Lothos first HoI 2 game (1.3) AAR

[Lothos]

Lothos first HoI 2 game
Patch 1.3
Normal/Normal

Country: Germany
Campaign: 36GC
Goal: Play a historical German game

Knowing full well that the AI will pound me to death I took a very early start on making builds geared specifically to this. Below is a list of the main things I did to prepare for this

1) Goal to have 20 Interceptors by the time Polish invasion would start
2) Build 6 HQs each having AA guns
3) Place 4 Flag in every major province in Germany that has resources or IC
4) Break down the interceptors 2 per wing in each base on supremacy

In preparation for the Polish Invasion I organized my Army the following way with a goal of 120 divisions by the time the invasion started.

1) Infantry Armies consist of 7 divisions, 1 AT Brigade, 1 Artillery Brigade and 1 Anti Tank Brigade ( few have Engineers if their army is near a river)
2) Panzer Army consists of 3 Panzer Divisions, 1 Motor Divisions, 1 Heavy Tank Brigade, 1 SP Artillery and 1 SP Anti Tank
3) Motorized Corp consists of 4 Motor Divisions, 1 SP Anti Tank and 1 SP Artillery

Air formations are designed to provide maximum effort and protection. The bases are protected already by Interceptors so all I needed was a good balanced wing for support. I broke the air force in two main groups which are CAS and TAC.

1) TAC formations consisted of 3 TAC Bombers and 1 Long Range Escort
2) CAS formations consisted of 2 CAS and 1 Fighter


The Kriegsmarine main objective was to be able to handle the soviet Navy (not worry aobut the UK) with it’s surface fleet and to provide a sub fleet to hit the Atlantic. By the time the war started I had roughly 50 ships of various sizes (no carriers).

1936
Nothing special happened this year. Everything went historical

1937
Japan DOWed the Chinese via Marco Polo. The annexed Communist China and took Nanjing. The front has not moved since.

1938
All Historical stuff, Got Austria and Sudetenland.

1939
Checks fell and instead of forming Slovakia I gave all the territory to Hungary (this way they can get 3 Tech teams later on). Molotov Pact was historical outcome and I DOWed Poland with the Danzig event.

Poland attack plan
The goal was three prong attack. Instead of performing circling moves it was designed to shove the Polish army to the south. For this attack I had 3 Panzer Corps. One was stations near Konigsberg and the other in Oppelin and the last in Stetting. The 2 Panzer Corps in the North side of Poland would make direct drives to Warsaw while the southern one would make a drive south of Warsaw. The southern Panzer would be moving slower than the other to as to help shove the Polish army southward so that they would not bunch up in Warsaw. The plan worked and 15 days later Warsaw was taken and Poland was annexed.

Winter
While the Polish invasion was going on I had positioned a pretty decent size army to war off the French. A total of 15 divisions where positioned on the French border facing the maginot line with a HQ (was just behind it but allied air power forced me to stack it). They also had an interceptor wing as air cover with level 2 forts. Some efforts where made to start the submarine warfare early but I ran into the French navy and lost almost my entire sub fleet (10 subs) at the time. With my 4 newest subs still alive I retreated them back to Kiel and decided to wait till Vichy was formed.

1940
Spring
With the coming of March the Atmark event fired. For this event I had prepared 2 Paratrooper divisions and 40 ships to support the invasion. It consisted of the Bismark and Tripitz as the main figure heads leading the invasion.

The invasion was going to be broken into two parts. First was an infantry Corp diving in through Demark and racing to the northern tip of Denmark to meet the German transports that would be coming for them. The second part was 6 divisions landing in Kritiansand with a paradrop on Hamar. This effectively isolated Oslo and make it an easy conquest. By the time this was completed the infantry units from Denmark where loaded on transports and immediately taken to Narvik for the quick annexation (20 days).

Summer
With the coming of heat and the dirt dry it was time to move into the Low Countries. I began my attack on April 30th as there was a storm over Belgium that had finally left. Using a similar tactic I did in Poland the goal for the Low countries was in two main phases.

