Support units: when, how many, which ones?

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Support units: when, how many, which ones?

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All Forums >> [New Releases from Matrix Games] >> Gary Grigsby's War in the East Series >> Support units: when, how many, which ones?

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Support units: when, how many, which ones? - 7/11/2020 9:17:12 PM

CapAndGown

Posts: 3206
Joined: 3/6/2001
From: Virginia, USA
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When do you start creating SU support units? Which ones? How many?

I have my Army HQs set to level 3 so the game can automatically redistribute support units without having to pay admin costs. Mostly this gives me 3 artillery regiments per Army. A number of Armies also have sapper units, while some have motorcycle regiments. At what point do I need to step in and start creating new units? I am particularly interested in the MG-Artillery regiments since these seem to have a good mix of support elements.

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RE: Support units: when, how many, which ones? - 7/12/2020 9:23:20 PM

Kilo59

Posts: 35
Joined: 11/11/2019
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Joelmar has an excellent video on his youtube channel regarding support unit flow. He illustrates the most common methods of managing your SU's, being push and pull.

https://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=4795259&mpage=1&key=%26%2365533%3B

(in reply to CapAndGown)

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RE: Support units: when, how many, which ones? - 7/22/2020 8:02:54 PM

Nuklearius

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Joined: 9/4/2017
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When I played I build support units as soon as they were available for normal price and after I got rid of the most useless generals. Try to build units that use generic armament instead of specific artillery guns/rocket artillery, as you'll likely be short on special models early on. Check the upgrade paths to make sure that your support regiments don't downgrade to something weaker down the line (some of the early ones do). When you start going on the offense you should build railroad construction battalions to take care of the damaged railway quickly. For defense Sappers used to be good for digging in, but I think there were some rule changes and their utility was reduced. Later on, when your army is organized in Corps, I'd advise directly attaching 3 tank regiments to a Soviet Tank/Mechanized Corps, these "supercharged" units will have very high offensive and defensive power per hex, rivaling the early German Panzer Divisions.

(in reply to Kilo59)

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RE: Support units: when, how many, which ones? - 7/22/2020 11:30:36 PM

thedoctorking

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Joined: 4/29/2017
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Another very useful type of unit in the middle game is the various SU regiments. The TD batteries that you can build in the fall of 1941 will upgrade to light SU regiments when the SU-76 becomes available. The light regiments are good to assign to rifle corps to give them AFV backup. The SU-122 and SU-152 regiments are also very valuable for busting high fortification levels (the 152s are especially good at that and I tend to move them around to corps that are going to be attacking cities). You don't produce very many flame tanks but you should create as many flame tank battalions as you have vehicles to fill them up. Again, they are great for taking down heavily fortified or urban hexes.

I sometimes like to give additional infantry to armor corps. Vehicles are at a premium in the middle game (1942-43) and while Motorcycle Regiments are heavy on the vehicles, they are a good addition to the armored corps. The independent tank regiments are a good buy, especially for the mech corps, and the heavy tank regiments are about the only thing you have that can fight German PzV and PzVI AFV's. I try to give each rifle corps an independent tank battalion in the early going (you will have an embarrassingly large quantity of tanks); I think they later upgrade to regiments as well.

Every Army should have at least three artillery regiments of some sort. There will be a long period when the BM Heavy regiments don't get any new guns, so don't build any new ones of those. I think the Howitzer Regiment is the cheapest choice in terms of armaments.

AT and AA gun units are somewhat of a luxury. I try to save as many of the city-based AAA units as I can (it costs 1 AP to detach an AA unit from a city if there is an in-supply Axis unit within 5 hexes). I rarely build AA or AT beyond what I get at the beginning, though those 100mm AT guns are real killers and can easily punch through a Tiger's armor. The problem is that the system doesn't match stuff up rationally, just randomly, so you are unlikely to get the shot even if both units are present in a battle. I think that AA firing at aircraft can disrupt bombers and reduce bombing effectiveness even if they aren't actually hitting the airplanes, so I like to spread some around, but not enough to actually spend AP on them.

Every army should have sappers even though as previously stated they don't have much combat effectiveness any more. They help build fortifications and take down enemy fortifications.

(in reply to Nuklearius)

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RE: Support units: when, how many, which ones? - 7/23/2020 8:51:26 PM

CapAndGown

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From: Virginia, USA
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Do construction battalions help build forts? I ask, not because I want to create any (sappers obviously being superior) but because I wonder if I should reassign them to Armies/Corps working on building up my MLR.

(in reply to thedoctorking)

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RE: Support units: when, how many, which ones? - 7/25/2020 2:20:08 PM

thedoctorking

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Joined: 4/29/2017
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quote:

ORIGINAL: cap_and_gown

Do construction battalions help build forts? I ask, not because I want to create any (sappers obviously being superior) but because I wonder if I should reassign them to Armies/Corps working on building up my MLR.

They have a construction rating, but seems rather low. I don't know how much help they are. I tend to build the engineer-sapper brigades once they become available, and the RR construction regiments. As far as building fortifications, AFAIK if they are assigned to an HQ and a unit under that HQ is building a fort, they can be assigned to assist construction. The more important function of construction units is repairing railroads during an advance.

There has been some discussion of assigning construction units to short-ranged HQ's - Soviet Armies and Axis Corps - to limit the area they work in so as to prioritize specific rail lines you need during an advance. I've fiddled with it but never mastered the technique.

Note that if you set a higher HQ to support level 0, like a Front or Army Group, it will nonetheless gather construction units to itself. You have to clear it out and then set it to locked if you don't want it to steal your construction units. This is particularly important for the Soviet military district HQ's located far from the front.

< Message edited by thedoctorking -- 7/25/2020 2:23:07 PM >

(in reply to CapAndGown)

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RE: Support units: when, how many, which ones? - 7/25/2020 2:52:30 PM

eskuche

Posts: 1094
Joined: 3/27/2018
From: OH, USA
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The initial sapper regiments are your best bet. I like to stack them in airborne/cavalry corps with a few trash AT artillery brigades to direct fort construction in specified areas through support unit construction. Each sapper regiment gives ~2/3 of a level 1 fort or 1/5 of a level 2 fort per turn. Usually the preparatory phase for soon-to-be invaded areas is getting a level 1 fort up beforehand so the newly arrived units can finish a level 2 fort. More choke-pointed areas such as in front of Leningrad, which is almost guaranteed to see grinding battles rather than maneuver warfare can be pre-spiked with fortified zones to enable 3.10 level fort building.

(in reply to thedoctorking)

Post #: 7