Rank and File: A clerk's war Germany 1936 (Semper Fi)

[kigrwik]

Great update. Amazing work so far.

One word of caution: in Barbarossa, the major trouble is supply. Beware of supply-hungry divisions (like ARM and MEC) and prefer good ole infantry units. If you have the manpower, of course. As Germany I usually tech rush agriculture so that I have a good supply of troops. The SU is large, but not *that* large and if they didn't focus on agriculture, you can win an attrition war on the eastern front.

[Uriah]

Cologne is a rich VP. I bet the AI will race there and beyond, if not countered. It's good at exploiting such generous openings.

As to armies, I'd try reattaching them to the western army groups, giving new orders, and waiting an hour or two of game time for the AI to catch up. In my experience, it should start redeploying almost immediately when units aren't in contact with enemies.

Good point - I had forgotten how much VPS drive the AI. I will set it as a defensive objective: that should prompt some movement (I am determined not to take over manually in the west). Just remember I am a little ahead (4 days I think) so wait a while to see action.

I have previously tried to reattach units from different theatres and it just doesn't work. In one instance I had a corps that was spilt between theatres and the units already in the theatre moved and those not in the theatre didn't. At the time I searched the forum and found several posts reporting the same (I think in the bug reports).

[Uriah]

Excellent show! Our clerk has finally met the Fuehrer. I hope you two get a close relationship some day. The Fuerher could need a good man like him.

I hope Poland gives up soon, but I doubt it. In my games it took a lot pain and a long time.

Boemsiboemsie:

As you know, our clerk is a shy and retiring type who knows his place. But he may be able to contribute and come to attention.

I am sure that Poland will collapse soon: in previous games when down to only one or two VPs it surrenders so when I take Warszawa that should do it. If it doesn't I will have to start stripping the east - at least one army group will move west.

Great update. Amazing work so far.

One word of caution: in Barbarossa, the major trouble is supply. Beware of supply-hungry divisions (like ARM and MEC) and prefer good ole infantry units. If you have the manpower, of course. As Germany I usually tech rush agriculture so that I have a good supply of troops. The SU is large, but not *that* large and if they didn't focus on agriculture, you can win an attrition war on the eastern front.

kigrwik:

Thanks for the praise.

I probably won't have a huge number of arm/mech for the start of Barbarossa: but I have had some concern about supply for my forward air bases. I am already advance researching agriculture, and have consistently kept ahead on all the supply projects. Manpower will also determine my occupation policies. But I take your point and actually had decided to start quite a few foot infantry divisions for front line duty, simply because I can't afford too many motorised.

[OKH]

I just finished the French campaign; The BEF was there in force, along with the French. Combined, they fielded atleast 110 div, Belg+Neth another +20 div.
What started out as a quick campaign, turned into a 3 month + 1 week brawl.
Belg/Hol went fast....I was in Paris in a month....then the French came off the Maginot in force...they also pulled in their units from the ITA border, 9

[Baltasar]

All those attacks where your troops are taking on numerical superior but completely unorganised enemies should actually succeed and not only keep the enemy from reinforcing. Keep the enemy on the run and he can't recover.

[Forster]

As usual, another good update. I too find that when you get the three cities, Poland goes away.

As to the question about delay. I really don't know. I just play for fun and don't spend time doing that kind of analysis. I have faith in the nuts and bolts types to provide us with timely and useful information.

Your best bet would be to sr the units west and assign them to their new hq when they get there. Hopefully you'll be able to give the French and Belgians a surprise when your army arrives en masse.

[Uriah]

I just finished the French campaign; The BEF was there in force, along with the French. Combined, they fielded atleast 110 div, Belg+Neth another +20 div.
What started out as a quick campaign, turned into a 3 month + 1 week brawl.
Belg/Hol went fast....I was in Paris in a month....then the French came off the Maginot in force...they also pulled in their units from the ITA border, 9

130 divisions!!!! That would be umm.... interesting. I have had enough trouble with the Poles, who would have had 50 at tops. We will just have to see. I haven't detected any UK ground troops as yet, but it would be rash to think that the UK has not sent the BEF to help.

As I mentioned elsewhere, I am worried that a large French force (with the BEF?) may be marching across Belgium, out of sight.

All those attacks where your troops are taking on numerical superior but completely unorganised enemies should actually succeed and not only keep the enemy from reinforcing. Keep the enemy on the run and he can't recover.

They should succeed and many times do, but I found in Poland that if I didn't break them quickly they were rapidly reinforced. The other thing I found was that if there was one unit with high org, the others often stayed long enough to blunt my attack: often happened when there was a HQ or two with org.

As usual, another good update. I too find that when you get the three cities, Poland goes away.

As to the question about delay. I really don't know. I just play for fun and don't spend time doing that kind of analysis. I have faith in the nuts and bolts types to provide us with timely and useful information.

Your best bet would be to sr the units west and assign them to their new hq when they get there. Hopefully you'll be able to give the French and Belgians a surprise when your army arrives en masse.

