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How do you organize your armies?

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bunkerbuster said:
I derive my armies organization somewhat from real life ones. I particularly like this site (http://niehorster.orbat.com/index.htm) and this (http://www.axishistory.com/index.php?id=30) for reference.


Also I try to maintain 3-4 divisions/corps, 3-4 corps/armee, 3-4 armees/armeegruppen.

When a corps gets only panzer/motorized divisons, I rename it to panzerkorps, keeping the numbering, or gebirgskorps when contains only mountain divisions.

All my air units I keep under an Army Group named Luftwaffe, since I dont like handing units to the AI I can keep them under one theater. Makes it easy to get the numbering right and finding them. I keep fighter, bomber and CAS aircraft separated in groups - JG (Jagdgeschwader) for fighters, KG (Kampfgeschwader) for tac bombers, SG (Schlachtgeschwader) for CAS and so on. I dont know how Im going to organize them if I build too many, wish air and sea units had the same hierarchy as ground ones.

In the same manner, I keep all naval units under an Army Group named Kriegsmarine. I spread all destroyers, light cruisers and some heavy ships in several Kriegsflotte, but submarines I keep in separated Ubootsflotte with 2 flottille each.
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this is exactly how i organize my forces. i rename all new incoming infantry divisions and brigades such as "Infanterie-Regiment 132". now that i come to think of it, the game refers to the small units that compose a division as brigades but isn't the current level in most militarys regiments as suggested by the default german military names? i thought a brigade was a larger force than a regiment but anyways.

also how exactly how do compose ur panzerkorps. that has been the subject of much consideration for me as i want to keep it realistic and not just load 1 panzerkorps with all my tanks and mech/mot. i thought it might be wise to include infantry early on and later straight motorized divisions as panzergrenadiers (i think motorized can be, not just restricted to mechanized divisions) into the panzerkorps so i am able to have more panzerkorps and spread out my armor more evenly. maybe as follows:

I.Panzerkorps
Panzer-Division 5
-Panzer-Regiment 15 (Armour)
-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 26 (mot/mech)
-Panzergrenadier-Regiment 32 (mot/mech)

now Repeat 2 more times and then add a straight mech or motorized div. of panzer grenadiers to beef up the panzerkorps. having only 1 armour and 2 infantry style regiments is consistant with a real panzer division and really allows u to have more panzerdivisions cheaper

what would u clasify as a panzerarmee? obviously most panzerkorps were integreated into regular armee's such as the 9th armee of Paulus that was caught in Stalingrad. what criteria would u need to have a panzerarmee and how much infantry would u include bcuz i doubt u could make an entire armee out of armour.

just lookin for some neat suggestions

o and i like ur system with giving the navy and air force their own HQ's but do u assign an army commander to those HQ's?
 
'Mountain divison' translates to "Gebirgsjäger Divison"
or corps in " Gebirgsjäger Korps"

I simply name them "1./2./3. Jäger Korps" for easy referance(and its less writting:p)

irl all corps were "Armeekorps" with roman numerals, regardless if it was a armor or infantry corps
but i personly name them 1./2. etc Panzer...Armee/Korps
 
I only rename the HQs but not the divisions, it's crazy at the end... I form the "OK der Luftwaffe or OKL" and "OK der Kriegsmarine or OKM" with a couple Army Groups or Armies to leave them in IA mode sometimes (very usefull, just hoping that IA could be improved a little bit). The only bad thing of it is that the army group is trated as Heer and not Luftwaffe or Kriegsmarine army so there's no air or navy commander at the top... Paradox should add the possibility to create as well armies and armygroups in the Airforce and Navy.

The Heer HQs are OKW or OKH and then A, B, C, D, E Armeegruppe..., 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th Armee... I, II, II, IV Armeekorps, and the divisions names are the ones from the game. Some special divisions I rename them but just a few ones.
 
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I don't ever both with renaming units. So far as organization goes I keep my fleet and airforce independant of any structural command. I prefer the freedom to move them around where needed as needed. It doesn't bother me much as I micromanage my wars anyway.

So far as my armies however I have two groups. My garrison armies I give entirely separate theater commands from my combat armies. I find them easier to use with this sort of method and I have a hell of a lot of garrison armies since I prefer the old fashion masses in annexed territories, etc. for the desire of some realism there.

I set them up 4 Brigades per Division (typically adding up to 10,000 troops), 5 Divisions per Corp, 5 Corps per Army, 3 Armies per Army Group. 2-5 Army Groups per Theater HQ depending upon the Theater and its need.