Phase One was breaking the Belgium fortress and taking Namur as quickly as possible (before the French arrived). To accomplish this task I had 2 Army Corps, 2 Panzer Corps and 1 Motor Corp to attack in this area. They would breach the initial defenses and as soon as they take the province Paratroopers would be droped on Namur so that I can get the extra speed bonus for moving in friendly territory.

Phase Two was a drive to Roterdam dam and pushing the Dutch army into Amsterdam for one swift kill. This would effectively split the Low countries in half and make the conquest very easy with little to no casualties.

The attack started just as plan and everything was going smooth. The Paratroopers droped on Namur but the French launched an immediate counter attack. They wun the initial battle but before they could take the Province my armor arrived and repulsed their advances. While this drive was going on the drive to the north was moving quickly to Roterdam. This caused a pocket of Belgium forces to form in Antwerp. To take advantage of this side effect I split my two armor corp one taking Brussels and the other Mons with the Motor Corp in Mons as well. The infantry Armies where trying to keep up but had not arrived in Namur yet. Rotterdam was then take and the Dutch surrendered shortly after. At the same time I took Ghen and Belgium pretty much fell as well.

Battle of Namur
As this was happening the French decided to make Namur a major fighting ground with both our (Infantry Armies) moving back and forth taking and loosing the province. I was using this as a delaying effect so that my armor could continue to drive into France and with 2 Infantry Corps now relieved from the Dutch surrender gave me ample enough forces to do both.

Slice and Dice
Instead of making a direct drive on Paris I decided to wittle his army down a bit. To accomplish this I decided to slice into his line and use the coast to cut his troops off. My first target was Dunkerque. I attacked Lille and then drove to Calais therebye forming a pocket in Dunkerque of 4 divisions. Did the same exact maneuver with Amiens and Le Havre and Paris fell shortly after. The campaign took roughly 40 days from start till Vichy was formed.

Fall
With Vichy formed I rushed my troops to Yugoslavia to prepare for an August invasion. At the same time I sent in all my Tac bombers to start bombing England.

Yugoslavia
The attack plan for Yugoslavia was pretty simple. Have the armor drive through the clear hexes and try and take the VP hexes to make an easy annexation. The main thrust came through Maribor with Mountain divisiosn driving therough the southern mountaness terrain. A paradrop mission was conducted in the Split province when the mountain units had gotten within range to support it. This caused an encirclement of the retreating Yugoslavians and an easy encirclement. Within days Belgrade had fallen and a steady drive with my mountain troops began southward to meet up with the Italians in Albania.

Greece
With Yugoslavia out of the way it became imperative to remove Greece as well so that the Allies do not have an easy stepping stone onto the continent. The drive was a simple bully drive to Athens with a paradrop on Crete to complete the annexation.


Atlantic
Once France had fallen the battle of the Atlantic began to rage on. I must have had about 10 submarines in the build que to keep up the pace on how fast I was loosing them but at the same time I was not only sinking convoys but getting some nice surface ships as well. This was helping to take some of the preasure off the Italians in the Med and North Africa.

Britain
The bombers continued to pound britain day and night and with the submarines as well his IC was going steadily down (but at a very slow pace)

1941
This is the year where things get really stinky!!!

February Japan decides to declare war on the USA (umm ok!) This caused the battle for britain to almost come to a complete halt as USA interceptors where covering the island fairly well.

Atlantic
Battle for the Atlantic saw some real heavy casualties on my sub fleet. Constantly running into full size US fleets and having some severe engagements. In most cases I would loose a sub for 1 to 2 destroyers and occasionally sink a battleship.

Med
I decided to concentrate ALL my naval bombers in the Med near Sicily. Italy was loosing ground steadily in North Africa and I needed to do something to stop the UK fleet from providing battleship support to his troops on the coast. This tactic proved to be effective in sinking UK ships and detering him from staying long periods of time. It has bought Italy sometime as we are now in July and fighting in north Africa is still continuing.

