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All Forums >> [New Releases from Matrix Games] >> Gary Grigsby's War in the East Series >> After Action Reports >> RE: Sapper's T4 North

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RE: Sapper's T4 North - 11/12/2013 10:19:44 PM

Toidi

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After Smolensk is passed, any quick advance in the centre much relies on the HQ buildup, at least till rail catch up (still, even with rail, only rested or air supplied divisions may get 40+ mp, otherwise it will be high 20 - low 30 range). Same in the south - he may be just in range of HQ buildup with division which did not cross the river. Once the river is crossed, quite some issues with supplies are present (again once river is crossed expect max around 30 mp for non-rested, non-air supplied units and units which did not have hq buildup previous turn). Best supply situation is in the north around Leningrad area, but there is also the best defensive terrain there. Though in Leningrad 30-40 mp are common for mobile divisions.

Sapper aims at getting industry in Dnetropetrovsk (if there is any, if not he may ignore it for a while), than Kharkov, than Stalino. Do not think that any defensive lines will stop Sapper for too long - they will stop tanks (maybe), but not infantry. Garrison Kiev - the rail depots there are significant - and every turn you get them on-line it is probably 10000 rail points. Well worth a lost infantry division (Sapper will probably attack it without encircling anyway, just because of those rail points).

In evacuation I would ignore heavy industry and vehicles and evacuate armaments; possibly I would get a single point of any tanks/aircraft production out of those towns in the south (those which do not stop being produced soon and which do not upgrade). If you are almost certain that Moscow will fall,, you can get the critical industry out too - those planes there are quite cheap to evac, and now is good time for them to recover; you will need full swing airforce in '42 - in '41 you mainly need fighters and u2 night planes; those level bombers you have are generally sufficient, tactical bombers need to be used sparingly (perhaps in the night mode only) and manually kept at high morale, so their experience will go up. Generally, you need to do a lot transfer into national reserve and back to keep the planes morale high. Remember that your planes are fighting mostly 99/99 German fighters - and the German planes are a bit better than yours. So to be successful, you need numbers (think 100 soviets vs 20 German planes) and morale/exp as high as possible (you need to aim at least at 50, 60 is nice, anything more is great).

If you evacuate enough arm, you can build a very strong infantry heavy army later on. If you lose more than 80 arm points in '41 (at 50 you may start having issues, at 100 issues are severe) you will need to be very careful what kind of units you build and maybe intentionally reduce your army size, so the TOE upgrades will not cripple your armaments pool... In my opinion when your armaments are tight it is better to have 6-7 million army at 100% TOE and high morale than 8-9 millions at 60-70% TOE and not that high morale.

Still, the major goal for you in '41 is to preserve your army. If you lose too many units early, the Germans will have local superiority in numbers, when that happens, more encirclements follows, so you lose more men and so on... Also, it is very important to keep your units at as high morale as possible. Remember that if you cut off German mobile units such that HQ is not in range and they cannot trace supply, they are almost certain to lose 1 morale point due to being in bad supply. If you successfully attack them, they will lose 1 or 2 morale points. That applies only to successful mobile units of course, which are above national morale... but in Sapper case, almost all of them should be above NM. Also, attacking tank divisions is priority over attacking other units, as tank divisions need tanks which are always in short supply for Germans. Other units need only armaments.

Finally, be very, very careful about your cavalry. Each cavalry unit is worth 3-4 infantry divisions in terms of armaments (those cavalry squadrons are really expensive to build). Note that cavalry, unlike infantry, once destroyed will not get back as empty shell. Still, it is worth to risk cavalry when you can cut off several German units. It is not worth to use them as speed bumps or front-line units - use infantry instead...

Finally, against mobile units defend on every river - river crossing with mobile units is very expensive if the hex is in enemy zone of control and attacking over a river is both expensive in terms of mp and bear severe penalties. As Germans, mp-wise - it is almost always better to go around to land bridge than assaulting over a river.

Good luck,
T.

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Post #: 31

RE: Sapper's T4 North - 11/13/2013 12:06:34 AM

Tom Hunter

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Toidi you are confirming what I am thinking about Sappers strategy. Kill a lot of units early, and destroy the armaments production so the Red Army never really comes into existence. To date I�ve put a lot of rail into moving arm factories, that is starting to look smarter.
Your points about defensive lines are well known, there is nothing in the Soviet army that can stop the German infantry at this time.