I made the most regretable mistake of waiting until I had about 1o0 combat Divisions let alone garrison as well before I started with the organizing. Prior to that I just had everything set up to Corp then skip to Theater.

So far as infantry Divisions I tend to go with 3 infantry and 1 extra of any kind of supporting unit. I typically set them up with artillery but on a rare occasion I've assigned anti-air brigades. I'll then allow my airforce to focus more heavily on other sections of the line for a break through while those units with the anti-air hold their own. Tank Divisions have two tank and then either two motor or mechanized infantry. I match all unit speeds and what attack they're most proficient in though before making the Divisions so that it won't take too heavy casualties on any one kind of unit. My tank Divisions are mixed in with my infantry Divisions into their respective Corps though I do have a few all mobiled Divisions.
 
Szun said:
irl all corps were "Armeekorps" with roman numerals, regardless if it was a armor or infantry corps
but i personly name them 1./2. etc Panzer...Armee/Korps
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Not quite. Actually the Wehrmacht had both Armeekorps and Panzerkorps. There were a few more versions too, for example the famous Arfikakorps. In terms of hoi3 all of them were a HQ corps. But arguably they were built from different kinds of divisions. There's a list of all German Korps at Wikipedia.

Above those in the hierarchy of the Wehrmacht there were the Armee-Oberkommandos. This is what hoi3 calls Army. And Army Groups were called Heeresgruppe.

I try to rename my units historically too. But you got to admit, that from a gameplay perspective it is not feasible to do it 100% correct. In reality the hierarchy was subject to constant restructuring. Entire Army Groups popped up and vanished again with their units being gathered and scattered from/to other Army Groups.

For once I'd wish though, that the HQ units in hoi3 had names closer to reality. I mean, renaming 50+ corps, 20+ armies, around a dozen army groups and so on can be a royal pita.
 
Tried to get the term "Dasarmeedasgruppenfuheurvonsnauzeruberseltzerderpanzerfartenuntboogershnapper" on one unit but it was too long. is that a bug? LOL!
 
I even created Armeegruppe A, B, and C for Fall Gelb....

Historically they were Heeresgruppe A, B, C, Nord, etc.

Just FYI, not tryin to mess up your system.:D

EDIT: My bad, I just looked it up and for Fall Gelb it was in fact Armeegruppe. Wonder why they did that?
 
Playing as Germany, i tend to keep things simple. For my lone Infantry divisions defending a port, i tend to call them for example "Kiel Kampfgruppe Rommel". others like....

For an Army "Berlin Army Group Kesslring"

Infantry Corps "Berlin Kampfgruppe Gokke"

Panzer Corps "Berlin Panzergruppe Rommel"


With navy replace Kampfgruppe with Kriegsmarine etc.. you get the idea.
 
Personally this is what I a going to (probably) use one I get y new oputer and hoi3 working:

Theater: The area's name (something to understand where this is).

Army groups: Same

Armies: A-B-C etc for infantry, and A Panzer, B Panzer, C Panzer

Corps: A 1, A 2, A 3.... A 1 Panzer, A 2 Panzer,A 3 Panzer

Some special Corps (for example mountaineers, paras etc will this shown in their name (A 1 Mnt, etc)
 
My naming and organization policy:

Brigades: autonamed

Divisions: land-units autonamed, air-units renamed

- Infantry divisions consist of 2-3 inf brigades and 1 support brigade, artillery for the most part.
- Motorized divisions are 2-3 mot.inf brigades and 1 support brigade, SP artillery mostly.
- Mechanized divisions are 2-3 mech.inf brigades and 1-2 support brigades, Tankdestroyer and/or SP artillery.
- Armoured divisions I have two flavours of. Light and Heavy. Light armoured are 2 Light-Tanks and 1 mot or mech inf. Heavy armoured are 2 Medium tanks, 1 mot or mech inf and when researched, 1 heavy tank

- Air divisions are 2 wings of same type. Renamed for number + type, eg. 1 INT, 5 TAC, 2 STR etc

Corps: number + type, eg. 21 Infantry Corps, 6 Motorized Corps, 12 H.Arm Corps

- Armycorps are made with 3-4 divisions of near-same design. Only variation may be support units in the divisions. One division may for example have an AT brigade rather than an ART brigade as the others.

Army: number + Army (+ Role)

- Armies consist of 3 corps.

