P210 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 19, 2019 12:28 pm
For added challenge I did try following Barbarossa scenario.
On turn one I disbanded every third unit on every gategory for every nation.
With exeption for,
- Recon planes. All German tac, strat and naval into one group and then 1/3 off.
- Naval units. Everything into same group for each nation. Then 1/3 off. Some strategic decisions
No new unit purchases. Only scripted replacements and reinforcements.
Difficulty General. Realistic scenario. No replays.
How did it go.
Due to reduced number of units I planned limited offencives. Keep NA, get Caucasus oil, defeat Normandy landings and if possible conquer SU.
It went pretty much like that. With few more turns SU would have surrendered. One mistake was too late offensive towards Archangels.
It was surely difficult at times, but really fun
OK. I was bored. New game with above rules, except every second unit disbanded on Barbarossa turn 1.
Worst was the hit on fighters and artillery. Difficult decisions. Lacking numbers, had to rely on troop quality - Expert replacements when ever possible and always for fighters, AT, and couple of key units.
Lacking infantry I knew it is just not possible to aim for Caucasus oil fields. Maybe one offensive would be feasible.
Therefore I chose that main effort would be Leningrad. Close terrain to defend, in perpetuity, with infantry and it would keep Finns in the war.
Otherwise plan was to fortify and defend cities along Dneiper river. Knowing that Soviet steam roller cannot be stopped at fixed line, did form mobile battle groups that would fight in front of Dneiper and around Smolensk. These consisted of 3 tanks, StuG, Recon and SP FlaK + other units depending on situation and availability.
Fighting in the East was hard. For example Rostov on Don changed hands every year. Twice. Germans captured it in summer and SU would capture it in winter. Had to fall back again and again to preserve units. Every unit is precious. Managed to capture and stabilize the Leningrad front.
North Africa. Eliminated initial British attacks and captured Tobruk. Then captured Malta. Then shipped all German units to Europe and ferried all Italian units to NA. Plan was to defend Tunis with Italian units for as long as possible and buy time to build defenses in southern Europe.
Moved couple of FW190 and lots of JU88 to Med and prepared to make Allies to pay heavily for invasion of Sicily. Meanwhile elite Fallschirmjägers were digging into Monte Cassino mountain.
1944
West '44. To my surprise Italians fought with élan and managed to fend off both the Torch landing and Eight Army coming from Egypt. Then Italians advanced to Casablanca. In the east Allies were pushed back to gates of Egypt.
Victory in NA allowed to build solid defenses in Normandy. Invasion was contained. Air war hard due to lack of FlaK and experienced JG units.
U-boats, Wolfpacks, managed to gain upper hand in Atlantic.
East '44. Mobile fighting in eastern front continued, with notable difficulties against SU heavy tank and SPAT. Also the number of SU planes increased faster than Experten could shoot them down. German bomber operations were halted until FW190F appeared.
1945
West '45. Brest captured on turn 98. Three Allied units surrounded in Normandy on turn 99. Reichsverteidigung did not do so well. Fighter bases had to be relocated to Poland just to stay alive. Italians captured Gibraltar.
East '45. Russians finally got tired of bashing their heads against Panther and Sturmgeschütz armor. Panzers Forward. Rostov on Don revisited, Kursk captured and Moscow finally fell on last turn.
Conclusion
Result, Draw. Extremely happy with that after hard but satisfying game.
McGuba, your scripted replacement/reinforcement system works very well. It also really creates feeling of living through war time. Splendid Mod.
Thank you!
.
. On a serious note, WOW. I am HYPED to use this new patch.