I am taking a long time on this turn, as its becoming time to start optimizing armies.

The screenshot shows my finished move in Leningrad. Some key hexes have two units in them I am hoping that 15,000 men in a L1 fort behind a river will do better than 8000 guys out in the open. Though really I am hoping that the screen slows Sappers Pnz enough so they are restricted to hasty attacks T5, by T6 many of those hexes will have level 1 and 2 forts with 2 or 3 units in them, and armor in reserve.

Northwest front has the left flank commanded by Vatutin (inf 7) 27th army is west, and 28th east, each with inf 6 generals. Support is still kind of weak over all, but not too bad for early July. A second stronger line is forming a bit to the north around the three forts. My biggest concern is the concentration south of lake Ilmen, its not enough to stop the panzers and I am afraid I could be outflanked to the south. So I am going to put more troops near Vyshny Volochek, I may even pull troops from the South by rail.

If I weaken the South it does not hurt me, because I plan to run anyway, you cannot get weaker than nothing. I want Sapper to punch an empty bag. At the same time, if I hold Leningrad more strongly I can delay the factory evacuation there an move more factories in the South. This would cause serious trouble for Sappers plan to win by destroying my ability to rebuild the Red Army.

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RE: Sapper's T4 North - 11/13/2013 3:36:18 AM

mktours

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Great AAR!
Thanks for the sharing. very impressive work.

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Post #: 33

Tom's T4 North - 11/13/2013 12:25:54 PM

Tom Hunter

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@mktours thanks. I find writing about the game forces me to think before I move, often a good thing.

In the North I�m continuing to dig in and organize. Moscow is starting to put army groups into the field, my plan is to have Western Front reform on the northern approach, with Stavaka and some other front HQ covering the central, and Bryansk the South. I�m going to make the western air command into a strong force to contest the air over Moscow as well. As an experiment I put a bunch of I-15 fighter units into the national reserve and put them on auto upgrade, I want to see if they will upgrade to modern fighters without forcing me to spend AP.

I mentioned a concern that Sapper would go South of lake Ilmen and cut off Leningrad, I suspect that would be very tempting to him, especially after his successful pocketing in the South. I put Rossakovsky with a bunch of armor and cavalry behind the screening force a the lake. I think it�s a good place for me to fight, as I have a lot of depth to work with and it would be difficult for Sapper to pocket the troops. We will see what he does.

In front of Moscow I pulled back again there is no real target for Sapper to pocket, I made sure he will have to burn a lot of mps to advance, the zocs interlock three units deep, and there are stopping forces behind those. It will be interesting to see if its enough, or if he can break out again, inspite of his now long supply line and my improved defense.
I put two forts in near Moscow to boost the defenses at the land bridges. I am curious what people think of this, I am reluctant to spend AP on forts, but these seemed like a necessary gap filler.

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RE: Tom's T4 North - 11/13/2013 2:02:49 PM

821Bobo

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The defense in front of Moscow is unnecessarily deep. You should rather cover the flanks.

btw. Who is Rossakovsky?

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RE: Tom's T4 North - 11/13/2013 3:07:06 PM

Tom Hunter

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I put 11 divisions into the Crimea because its about to get cut off. I am hoping that this is enough to make Sapper go elsewhere with his armor, and that they army there will get to fill out and grow stronger while Sapper brings infantry up. Then I may just pull everything out by boat.

Further North I put garrisons in Denepropetrovosk and Poltava in the hopes that Sapper will push for them thinking he can take the factories before I evacuate them. In fact they are already gone.
I left troops in Kiev because I did not want to abandon it completely, I expect Sapper will smash them in T5, but maybe not until T6, he needs to keep his infantry moving in behind his armor to succeed, and Kiev is a distraction from that.

Over all I am trying to get the right balance of delay and low losses in T5. Sapper is advancing very quickly, and is 15, 19 or even 24 hexes from his rail head. He is not very concentrated because of the need to grab territory. This is smart of him, but if I get my deployment right it also means its difficult for him to encircle units.

In T4 I moved armament factories as follows: 4 from Denepetrovosk each to Gorky, Sverdlovsk and Chelyabinsk, bringing all three cities from 6 factories to 10. If I understand correctly this will boost each city by 3 in December 41. Moved 3 from Poltava to Molotov, bringing Molotov to 7 factories. 3 from Poltava to Vologda bringing Vologda to 4. Armaments is 355, down 3 from T3. To date Sapper has not captured much in terms of Armaments.