- Usually just use the default names for armies, but add on them if they are particulary usefull for one role or another. Pure infantry armies, get a (D) suffix, wheras more mobile armies, get an (O). This easily helps me see which armies are geared for defense and which are geared for offense. Those without any suffix, are multi-purpose armies.

- Armies geared for offense also receive 1 TAC and/or 1 CAS air-division.

- From time to time I give armies special names. Elite units with the best equiptment and leaders are candidates for this preferrential treatment. This can be anything. "Rommels Raiders", "Stalingrad Cowboys" or such. Just a way to seperate out the armies that are really good, or have been involved in an epic battle - and won.

Armygroup: AG + location and/or task.

- Armygroups receive 2 to 4 armies of varying type. In addition 1-2 TAC, 1-2 CAS and 1-3 FIG air-divisions. Also specialist units such as Paratroop-corps are organized under armygroups.

- Really pragmatic naming convention here. Names can be anything, just as long as the where and/or what is covered. Typical names are "AG North Atlantic Wall", "AG South", "AG Balkan" etc.

Theatre: Renamed to what theatre it covers. AI is never "on" on this level. Ever. Much prefer to let the AI control Armygroups or Armies, not entire theatres.

---

Example Hiearchy

AG Africa
+ 4th Army (O)
+ 12th Army
+ 7th Army (O)
-- 1 H.Arm Corps
-- 4 L.Arm Corps
-- 8 Mech Corps
-- 7 TAC
-- 3 CAS
+ 5 TAC
+ 2 CAS
+ 3 FIG
+ 4 FIG

---

Outside the structure:

Air-divisions outside of TAC, CAS and FIG (who are made to order for Armies and Armygroups). This leaves for direct non-AI control INT, NAV and STR (and Missiles). INT are placed on perpetual CAP over important sites within enemy bombers range. NAV are usually put to bomb convoys, whilst my STR forces concentrate on enemy industry or if in range, oil-resources.

On standby are also TRA, transport planes. I use these mainly as a contingency tool to keep encircled forces in supply. Though from time to time, I transfer them to an Armygroup that have a paratroop corps/army if an offensive is brewing where air-dropping infantry can be a big boon.

My Navy are concentrated into four different classes with as many instances as I got vessels to fill them to capacity: Surface Fleets, Submarine Fleets, Transport Fleets and Coastal Fleets.

Transport Fleets are usually protected by the less than cutting-edge floating materiell I got. Discarded ships of any size. I try to keep my Surface and Submarine Fleets as up-to-date as possible. Discarded materiell with a range less than the transport-ships, end up in the Coastal Fleets.

---

There you have it. It is organized mostly under the principle that for the most part, I tell Armygroup AI what to do, from time to time individual armies/corps (for invasions and such that require air or sea transport, don't trust the AI for such complex operations).

Most air operations are entirely hands-off after interceptors have been placed and put on CAP. Only exception being strategic and naval bombing pluss transport missions.

Naval operations are entirely player controlled.
 
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I tend to put the unit number after the unit name/type- even though that's not ideal-- like Infantry - 1st instead of 1st Infantry-- that way I can sort in the statistics screens so that all the same unit types list together...

onodoro
 
xxxxxx - OKH
xxxxx - Heeresgruppe A
xxxx - 1. Armee
xxx - I. Armeekorps
xx - 1. Infanterie-Division
xx - 2. Infanterie-Division
xx - 3. Infanterie-Division
xx - 4. Infanterie-Division
xxx - II. Armeekorps
xx - 5. Infanterie-Division
xx - 6. Infanterie-Division
xx - 7. Infanterie-Division
xx - 8. Infanterie-Division
xxx - III. Armeekorps
xx - 9. Infanterie-Division
xx - 10. Infanterie-Division
xx - 11. Infanterie-Division
xx - 12. Infanterie-Division

etc, etc...

or, If the panzer "wing"...

xxxxxx - OKH
xxxxx - Heeresgruppe A
xxxx - 1. Panzerarmee
xxx - I. Panzerkorps
xx - 1. Panzer-Division
xx - 2. Panzer-Division
xx - 3. Panzer-Division
xxx - II. Panzerkorps
xx - 4. Panzer-Division
xx - 5. Panzer-Division
xx - 6. Panzer-Division
xxx - III. Panzerkorps
xx - 7. Panzer-Division
xx - 8. Panzer-Division
xx - 9. Panzer-Division
xxx - IV. Panzerkorps
xx - 10. Panzer-Division
xx - 11. Panzer-Division
xx - 12. Panzer-Division



Why they used Roman numerals for "korps" but numbers for everything else is beyond me...but they did.

