How to get More Manpower?

[Kovax]

At a mere 1% per level, Trickleback is not going to make up for senseless attacks or constant bombing casualties.

As Riktol points out, the needs vary from country to country, so MIL, GAR, INF, or other solutions may work in one case, not in another. MPs will auto-flee if attacked, so you can leave them unprotected with only minor risk, but they won't hold a city or port against a troop of angry Girlscouts, much less Partisans or an enemy infantry unit.

 

[JimboOmega]

As far as I can recall, during the last time that I played GER, while I was deeply embedded in the SU, building occasional GAR+MP units to pacify the rear areas, and dedicating most of my IC to air and naval units, my Manpower was actually increasing from month to month. I believe I had around 4 maxed armies and part of a 5th, with 3 of them and an extra Corps or two in the East, each with 4 Infantry Corps and one Armored Corps. There was also at least an Army's worth of GAR+MP covering capitals and major VP locations, and at least 2 Corps of 2xGAR+AA holding major ports, mostly in France and the low countries. My available Manpower never dropped below 1000. As long as you're not spamming hordes of infantry and not losing hundreds of thousands of men in repeated head-on confrontations to "push back" the Red Hordes, manpower doesn't need to be an issue.

Take the paths of least resistance, encircle the enemy, cut the pockets into smaller bites, and destroy them piecemeal with concentrated force. You get less experience from it, but FAR less casualties.

Two mostly unrelated questions - why so much GAR? And why 2xGAR+AA rather than GAR+MP? (Is that just GAR MP or is it GAR MP MP MP or some other variant)?

 

[Pugmak]

Two mostly unrelated questions - why so much GAR? And why 2xGAR+AA rather than GAR+MP? (Is that just GAR MP or is it GAR MP MP MP or some other variant)?

I'm not Kovax but I do much the same thing with Gar (probably because I read something Kovax wrote about it lol). So, I"ll give you my understanding of it.

The 2xGar/AA for ports is because that's pretty much all you need. The AA helps disorg aircraft (other than strat) that the oppo sends to bomb either the port itself or the port defenders, which the AI will often do. And the AA gives some little punch to the Gar when defending. The port defender unit(s) only have to hold on long enough for your regional defense/counter attack force to arrive on the scene to get things under control.

The Gar/MP unit. It's one Gar brig and one MP brig. Those are rebellion risk (rr) suppressors and light weight defenders of either high resource/ic/mp regions or victory point regions or both. Gar is, within the game mechanics, a line unit so it can fight. An MP all by itself can fight because it is a support unit. So, if rebs pop up and try to take a region with a Gar/MP holding it, the Gar/MP unit will in most cases be able to hold on until your reb stomping unit arrives to put things right.

Both Gar and MP have some suppression, so together they're better at it than either alone. Neither brig is a hog on mp, supply or officers so not a high investment to use them.

 

[Kovax]

Pugmak has the gist of it. 2xGAR+AA for ports, possibly a 2xGAR+MP for a major occupied capital, GAR+MP for other important VP and serious resource locations (minor VPs minor resource locations don't justify the expense), and an occasional lone MP where you need better supply throughput. As mentioned, a lone MP brigade cannot fight, and will auto-retreat, generally after the first hour of combat, with no casualties inflicted by either side.

I often allocate one lone TAC to a region like France or Poland for garrison purposes, sometimes by removing a badly damaged one from its group at the front, and rotating it to the backwater areas, while the previous (and now fully repaired) Partisan-stomper takes its place. If/when you get a partisan spawn, the TAC can disorganize it and prevent it from moving more than once before it becomes stuck in place, where you can send one "chase" brigade (you can Strategically Redeploy a GAR+MP if you like, or use MIL or CAV) to finish it off. The GAR+MP divisions will hold out for weeks on their own against stray partisans, which is more than enough time to either bomb them into quiescence of send another unit to assist. The 2xGAR+AA port defenders have managed on several occasions to withstand amphibious invasions by multiple units for as long as it took to disorganize the attackers, despite repeated ground attacks by hostile CAGs. They're more expensive than the inland garrison forces, but still far cheaper than using regular infantry, and almost as effective in that particular role. Just don't expect to make counter-attacks with them.