Axis have lost 67094 men, 481 guns and 622 AFVs, Soviets have lost 1227375 men, 15871 guns and 8667 avfs.
I have 4.5 million men, 41,000 guns and 5800 planes, Germany has 3.4 million men, 34,000 guns and 2900 afvs. Axis allies add another 1.7 million men, 13,000 guns and 600 tanks. Soviet losses will continue to climb dramatically as the great Southern pocket gets eliminated.

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RE: Tom's T4 North - 11/14/2013 1:45:26 AM

hfarrish

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Crimea is a waste of men to defend - you should hope he goes there. Just one man's opinion after many games, but there just isn't much worth defending there and you definitely need the divisions elsewhere. It's tempting since it is eminently defendable, but if he wants to take it he still will, and if he doesn't you will just have wasted some men.

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RE: Sapper's T4 North - 11/14/2013 2:15:56 AM

Bozo_the_Clown

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quote:

Finally, be very, very careful about your cavalry. Each cavalry unit is worth 3-4 infantry divisions in terms of armaments (those cavalry squadrons are really expensive to build). Note that cavalry, unlike infantry, once destroyed will not get back as empty shell. Still, it is worth to risk cavalry when you can cut off several German units. It is not worth to use them as speed bumps or front-line units - use infantry instead...

Interesting post Toidi. I don't have that much experience with the game but I'm using cavalry to surround and rout Axis units. The Axis player usually doesn't have a solid line so there are lots of places to attack. This way you can rip some interesting holes into the front. Also, it often takes more then one turn for the routed unit to rally. The downside is that I often loose more cavalry then I should.

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RE: Tom's T4 North - 11/14/2013 4:53:54 AM

Toidi

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Tom Hunter

Further North I put garrisons in Denepropetrovosk and Poltava in the hopes that Sapper will push for them thinking he can take the factories before I evacuate them. In fact they are already gone.

In T4 I moved armament factories as follows: 4 from Denepetrovosk each to Gorky, Sverdlovsk and Chelyabinsk, bringing all three cities from 6 factories to 10. If I understand correctly this will boost each city by 3 in December 41.

1. It is visible for axis how much industry you have in each town.
2. I generally tend to evacuate differently. Think that each turn arm is not producing due to damage is a lost turn. As such I tend to evacuate each town fully. Also, I think (but I am not 100% sure) that the industry evacuated is not added to industry in town already. As such the calculations may be 1.3*4 (i.e. 5) + 1.3*6 (i.e. 7) giving 12 , not 1.3*10 giving 13. As I am not sure about that - you either need to do experiment yourself or ask someone in the know (Morvael may be the best source as he has access to the code). I think that they are calculated separately, as otherwise everyone would evacuate to a single town as much as possible, to avoid any troubles.

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RE: Tom's T4 North - 11/14/2013 6:12:25 AM

SigUp

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You are right Toidi, evacuated factories do NOT add up.

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RE: Tom's T4 North - 11/14/2013 12:36:27 PM

Tom Hunter

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Toidi "It is visible for axis how much industry you have in each town." That is interesting, before I moved the factories and deployed units I looked at German towns to see if I could see how much industry they had, and it was not visible. So I figured if I cannot see Sapper22's industry why should he see mine? Knowing which towns are empty may send Sapper after Zaporozhye instead of Dnepropetrovosk, we'll see.

If evacuated factories do not add up then I just placed 3x4, for 15, instead of 1x12 for 15, but I did lose 1 potential factory from Poltava since instead of placing 4 or 6 I placed two 3s. I'm not crushed by the loss of 2 or 3 potential factories, but I must say that some of the coding decision in this game are really just annoying. They seem to be explicitly counter intuative, somewhat like microsoft putting the shut down button under the word start. If you are going to show a city with 10 factories, why have it behave as one city with 4 and another with 6, that happen to be in the same hex?

Thanks for the information, it is helpful and its kept these issues minor when they could have been a major problem if they went unnoticed.

