also. First - when you say manually move them out - you mean assign those support units back to Stavka for example? second - can't you just set it to zero instead of lock it? Same effect?

quote:

ORIGINAL: ComradeP
-You could set armies to 0 support level too and concentrate everything at STAVKA. After that, put STAVKA on a train (rail mode) and tour the front.

It's not clear to me why doing this (attaching support units directly to Front (or Army are you saying?)) HQ's is better than leaving them in Stavka. If they are at Stavka won't they be assigned automatically downward in the chain of command as needed to HQ's with a number higher than 0 for their support level? Why is this manual tour helpful?

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/14/2010 11:02:46 PM

jjdenver

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ComradeP
I also lock down HQ's after setting them to 0 and after everything has moved out. I disband sapper battalions, artillery battalions and motorcycle regiments and the only support units I keep in armies are 4 artillery regiments, which is working fine in my games thus far. My AA regiments go to air bases at first and I disband AA battalions.

So just to be clear you are saying set all "out of the way" HQ's to 0 to let them push all their support units to Stavka over a week or three.
Then set all frontline HQ's to "locked" right away and start manually putting 4 arty regiments (in your case) into each army HQ by running around with Stavka distributing them - and leaving the army HQ's locked.

Why disband sappers? They seem to be useful for counterattacks in rough terrain/rivers from what I've read and I'd think you'd want them around for offensives in Nov/Dec/Jan right?
Do you disband other support units? It sounds like you only want arty regiments and AA regiments and nothing else?

Speaking of disbanding, there are some air regiments and air battalions for the Sovs. Do you keep both or only air regiments?

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/14/2010 11:26:55 PM

ComradeP

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quote:

Just to be clear - you mean don't disband Corp HQ's - and you don't mean don't disband corp combat units (not sure if Sovs even have any of these but in the Velikiye Luki scenario they do at least). Instead wait for corp HQ's to be cleaned up by some game script in 4-6 turns. Right?

I mean the HQ's, yes. There are no corps sized combat units until December 1941, when cavalry corps become available. The game will disband corps HQ's as follows:

quote:

18.5.2. AUTOMATIC DISBANDING OF SOVIET CORPS HQ UNITS
Soviet Corps HQ units will automatically disband as follows:
Soviet Mechanized Corps HQs will be phased out (disbanded) by August 1941.
Soviet Rifle and Cavalry Corps HQs will be phased out (disbanded) by November 1941.

Realistically, the majority of the corps HQ's will already be gone in late July, hence the 4-6 turns. Cavalry corps HQ's tend to stay around a little longer, but they will also vanish over time.

quote:

Stacking 3 units in a hex to dig in seems like overkill. Are you seriously suggesting 3 of these brigades entrench in a single hex instead of splitting them across 3 hexes to dig a line behind a river, etc?

The construction values of Soviet units are, plainly put, rubbish compared to those of good German units. The average good German regiment has an equal or better construction value than a Rifle division. Placing 3 brigades in a hex, with some help by construction units and civilian labourers (the Soviets get assistance from the population when digging in within 8 hexes of the city they live in when a supplied enemy uniy is within 25 hexes of the city they live in) will give you a reasonable construction value.

Depending on 3 brigades to fortify 3 hexes isn't a good idea. 3 units fortifying a single hex is overkill for the Germans, but a good idea for the Soviets.

quote:

do you keep these in the rear (with the gear haha) only to preserve them because they never can be rebuilt - or because you save them for some purpose later in the war like an actual paradrop?

Mostly to be able to form them into Guards airborne divisions later. You don't really have room for losses, as when you lose a single brigade that means you can create one less Guards airborne division in 1943 (or one less Guards Rifle division if you choose to merge them in 1942). I prefer to try and get them to become Guards prior to merging them, as they get Guards status automatically then. Even though it is thus technically possible to make Guards units out of airborne brigades you've parked in the Urals for 2 years who have never seen a German not to mention take part in a fight, that to me is a bit gamey so I prefer to make them Guards myself.

quote:

First - when you say manually move them out - you mean assign those support units back to Stavka for example?

