Slitherine

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Telemecus, Axis Supreme Commander

Soviet Turn as I can see it before recon
Up and down the line ground bombing of the Finns - not intercepted but they still escorted them fully, very little damage done - but we know the Finns were not taken care of at the start of blizzard
A little bit of airfield bombing - showing their teeth
Two hexes successfully attacked and advanced into west of Tambov - the only soviet attacks
No interdiction whatsoever so no indication of any rear areas movement as many air ranges switch low by @xhoel and probably sensibly
Lines seem weaker and have moved back west of Stalingrad/ boguchar area
Also I see a lot of stacked hexes on the 1st line, but no real further lines except west of tambov. This may be just down to detection levels - but worht checking with recon
Trace soviet recon - not overusing it but does not seem targetted?
A lot of guards in far north still and west of Tambov
No recon of airbases yet- but seems to indicate they have some defence of their industrial cities
Motorised units on front lines from Oka to Voronezh roughly - but also we do not have too much to do anything strategic anywhere, so will be mostly tactical level before mud

Our status
Panzer divisions in Germany to rail plus garrisons - so we are going to be maxing out rail cap for a while
Remember the 1942 summer plan in pdf in dropbox - will be thinking of that for reinforcements and what goes where first - let me know any comments
We are 50 k down on the lorry pool and our units are 20 k short of vehicles too
Nothing is on static - do we need to rethink?
The Finns cannot go static and occupy almost everything down to the no move line
We have 383 points - how did we let that build up!

Rail Repair
We have finished the loop through Karelia and are two turns away from the first lateral line behind the fronts north of Moscow being finished
Apart from the loop up to Boguchar everything else is building branches to the front, or shortucts through the rear
oh yes - Crimea still (relatively) far from rail - we are not planning on advancing there
A lof of construction in the corps HQs should be moved to army group level and above

Priority is first branches up to front line to reduce lorry use
2nd loops for the rail around Moscow which is a bit in danger from partisans for a couple of turns
3rd is a line through the marshes
it would also help to have a line to Leningrad and then Talinn - which is what FBD1 will do if not needed to keep up with front
another thing useful is to get rail lines to cities to help with rotations of units in refits used for garrisons

Rail Capacity {Note we were playing before v1.12 which now allows rail capacity to be varied}
There is going to be a big constraint of rail cap for the next many turns. As well as the normal arrivals, we have the units returning from the Tambov pocket to rail back to the front. As well as the usual unfrozen allies, we will have the 2nd Hungarian Army and the 8th Italian army to rail in. We still have many good motorised and infantry units we want to move from garrisons. To replace them there will be some low morale units we would like to railback for refit more than 10 hexes from the front for rapid morale recovery, and generally allies to take over garrisoning of the south while German security moves to garrison the north. Bottom line we are not going to have anything to spare for many turns. I am going to start making a schedule to plan what we can do over the next many turns. There are possibilities now of railing in motorised units near to the front to help with attacks now (Orel, Kursk, maybe Dtown and Ztown too?).

I have made estimates and a broad outline for now but this is where I think we are at

Free Rail Cap T39-T52 380k
Arrivals and Unfreezes in Home Countries to front 185k (note most will be counted twice as needs two turns of railing)
Combat units currently in garrisons to front 55k
Moving units to replace them in garrisons 21k (Note 7 allied units need to be moved from frontlines to garrisons - I have assumed 7 Rumanian divisions)

This should mean we have about 150k spare. This is much better than I thought - but in previous games this spare has evaporated very quickly! There are many uncounted inefficiencies. I have also made assumptions that some units would walk rather than rail small sections of their journey even though they could be railed.

This spare can be used for strategic movement (e.g. 4th Panzer Army south, Crimea Germans to elsewhere). It can also be used to rail poor morale units to the rear for a refit to build up their morale again. A German infantry division will often cost 2000 rail cap, but that needs to be paid going back again. So if we were to use the rail cap for nothing else, we could potentially rail back and forth 37 infantry divisions.

Boundaries
I am proposing that the north-centre boundary moves to the Oka, but also the Centre-South boundary moves to the upper Don. Essentially we are going to be reorienting ourselves south eastwards.