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Sapper T5 North - 11/15/2013 3:45:33 PM

Tom Hunter

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Sapper continues to push the operational tempo across the map, but the thin end of the wedge keeps getting thinner. The Soviets are more and more likely to be fighting from a fortified area, and you can see the multiple lines of fortification at Moscow and Leningrad starting to take shape. My impression is that I need forts to have any chance of rebuffing a German attack at this stage, along with good leaders, support, and some luck I suspect.

Sapper continues pushing South of Ilmen, I think I have to send more there to stop him, he is trying to overrun production in part by pushing on more factories than I can evacuate. To stop that I have to pick a spot to hold him at least for a few turns, and Leningrad is looking much better than Kharkov for that.

In the center its getting to be time to work on Moscow�s flanks, to keep Sapper from making a giant war winning pocket. He cannot do that now, because he has advanced so far, but he could certainly do it in September when his RR catches up, and I think the only way to defend against it is to start getting ready a month in advance. This turn I had 7 division cut off in the North, which is more than I can really afford because of the very high numbers of troops Sapper cut off T1. I�m working on that, in a number of places I fought him without anything getting cut off at all, so I am getting a better feel for what works and what does not.

Soviet casualties were very high in T5 because Sapper made a major effort to squeeze the southern pocket. The Red army went from 4.5 million men down to 3.9. There will be another turn or two of that before it finishes playing out.

One curiosity, I put a fortified area down on a Fort 0 and it removed it. You can see the fortified area on the map North of Novogrod at the rail junction, and if you go to the T4 Leningrad map you can see the fort 0.

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Sapper T5 South - 11/15/2013 4:12:54 PM

Tom Hunter

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In the South there was some effort by Sapper to reduce the pocket but he is still focused on moving troops East to keep his momentum going. Outside of the pocket he attacked 4 Soviet units, pushing them back to continue his advance, and cut off Kiev, which I am going to retreat out of this turn.
He also isolated the division at Krivoi Rog, but I felt I had to leave something there to slow his advance a bit.
I am considering putting some paras and other forces into the woods hexes in the Pripet, to see if I can cut the Northern rail route into the Ukraine. Sapper has left this weak, and failed to move into the Pripet with anything at all which creates and opportunity that might let me reduce supply for much of his Southern advance.
I�ve got a fairly powerful army in the Crimea which Sapper is ignoring, and I am happy with that. It allows me to build up a force while threatening his flank but not taking casualties. On T5 with an opening like Sapper had I think any threat that I can make without exposing myself to being pocketed is a good thing. Depending on Sappers future moves those troops may take a boat trip to Rostov, but for now they are changing from guys with (and without!) rifles into infantry divisions.
Overall in the South I am retreating again, I need more turns of low losses to rebuild the Red Army.
It does seem that Sapper is watching my factory evac closely, he pushed Zapo harder than Poltava or Dnepro, and Zapo still has a 4 factories in it. It�s pretty clear now that he is pushing for Stalino, and then further East. It�s certain he is going to go a long way, because I do not have the material to stop him on three axis of advance, and the Southern front has the worst defensive terrain and the most space, so its clearly the best place to trade space for time.

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RE: Sapper T5 South - 11/16/2013 2:36:01 AM

Tom Hunter

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Sapper advanced faster that I would like (but likely slower than he would) and is not on the edge of my first fortified line. I tried to break the two isolated divisions out but failed, though the motorized inf division is kind of beat up now, and I flew supplies into the two divisions in the fort. It�s not visible, but there are two armored divisions under the airbase on the south side of lake Ilmen, and more armor or mech inf on reserve in the area, I am very curious to see if this is enough to stop Sapper for a turn or not. Further back is a new infantry army under a inf 6 general so even if Sapper advances I have more to throw into the fight.

Further North there is a double row of divisions and forts. It would not surprise me if he makes it across the river, but in T5 his hasty attacks bounced off several of the screening divisions before they pushed them back. Now instead of single divisions in 1 an 0 forts he is facing 1 or 2 divisions, behind a river in 1 or 2 forts. It won�t hold for ever, but maybe parts of it will hold for T6. As Sapper closes up on the line that the Leningrad army is holding (orange) I plan to pull it back to shorten the front. I think the real battle is in the swamps North of Novogrod, and the land South of Ilmen. I�m not certain I can hold, but I can delay, and will. Delaying allows me to move Southern factories instead of Leningrad factories, and I believe getting the Southern factories away is key to undermining Sappers strategy in the long run.