Yup.

quote:

can't you just set it to zero instead of lock it? Same effect?

Not the same effect, as construction and engineer units dodge the numerical setting and try to achieve their own hard coded setting. The hard coded setting is:

(construction/engineer)

corps: 2/2
army: 3/3
army group/front: 16/4 (that's why you lock rear area military districts and fronts)
high command: 0/0

You'll appreciate the difference after you've spend a few turns chasing construction and engineer units around and playing whack a mole with them to kick them out of rear area HQ's.

quote:

It's not clear to me why doing this (attaching support units directly to Front (or Army are you saying?)) HQ's is better than leaving them in Stavka. If they are at Stavka won't they be assigned automatically downward in the chain of command as needed to HQ's with a number higher than 0 for their support level? Why is this manual tour helpful?

It's helpful because I then get the amount of support units I want to be somewhere, at the location where I want them to be. The automated system is nice, but it isn't precise. Touring STAVKA (or OKH) around is a cost effective way of assigning support units as it doesn't cost you any AP's to reassign support units from high command to an in-range HQ.

quote:

So just to be clear you are saying set all "out of the way" HQ's to 0 to let them push all their support units to Stavka over a week or three.
Then set all frontline HQ's to "locked" right away and start manually putting 4 arty regiments (in your case) into each army HQ by running around with Stavka distributing them - and leaving the army HQ's locked.

Why disband sappers? They seem to be useful for counterattacks in rough terrain/rivers from what I've read and I'd think you'd want them around for offensives in Nov/Dec/Jan right?
Do you disband other support units? It sounds like you only want arty regiments and AA regiments and nothing else?

Speaking of disbanding, there are some air regiments and air battalions for the Sovs. Do you keep both or only air regiments?

Preferably the rear area HQ's move their support units to STAVKA in a single week, after which I manually remove the obligatory annoying construction/engineer units that refused to move or actually moved out in and lock the HQ.

After the corps have moved all their support units to STAVKA, which normally takes about 2 or 3 turns for the full journey but one turn to move them out of corps, I again manually remove the obligatory annoying construction/engineer units that refused to move out or actually moved in and lock the corps HQ, after which I empty the army HQ and lock that and after that I take STAVKA on a tour of the frontline HQ's. I do have to note that when an army HQ has, say, 3 artillery regiments and a bunch of sapper battalions, I simply disband the sapper battalions, form or assign a fourth artillery regiment and lock the HQ. I don't always set army HQ's to 0, it depends on what's in them.

By the time I'm done with disbanding units, there'll be three main support types left, with a fourth one as a honourable mention: artillery regiments of various sizes (keep in mind that the 41a,b and c artillery regiments have a different amount of guns and upgrade to difference kind of artillery regiments), sapper regiments (I usually just store them in a front HQ, usually Western Front, until I can assign them to cavalry corps in the winter) and AA regiments. There'll be some AA battalions in cities, but they're too expensive to buy out and there's no need to. The honourable mention is for the single seperate Tank battalion in the north. I don't disband Tank battalions as they eventually upgrade to regiments.

I don't disband all sappers, just the battalions. I keep the regiments. The Soviets need to think big as they need numbers to win, which is why I prefer the biggest unit of a certain type I can get.

The smaller air units upgrade to full squadrons when the planes are available, so I don't disband them.

< Message edited by ComradeP -- 12/14/2010 11:37:36 PM >

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 12:14:23 AM

jjdenver

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Ok big help. Thanks.

Another question occurs to me but maybe it's been addressed elsewhere. Construction units/engineer units.

How do you normally handle those? Do you manually assign them to HQ's? If so what is your basic philosophy in doing so? (i.e. 3 per army, all in the rear armies, etc)? Or do you assign them to Fronts and let them float as needed to armies? I suppose that they just make all units dig in faster if those units aren't moving right? Thx

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 12:19:15 AM

Flaviusx

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I build 3 construction battalions per army, and a further 3 for some Front commands. (Leningrad and SW in particular.) I used to build as many as 5 per HQ and have decided that is overkill.