I think it depends on the percentage of total VPS left in control of the defender and the national unity. With a high national unity like Poland they hang on until they only control 2 out of the total. You can drop the unity with spies, but that is too devious for the Wehrmacht! (in other words I have never remembered in time to try it).

Having looked at a few of my battles, I am 99% sure it is based on the time the unit ARRIVES at the battlefield province. So it is related to "Attack Speed" - movement into a province while attacking. I will chack it as we go, but that would tie in with Streategic Movement delay, which is similar and where the clock starts ticking when you arrive in the target province.

The different times for units in the same battle would result from when they started fighting (attack advance) and their differnt attack speeds.

The plan is to SR all the units mentioned in my update to points several provinces back, where I will set up new formations while they recover organisation. Army of Polen Nord will be renamed and take 5 armeekorps into Belgium. I am still deciding whether to declare war on the Dutch but think I will as otherwise I'll have a supply bottleneck at Eupen/Luxembourg.

[kigrwik]

I too had a dreadfully difficult campaing of France. *Huge* number of troops and no way to manage a breakthrough withouth isolating my forward units.

This may be due to the fact that I started Sealion at the same time as I attacked Poland (!) so I had lots of troops in the UK and perhaps not enough to attack comfortably.

But in the end, even though I had flanked the Maginot line through Belgium&Netherlands, sent troops ashore in Brittany (MAR, MOT and some LARM that did wonder in the undefended coutryside) and dropped 6 divs of PAR on top of Paris it was a difficult fight. I only succeeded after calling Italy and Nat Spain (SCW went the "good" way, for once !).

Anyway, I'm looking forward to your more historical approach (but if you like the Kriegsmarine it's very fun to build one strong enough to support a surprise landing in the UK, but don't hold on too dearly to your battleships).

[Uriah]

I too had a dreadfully difficult campaing of France. *Huge* number of troops and no way to manage a breakthrough withouth isolating my forward units.

This may be due to the fact that I started Sealion at the same time as I attacked Poland (!) so I had lots of troops in the UK and perhaps not enough to attack comfortably.

But in the end, even though I had flanked the Maginot line through Belgium&Netherlands, sent troops ashore in Brittany (MAR, MOT and some LARM that did wonder in the undefended coutryside) and dropped 6 divs of PAR on top of Paris it was a difficult fight. I only succeeded after calling Italy and Nat Spain (SCW went the "good" way, for once !).

Anyway, I'm looking forward to your more historical approach (but if you like the Kriegsmarine it's very fun to build one strong enough to support a surprise landing in the UK, but don't hold on too dearly to your battleships).

I am amazed you had 6 divs of Paras: I'm still building my first. And I'm only on my second Transport wing.

The reason for no update today is that I wanted to get a bit ahead: I was only up to July 3 I think (just 3 days ahead). And then I struck a problem and I have trying to see why it happened. (SPOILERS AHEAD!!!)

Poland has surrendered and the Hungarians only have a few provinces, the rest going to the USSR. Most of the Hungarian Army is in Soviet Poland. the problem is that about half the Hungarian Army is heading off to Siberia or the Causcasus. I think I counted about 10 divisions and 2 or 3 HQ marching east at full speed.

I have gone back to save games and tried it several ways but I always get the same result. Sometimes the USSR seizes the Baltic States, sometimes not, but every time the Hungarians march into internment.

I haven't had this happen before, but I have never invited the Hungarians before I finished Poland before. Has anyone experienced this?

I have decided to just play on, but do they ever turn around? Or do they keep going until they hit the Pacific? Or do they simply attrition away?

It is a bit annoying as this means that the Hungarian-Soviet border is completely ungarrisoned at the moment. There may be enough return to give a sort of defence, but it looks as though I may have a huge border to defend.

[Modo]

I haven't had this happen before, but I have never invited the Hungarians before I finished Poland before. Has anyone experienced this?

Are you at war with some Asian country perhaps? In that case there seem to be some automatic access rights, so the Hungarians could be feeling lucky, and attacking something. I've seen in a Japan AAR Polish units fighting from USSR lands in China, even though the player (Japan) was at peace with the Russians (which had beaten Germany and puppeted Poland, which was still in the Allies, so at war with Japan somehow).

[Uriah]

Are you at war with some Asian country perhaps? In that case there seem to be some automatic access rights, so the Hungarians could be feeling lucky, and attacking something. I've seen in a Japan AAR Polish units fighting from USSR lands in China, even though the player (Japan) was at peace with the Russians (which had beaten Germany and puppeted Poland, which was still in the Allies, so at war with Japan somehow).

Well, I am at war with the usual suspects, Yemen, Oman, Iraq, Bhutan and Nepal, but I wouldn't think that the Hungarians would go off to take them on. If they are keen for a fight, the Greeks are just down the road, or they could cross a nice friendly country (Germany) and fight the French.

But even if that is the case, surely they don't get supply from the USSR? I can understand sailing around the world and getting supply from a port, but these boys have nothing.

[loki100]

You might want to revert to that trusty technique of editing the save game file. This sounds like one of those instances when its perfectly justified.

