Let's get ahead of ourselves : Axis Operations 1944/1945

[DacianWarrio]

<<ATTENTION! This thread contains spoilers of the Axis Operations 1943 Dev Diary 1 spoilers! You have been warned!>>

So.

As it has been stated in Dev Diary 1 for AO 1943, winning at Kursk opens a fictional campaign for securing the Caucasus (including Stalingrad) "for real this time".

Now, this is clever on behalf of the developers because even a success in the Caucasus can reasonably be assumed not to prevent a Russian attempt to relieve Leningrad (the way it happened in early 1944) or Operation Bagration in summer of 1944 (arguably AO 1944's "main event" the way Operation Citadel is the "main event" for AO 1943).

This means that, work load wise, the first scenarios up to and including Operation Bagration can be part of the "common trunk" of the 1944 campaign.

And from then on, in case of a success against the Soviet summer offensive of 1944, well that's when things get REALLY interesting.

That said, I think that regardless of how big a victory we are allowed to achieve in 1944, I posit that Axis Operations 1945 will feature a "common trunk" set on the Western Front (Battle of the Bulge and onwards) and depending on the successes achieved in the present and past AO, things can really spin off (this is particularly facilitated by the fact that, it being 1945, there really aren't that many historical battles to cover, which gives more room for the devs to spread their ahistorical wings).

In all, I am looking forward to playing 1943, 1944 and 1945, particularly in light of the developers' pledge to follow through with taking into account our successes on the battlefield.

[makoto14]

if we are getting ahead of ourselves....assuming bagration and bulge go well the ahistorical path could be....yup AO1946 featuring old favorites like Sealion 46, US east coast 46, US west coast 46, and maybe even pacific 46 to connect it to Pacific game coming out. Imagine importing core from both Panzer and Pacific General to fight in Asia.

[Kerensky]

I really can't say anything to confirm or deny what is coming, even denials would give away too much information on what is planned.

It does make me realize something though. I think in future we might have to obscure scenario names, because just knowing geographical locations is spoilerific. Just knowing where Astrakhan is, for example, is a pretty dead give-away which way the post Kursk German victory path leads (at least in the short term).

We might have to use Operation names to obscure the content in 44 and 45, or else people can make a partial picture of what is going to happen before they get the chance to actually experience it.

[DacianWarrio]

I really can't say anything to confirm or deny what is coming, even denials would give away too much information on what is planned.

It does make me realize something though. I think in future we might have to obscure scenario names, because just knowing geographical locations is spoilerific. Just knowing where Astrakhan is, for example, is a pretty dead give-away which way the post Kursk German victory path leads (at least in the short term).

We might have to use Operation names to obscure the content in 44 and 45, or else people can make a partial picture of what is going to happen before they get the chance to actually experience it.

That sounds like a good idea!

[Raganr129]

I really can't say anything to confirm or deny what is coming, even denials would give away too much information on what is planned.

It does make me realize something though. I think in future we might have to obscure scenario names, because just knowing geographical locations is spoilerific. Just knowing where Astrakhan is, for example, is a pretty dead give-away which way the post Kursk German victory path leads (at least in the short term).

We might have to use Operation names to obscure the content in 44 and 45, or else people can make a partial picture of what is going to happen before they get the chance to actually experience it.

Yep, can confirm the scenario list is one of the first things I dove into when it was announced. Maybe without changing scenario names, is there a reason that the scenario list is published pre-launch? I don't really see a reason why that would be necessary as part of the promotional material, if that's easier than finding alternate names for the maps themselves.

[Wolfenguard]

from my view, what will be a nice idea are the order of missions, depending on your path ahist or hist
something like
history
DDay -> defending paris -> defending x -> Last Stand in Berlin
standart war a lot of defending mission to the normal war End, you where sending back from the eastern Front to defend the west

a history
Pushing back at x -> recapture Paris -> recapture omaha Beach -> Sea Lion ...
we get some victorys in the east, but the allied startet a invasion, you where send back to the west to help to push them back.

we play the same Missions, or maps with different goals and in a different order.

