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Here's what it looks like just north of the Prypett Marshes. It's T3 for me and I received moves from Ken this morning early and I've been working since then and I've already moved about 1/3 of my units that can move. There are of course about 100+ CD guns and garrison units that can't move and they are listed on the OOB just like every other unit. I'm tempted to disband a lot of those CD guns just to get them off the OOB. Supply levels are great, the weather is good, we're making a little bit of progress.
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My theater recon value went down to 0 ( zero ) and so I can't see the Soviet defenders until I'm adjacent to them unless they move in which case sometimes they occupy their hex visibly. So I'm following my recon units for the most part. Soviet units have been relatively scarce so far. This image is just after the fifth combat round and I'm going around digging people in for the end of the turn phase. That's where I set everybody to ignore losses, dig them in, and set some of the deeply green bombers on INT and leave the pastel green bombers on CS. All the fighters are on AS but I'm thinking of putting them on INT as well, since the greatest proportion of the Soviet air fleet has retreated far to the east. I doubt that I shot down 452 Soviet aircraft. It's probably more like half that. About 1/3 of my aircraft are yellow and therefore resting. The weather is still good and the supply levels are great. I'm optimistic that I'll be able to invest Minsk sometime during the next five turns or so.
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I found an unguarded intact bridge over the river. That will help accellerate the advance quite a bit. I'm still fighting over the crossing at Riga but it looks like it's about to fall to that will make two intact crossings I can use to stream my troops to the east side of the river. I need to do that quickly to stay on schedule. The inset shows the zoomed in view of the crossing at Jekapils.
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I found my first partisan. It's important to convert all the enemy hexes you can so that these partisans don't go undetected. The earlier you can find them the less damage they can do to your rails and bridges.
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It's T5 already and I feel like I'm behind schedule. This is the Riga area right now and you can see how Ken has placed some roadblocks in my way to slow me down and make my progress problomatic. I was disappointed that the Stuka's don't have a significant anti-ship value because that's going to make the Soviet ships almost invulnerable to my aerial attacks. The Axis rail damage value was 0% for the first three turns and now it's 100% so only now are the RR engineers busy repairing rail but fortunately the rail is already repaired to just past Riga already. The supply levels are in the high 20's. Out near Gesis the level is 28. I'm contemplating moving my RR arty up here to attack the Soviet ships because that seems more efficient than attacking them from the air, given that none of my aircraft have a decent anti-ship value. I question running my supply lines north from Riga along the coast. Because of the possibility of Ken cutting off the flow of supply by using one or more of his ships somehow. I'm wondering if Ken moving one of his ships adjacent to my supply path along the coast will extend an enemy ZOC inland to cut off my supply lines. So I'm planning on building the rail NE to Gesis.
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This is Minsk early in T5. I haven't moved anybody yet so this image is going to change remarkably. Supply levels are between 21 and 30. I'm optimistic that I can capture Minsk this turn. Wish me luck.
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This is right after the sixth combat round in T5 near Riga. I'm expanding the footprint I've created on the east side of the river. Soviet units are scarce so far. The supply level is 20 out at the tip of the spear. I'm trying to repair rails from Riga to the NE but at the same time I'm wondering if a line going SE from Riga might be advisable as well. I have a line going to Daugaspils but it's not quite there yet. I'd also like to have a line leading to Minsk and from there just go due east to Moscow. About 2/3 of my bombers are either yellow or red and are therefore resting. I tried about half a dozen airfield attacks on Soviet aircraft out near the Urals, far east of the extent of my fighter umbrella and the Soviet fighters chewed them up pretty good. Lesson learned.
I was disappointed that the Stuka's don't have a significant anti-ship value because that's going to make the Soviet ships almost invulnerable to my aerial attacks.
From experience I find that, while ideally you want a 120 anti-shipping value, it's entirely possible to whack ships with "normal" bombers. Worth a try, at any rate.
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This is the front lines at the end of T5. There are several Soviet ships just offshore near Riga and if they are there next turn I'm going to rail some RR arty into Riga and see if I can't discourage them enough to make them move. Maybe sink one or more. Probably just lose some RR arty tubes. There's only two more enemy units NW of Riga near the north tip of the peninsula and when they are gone I'm going to need to garrison the ports just in case Ken get's an idea. I lost enough RR repair squads to total 5 RailRepair squads so far, somehow. I'll have to research the combat results tables to see where they were lost and how so I can avoid that in the future.
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quote:
ORIGINAL: golden delicious
quote:
ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson I was disappointed that the Stuka's don't have a significant anti-ship value because that's going to make the Soviet ships almost invulnerable to my aerial attacks.
From experience I find that, while ideally you want a 120 anti-shipping value, it's entirely possible to whack ships with "normal" bombers. Worth a try, at any rate.
I'm not all that experienced in attacking ships with aircraft that don't have a substantial anti-ship value but I'll take your word for it. I'll give it a go. And I thank you for the tip. I applaude your efforts to teach us.