If you scroll up you will see that the line I labeled likely to break in T4 was pushed back 1 hex in T5. That is a bit better than I expected, and I think it shows that Sapper is operating at the end of his logistics at the moment. That will change as he moves the railhead forward, but it�s a huge help at this moment.

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RE: Sapper T5 South - 11/16/2013 2:44:59 AM

Tom Hunter

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Scroll up to the T4 Leningrad map and look at the defense. To isolate the two divisions Sapper had to punch through my screen and then launch an attack that drove back two divisions and a brigade, move into position and then drive one of the two (now) surrounded divisions back onto the other. That takes very carefully considered play, and shows what a pro Sapper22 really is.

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Soviet T5 Center - 11/16/2013 3:14:12 AM

Tom Hunter

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In front of Moscow we are starting T6 on a line I (scroll up) called the T5 line. The screen slowed Sapper, and most of it survived to withdraw into the T5 line which is now much stronger. It�s not strong enough to hold for long, but it has numerous forts and numerous stacks. In T4 I had a few forts and no stacks at all, so it�s a harder line to break, and I don�t think Sapper will push through it quickly. If you count, you will see that three hexes behind it is the T6 line, which is already stronger that the T5, and the red star is on top of 2 armored corp (disorganized, failed, 1941 armored corp) with a mech 6 leader ready to counter attack. Its not much, but its more than before.
As time goes by Western MD will slide North and Moscow MD will retreat east, if that goes very well it will expose Sappers flank, and if not it will be two retreating armies with good leadership and organization.
I�ve set a lot more stuff on the flanks to keep Sapper Honest, I don�t want to give him a 30 hex open road to exploit, because if I do, he will.

I�ve filled Moscow with cavalry that I want to save for later. It�s relatively safe there, it gets stronger, and if Sapper comes up with a clever trick to reach the city in the hopes that it�s empty the Cossacks will get him.
New armies are forming in front of Tula, and there are significant forces between his spearhead and Bryansk, in case he decides to change his axis of advance.

Someone suggested that I had to much defense in depth, and not enough on the flanks at Moscow. I disagree, I think I need forts to survive, and I put in lines to dig holes, not defend. It might have looked like a defense in depth, but it was actually a massive ditch digging project, and you can see the lines of forts solidifying in front of Moscow and the flanking defenses starting to take shape. You have to make the shortest road to Moscow the hardest road, that will push the germans out to the flanks, which may be easier, but is certainly longer.

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RE: Soviet T5 Center - 11/16/2013 6:49:12 AM

janh

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Tom, from the screen it seems you did leave Leningrad's back door open? The best delay you can gain in the north by forcing Axis to cross the Neva into level 2 or if lucky, level 3 forts.

From Sappers dispositions it looks like he's merely waiting for his infantry to catch up before the next huge leap breaks loose. Might be he did some HQ build-ups this turn. What makes me wonder is his concentration of the fast divisions in the center. He completely lack widths to his efforts, and allows the Soviet units to be nicely concentrated in the direct line of advance as well. A bit like WW1, bully style. 1941 is the one time where width and stretching the lines works in German favor. Anyway, are you prepared to loose Bryansk and Tula?

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RE: Soviet T5 Center - 11/16/2013 12:40:27 PM

Tom Hunter

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Janh, you have to close the Leningrad front door first. Sapper is not waiting for his infantry to catch up, he pushes the pnz forward with offensive operations every turn. You can see that if you scroll up to the maps I post of his T5, look at the battle marks. However, as I have posted, he will bring the infantry up and launch offensives with them too and that will be a big problem for me.

These map shows priorities. Moscow is priority number 1, Leningrad priority number 2. That�s because the big issue is something you cannot see on the map, moving factories before Sapper caps them. Sapper�s priorities are clear too, he is trying to win by gaining a lot of ground and capping a lot of production. If I stop him for a few turns in front of some locations, I can rail stuff out of other locations. Sapper and I both know this, and though I am the only one of us writing here you can clearly see the two of us using every resource we have to make our respective strategies work, and making trade offs as the war goes forward in time and the mix of resources available changes.