[FunPolice749]

I know this is unlikely to happen but honestly I would love to see the "winning" scenarios not see the Germans actually win the war but instead drag it out for several years and possible end it without Germany being utterly destroyed. Like say you become prestigious enough to preform a coup and make peace talks so the war doesn't devastate Germany more. Blitzkreig 1946 would be awesome to see as a stuff like the E series of tanks or various other German designs that were just starting to roll out on top of Allied stuff also.

One of my favorite things so far in AO is how we can overperform but the reality of the war always sets in. We preform Sealion but are forced to leave, we actually fight into Moscow but then withdraw due to the soviet counterattacks, and more to come. To me it gives this great flavor of even though we are able to preform things the Germans couldn't ever do in reality the bigger picture is just something that one army cannot change and that in the end we will slowly be forced back.

Maybe the historical path in 1944 could split again to have a "semi historical" tree also. Like what if the Germans stopped D-day, defeated Bagration, or didn't preform the Ardennes offensive. They conserved their strength and drag the war through 1945 into 1946 and how that might have changed things while not being the whole "Somehow Germany in 1945 managed to just conquer the world" that the completely alternate history path will probably end up.

[George_Parr]

<<ATTENTION! This thread contains spoilers of the Axis Operations 1943 Dev Diary 1 spoilers! You have been warned!>>

So.

As it has been stated in Dev Diary 1 for AO 1943, winning at Kursk opens a fictional campaign for securing the Caucasus (including Stalingrad) "for real this time".

Now, this is clever on behalf of the developers because even a success in the Caucasus can reasonably be assumed not to prevent a Russian attempt to relieve Leningrad (the way it happened in early 1944) or Operation Bagration in summer of 1944 (arguably AO 1944's "main event" the way Operation Citadel is the "main event" for AO 1943).

This means that, work load wise, the first scenarios up to and including Operation Bagration can be part of the "common trunk" of the 1944 campaign.

And from then on, in case of a success against the Soviet summer offensive of 1944, well that's when things get REALLY interesting.

That said, I think that regardless of how big a victory we are allowed to achieve in 1944, I posit that Axis Operations 1945 will feature a "common trunk" set on the Western Front (Battle of the Bulge and onwards) and depending on the successes achieved in the present and past AO, things can really spin off (this is particularly facilitated by the fact that, it being 1945, there really aren't that many historical battles to cover, which gives more room for the devs to spread their ahistorical wings).

In all, I am looking forward to playing 1943, 1944 and 1945, particularly in light of the developers' pledge to follow through with taking into account our successes on the battlefield.

I'm not sure Bagration would still be on the table under such circumstances. A German victory at Kursk, followed by a successful push into the Caucasus, means a ton of Soviet forces would have been destroyed to get there. Bagration was designed as a knockout blow against an entire army group, following on the heels of a whole line of devasting losses for Germany between Kurk and mid 1944, with an exposed Army Group Center that was outflanked in the south, drastically outnumbered and didn't expect an attack. If Germany actually succeeds at Kursk, and then drives the Soviets back in such a huge fashion, the whole basis for the operation seems to be gone.

Unless you turn Bagration into just meaning "a Soviet offensive in the center of the line", to make use of the Germans overextending themselves by once again moving into the Caucasus. That would seem plausible, though likely not nearly as big of a push as the actual operation was (due to the earlier Soviet losses) and aimed at a somewhat odd target considering how the frontlines would look like. Though maybe, if combined with attacks around Leningrad, it could be considered an approach to cut off army group north while the bulk of the German forces are busy further (south)east.

[Bee1976]

Maybe the historical path in 1944 could split again to have a "semi historical" tree also.

Well that sounds like a little "too much". The old PC1 design allowed that better wir 2 diffrent victory types. But if they dont split the dlcs in to 1944 ahistorical and 1944 historcal as 2 real diffrent dlcs, splitting up the historical tree would mean even less scenarios in a single 1944 campaign, because the dlcs would have to cover 3 diffrent paths.

and if hey split up the fans of the historical tree will recieve ~0,5 dlcs pure historical campaign and the fans of ahistorical outcome will recieve ~1,5 dlcs.

