Feel the Wheel of Steel: Red Steel Review and Discuss

[fuzzayd]

So happy to play a new campaign! Loving the new UI changes

[best75]

Toropets–Kholm, 4th difficulty

This one was a long trek through the winter forests. I split my forces into 2 groups. One went in a north west direction to link up with the northern pincer and take Marjovo and Kholm. The other went south west to take Andreapol and Toropez, leaving quite a gap in the middle between the two groups. My regret was moving the anti air unit with the northern group due to enemy air units only operating in the south.

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[bebro]

Good job. The cam moves south now, so no big winter forests for a while. But things get worse before they get better for the Red Army...

[Andy2012]

Okay, I went for a snowy hike, too. However, I did not deploy any tanks and relied on my snowshoe warriors instead. Even had eight army CP to spare I did not need. And finished in 22 turns.
This mission is less about quick advances, I feel, but rather about systematically advancing under AT cover and playing to your strengths: heavy mortar preparation, rotating shell-shocked units, flanking, not overextending. Stay away from the northern part and move along roads. Leave heavy inf at home, light inf rules in difficult terrain. Later on, add some fighters and tacbombers.
Also, I added Guard Infantry as a spec, so getting my inf up to three stars will pay dividends soon. Elite reinforcements are now worth it.

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[Andy2012]

Its possible to change the german Infantry uniform skins in African scenarios yet to a more desert camo ? In Panzer Corps 2 it looks so amazing !
Or its possible to replace the skin textures diectly in an mod subfolder ? That would be realy better and easier for the modding community.

Okay, Otto65 was another HBalck account and is now banned.
Policy is here. https://www.slitherine.com/forum/viewto ... 74&t=77956

Mr Weinert, I know you are reading this. You were told again and again that we can and will spot you from miles away and nuke your accounts on the spot. GTFO and find some help for your obvious problems.

[GabeKnight]

Toropets–Kholm, 4th difficulty

Hey, Best, I'm not your wife and you can fool around with RedSteel all you want, but please remain faithful to your RedStar AAR, okay....Thanks...

[LandMarine47]

Just got to Second Kharkov, and I really enjoyed the two Crimean scenarios. While I am sad we didn't get to command the opening days of the Second battle of Kharkov, that very tense escape from Kerch scenario was a worthy replacement. The Luftwaffe made me pay very dearly with a core AT gun and HW infantry unit holding one of the bridges will my paratroopers blew as many bridges as they could.

That being said, I've encountered a rather game breaking bug, I cannot access the unit purchase or upgrade menus in the deployment phase for Kharkov. Do not know what caused this bug as I was able to open the menu earlier in the same deployment phase.

[LandMarine47]

Almost done with Kharkov, fortunately the aforementioned bug seemed to go away with a quick game restart. I am really enjoying Red Steel scenarios, the opening winter offensive near Rhzev does nail that feeling of fighting an exhausted but still very much battle ready army group center spread out over an extremely vast frontier was great, played both scenarios very slowly, avoiding some potentially nasty ambushes.

Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't there a major but botched airborne operation during the Rhzev winter offensive?

Apart from that, you guys really nailed the desperation aspect of the early days of the summer offensive. Can't tell you how many bridges my engineers have been blasting throughout Ukraine, but it is enough to buy me only just enough time to fall back to another defense line.

Air battles seem to be much more even between both sides as well now, while the Germans still enjoy a technical advantage over the reds, it isn't the total air supremacy of Red Star's opening scenarios. The Red Air Force can finally threaten those vicious Stukas, so long as the BF-109's are driven off

Haven't really tried out the lend lease equipment, as I'm try to spend my requisition points conservatively. but I will probably replace at least one of my matildas/valetines with a Lee or Sherman at Voronezh.

[best75]

Crimea, 1942, 4th difficulty. Completed with all objectives on turn 16.

We get sent south to more summer skies but this turned out to be no vacation as we been ordered to attack fortified lines. Well the main objective only required 3 of the primary objective so I focussed on taking Tulumchak, korpech ,and Koi-Asan only. The assault only occurred in the north and center. The south was left empty of soviet troops. The distance looked quite short but as the initial mines and fortifications are cleared, the enemy counter attacks with their infantry and tanks. This slowed the advance but I was still able to capture Tulumchak on turn 13 and the other objectives soon fall.

For secondary objectives I went fairly heavy with fighters, using a core deployment of 4 fighters and 1 tactical bomber. I sent 4 fighters south to protect the soviet ships. They shot down the 2 german bombers and the soviet ships reached the exit with only little damage. The 2 destroyers were sent north immediately to destroy the targets at Feodosia. It looked like the 2 destroyers just might be able to destroy the targets in 10 turns by themselves but towards the 10th turn I sent the tactical bomber south to be certain the targets were destroyed in time.

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[bebro]

Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't there a major but botched airborne operation during the Rhzev winter offensive?

Yup, Vyazma Airborne Operation, near the second main objective of the Rzhev-Vyazma offensive in January.

I toyed with the idea to include this - but it is not easy to depict with all the back and forth, very fluid situation, and I wanted to stay away from the Rzhev-Vyazma area since at least Rzhev is featured in several other scns already.