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Soviet T5 South - 11/16/2013 1:16:19 PM

Tom Hunter

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In the South I have problems, Sapper�s advance is threatening a lot of factories and is running ahead of my rail capacity. Sapper continues to push as hard as possible to as many factories as possible. He is not really there yet but can threaten Kharkov and the Stalino area. He is also operating way out at the end of his logistics.

The best answer I can come up with at this time is the same tactic that I started using near Moscow on T3, spread out and build a deep region of interlocking zocs. If Sapper has done HQ buildup I think this will fail for at least one Front, and possibly both. If not I think one front will hold at least one more turn, and maybe two will.

In the Northwest corner of the map you can see a ? and just to the north some paratroops I railed into the Pripet, sitting on an airbase in the woods. Sapper has one rail line North of the pocket and I am going to try to drop on it next turn and reduce his supply in the South. The mechanics of this are difficult, so I am not sure if its possible to do this in the game, and I am not sure if its possible for me to make it happen, but its worth the try. Before you all post the directions on how to, I�ve studied and practiced, and sometimes it works and sometimes it does not, the whole process seems to be controlled by the same gremlins that plague the US 8th airforce bombers.

Things you cannot see on the maps:
My recon aircraft are exhausted and many have low moral. I think there is a large force of infantry following Sappers panzers into the Dnepr basic but I cannot find them because of the sad state of my recon.
The Red army is getting better organized every turn. Many of the corps HQs disbanded T5. I have put leaders with infantry ratings of 5 or 6 into all the important armies, and gotten rid of the 2-4 front commanders. The armies have multiple support units either in place or forming. So my stuff does not roll over dead quite as easily as it did before. Leningrad and Moscow are best organized, followed by the North Crimea near Stalino, which is still getting going. The airforce is getting about 10% of my AP at the moment, because the army needs it more. It is getting better, but it will be a while before it�s a well organized force.

There were a couple of 2-4 generals in charge of the Orel Front and Kharkov front. Stalin had them relocate the HQ many times, and eventually they forgot to close the doors of the small planes they were using and fell to their proper place as posthumous heroes of the soviet union. In Orel I got Timoshenko instead, which is a pretty good upgrade. In Kharkov Chenikov was replaced by a 3-5, which is at least a bit helpful.

T5 moved 30 of the Kharkov tank factory to Magnitogorsk, then read Wallocs guide and realized I likely moved more than I had to, but it may be good to have more T34s earlier. 1 of the vehicle factory to the same place, 10 armaments from Kharkov to Izhevsk, One armament from Stalino to Kubyshev. Sapper is clearly pressing the South to see if he can cap the armaments before the evac. He did get 4 at Zhaporozhye, but otherwise I have been pretty successful in getting stuff out before he arrives. We�ll see if I can maintain that.

Soviets have 3.95 million troops, 41,854 guns 6115 tanks, and 5448 planes
Germans have 3.4 million troops, 34,000 guns, 2724 tanks and 2906 planes
Axis Allies have 1.7 million troops, 13048 guns, 602 tanks, and 1125 planes.
Soviets have lost 1.4 million men (+180,000 this turn), the axis about 90,000 (+23,000 this turn).

Interesting my Orbat shows me down 500,000 troops, but my losses show me losing 180,000 troops. My gun and tank numbers are about the same as last turn, another positive trend, the Germans are down by about 175 AFVs which is not a big enough loss to matter, I need to work on that.

Sapper has had the turn for about 12 hours, we will see if he pushes the front hard in T6, or takes a pause.

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German T6 North and Center - 11/16/2013 6:35:38 PM

Tom Hunter

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T6 in the North Sapper breaks through the Luga line and starts his push around lake Ilmen, both in the face of serious resistance. Sapper is running attacks with up to 50k men in the stacks, he is still unstoppable in individual hexes, but his advance is just a couple of hexes. I am worried about it but there is not much I can do but keep fighting.

I have noticed that the fortified areas I placed T4 appear to be stopping the ground units in the hex from digging in. I am not certain I would have placed them had I known that, and I am not sure what to do with them now. Will they start to fortify in the future? Will they allow other units to dig in? It�s odd.

In front of Moscow Sapper turns South for the flank. He chews up some Russian infantry and takes some losses himself, the Germans lost over 170 afvs this turn many in the push to the SE near Moscow. Importantly Sapper is not any closer to Moscow than he was last turn. Bryansk and Tula are threatened, but the work of fortifying them is already underway. In T7 and T8 sappers infantry will start hammering on the Moscow lines, which is going to be a big problem, but at the moment he has been forced to respond to my position, which is a small step forward.
I�m still very concerned about the Red Armies ability to stop much of anything at this time. Sapper is close to a lot of very important locations, and has another 12 turns before mud. This is going to get very ugly.