Im not against playing the same map with diffrent goals if it fits, but building a complete dlc on just using the same maps for both paths sounds boring and "lazy"

Edit: Nice im a STUG

[FunPolice749]

Maybe the historical path in 1944 could split again to have a "semi historical" tree also.

Well that sounds like a little "too much". The old PC1 design allowed that better wir 2 diffrent victory types. But if they dont split the dlcs in to 1944 ahistorical and 1944 historcal as 2 real diffrent dlcs, splitting up the historical tree would mean even less scenarios in a single 1944 campaign, because the dlcs would have to cover 3 diffrent paths.

and if hey split up the fans of the historical tree will recieve ~0,5 dlcs pure historical campaign and the fans of ahistorical outcome will recieve ~1,5 dlcs.

Im not against playing the same map with diffrent goals if it fits, but building a complete dlc on just using the same maps for both paths sounds boring and "lazy"

Edit: Nice im a STUG

I think it would be entirely possible to have a completely unique 1945 campaign that sees stuff like the Ardennes Offensive not happen leading to Germany having more forces to last longer. You would likely see some pretty different scenarios between the two which gives ways to more interesting scenarios. Like what if instead of having the Rhur Pocket happen the Americans are forced to fight for it because they can't close a pocket? A stalingrad for the Western Front would be completely unique to this semi historical path without straying into the "win the war" alt history we would likely see.

[charge62]

Another possibility for '45 is the often forgotten "what if" the Western Allies really didn't have a plan to counter. They worried over the possibility.

What if Wacht am Rhein doesn't happen and the forces are instead sent east, to East Prussia and Poland. Then von Rundstedt surrenders the western forces, while the rest of the Wehrmacht keeps fighting the Russians. Quite a decision for Eisenhower whether to keep killing Germans who have by then surrendered or do they race for Berlin? Also presents some interesting possibilities in the East as the Germans know the Americans and British are coming up behind them. German soldiers were were already fighting what they knew to be a losing fight. Their options were to surrender or keep fighting to hold the Russians out of German lands for as long as possible.

In this situation, they'd be fighting for more, the possibility of saving Germany from the Russians completely.

Then what does Stalin do? Does he abandon the mostly set piece offensives that made the most of the Russian push supply system and all those trucks from Lend Lease? If so, he would be driving for Berlin without adequate supplies at the front, forcing units to push regardless of circumstances in a pell mell race to Berlin.

[Retributarr]

WWII-UKRAINE:'
Before WWII even got started... previously 'Russia' had on occasion tried to subjugate 'Ukraine' to put it under its thumb!. The last major-atrocity before the WWII event... was the forced starvation of somewhere between 6-10 million Ukrainians.

When the 'Germans' finally swept through Ukraine, the Ukrainians were 'Ecstatic!' to have been liberated from Russian-oppression. In-fact... great numbers of them wanted to volunteer to help the Germans fight the Russians... and I believe that some actually did. However... Hitler's determination to exterminate the 'Sub-Humans' was the priority-policy... and so now those actions of the Germans... were worse than what Russia was doing to the Ukrainians.

So!... now!... what-if... Hitler was informed of these matters... and instead... had decided on a different course of action... and then otherwise had accepted many hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian volunteers into the German-Army... could this have made any real difference at all?. The Ukrainians knew their countryside very-well... and as well, would know where and where not to press the advantage, or to know where not to stumble on their landscape,... this knowledge would or could have been a definite advantage over the Russians.

[Bee1976]

I think it would be entirely possible to have a completely unique 1945 campaign that sees stuff like the Ardennes Offensive not happen leading to Germany having more forces to last longer. You would likely see some pretty different scenarios between the two which gives ways to more interesting scenarios. Like what if instead of having the Rhur Pocket happen the Americans are forced to fight for it because they can't close a pocket? A stalingrad for the Western Front would be completely unique to this semi historical path without straying into the "win the war" alt history we would likely see.

These are some nice ideas indeed. But that would still mean a normal historical loosing path.
an additional ahistoric loosing path
and an ahiistoric winning path

maybe these are some ideas for a mod ?

