RE: Captured manpower

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RE: Captured manpower - 4/12/2011 12:44:41 PM

Steelers708

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Zebedee

quote:

ORIGINAL: Steelers708

I have no idea who/what Overmans is, the figures I gave are from Manfred Kehrigs' Stalingrad: Analayse und dokumentation ener schlact(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlag Anstalt, 1974) citing reports dated 11th & 19th November, and can be found reproduced in David Glantzs' Armageddon in Stalingrad: September-November 1942, the Stalingrad Trilogy Vol.2, as far as I'm aware Veit Scherzer also used the same figures in his book on the history of the 113th ID.

The reports regarding the 44th ID in Mid-October also show that the 44th ID had 3,964 Hiwis/POWs within the division itself.

Whilst I agree that we will never know the exact numbers for all Hiwis at any one time, unless somebody has the time, money and inclination to spend years going through the archives, we do know how many Hiwis were authorized for each division via the KSTN tables, and therefore it would not be difficult to include them within the games TOE's.

I have always found Beevor to be great on narrative and very short on detailed info.

If you're quoting directly from Kehrings then you should be aware of the distinction he makes in the numbers as they appear in the reports, which is precisely the one I've drawn your attention to. If Glantz is quoting the two numbers together, then he too has made the same mistake as Overmans (who incidentally also claims to have got his figures from Kehring but has obviously misread/misunderstood the distinction that not every non-divisional unit attached to a division was 100% hiwi).

edit: an example of what I'm talking about. http://img651.imageshack.us/f/hiwisxiak.jpg

(for some reason can't imbed it nvm)

edit 2: not sure how authorised numbers under ToEs can help any more than using ToEs to claim that German divisions were at maximum strength all the time... it's blindly flailing about for lack of the information which has so far eluded decades of researchers into the subject.

edit 3: in fairness to Beevor, he does mention the problems of numbers in his appendices and does cite the figure of 19300 for Hiwis on 18 November as well as other figures reflecting what the reports actually say.

I have that document stored on disc, and it's the document that shows that the 44th ID had 3,964 Hiwis/PoWs within the division itself.

As the game is an abstract and not totally historically accurate anyway, by knowing how many Hiwis were authorized per division you have a base line to work with. Obviously if you don't capture enough Russians you don't have full allocation of Hiwis per each division.

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Post #: 31

RE: Captured manpower - 4/12/2011 1:18:30 PM

Montbrun

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"Hiwis" were being incorporated into German units as early as mid-1942. It was made official in 1943, with Hiwis being made part of the unit's organization. Examples for the "Division 44" organization:

Attachment (1)

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Post #: 32

RE: Captured manpower - 4/12/2011 1:26:23 PM

Steelers708

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quote:

ORIGINAL: squatter

So what we're saying is that there is no way to be sure exactly how many hiwis there were in the German Army.

But I think we are in agreement that there were a substantial number, in the tens of thousands, and that is referring to combat troops alone, and not even including what the game would refer to as 'support' elements.

So do we agree that the game perhaps ought to have some mechanism for captured manpower to add to German manpower strength, whatever the figure ends up being agreed on?

I think we all agree on your first point in general, although we do have snapshots, I remember seeing a table that showed that as of 1st June 1944 there were just under 190,000 Hiwis on all fronts, and we do have some figures from individual divisions.

I think we should have some mechanism for including Hiwis. As we know the numbers that were authorized per division type, we can then agree on a % of PoWs to be counted as Hiwis. Let's assume a figure of 10%, therefore If I capture 1,000,000 Russians then 100,000 would become Hiwis, if this isn't enough to fill every single division with the authorized number, well then it would just reflect the historical reality where some divisions had more than others.

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Post #: 33

RE: Captured manpower - 4/12/2011 1:35:16 PM

squatter

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I think that the issue is also about gameplay.

Currently, I'm undecided about the wisdom/benefits as the Axis player of attempting to capture large swathes of the Soviet Union in 41/42.

As a tester has pointed out, capturing resource production centres has zero impact on the Axis war effort, as the axis owns enough resources at the beginning of the game to power its industry at maximum throughout the entire war. And currently, the manpower of captured territory does not help either. Other testers have posted that the capture of oil production in the Caucuses will take a long time to impact on Axis production, if at all.

So essentially, the only thing in capturing Soviet resources for the Axis is to deny them to the enemy. We shall see how much the Axis player would have to capture to have a significant impact on Soviet strength.

Under these conditions, it would appear that the game is almost exclusively decided by whether or not the Axis can destroy enough of the Soviet army in 41/42, not by how much of the Soviet Union he can conquer.

How does this pan out regarding encouraging historical actions such as an invasion of the Caucuses? This is a strategy I have adopted in my current PBEM where in Aug 1942 I control Stalingrad and am at the gates of Grozny. But I'm yet to see if this was just complete folly given that my opponent can basically give up most of this ground slowly, while his strength grows in the central sector.

If however, the manpower of this region was enlisting to help in the fight, the captured resources were assisting in the war effort, and the captured oil production also, then this would cast a different light on a caucuses strategy.

So adding in things like captured hiwi manpower - regardless of exactly how historically accurate the figures are (which I think we all agree is impossible to precisely measure - not in itself a reason to exclude altogether, however) - would give the Axis player a second viable strategy other than 'kill the soviets in 41/42, or lose'.