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Joelmar, Axis South commander
@Telemecus: you will have noticed that I took the 2nd pz at Krivoi Rog. If you ask a commander if he wants a panzer division, he won't say no! lol!

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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Joelmar, Axis South commander
@Telemecus: you will have noticed that I took the 2nd pz at Krivoi Rog. If you ask a commander if he wants a panzer division, he won't say no! lol!

In the old days they took it even without the offer! Not mentioning any names ... @Sardaukar!

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ORIGINAL: joelmar

@Zorch

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@Zorch
Something like https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuqfKnFuM-w&feature=youtu.be&yt%3Acc=on

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Joelmar:

Just a few thoughts: at first, I wanted to push ahead straight away, but I'm not sure about the wisdom of it because after analysing things a bit more, I realized I'm a somewhat short of forces yet in the area north-east of Voroshilovgrad and those at hand guarding the left flank are weak. If I push too fast and too far, an aggressive Soviet might make me pay for it.

That said, I was really surprised there were no Soviet attacks in my area last turn. There were a few hexes where defensive CV was very low and facing strong Soviet divisions and I was not confortable with the situation. I was expecting the Soviet south commander would use the opportunity to farm some Wins, but he didn't.

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Joelmar:
I am curious now to see how they will react to the offensive operation I have initiated south-east of Voroshilovgrad. You guys say if you think otherwise, but my main goal for the winter offensive is to get on the east side of the Donets and if I can trap a few Soviet units doing so, all the better. Going over the Don to get ready for caucasus offensive might also be a good option. It will depend on what A21 does.

At the moment I have 6pz and 2 mot divs available. I use 2 for defense south of Boguchar, but the rest is now pretty much ready to jump and in a good supply position, so I should have option either for the pincer, or if he falls back or defend in depth, that should open the way to maybe go for a lunge in the direction of Chernyshkov to cut off the rail.

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Telemecus:

All mountains should be with you by summer. Crackaces needs to take the lead on moving the boundary south first so he can release your troops to electric slide south too. So depends on how far south he can push or stretch it each turn - but that is the direction. 101 Jgr is temporarily with them but likewise will be permanently with you. Also 5,8 and 28 Jager when they are upgraded to that from during the mud period

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Joelmar:

I will probably use 2 corps of 17th as "mountain" corps.

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Joelmar:

Also, that brings me the memory, do you guys think AGS split into A and B might be worth a Rostov offensive sooner than later? Maybe that could be more important for now than going east?

Telemcus:

My suggestion is not to prioritise the army group split. Army group A would have to be further rear to help with rail repair anyway. and we have Jodl with morale 7 in AGS anyway - so some benefit in spreading that all over a big AGs with no penalties. Not to say the army group split is not nice - but not a priority over the manpower centres or units we could capture..

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@Telemecus

My impression now is they are going to defend the Caucasus. In many games there seems to be a break out just after you get past Rostov. The expanding front line cannot be easily defended until new units are brought in. So front lines tend to fall back to Krasnodar. If this follows that pattern then expect then to be the really mobile period.

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Telemecus:

let us go with XXXXPz then

joelmar:

lol... had I known!

Telemecus:

Nehring might be annoyed for being led away and now back again!
give him a schnapps and tell him to calm down

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@Telemecus:

The interesting background here was that by dislodging the units circled in red there would no longer be an easy threat of Soviet forces attacking northwards - and so we could leave only Rumanian troops to guard the entrances to the Crimea. We will be posting the 1942 summer plan later, but one part of it was we would NOT be looking to force our way in to the Crimea. More on this to come ...

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ORIGINAL: joelmar

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Telemecus:

let us go with XXXXPz then

joelmar:

lol... had I known!

Telemecus:

Nehring might be annoyed for being led away and now back again!
give him a schnapps and tell him to calm down

So that's how easy we settle BIG problems in the 2x3+ Axis team! Nehring was very happy with his schnapps, but I got myself a rhum on the rocks to cheers!

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ORIGINAL: Telemecus

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ORIGINAL: joelmar

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Telemecus:

let us go with XXXXPz then

joelmar:

lol... had I known!