These are the secret weapon of the Red Army in 1941 and probably the only support unit you should bother building before 1942. The others mostly need scarce equipment, whereas these guys just soak up manpower, which is plentiful in 1941.

There's no need for assignments here. They can be built directly by the HQ in question and are useful for any of them so they should all get a compliment of CBs. This is a very big AP investment, but forts are that important.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 12:36:56 AM

ComradeP

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First, a disclaimer: I mentioned that Andy, Flavio and me have lots of ideas on the things to do with the early Red Army, but I didn't mean to imply we're the only testers playing as the Soviets. Most of the others are simply mostly playing the late war Soviets and we also have some less vocal testers that don't debate much.

-

Flavio: you're really still building construction battalions, not RR repair brigades? Just curious as I thought you had moved to the brigades. I have recently moved to brigades.

-

The main problems with construction battalions, as discovered by mid and late war Soviet players is that a) you don't really need them for fort construction after 1942, provided the tide swings in your favour and b) as they'll generally appear on a hex in stacks of 3 construction battalions, something they share with their Axis counterparts, they can take up space in hexes near the frontline that other units can use.

We've also had a debate about whether the Soviets should still be able to build construction battalions to begin with as the masses we were forming at first (200 was a low figure) were rather ahistorical.

Railroad repair brigades, the other available construction unit the Soviets can build, are more efficient. One of them is enough to patch a hex up.

I now assign two to each army.

Engineer units also assist in fort construction, so as soon as you can form corps and attach sapper regiments to them, you don't really need construction units for fortification duties. As such, I intend to move the 6 units in a front's armies to front HQ level (to increase the rail repair range) or NKPS units from 1942 onwards.

As manpower is plentiful in 1941, I'd rather just build big units that are useful throughout the war than battalions which lose their value after about 1.5 years, especially as they both cost 1 AP.

< Message edited by ComradeP -- 12/15/2010 12:38:35 AM >

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 12:55:58 AM

Flaviusx

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I build RR brigades too, but later. Rail repair isn't really an issue in 1941.

I have reduced my CB investment in 1941 for the reasons you mention. But they are invaluable for the time period.

I build sappers, but only after getting combat corps, and only as many as needed to give each combat corps a single attachment.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 1:02:17 AM

ComradeP

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The brigades are, as far as I know, regular construction units as far as fort construction is concerned (they're construction units in the editor and in the scenarios), albeit with 200 labor squads and 50 support squads. You save 600 manpower if instead of that, you form 4 construction battalions, but I'd still rather have brigades.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 1:04:55 AM

Flaviusx

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Are you sure the RR brigades assist in fort construction? If so, that does change things. I had always assumed otherwise.

In that case...bye bye CBs.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 1:20:08 AM

ComradeP

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As far as I know, the game doesn't have any rail repair only support units, as all construction/rail repair units seem to be filled with various amounts of construction/labor squads and all are construction units.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 3:01:26 AM

jjdenver

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ComradeP
-The first thing you do is set aircraft upgrades to manual. CR screen>air groups>AC Change Mode>0/manual.

I go to CR and click AC Change Mode, then type in 0. How do I know this worked - that it is set now for all units? There doesn't seem to be any immediate feedback on this in the CR. Is it the column Upd that is set to "M"?

Also I tried clicking on Reserve, and am prompted with whether I want to "place selected units in reserve". I select "yes" but the units are not all sent to reserve. Shouldn't all units in this filter be set to reserve by this action? Or is it that all air units not sent into reserve are frozen so they can't be touched?

Thx

< Message edited by jjdenver -- 12/15/2010 3:05:01 AM >

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 3:24:53 AM

jjdenver

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ComradeP
-You could set armies to 0 support level too and concentrate everything at STAVKA. After that, put STAVKA on a train (rail mode) and tour the front. Attaching support units directly from STAVKA costs no AP's if you do it through STAVKA menu>click on support unit>in that support unit's information screen select the change HQ button>assign the support unit to a nearby HQ. Ranges for unit assignments have recently been made fairly generous, so you don't need to hug the actual frontline.

