War in the East

[PDH]

The Soviets in WitE are difficult. I have a game going against another supposed newb player, and on turn 4 his Germans are threatening Moscow. I think I must be doing something wrong as the Soviets.

Ah, the old "I have never played this game before" ploy.  Probably that nazi fanboi over at Matrix...

[Berkut]

The Soviets in WitE are difficult. I have a game going against another supposed newb player, and on turn 4 his Germans are threatening Moscow. I think I must be doing something wrong as the Soviets.

Ah, the old "I have never played this game before" ploy.  Probably that nazi fanboi over at Matrix...

For someone who supposedly is a newb, he is an expert at setting up perfect encirclements every single turn. I need to get better at defending against them though.

I am kind of wondering how he is getting so far - in my games as the Germans, I cannot get my mech forces to move so far every turn, they have long since outrun their supply lines.

[PDH]

The first two turns you get massive supplies as the Germans.  An experienced player (and this is what gives it away, I think) then uses turn 3 to do an "HQ Buildup" to have full move again on turn 4 (and another hefty move on turn 5.  He has enough transport to fuel a couple of tank corps each turn, but not all of them. 

The "perfect encirclements" is also a give away - even the better players get them broken all the time...so either he is very lucky or he is not that new.

[Berkut]

I am unsure how people break encirclements. 95% of my troops are 1 CV, maybe 2 at best. I had one mech corp that had a couple 6 CV tank divisions and a 4 CV motorized that I had been hording.

I carefully saved them and pounced on a German motorized division that was the "point" of an encirclement.

Total of 12 CV against his 6 or 8 or something. Not only did I lose, I lost 350 AFVs. He lost 4.

[PDH]

Counter-attacks is a bit dicey as the Soviets.  Multiple units, and the goal is to get to 1-1 odds (which kicks up to victory). You will always lose more men, but it can work.

Deliberate attacks work best, that is why the armor and mech for the soviets is shitty in 1941, they don't have enough movement.  Masses of infantry are what you need in deliberate attacks.

The easiest encirclements to break are the one that aren't "rings of iron" if you don't have infantry to counter-attack.  Slipping units into ZOCs and as soon as it is broken the units inside are not isolated.

[Berkut]

Counter-attacks is a bit dicey as the Soviets.  Multiple units, and the goal is to get to 1-1 odds (which kicks up to victory). You will always lose more men, but it can work.

Deliberate attacks work best, that is why the armor and mech for the soviets is shitty in 1941, they don't have enough movement.  Masses of infantry are what you need in deliberate attacks.

The easiest encirclements to break are the one that aren't "rings of iron" if you don't have infantry to counter-attack.  Slipping units into ZOCs and as soon as it is broken the units inside are not isolated.

Right. My problem with this is that what happens is something like this.

And army gets isolated by being encircled after attacks on its flanks. It is a loose encirclemtn though, with ZOCs blocking supply, rather than actual units.

I can probably "relieve" it by moving units up, but what tends to happen is that the germans just encircle those units as well, and I end up throwing even more units into the encirclement, because they move so much further than my guys can.

It feels like I should have more units. I am no where close to being able to amass enough shitty 1 CV infantry units to attack anything, without leaving huge holes in my lines.

[PDH]

Just break the encirclements every turn, who cares if you throw more crap units into the cauldron.  Eventually with ZOCs behind them the Germans will be strung out, low on supply, and not in too good a position. The key is to get those units unisolated each turn so they route instead of surrendering.  Use a carpet of ZOCs behind your front lines too. This slows the Germans down if they are inexperienced.

[Berkut]

OK, figuring more stuff out. Finally got a handle on the Coviet command structure and how the CP thing works. The manual is annoyingly clear on some things, then completely opaque on specifics.

Anyway, another useful thing to do is use the 'z' key to switch between how the unit factors are displayed. Turning on my own units defense strength helps a lot - they are not nearly as useless as I thought. Kind of silly that they cannot manage to get three numbers on the counters though.

[KRonn]

This game sounds fun, challenging. Is that so, even playing against the AI?

[Berkut]

Yeah, although playing against the AI is supposed to be quite good, but I cannot get into it.

[Berkut]

Syt, are we just giving up on this, at least for now?

No time, or just don't like playing the Soviets?

PDH, you are up for some PBEM?

[PDH]

I am in two PBEMs now, sorry.  Email me a first turn (I want to be the Axis, as I love black counters) though, and I can get a couple of turns in a week I am sure.

[Syt]

Syt, are we just giving up on this, at least for now?

No time, or just don't like playing the Soviets?

PDH, you are up for some PBEM?

Sorry, crazy times over here, not much time.

There's Wiking on the Pardox OT forums, though, who's playing, I think.

[Berkut]

Syt, are we just giving up on this, at least for now?

No time, or just don't like playing the Soviets?

PDH, you are up for some PBEM?

Sorry, crazy times over here, not much time.

Does that mean you want to 86 this game, or just not going to get to it all that often?

There's Wiking on the Pardox OT forums, though, who's playing, I think.

Why would I want to play with someone from over there???

[Syt]

If you don't mind receiving only two, three moves on weeeknds, we can carry on.