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German T6 South - 11/16/2013 6:47:17 PM

Tom Hunter

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In the South Sapper chooses Kharkov and reaches the hex next to the city. The screen and distance prevent him from accomplishing the same thing at Stalino in T6. He is getting closer to his goal of overrunning many factories before I can move them, which will win him the game if he pulls it off. My forces in the South are still to weak to do more than slow him for a bit, and I don�t have enough to counter attack, so he is getting to play some of the games you can see on the map where a light unit is used to surround and slow a retreating red infantry unit.
I am going to look for counter attack opportunities, but my feeling is that I am still in delay and run away mode in most places on the map.

To me it does not look like Sapper has used HQ supply, but if anyone thinks otherwise I would like to hear why.

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Sapper T7 South - 11/17/2013 8:26:59 PM

Tom Hunter

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I did not have time to post my moves for T6, and now Sapper�s T7 is here.
The short summary: I committed strong defenses in a number of places, and was concerned they would fail. I�m very happy to say they held in most locations.

My factory evac situation is worse than I would like, this is what I moved T6: T6 moved 10 arm and one vehicle from Stalino to Nizhy Tagil, moved 4 from Stalino to Ereshovo, 1 KV factory from Leningrad to Sverdlovsk, 3 from Makeevka to Ak Burlak, 1 from Mauriopol to Guriev,

Sapper got Kharkov and Stalino before I could fully withdraw them, my Arm production is now 332. All that said, I am much happier at the end of Sappers T7 than I was at the end of his T6. I�ve included his attacks in the screenshots, so you can see where he pushed.

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Sapper T7 North - 11/17/2013 8:48:00 PM

Tom Hunter

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In the North Sappers push for Bryansk is slowed, and he does not attack the direct line between army group center an Moscow. T6 I pulled back from my T5 line, and moved a full Front South to the Bryansk line. It did not hold, but Sappers advanced 2 or 3 hexes, with no breakthroughs. I�m still very concerned that he can do an HQ buildup, rip my lines apart and go far, but the chance of that working on T8 is much lower than the chance of it working on T6 when I had smaller reserves and weaker armies. T6 the Red Army fell to slightly under 4 million men in the field, T7 its back up over 4 million in spite of Sapper finally finishing off the Lvov pocket. If you look closely at the map west of Vyshny Volochek you can see a Red Army hex with a German attack mark, which indicates that Sapper wanted a hex but did not get it. I�m pretty sure this is the first genuine rebuff of the german offensive, there have been other units which held the first attack and retreated on the second, this time the hex is still Soviet.

At Leningrad Sapper continues to push the direct line. I�m slowing but not stopping him, which is pretty much what I expected.

I�ve got a delay at Leningrad, and I�ve pushed Sapper off the direct access to Moscow, which were both early objectives of mine. Sapper is taking more factories than I want in the South, and is likely winning the game because of that, but T7 still has me a bit more optimistic than T6.

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RE: Sapper T7 North - 11/17/2013 9:08:03 PM

Tom Hunter

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I regrouped my air near Leningrad very early, and upgraded a disproportionate number modern fighters. It has not stopped Sapper, but while cleaning out low moral air I noticed this unit:

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RE: Sapper T7 North - 11/18/2013 2:35:52 PM

mktours

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Very fascinating game to watch, you are certainly a very good player. I believe you could defend it even with not-random weather, when you become a Pro player as GHC one day, you would see it yourself. Every good GHC believes it could get stopped even with no-random weather if the SHC react correctly.
If you do everything right from now on, you are very likely to survive 1941. One key element might be that you should keep an eye on railing your Leningrad armies out before the rail line being cut, which is important if you are to defend Moscow in 1941.
Don't be too concerned with the army loss to this turn, a good example is the AAR [DV vs Sillyflower/Belphagor], the SHC have a very good start but losing 1750000 POW before winter, and see how the game is now. You have a very good chance to defend, in deed.