If you did this I'm assuming you'd also do it for Fronts - right?

And how long would this mean your armies are without support units? If you set them to 0 on turn 1 - will the support units be back and Stavka and ready for the tour on turn 2 - so they are only without support units in the armies on turn 1 but on turn 2 they are back in the line?

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 2:48:44 PM

Elladan

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Could you perhaps shed some light onto pros and cons of different Soviet artillery regiment types? Basically, I'm struggling to see much difference between them except the fact that some of them include heavy artillery type and some not. Is there any significant difference in performance between say 122mm and 152mm howitzers?

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 5:04:25 PM

ComradeP

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quote:

I go to CR and click AC Change Mode, then type in 0. How do I know this worked - that it is set now for all units? There doesn't seem to be any immediate feedback on this in the CR. Is it the column Upd that is set to "M"?

The Upg column should switch from "A" to "M"

quote:

Also I tried clicking on Reserve, and am prompted with whether I want to "place selected units in reserve". I select "yes" but the units are not all sent to reserve. Shouldn't all units in this filter be set to reserve by this action? Or is it that all air units not sent into reserve are frozen so they can't be touched?

If an air base is frozen, it's squadrons are frozen too, so there are a couple of air bases that can't send units to reserve on turn 1, such as some of the ones near Moscow.

quote:

If you did this I'm assuming you'd also do it for Fronts - right?

I tend not to place support units in front HQ's, aside from the RR repair brigades I form in them.

quote:

And how long would this mean your armies are without support units? If you set them to 0 on turn 1 - will the support units be back and Stavka and ready for the tour on turn 2 - so they are only without support units in the armies on turn 1 but on turn 2 they are back in the line?

That depends. Most of the time I can lock STAVKA by turn 3 or 4, but by that time some armies will already have the number of artillery regiments I want them to have. Touring STAVKA around takes a single turn usually, provided you have already moved it to the northern or southern part of the front (so you can rail it to the other part of the front in the next turns, stopping along the way to assign support units).

quote:

Could you perhaps shed some light onto pros and cons of different Soviet artillery regiment types? Basically, I'm struggling to see much difference between them except the fact that some of them include heavy artillery type and some not. Is there any significant difference in performance between say 122mm and 152mm howitzers?

There is a difference in performance between 122mm and 152mm howitzers, but the main differences are the number of guns, the type of guns, the number of support squads and whether the support unit has an upgrade path or not.

At this time it's not possible to see the future TOE's for a unit when trying to form it, which makes it difficult to see whether a unit has an upgrade path unless you have already formed one of them, in which case you can see the upgrade path (if any) through the TOE screen. I've posted a suggestion on the tester forum to add the functionality to the TOE screen for units you want to form. Currently, you'd need to either form one of them to see whether they have an upgrade path or make a list of its future TOE's.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 5:39:13 PM

Flaviusx

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122mm and 152mm have different construction costs and different numbers allowed in unit OBs.

I consider them more or less interchangable. A 1941 RVGK artillery regiment actually includes both, I think. 24 122s and 12 152s. In the end, they'll wind up producing similar combat power due to these proportions.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 6:40:23 PM

ComradeP

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To reduce the strain on artillery production, you could consider using mixed regiments.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 6:55:11 PM

Elladan

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ComradeP

To reduce the strain on artillery production, you could consider using mixed regiments.

Aren't they all built from the same pool of armament points? If so, wouldn't the same number of tubes be produced, whatever the mix, provided there is enough points in the pool?

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 8:20:34 PM

ComradeP

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The various artillery types have different build costs, as Flavio indicated. If there are enough armament points in the pool then yes, there should be no problem. Soviet production will have difficulties meeting demand until about 1943.

If you're using regiments using a single type of artillery, there'll statistically be a higher chance that it will strain production and the pool, as the gun type it's using is often also in use by other unit types. Let's say 1000 152mm howitzers are produced, and your artillery regiments need 1000, that will leave nothing for other units as the support units are always refitting. I normally use some non-mixed and some mixed regiments.