I fear that under current circumstances a strategy of 'defend Moscow and Leningrad, let everything else go' could become the only sensible one for Soviet players, and one which might prove almost undefeatable by the Axis.

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Post #: 34

RE: Captured manpower - 4/12/2011 5:21:56 PM

Zebedee

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Steelers708
I have that document stored on disc, and it's the document that shows that the 44th ID had 3,964 Hiwis/PoWs within the division itself.

As the game is an abstract and not totally historically accurate anyway, by knowing how many Hiwis were authorized per division you have a base line to work with. Obviously if you don't capture enough Russians you don't have full allocation of Hiwis per each division.

If you do have the reports on disc, can I encourage you to read them? Perhaps cite the Sixth Army's summarising QM figures for ration strength of Hiwis on their books and explain where the additional tens of thousands of Hiwis you have located came from?...

Using ToEs you get neither a maximum nor minimum number - you get an aspirational figure which may or may not have any bearing on reality (and usually has none). It helps not at all with working out manpower generation from this source any more than the ToEs reflect German manpower generation or even economic production. If you take 10% PoWs as being Hiwis, as you suggest, then that would give Germany a manpower pool of several hundred thousand to pad out their ToEs as early as autumn 1941. It's just totally random numbers being generated for the sake of generating totally random numbers.

---------

Squatter - I agree generally but in terms of gameplay, I think the economic impact is an avenue which could be explored to give a more nuanced game. The numbers are available to provide the necessary historical element to it. However, I'm sure there's good reason why resources were taken out of the decision making process in testing. It's perhaps an area to investigate when other areas of the game are no longer in a state of flux.

< Message edited by Zebedee -- 4/12/2011 5:57:47 PM >

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Post #: 35

RE: Captured manpower - 4/12/2011 6:19:27 PM

Steelers708

Posts: 138
Joined: 12/7/2010
From: England
Status: offline

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zebedee

quote:

ORIGINAL: Steelers708
I have that document stored on disc, and it's the document that shows that the 44th ID had 3,964 Hiwis/PoWs within the division itself.

As the game is an abstract and not totally historically accurate anyway, by knowing how many Hiwis were authorized per division you have a base line to work with. Obviously if you don't capture enough Russians you don't have full allocation of Hiwis per each division.

If you do have the reports on disc, can I encourage you to read them? Perhaps cite the Sixth Army's summarising QM figures for ration strength of Hiwis on their books and explain where the additional tens of thousands of Hiwis you have located came from?...

Using ToEs you get neither a maximum nor minimum number - you get an aspirational figure which may or may not have any bearing on reality (and usually has none). It helps not at all with working out manpower generation from this source any more than the ToEs reflect German manpower generation or even economic production. If you take 10% PoWs as being Hiwis, as you suggest, then that would give Germany a manpower pool of several hundred thousand to pad out their ToEs as early as autumn 1941. It's just totally random numbers being generated for the sake of generating totally random numbers.

---------

Squatter - I agree generally but in terms of gameplay, I think the economic impact is an avenue which could be explored to give a more nuanced game. The numbers are available to provide the necessary historical element to it. However, I'm sure there's good reason why resources were taken out of the decision making process in testing. It's perhaps an area to investigate when other areas of the game are no longer in a state of flux.

I don't have all the reports on disc, although if you have them I would be delighted to get a copy from you if at all possible.

Considering the whole game is abstract and unhistorical in regard to the games TOE's compared to real life, I don't see what harm one more abstraction regarding Hiwis would be. The 10% figure was just an example, make it 5%, 7% or 3%, I just think that considering how units were able to free up manpower for frontline service by using Hiwis it would be a nice addition to the game.

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Post #: 36

RE: Captured manpower - 4/12/2011 10:51:07 PM

Zebedee

Posts: 535
Joined: 8/30/2005
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Steelers708
I don't have all the reports on disc, although if you have them I would be delighted to get a copy from you if at all possible.

Considering the whole game is abstract and unhistorical in regard to the games TOE's compared to real life, I don't see what harm one more abstraction regarding Hiwis would be. The 10% figure was just an example, make it 5%, 7% or 3%, I just think that considering how units were able to free up manpower for frontline service by using Hiwis it would be a nice addition to the game.

If I had in electronic format I'd be happy to share. But I don't I'm afraid.

The problem from my perspective is that adding Hiwis without the necessary historical groundwork existing (and then being implemented sensitively in coding for the game) would potentially severely unbalance the German manpower numbers at critical junctures of the war. Those who play the Soviet side would rightly then argue that they too should have the benefit of the doubt come 1945 (especially given that they've already had a nerf to historical manpower generation numbers for 1941) when anecdotal evidence exists for widespread recruitment of liberated PoWs straight into frontline divisions. There always seems to be a desire in games to overpower Germany to try and get them 'historical' in terms of results. It makes for good alternative scenarios - AE's overpowered Japan is fun to play and a good example - but is the game intending to provide the historic framework for player made operational decisions or not?

You said you'd seen figures for 190k Hiwis in 1944. Mueller-Hillebrand suggest a figure of 61k (out of 1.55m) as 'foreign volunteers' serving in the West on 1st March 1944, based on ration strength reporting. We really are talking tiny numbers of men in the grand scheme of things by this point. I've honestly not checked, but does the game replicate German railway units which would have been of similar size, if not larger?

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Post #: 37