BletchleyGeek
Posts: 4713
Joined: 11/26/2009 From: Living in the fair city of Melbourne, Australia Status: offline
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: terje439 WOW! Invaluable information there, and unfortunately one that works to my disadvantage. My attacks this turn were mostly performed by 4 corps and 2 divisions giving a value of 78, or 3 times the allowed number Thank you, but I didn't mean that these ROF reduction due to poor coordination was a HUGE issue, it's an issue to take into account in order to use your forces in the most efficient manner. quote:
ORIGINAL: terje439 But at the same time, I need such masses of troops to be able to reach a 2:1 unmodified CV ratio. Hmm no big fan of damned if I do, damned if I don't situations Those on-map CV's you're seeing can be quite a red herring, and in an startingly number of occasions, just plainly misleading. Consider the displayed CV of a German stack. Say it reads 24, and the fort level is 3. The actual CV of that stack is 6, not 24. Those extra 18 points are due to the multiplier effect of fortifications. So as gingerbread said, I think, by all means, bring to the party as many sapper regiments as the fort level in the hex, so it gets reduced before the actual shooting starts. Note that this is chance-based, so it's just a rule of thumb, that might or not work. So what I do - when I have corps in the attacking force or armies loaded to the gills with Sapper SU's and good leaders - is to think in the following terms: 1. On-map defensive CV is 24, hex fort level is 3 2. If the Fort level gets reduced by 0, def CV stays the same, then I'll need 48 CV 3. If the Fort level gets reduced by 1, def CV is 18, then I'll need 36 CV 4. If the Fort level gets reduced by 2, def CV is 12, then I'll need 24 CV 5. If the Fort level gets reduced by 3, def CV is 6, then I'll need 12 CV Note that fort level reduction is chance based and depends on the Engineering level (some of it contributed by engineer elements in your on-map unit TOEs, other by Engineers) of the attacking force. I haven't done any testing, but it's fairly reasonable to assume that mild Fort level reductions are more likely than stronger reductions, and at the same time, the base chances are increased by the total engineering level. Can't give you any numbers on this - perhaps someone with a lot of time could get them - but I think it suffices with being aware of this. A pessimistic estimate is that you'll be only to reduce by 1 level, and note that this would imply attacking with - according to the map display - 1.5:1 odds. I find it's a good rule of thumb. Command and control is also very important: get rid of those negative modifiers because of several commands being involved. And for the important offensives, make sure the best & brightest are at the helm. Last but not least, the "soft" factors. Ammo level, experience and fatigue levels can reduce (or multiply) the actual combat power of the unit to a vast degree. One thing with the Soviets that I think most people overlook is that until 1943 (?) Soviet units tend to suffer ammo shortages even when they're well supplied (this is somewhere in the Logistics chapter). And this can really reduce the ROF of the attacking force drastically. Depending on how important is that attack for your plans, overcommitting - both SU's or combat units - is the way to go to stack the odds. Given WitE variability, you'll find yourself doing this whenever you are really after something. Hope it helps, assessing combats in WitE is more an art than a science. Arithmetic alone will disappoint you quite often.
_____________________________
|