From 1943 onwards, there's much less need to use mixed regiments or even form regiments as you should be investing in on-map artillery.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/15/2010 11:43:54 PM

jjdenver

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After thinking about all of this some more - I realized we hadn't talked about air commands and air HHQ like Long range air command. Do you normally leave their support level at 3? What effect does this have - since I'm not sure what support units they could draw that would help other than maybe AA?

Also is Soviet pilot supply usually a problem? I.e. should USSR air force not deploy its "bad" planes - frex the obsolete biplanes - in an effort to save pilots for better planes to come in the future?

< Message edited by jjdenver -- 12/16/2010 12:01:03 AM >

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/16/2010 12:30:47 AM

Zovs

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Per the manual:

8.3. AIR HEADQUARTERS UNITS
Air headquarters units fulfill the same function as other headquarters units with the exception that they cannot attach any combat units and the only support units that can be attached to air headquarters units are anti-aircraft support units.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/16/2010 9:14:09 AM

Elladan

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quote:

8.3. AIR HEADQUARTERS UNITS
Air headquarters units fulfill the same function as other headquarters units with the exception that they cannot attach any combat units and the only support units that can be attached to air headquarters units are anti-aircraft support units.

From your experience, how important it is to fill those Air HQs with AA support units? I have seen a lot of comments about the unprofitability of airfield bombing after turn 1 (for Axis at least), wouldn't that mean that those AAs might not have an occasion to be useful at all?

quote:

Also is Soviet pilot supply usually a problem? I.e. should USSR air force not deploy its "bad" planes - frex the obsolete biplanes - in an effort to save pilots for better planes to come in the future?

As pilots are integral part of the aircraft in WitE I don't think you can even have a pilot supply problem. Having said that, it's probably not to wise to use your groups when you know the loses will be high and any gains strategically insignificant.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/16/2010 3:04:14 PM

ComradeP

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quote:

After thinking about all of this some more - I realized we hadn't talked about air commands and air HHQ like Long range air command. Do you normally leave their support level at 3? What effect does this have - since I'm not sure what support units they could draw that would help other than maybe AA?

I usually assign 1 AA unit per controlled air base to air commands.

quote:

Also is Soviet pilot supply usually a problem? I.e. should USSR air force not deploy its "bad" planes - frex the obsolete biplanes - in an effort to save pilots for better planes to come in the future?

Pilot supply shouldn't be a problem, every plane should automatically have a pilot. We used to be able to check the pilots, but that was for debugging purposes.

quote:

From your experience, how important it is to fill those Air HQs with AA support units? I have seen a lot of comments about the unprofitability of airfield bombing after turn 1 (for Axis at least), wouldn't that mean that those AAs might not have an occasion to be useful at all?

AA units should fire at air missions moving through their area. You could assign most AA units to regular HQ's, but I prefer to keep a number of them in air HQ's. AA units can be pretty fragile when involved in a battle, especially the battalions.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/18/2010 2:31:14 AM

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post deleted - i answered my own question

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/22/2010 3:28:02 PM

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Is Hango usually evacuated? It looks like there is a tank battalion and some sapper attached units there. Is it better to pull out all attached units (I think this was already suggested on another thread so I'm pretty sure it's the right thing to do), evacuate the brigade, set the fortified zones to 50 TOE and let the Finns wipe them out? I don't see any reason to hold onto it and leaving more troops there is just more losses to Finns. Or am I missing something?

< Message edited by jjdenver -- 12/22/2010 3:50:12 PM >

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/22/2010 4:12:00 PM

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I'd suggest moving the support units out prior to the Finnish activation, as stated elsewhere. If the Finns don't take Hango on the turn they activate for some reason, evacuate the brigade by sea and disband the fortified zones, no need to lose equipment and men for nothing.

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RE: How to organize Red Army on Jun 22 - 12/22/2010 10:41:26 PM

randallw

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I keep trying to evacuate that brigade, using both the naval transport and amphibious transport modes; neither works.

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