Telemecus:

Nehring might be annoyed for being led away and now back again!
give him a schnapps and tell him to calm down

So that's how easy we settle BIG problems in the 2x3+ Axis team! Nehring was very happy with his schnapps, but I got myself a rhum on the rocks to cheers!

Staff Officers at XXXX Pz HQ say it is all chill now!




Soon they will be less happy with their new colour scheme ...

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ORIGINAL: Zorch

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Xhoel -
Recon is done and turn is up. I spot 8 Cavalry formations in the stretch from the Oka to Voronezh. AGC commander tread carefully. Air group ranges have not been changed. Turn is free for you Aces.

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Crackaces - They can attack south of Lipetsk .. but I think my salient are safe for now .. I stuffed a couple of HQ’s next to cav units with light flak .. I should extract a toll ..I will say although . if the Soviets do not start building a MLR [main line of resistance] soon behind a river in the rear .. they are going to be sucked into a huge Kessel ..

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Telemecus -

There is a strong hex south east of Ryazan with three units including a guards stacked (117,54) - but around it there are ants. Both along the banks of the Oka and to the south of it there are lots of 1=1s,2s,3s - so it looks like it is almost begging to be surrounded? There is also a traffic jam of units that have been offloaded from rails west of Lipetsk. Also note 329 infantry division is on rails and could be railed to Lipetsk, offloaded and engage in action this turn? Although it is facing quite strong units, there do seem to be weak points north of Lipetsk.

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Xhoel, Axis North Commander
I’m all for rotating them and getting their morale and exp up but I would prefer to move the unit piecemeal so that you save all the headaches. However due to the offensive that I just launched I need to stretch certain sectors to the max so that I can concentrate my units on 1 Schwerpunkt. Therefore I would advise rotating it at the end of the snow turns, during mud.

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Xhoel, Axis Air Commander
Reshuffled air groups and air bases around so that they can better support the offensive. Most fighter groups are set on unlimited range so they can cover forward ground units. Bombers are set to medium range to conduct interdiction. GS is off and I don't think it will be needed.

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ORIGINAL: Beria

I am a bit surprised to find people are telling me that I am playing another team game with someone I had never known or heard of before http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/fb.asp?m=4628076 . Coincidentally along with everyone else who had asked to join the 2x3+ team game. And then get a direct message telling me the game I am actually playing does not exist from that same person I have never known.




Turns out the other team is only one person!

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Der_Panzer, Soviet North Commander
Tankoffensiv in the north near yaroslavl.
Tankoffensiv near Tambov.
Tankoffensiv near Voroshilovgrad.

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It looks like each commander has a panzer army, and one is in reserve somewhere ready to spring an encirclement if the opportunity presents itself or waiting for summer. I am guessing it's in the Ryazan area, what do you guys think? As for the Northern push, Vologda is the real target, hugging those two ss mot divisions who could bolt up through the frozen marsh is important. The center push if combined with a reserve panzer army could be dangerous. I am for a screened retreat there. the southern push could be stalled by pushing that panzer division back over the river, but it's risky. It's gonna cost 29 ap to assign air command to crimea front, if crimea front wants to stand and fight, it's needed now, if it's going to retreat it could wait.

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sil01, Soviet Centre Commander
Top secret! Panzer recon turn 39. see attached spreadsheet

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This is great info, so where is 2 pz group hiding? I am thinking if the 2pz army doesn't appear next week, we should just conserve the recon until after mud

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If they cut your only railine, your whole front is effectively out and then they send the panzers to crush alexey's front. that's their plan i believe. Know thy enemy. The ss mot are the most dangerous german units in the game. highest morale and movement and easy to keep fueled up with air supply. its very telling that they are up north. They don't have to destroy your front, only have to render it ineffective so that they can concentrate on the deep center for the vp win. Time is really our only effective weapon at this stage. Hug those ss and shoot down their transports will help alot

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This is great info, so where is 2 pz group hiding? I am thinking if the 2pz army doesn't appear next week, we should just conserve the recon until after mud

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ORIGINAL: Beria

They wont want to get caught out exposed in mud so i think they are letting each command try to destroy some units before regrouping in the mud for summer. They will try to destroy our army first and then go for the vps. Retreat for snow where threatened may be best