So I went with Toropets–Kholm, which was successful in pocketing Ger forces at Demyansk (Kholm did hold tho)

[bebro]

That being said, I've encountered a rather game breaking bug, I cannot access the unit purchase or upgrade menus in the deployment phase for Kharkov. Do not know what caused this bug as I was able to open the menu earlier in the same deployment phase.

If you see it happening again, could you post a save with it. That would be very helpful. As long it's fine after a simple restart it may not be a huge prob, but may still be worth investigating to make sure there's no more serious issue behind this.

[Andy2012]

Okay, I pushed the Wehrmacht across the Crimea, but not all the way.
This is a neat and fast mission if you keep the multiple objectives in mind. Deploy two fighters and a tacbomber IL 2 in the south, let them head towards the three bombardment targets. The destroyers move there as well. There some minefields, be careful. Knock out the barge and the two trucks over the next few turns, the fighters take down the Luftwaffe bomber. The supply vessels should reach their destination around turn 12-14.
Rest of the mission is straightforward. Bring more engineers than usual, there are a lot of mines and bunkers. Make the northern push a bit of a priority since you should seize the target there around turn 14. Add a pontoon bridge in the northernmost approach. Dont overextend your forces and keep them under AT cover (I should have brought more AT), the counterattacks can be nasty.

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[Andy2012]

Oh yeah, I also managed to win the first ahistorical mission in the United States in Panzercorps 2.
(Illustration similar... )

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[bebro]

Lol

[LandMarine47]

That being said, I've encountered a rather game breaking bug, I cannot access the unit purchase or upgrade menus in the deployment phase for Kharkov. Do not know what caused this bug as I was able to open the menu earlier in the same deployment phase.

If you see it happening again, could you post a save with it. That would be very helpful. As long it's fine after a simple restart it may not be a huge prob, but may still be worth investigating to make sure there's no more serious issue behind this.

A simple restart did fix the issue, I just can't figure out what was triggering it. Happened multiple times during multiple play sessions. If it happens again I'll make a dedicated post in the bug submission

[LandMarine47]

Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't there a major but botched airborne operation during the Rhzev winter offensive?

I toyed with the idea to include this - but it is not easy to depict with all the back and forth, very fluid situation, and I wanted to stay away from the Rzhev-Vyazma area since at least Rzhev is featured in several other scns already.

Now that you mentioned it, what other battles did you think about including but decided against for the final version? I was surprised that we didn't see a Sevastopol scenario, but considering how many battles were raging throughout the Soviet Union pretty much the entire year, I wouldn't know what to add either. Rzhev was a very long and painful battle for both sides that got overshadowed by the fighting in the south

[best75]

Kerch. 4th difficulty.

The Red Army has been put on the defensive. I try to save as many of the auxiliary units as I can and use them to bolster the defence along the secondary VPs. Once the 10 turn initial defence is done, the 2 southern VPs are abandoned to maintain a easier defensive position for the rest of the scenario.

My air deployment consists of only fighters and they were busy fighting off the Luftwaffe. One of the evacuation ships was lost but the other 3 reached the exit. I didn't use the Voroshilov for any support fire and played it safe by exiting it rather early.

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[best75]

Kharkov 1942. 4th difficulty.

The situation is dire here. The pocket will be certainty be encircled in the start and axis attacks are along the frontline. The main attacks look to come in the south and the north. The attacks in the centre were more minor. Once Volchansk is held for 5 turns I withdraw the northern defence east to get out of range of axis artillery. Soon the german troops moved towards Izyum, the defence was successful. Heavy infantry in the encirclement were able to hold 2 of the secondaries at the end. Through even if they fell I still hold one of the secondaries due to my main core force taking Petrovskaya.

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[LandMarine47]

Just finished Red Steel, and I am very happy with the DLC. Top notch scenario design from the developers. I had never known the Red Army and Navy had been maintaining a beachhead near Novorossiysk, nor how heavy the fighting was around the Kuban bridgehead. I definitely hope to the Red Navy again in the final part of this trilogy, maybe even get to use the big Capital Ships of the Black Sea Fleet during the eventual liberation of Crimea! I really liked the lend-lease objectives to encourage variety in the core vs hordes of T-34 and KV tanks. Surprised to see we didn't get any Sherman or M3-Halftracks and their variants on the eastern front however. Ended the campaign with 6 units of Guards Infantry. Was not really the biggest fan of the 3rd battle of Kharkov scenario however, felt super similar too the Panzerkrieg variant but over all great campaign.

[best75]

Voronezh, 4th difficulty.

The counterattack of the 5th Tank Army will face much german tanks and their air support. So in addition to tanks I deployed AT guns and AA gun plus some fighters over the counter attack force. The biggest risk to the secondary objective for destroying the german tanks was them running away when they are on low health. So i was sure to have follow up attack on the german tanks or prevent them from escaping. I narrowly completed the objective on turn 10. I then retreated my force north and held a defensive position.

I retreated forces west of the Don River across the Don River and held defensive position east of the Don River, blowing up a bridge when I could. Once reinforcements and attack on Voronezh started on turn 5 I deployed the reinforcements at Voronezh. I gave up the secondary VP south east of Voronezh but I recapture it near the end of the scenario. I found it a bit difficult to deal the 2 damage with the Night Witch bomber. I dealt the 2 damage to german infantry unit and got the 2nd damage just near the end of the scenario.

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