Usually I have 2 Armees and 1 Panzerarmee per Heeresgruppe
 
tokirch said:
I rename my Groups strictly organized with Numbers: 1 HQ for Theater HQ; 1.1 for Army Groups; 1.1.1 Armies, 1.1.1.1 Corps and 1.1.1.1.1 xxx for the Brigades with xxx = Inf, Lar, Arm, mot and so on.
If one HQ ist not "full" (not enough lower Level HQs or Brigades it gets an x as Prefix).
Not historical but easier to restack if I pulled them out for "helping out" the AI when I let it take some action.
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Exactly the same for exactly the same reason. Easier to restack. But i don't number the theater.
I just put a name at the side to memorize more easily their location on the map.
 
I let the brigades and divisions get auto-named, except for my tank divisions, which I explain below. I rename the HQs. Playing Germany, I don't speak German but know a few words. So I'll have Oberkommando East and West. Then I have Heeresgruppe A, B, C or Nord, Sud and so on. As I expand, I'll have like "Heeresgruppe Iberia" or whatever.

Then I have I.Armee, II.Armee, or "Armee Nord Finlandia". Like the historical German Army, I tend to mix things up and not keep it strictly organized or sensible. :)

Under that I get strict, so I have I.Armeekorps, IV.Panzerkorps, I.Sturmkorps, etc. In my Armeekorps I usually have 5 Infantry divisions, or maybe 4 and a Mechanized division. I count Mountain as infantry, don't really set them apart but try to assign them to a corps in a mountainous area. Those are the corps that I put under AI control. For the Panzerkorps, it's 5 units, usually a mix of Light Armored, Medium Armored and Mechanized divisions. These I keep control of for breakthroughs and encirclements. Paratroops and Marines I put under a Sturmkorps just so I can find them, they don't really operate at corps level.

I almost always put 5 units into the HQ above it so I don't have too many half-filled HQs, which wastes officers.

My infantry divisions are 3 x Inf, and I try to put at least 1 3 x Inf, 1 x Art in each corps - this represents the corps-level artillery assets. Sometimes I assign AT, TD or AA to one of the divisions.

My "Leichte" divisions are 2 x Light Armor and 2 x Motorized or 1 xMot and 1 x AC. My "Panzer" divisions are 2 x Medium Armor and 1 or 2 x Motorized. I have "Panzergrenadier" divisions which are currently 2 x Mechanized, but I'll probably add some Light Armor to them or reconstitute the Leichte divisions when I can.

Finally, when needed I grab some divisions of whatever, detach them, then create a new HQ and name it "Kampfgruppe xxx", where xxx is whatever the name of the commander either auto-assigned or that I pick. These are ad hoc units made up of whatever is nearby to perform some task.

For partisan control I have "Kavellerie" divisions attached to Heeresgruppe or Oberkommando directly, and under AI control.

I have Garrison units in all port provinces, usually 2 x Garrison and maybe 1 x Art or 1 x AT in vital ports that the AI likes to invade. They are static and not in the OOB. I also remove their commanders so as not to waste them.

I place air assets under AI control at the OK level, and let the AI have fun with them. There's no real good way to organize them and I hate micro-managing bombing campaigns.

My main fleet is all grouped together in my "Hochseeflotte" and moves as a big blob of CVs, BBs, CAs, and DDs. I have a "Truppentransportflotte" with transports guarded by CLs and a few old DDs to move troops or land Marines. I have Unterseebootsflotten of 1 or 2 U-boats apiece. Not a lot of staying power if they get caught in a fight, but I can spread them out all over the place so the AI can't adjust it's convoy routes (and it does, despite some complaints to the contrary, it just has to reach a certain threshold - callous, but realistic and historical).

Finally, I like to keep a few divisions that have been built undeployed to the map, just sitting in my Available Units queue. In an emergency I can deploy them a couple provinces away from the front lines and they can build up Org and enter the fray in a week or less.

Is that enough detail? :rofl:
 
xxxxx OKW, OB West (up to now, still 1940)
xxxx Heeresgruppe A Nord, B Süd, C Küste, etc., regarding the location
xxx 1., 2., 3. ... Armee / Panzerarmee
xx I., II., III. ... Armeekorps / Panzerkorps
x Auto

Keeping track of my number of corps, armies and army-groups with pen and paper, so every newly created unit gets its unique name.

€: Armies not in latin but in arabian numbers :)
 
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