< Message edited by mktours -- 11/18/2013 3:38:15 PM >

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Sapper222 Breaks Through at Leningrad! - 11/18/2013 10:50:35 PM

Tom Hunter

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Sapper broke through in the North, used air supply to fuel the SS, and has cut the rail line to Leningrad while isolating several divisions of 33rd army. mktours thanks for the compliment but you may have spoken too soon.

He also moved the 9 divisions that were leading the frontal attack on Leningrad to the lake Ilmen area, my recon found some of them, you can see them on map. Notice Sapper punched a bunch of Red Army troops out of the way, and I have launched counter attacks here and there, when I do, I lose a lot of tanks and the Germans get a good laugh.
One bright spot in the North, three Soviet air groups have been chewing up the Finnish airforce, including the one shown above, they all have modern fighters and 70exp. Sapper has been pounding the Red Airforce, killing over 450 planes but losing 148 in return, including Gladiators sent by the British to fight the Soviets, which is proof that war is strange.

Ground casualties were light on Sapper�s turn, 56000 Soviet and 6k German.
I ran out of time before I could post a full update on T7, and now we are on T8, these are my factory moves:
T7 3 Arm from Gorlikova to Chapaevsk 2 from Kursk to Agryz, 3 from Voroshivogrod to Zuveka, 4 from Bryanks to Molotov, 4 from Rostov to Serov

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Bryansk Front Under Hitlerite Attack! - 11/18/2013 11:00:43 PM

Tom Hunter

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In the center there were large battles South of Moscow, and Sapper was nice enough to show me that he is going to try to end run into Moscow in T9, note the air recon of the city.

The big black circle shows more airbase attacks in the center.

Sappers main line of advance punished the Red Army, I was unable to hold any hexes against the concentrated pnz corps, but Sapper did not break out. in one of the larger battles it says Sapper222 lost 48 tanks, but the list for his turn shows a loss of 43 afvs, anyone know why?

Further South you can see that my speculation about him coming at Moscow from the South may have been correct. Two pnz groups are pushing North, though they are at the end of very long lines of supply the troops near Kursk are 50 mp from the railhead.

At the moment the Moscow area is holding fairly well, but Sappers infantry has not started attacking yet, when it does I think things will get pretty bad.

One problem for Sapper is there are now three distinct fronts, North, Center and South, which are very far apart, to get troops from one to the other he has to walk a long way.

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Hitlerites stopped in the South - 11/18/2013 11:07:03 PM

Tom Hunter

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In the South Sapper222 clears some screening troops in the Stalino area, but hardly advances at all. The strong defense infront of Rostov is not even attacked and the huge void to the North remains empty of troops.

In the Crimea the Romanian air force has been bombing Southern air command and killing many 1-15s and I-16. I am thinking if I swap in some better fighters I might make a substantial improvement in both my loss ratio and my fighter quality. Sort of like what is going on North of Leningrad, but with more than three fighter groups.

Over all this was a quiet turn, I think Sapper is bringing up infantry to smash my fronts. I am afraid that will work well for him, its only turn 8, there are 10 more to go before mud gives us a pause, and the Soviets are still awful in combat.

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Chaos at Leningrad - 11/19/2013 12:36:36 AM

Tom Hunter

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Sapper moved his main force at Leningrad, so I moved mine. Troops from NW Front rushed East to cover the approaches from Sapper222�s main Pnz force, which is currently off the front line more or less South of Lake Ilmen. I had to shorten my line a lot, but anything else would be a total disaster.

I have no idea if I can stop him from breaking out, when I looked at the map I figured my big advantage is rail, so I moved troops in as fast as I could, brining over 11 divisions to the area. Normally Sapper222 could easily blow this defense apart, and I think he may be able to now, but he does have a long way to move before he can attack. Sappers big advantage is being able to choose direction, I have many places I have to cover, so I am spread thin.

I am delighted with my little counter attack, for the first time ever I broke a supply line into encircled divisions by attacking. It�s not very much, and I doubt it will save the troops in the long run, but it�s a step in the right direction.

I�m no where near done with the turn but I thought it would be interesting to post the Leningrad moves.

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RE: Chaos at Leningrad - 11/19/2013 12:50:09 AM

hfarrish

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If that is the far northern rail line he cut, you may have some issues. As I have painfully found out in the past, if he cuts it far enough from your garrison they will all be isolated and easy pickings, regardless of their otherwise unisolated status.

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