[adiekmann]

WWII-UKRAINE:'

So!... now!... what-if... Hitler was informed of these matters... and instead... had decided on a different course of action... and then otherwise had accepted many hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian volunteers into the German-Army... could this have made any real difference at all?.

In fact, this was suggested before Operation Barbarossa was even launched by Field Marshal von Kleist. To invade as liberators I think would have worked to collapse the Soviet Union, but this was too logical for the crazy racial thinking of the Nazi regime.

[charge62]

Referencing ideas related to Kursk:

Citadel was probably as least minimally feasible when first proposed. So what doomed it?

1. Both OKW and Army Group Center had high level moles reporting daily by radio through the Lucy spy ring. Stalin knew where the attacks would land, the units involved, their equipment, and strength.
2. The time delay gave Stalin ample opportunity to prepare the battlefield.
3. Stalin had an overabundance of forces available. In fact, looking at the Kursk Salient and the forces for the Belgorod-Kharkov offensive, Stalin could have launched two well prepared attacks with front level forces, and perhaps three, before Citadel was launched.

Suppose the Panther variants were delayed another couple months and this was known in advance. This was one of the main reasons Hitler provided to justify the delay. Then Citadel might have launched much earlier.

Another path is to exclude Citadel altogether. Rather than building up for that attack, the Germans embark on a general reinforcement of the Eastern Front. Catching their collective breaths in anticipation of further Soviet assaults. This becomes more viable when considering one of the often overlooked aspects of the preparations for Citadel, the drastic weakening of the flanks north and south of the planned operational area.

During normal operations a battalion might have been expected to defend a front with 5-7 kilometers width. During the flank draw down, battalions were covering 50kms. That's not a defense, it's a tripwire.

Hitler's obsession with the Kursk salient was WWI static warfare thinking applied to a WWII mobile warfare environment.

If the Germans had taken the summer of '43 to rebuild their forces and stabilize their supply situation, they'd have been better placed to bleed the Soviets badly. And they would have been better placed to reinforce other fronts like Sicily/Italy.

[Kerensky]

Referencing ideas related to Kursk:

Citadel was probably as least minimally feasible when first proposed. So what doomed it?

1. Both OKW and Army Group Center had high level moles reporting daily by radio through the Lucy spy ring. Stalin knew where the attacks would land, the units involved, their equipment, and strength.
2. The time delay gave Stalin ample opportunity to prepare the battlefield.
3. Stalin had an overabundance of forces available. In fact, looking at the Kursk Salient and the forces for the Belgorod-Kharkov offensive, Stalin could have launched two well prepared attacks with front level forces, and perhaps three, before Citadel was launched.

Suppose the Panther variants were delayed another couple months and this was known in advance. This was one of the main reasons Hitler provided to justify the delay. Then Citadel might have launched much earlier.

Another path is to exclude Citadel altogether. Rather than building up for that attack, the Germans embark on a general reinforcement of the Eastern Front. Catching their collective breaths in anticipation of further Soviet assaults. This becomes more viable when considering one of the often overlooked aspects of the preparations for Citadel, the drastic weakening of the flanks north and south of the planned operational area.

During normal operations a battalion might have been expected to defend a front with 5-7 kilometers width. During the flank draw down, battalions were covering 50kms. That's not a defense, it's a tripwire.

Hitler's obsession with the Kursk salient was WWI static warfare thinking applied to a WWII mobile warfare environment.

If the Germans had taken the summer of '43 to rebuild their forces and stabilize their supply situation, they'd have been better placed to bleed the Soviets badly. And they would have been better placed to reinforce other fronts like Sicily/Italy.

Well, the seeds of Kursk were planted at Stalingrad. Axis resources poured into that defeat were stripped from many other parts of the front. The Voronezh43 solo scenario partly explores this. It's part of the Soviet Winter offensives that created the Kursk Salient.

Such a position could hardly be ignored, because it provided such a well positioned staging ground to launch attacks from right in the very center of the Eastern Front. Manstein, in not wanting to attack Kursk, didn't mean he was opting to ignore it. He wanted the Soviets to make the first move and counter that, to repeat his success earlier that year with his Backhand Blow.