Italy
Seeing the possible invasion of Italy coming soon due to the hopelessness of north Africa I began to position units in Austria to move into Italy the second the surrender. This is provind to be very difficult as I am desperate for troops in Russia (will get to that soon)

France
With USA in the war it became necessary to start building the Atlantic wall earlier than I had anticipated. This has also caused me to keep a strong army of 24 divisions in the French, Dutch, Belgium coast to deter an early Dday.

Romania
For some damm reason they became a democracy and have not joined my alliance. By the time I became aware of this it was to late to DOW them because I was already massed for the Russian invasion. This has caused a money pit because I have to spend it to keep relations with them very good so they do not join the allies.

Bulgaria
Joined the access just after Yugoslavia was annexed.

Finland
Joined the Axis roughly January 41. I waited this long to avoid any chance they may DOW the soviets before I was ready to move in.


Russia (started May 12th 1941)
The weather was completely clear at the start of the attack. I had positions roughly 130 divisions for this (180 in my entire army). The consisted of two main thrust that where planned for the first month of the war.

Phase 1 (3 weeks)
Center thrust is a drive toward Minsk causing pockets in Alytus and Bialystok
Southern thrust two was a drive toward Kiev causing a pocket in Lvov.

The second step to this plan was to clear out the remaining area in the center up to the river line and to surround the city of Minsk. In addition clear the southern region by turning my army away from Kiev and driving straight to Odessa.

Phase 2 (2 weeks)
Central thrust succeeded in surrounding the city of Minsk and as that was completed I noticed that Smolensk only had 2 divisions defending it. Realizing this was a golden opportunity and that the Soviets would reinforce it soon I decided to stretch my army out and attack it. I had only 2 Corp available for this attack (1 Motor and 1 Panzer) and I could only attack from one province as the rest of my armor was still tied up south of Minsk completing the encirclement and killing the pocket. The attack proved successful and I was able to hold my position and take Minsk.

Southern thrust drove straight down supported by 2 Panzer Corp and 1 Motorized Corp. It was successful in taking Odessa but a last minute soviet counter attack retook the city. The soviets reinforced Odessa with so many forces I was forced to wait and let the majority of his force escape before completing the encirclement.

Phase 3(3 weeks)
North thrust to clear out the Baltic States. Straight drive up the coast with naval support. Russians had very little defenses in the area so it was easy to advance and cross the river line. (Almost up to Leningrad)

Center cleanup of the line. Took Vitebsk and lost it to a Soviet counter attack but then retook it a few days later. Cleared out the swamp to the south and gave my air force a very much needed rest to support an attack in August to cross the river and make a drive to Orel.

South still cleaning up the area. Manage to take Kiev and retook Odessa. Was able to take Dnepropetrovsk from the soviets but my army got surrounded in the city causing me to do a massive counter attack to re-establish my supply line and relieve my armor corp in the city.

[Oranje Verzet]

Thats a pretty cool game, i like the historical attempts.

That was a classic invasion of France, with them paratroopers, always works so very sweat in MP.

Interested to see more..

[Helio1989]

Let´s go for Mother Russia!!!!! There the game wont be historical any more......

[Lord E]

Nice work, will be interesting to see how historical you can get he game when you invade the Soviet Union. Will be cool to read what happens next

[PB-DK]

cool stuff!

[lifeless]

good to see where this turns out...what are flags?

[Markusw7]

Originally Posted by lifeless

good to see where this turns out...what are flags?

he means flak

[yellowstriker]

Good, this is a good gmae. Do something unexpected Lothos. Sealion time.

[lifeless]

Originally Posted by Markusw7

he means flak

ah

[Earth's Savior]

Can we see screenies?

[Brasidas]

I'm a bit confused by your panzerkorps formations. You're mixing ARM and MOT but not going for the combined arms bonus?

You need at least 1/3 hard and at least 1/3 soft divisions for combined arms bonuses, last that I heard.

[Lothos]

Updated

[Helio1989]

Use political view on the screens... Is easyer to see the borders.

[Lurken]

Originally Posted by Helio1989

Use political view on the screens... Is easyer to see the borders.

Second that, I always nice to read a AAR lke this one.