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Partisans have started popping up, last turn and this one. I'm wondering how many partisans can operate simultaneously. There were three last turn and I've found two more this turn so far. There may be more that I don't know about. I just captured Minsk last turn and now the next short term goal is Smolensk. Supply levels are in the high teens in this AO.
I'm wondering how many partisans can operate simultaneously.
Not sure, but in my game w/ David (I'm on turn 72 as Soviets) I've had about seven or eight pop up for me so far, I seem to be getting more. I should look at replace / reinforce schedule.
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I'm still moving units nine and a half hours after I received Ken's moves. I'm still in the process of moving units and scheduling attacks for the first combat round. The supply level is 15 out at the tip of the spear. This is the AO just NE of the Prypett Marshes and demonstrates me handing off the babysitting to the follow up infantry so that the Panzers can concentrate on their greatest weapon: speed. I try to avoid knife fights involving my Panzers so that they have more moxie for moving at top speed. I need to get to the Soviet front lines before they have been turned into a fortress. I saw in the playback where he's already started building a line in my path to Moscow.
Partisans have started popping up, last turn and this one.
I know the Germans had some challenges with stragglers from the Soviet western armies in their rear areas in the early part of the campaign, but it is I think extreme to give them a guerrilla icon, which will make them extremely slippery and hard to kill. I would suggest that it would be best to omit these units entirely along with the corresponding security units in the German OOB.
Perhaps later in the war true guerrilla units might be appropriate, where these were fighting as large, organised bodies, with Stavka having some degree of control over them. In 1941, it doesn't feel realistic.
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Hey you guys: I'm playing Walter as the Soviet player and I've received Walter's first turn moves and I watched the playback ( 18K+ events ) and now I'm moving my units and I've come to the "Soviet Factories, Kiev" unit and it says that it has motorized movement but it's MP's are zero so I'm wondering what trigger gives it the possibility of moving? I'm guessing off the top of my head that it's the close approach of the Axis units that pulls some trigger event of some kind. I suppose I could use the editor and look through the events that might apply. I'll let you know what I find.
. . . I've come to the "Soviet Factories, Kiev" unit and it says that it has motorized movement but it's MP's are zero so I'm wondering what trigger gives it the possibility of moving?
R/R movement. Soviets have about 5000/turn, enough to move one factory per turn.
Regards
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quote:
ORIGINAL: rhinobones
quote:
ORIGINAL: larryfulkerson . . . I've come to the "Soviet Factories, Kiev" unit and it says that it has motorized movement but it's MP's are zero so I'm wondering what trigger gives it the possibility of moving?
R/R movement. Soviets have about 5000/turn, enough to move one factory per turn.
Regards
Sounds good to me. I saved the game in the editor and got a *.gam file that weighed 55M bytes. Notepad++ took almost 1/2 an hour to load the whole thing in so I could edit it. I'm trying to save just the events and throw everything else away. I said that wrong. I'm going to try to save just the events to a file and edit that. I'll let you know what I find. EDIT: There were over 10K events and I couldn't make heads or tails of any of it. This is the front lines in T6:
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Here's what it looks like around Kiev right now ( T8 ) and I've run into the first rank of the Soviet front lines. I'm positive that it's backed up by a substantial collection of arty. The supply level is 11 at the tip of the spear and that's just about as low as I would care to go right now. All my aircraft are green except for about 8 or 9 bombers. The weather is holding up as good and I'm just now reaching Kiev only because Ken has pulled all his troops back, all over the map. And he's broken all the bridges he could behind him. All those broken bridges are a major problem. I've got units that need to get across the river but the bridge is broken and HQ units can't bridge that gap without help. Also, some of the Axis units are incapable of moving across broken bridges as well. Ken surely has time to build a superior front line because of all the broken bridge delays. This game is so interesting that I've been putting in marathon sessions to get my moves done so we can see what happens next. Ken must be off work because he's been doing the same thing. So we're moving at a blistering pace for this scenario. It's a lot of fun too.
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It's T9 already and I've run headlong into Ken's defenses at Pskov. He managed to build a fairly substantial front line there and I haven't found a way around it yet. And as I expected he's got a boat load of arty there to back up his valient troops. It's going to be costly breaking through his defenses in this AO. I'll have to use the bombers to drop the bridges east of these defenders in an effort to cut off their supply lines. I can see I'm going to need a lot more arty to bust through here. All my aircraft are green except for 4 bombers and the weather is good so far. The supply level is 12 at the tip of the spear. I'm probably going to need to find a way around this group.
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Ken has spent the first 9 turns pulling his troops back and now here in T10 I've run into the front lines that he has constructed near Smolensk. His front lines run from Pskov all the way south to the Crimea. I have no idea how he did that. Now that I've confronted his front lines the character of the game has changed. It's no longer slash and dash. Now we're into the hand-to-hand fighting. Now all my gains must be made a hex at a time. Ken has flown most of his aircraft into positions to support this troops and the air war is heating up. Ken's partisans popped up near Riga and he captured the city and cut off my troops from their flow of supply flowing through Riga so I need to re-capture it real soon.
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