To take an alternate path away from Kursk would require having an alternate path that prevents the seeds of that conflict from being planted at Stalingrad.

And a ww2 game/campaign without Stalingrad or Kursk... well there have been examples of those who have tried to overlook such important battles, and you can see where they are now for yourself.

It's part of why the Axis Operations historical split happens when it does. We absolutely wanted to cover these famous battles and not just omit them entirely.

[charge62]

@Kerensky

I agree. The great challenge with what if scenarios is plausibility. The first time I recall thinking about what ifs for WWII was elementary school watching The World at War series when it first aired. Of course, at that time, I thought the series was truthful.

When evaluating such possibilities, I look for a few things. Was the option discussed at the time? Was it physically possible, i.e. were the resources available? What are the legitimate applications of random events to the circumstances? Was information concealed at a critical moment whose revelation would likely change the course of events?

The scenario I posted above was in answer to the question posed about Kursk was a food for thought reply to the previous Kursk post, if a dev wanted to go down that path. My earlier post about the possibility of von Rundstedt surrendering was more likely and plausible. Of course, if he had surrendered the Western forces, there would have been a cascade of downstream events working both in furtherance of and to hindrance to that action's objectives. Chaotic.

One example of a solidly plausible what if is the Kent case. FDR illegally conspiring with Churchill both before he was prime minister, subverting the government of an ally, and after. Then FDR asks Churchill to arrest and hold an American citizen indefinitely to cover up his actions. Imagine the American press getting hold of this in May or June 1940. It would have had repercussions throughout the '40s.

I've been working on a list of the more plausible events for a few years now. I don't want to hijack the original subject, but if you want to discuss, I'd be happy to contribute.

[DacianWarrio]

Well. AO1943 has been quite a ride, huh.

As expected, the Victory Path in AO 1943 doesn't prevent things from going historically bad in the Northern and Central Sectors of the Eastern Front (in fact, for the Northern Sector ahistorically bad with the lifting of the Leningrad siege by the end of 1943).

So, looking towards AO 1944, let's get ahead of ourselves :

Conveniently (and plausibly), Operation Bagration would be the "main event" of an AO 1944 regardless of whether we are arriving in from a Victory Path AO 1943 or not.

Now, right out of the gate we run into a dilemma : If importing from Victory AO 1943, the entire historical early 1944 campaign around Leningrad is moot (it is assumed to have happened in 1943). What I imagine will happen here is that the devs will be clever about it :
- The Historical Path will see us fight a number of battles while retreating from Leningrad, maybe picking up an Ahistorical Victory Token along the way if we do very well.
- The Ahistorical Path will see us playing the exact same scenarios as the Historical Path but in reverse order and with the roles reversed (we are attacking instead of defending), and pick up an Ahistorical Victory Token if we do very well.

Then I imagine both branches will merge for Bagration and split after it.

The post-Bagration split, that will be interesting because it is reasonable to assert that beating Bagration when arriving from the 1943 Historical Path is very different from beating Bagration when arriving from 1943 Victory Path.

Thus I don't think it's unreasonable to expect 3 ending branches for AO 1944 East : Historical, Lesser Victory (Historical 1943, Victory 1944) and Greater Victory (1943+1944 Victory). Regardless of whether Greater or even Lesser Victory takes us to Moscow "for real this time", AO 1945 will need to feature, at this point, an entirely fictional "shadow" campaign completely separate from the historical one (unless the devs decide to "rocks fall, everyone dies" invalidate all our gains, an inexcusable insult of our investment that would result me in not giving the devs a single dime and a single second of my time again).

Overall, I do believe AO 1945 will have a lot of content spread across timelines. Conveniently, the amount historical content to include in AO 1945 would be less than a half years' worth so it's not prohibitive for the devs to entertain different contexts.

[Bee1976]

Conveniently (and plausibly), Operation Bagration would be the "main event" of an AO 1944 regardless of whether we are arriving in from a Victory Path AO 1943 or not.