I'd simply find the rogue Hungarians and put them all in Budapest - this works fine as long as you delete the 'previous province' and % moved lines from the file ... and of course, don't forget to back up before you do it

[Warspite_TW]

I have decided to just play on, but do they ever turn around?

I think they are heading for Hong-Kong or Macao. They will become acustomed with gambling and girls and no, they will never return. After a while they will set sail for Las Vegas or Miami.

[Uriah]

You might want to revert to that trusty technique of editing the save game file. This sounds like one of those instances when its perfectly justified.

I'd simply find the rogue Hungarians and put them all in Budapest - this works fine as long as you delete the 'previous province' and % moved lines from the file ... and of course, don't forget to back up before you do it

I think I will try that : haven't ever moved units in a save file so may have to experiment!

One question: do I move corps, divisions or regiments? May take a while if I have to move many small units.

Anyone know?

I think I can work out the rest by loading up as Hungary

[loki100]

I think it depends how they are organised. If the divisions are in a corps, I think you can redeploy by moving the corps but I suspect you may have to do it division by division - so a bit of a pain.

danger with loading up as Hungary is you let the AI loose, even without any passage of time, on your whole German set up, so you may find stuff SRing around.

[Uriah]

I think it depends how they are organised. If the divisions are in a corps, I think you can redeploy by moving the corps but I suspect you may have to do it division by division - so a bit of a pain.

danger with loading up as Hungary is you let the AI loose, even without any passage of time, on your whole German set up, so you may find stuff SRing around.

Yes, I know the AI will reorganise everything, even if no time has passed. I went in as Ungarn to see where things were, and to note whihc units have to be moved.

And I found the problem.

The Theatre HQ has set objectives all over the USSR and the units are trying to reach them all. I have gone back some distance and it seems to be way befopre Poland fell. I may be able to simply load as Hungary immediately after the fall (when all my units have strat moves already), change the objectives and saee if all the Hungararians move home safely.

I'll give it a shot: easier (and, given my level knowledge, safer) than changing the save game. That will be plan B.

But a short delay before the next update.


PS loki100: do I actaully delete the "previous province" liine or just alter it to an adjacent province? It's just that I noticed that all divisions seem to have a previous line. I thought I would just locate a division in Hungary and duplicate its location etc for all the "rogue" divisions. And change the HQ objectives of course to defend Hungarian rather than Russian positions.

I suspect that the Hungarians thought they were part of the Warsaw PAct after the Poles conceded.

[loki100]

re previous province - its seems to work well if you delete this and it seems less checking/complication in setting up the new location, I think the save file then reads almost as if the unit is newly placed on the map as opposed to in motion.

[Uriah]

re previous province - its seems to work well if you delete this and it seems less checking/complication in setting up the new location, I think the save file then reads almost as if the unit is newly placed on the map as opposed to in motion.

Thanks - have done this but I had to load as Hungary to alter the objectives: they all started to head off in weird directions again. Don't know if they would have crossed into Russia but didn't want to risk it!

And of course the AI took the opportunity to alter my objectives: made them all Army Group objectives which has messed up a lot, including the air.

But I think I can sort it out - will just take some time.

[Forster]

I noticed in your response to me my quote said three cities, that should have been four, of course. Everytime I have Warsaw, Danzig, Krakow and Lodz (I think that's the fourth VP city), the message pops up immediately about the surrender, and, of course, their fighting on in exile. No delay, as soon as the last city falls, that's it. Poor Poles don't even get a chance to retake it.

[kigrwik]

I am amazed you had 6 divs of Paras: I'm still building my first. And I'm only on my second Transport wing.

Paras are a very interesting tool: if you keep them under human control, they can really shift the battle over to your side, especially if you have enough divisions to hold your ground. And of course, enough transports for 6 PAR divisions means you have enough transports to supply them (air supply missions are a godsend). My theaters were under AI control but I kept the kriegsmarine and the Sondertruppen (is this the correct word for "special forces", like MAR and PAR ?), with the required TRA, under human control.

In my barbarossa, I hadn't turned Finland to my side yet so I air dropped my 6 PAR divisions in the narrow part of the Kola peninsula. I did an amphibious landing in Murmansk and between those two I managed to cut off and destroy several army corps.

However, I recommend preparing additional port facilities in advance: you can deploy a level 1 port in any province you hold. This is how they implement the "mulberry" ports. You may also have to define supply convoys by hand. All in all this can mean the difference between a devastating flanking attack and a massive starvation of troops and equipment.

I did amphibious invasions in Murmansk, Arkhangelsk (to threated Moscow) and Batum in the Black Sea to rush to the oil fields. In those cases two INF divisions holding two provinces against counterattacks are way better than one MOT holding one province and they consume the same amount of supply. And don't tell me about ARM, they are only useful in the spearheads of the main battle front.

Anyway, with your gift in storytelling, I'm looking forward to your own Barbarossa. Will you stay on the historical approach, or will you go for some "ahistorical" (?) moves ?