Im not sure if this is possible. Careful spoilers ahead:



On the 43 victory path we fought our way back to Stalingrad. So AO43 ahistoric route ends hundrets of kilometres away from AO43 historic. Im pretty sure Kerensky is able to write a story why we have to fight at Minsk on the ahistorical path but it still would feel kinda strange and bad, because it would mean that "the winning path" doenst change anything if he have to fight that long distance back in the west for Minsk.

Thats the most promising and problematic thing with the ahistoric path. On this winnig path there should be the option to win, so fighting battles from the histoic path would mean "no progress" on the frontline. I assume AO44 will be comple splitup between historic // ahistoric. The most ideal solution would be again 1 DLC fpr 44 historic and 1 for ahistoric.
I Mean following the winning path from theb ase game, there should be a "sea lion" at some point and maybe an invasion of the US. It would feel really short to fight 2-3 misisons in the uk and 2-3 missions in the us.

I mean the normal amount of missions per DLC is about 16. Considering 1945 was a short year in the war, and that there is a lot of historic stuff to cover, this would mean a real short "winning" campaign. So i really hope for a complete splitup and 2 DLCs for 1944 released at the same time and the same for the following year. This would give the team the chance to cover most important histoircal events and still the option to add some real flavor battles in the ahistoric path.

'This would make some sense, because there are still some DLCs in the pipeline (at least i hope they are) i mean SovietCorps, AlliedCorps, Afrikacorps...and maybe all with an ahistoric route (ok im dreaming...).

But, just to mention it again, the splitup in AO43 was well done, the DLC was one of the best so far, i would only rate SCW higher. So maybe Kerensky and the team got some real neat ideas for a 1944 with both routes in 1 DLC that will work exactly as good as it did in 1943. But to be honest i would wish for 2 DLCs, because that menas more battles

[Alice1919]

Conveniently (and plausibly), Operation Bagration would be the "main event" of an AO 1944 regardless of whether we are arriving in from a Victory Path AO 1943 or not.

Im not sure if this is possible. Careful spoilers ahead:



On the 43 victory path we fought our way back to Stalingrad. So AO43 ahistoric route ends hundrets of kilometres away from AO43 historic. Im pretty sure Kerensky is able to write a story why we have to fight at Minsk on the ahistorical path but it still would feel kinda strange and bad, because it would mean that "the winning path" doenst change anything if he have to fight that long distance back in the west for Minsk.

Thats the most promising and problematic thing with the ahistoric path. On this winnig path there should be the option to win, so fighting battles from the histoic path would mean "no progress" on the frontline. I assume AO44 will be comple splitup between historic // ahistoric. The most ideal solution would be again 1 DLC fpr 44 historic and 1 for ahistoric.
I Mean following the winning path from theb ase game, there should be a "sea lion" at some point and maybe an invasion of the US. It would feel really short to fight 2-3 misisons in the uk and 2-3 missions in the us.

I mean the normal amount of missions per DLC is about 16. Considering 1945 was a short year in the war, and that there is a lot of historic stuff to cover, this would mean a real short "winning" campaign. So i really hope for a complete splitup and 2 DLCs for 1944 released at the same time and the same for the following year. This would give the team the chance to cover most important histoircal events and still the option to add some real flavor battles in the ahistoric path.

'This would make some sense, because there are still some DLCs in the pipeline (at least i hope they are) i mean SovietCorps, AlliedCorps, Afrikacorps...and maybe all with an ahistoric route (ok im dreaming...).

But, just to mention it again, the splitup in AO43 was well done, the DLC was one of the best so far, i would only rate SCW higher. So maybe Kerensky and the team got some real neat ideas for a 1944 with both routes in 1 DLC that will work exactly as good as it did in 1943. But to be honest i would wish for 2 DLCs, because that menas more battles

I believe Operation Bagration would still happen in a similar way, after all North and Center Army Group is losing strength with their diversionary attack in A-historial route.

But if AO44 provide some Air only mission, like sinking most of the landing force in Normandy landings, it is possible to transfer part of the western garrsion force like the 5th Panzer Army and 7th Army (According from Wiki.) to strengthen the eastern side (A repeat of the 6 Army) and change the outcome.