 

[RELee]

How interesting, @Kovax . You always get me thinking.

Slightly OT, how many different division types do you use as Germany? Do you specialize a lot, or do you have a single type for each category depending on your tech levels?

 

[Kovax]

My own division composition is very consistent between Infantry Corps:

- HQ+INF+AA provides limited assistance where needed (third axis of attack gives the defender a 10% "Encircled" penalty), gets the Commander some direct experience along with what he receives from his subordinate divisions, and (minimally) protects the province from air attack while the individual divisions do their jobs. In a few games, I used AT instead of AA, but regretted it later, because the AT really wasn't that useful, and the speed of armor means it's difficult to put that AT where it's most needed.

- One 2xINF+ART+ENG division goes places where the other divisions don't fare so well, like assaulting fortifications and cities, crossing rivers, or attacking dense forests. The ENG brigade is one of the weakest brigades in normal open plains combat that you can possibly add, other than MPs, but it more than makes up for that lack of base firepower by negating penalties in certain terrain. It's still "even up" against the typical 2xINF+ART+AT division in the plains, but will crush it in dense woods. One division with ENG per Corps is sufficient for my playing style.

- Four divisions of 3xINF+ART or 2xINF+2xART (depending on the availability of Manpower for INF versus more IC and supply needs for ART) do the bulk of the work. Very high Soft Attack, fairly resilient, and enough sheer firepower to engage armor divisions on passable terms despite the lack of Piercing. Note that AT is reasonably effective ONLY against Hard targets, and even an armor division is composed of mostly soft or semi-soft units, unless you play multi-player where you may face super-hard divisions with HARM and MEC. The nasty penalty to ORG damage can be compensated by ganging up 2:1 or 3:1 against armored divisions, and calling in air power or your own armor.

My Armored Corps are generally a lot more fluid and variable, with brigades sometimes being removed from one division and used to form fresh divisions, but typically something like:

- HQ+INF+AA

- Two divisions of ARM+2xMOT+AC (one MOT per division may be replaced by SPART as war progresses)

- One or two LARM+2xMOT+AC (LARM from game start)

- One or two 2xMOT+AC+SPART

As in any other situation in this game, the composition and results depend on what country you play, how you use the units, and on personal taste (armor has a nasty metallic taste, in my opinion).

 

[yamato2cz]

My own division composition is very consistent between Infantry Corps:

- HQ+INF+AA provides limited assistance where needed (third axis of attack gives the defender a 10% "Encircled" penalty), gets the Commander some direct experience along with what he receives from his subordinate divisions, and (minimally) protects the province from air attack while the individual divisions do their jobs. In a few games, I used AT instead of AA, but regretted it later, because the AT really wasn't that useful, and the speed of armor means it's difficult to put that AT where it's most needed.

- One 2xINF+ART+ENG division goes places where the other divisions don't fare so well, like assaulting fortifications and cities, crossing rivers, or attacking dense forests. The ENG brigade is one of the weakest brigades in normal open plains combat that you can possibly add, other than MPs, but it more than makes up for that lack of base firepower by negating penalties in certain terrain. It's still "even up" against the typical 2xINF+ART+AT division in the plains, but will crush it in dense woods. One division with ENG per Corps is sufficient for my playing style.

- Four divisions of 3xINF+ART or 2xINF+2xART (depending on the availability of Manpower for INF versus more IC and supply needs for ART) do the bulk of the work. Very high Soft Attack, fairly resilient, and enough sheer firepower to engage armor divisions on passable terms despite the lack of Piercing. Note that AT is reasonably effective ONLY against Hard targets, and even an armor division is composed of mostly soft or semi-soft units, unless you play multi-player where you may face super-hard divisions with HARM and MEC. The nasty penalty to ORG damage can be compensated by ganging up 2:1 or 3:1 against armored divisions, and calling in air power or your own armor.

My Armored Corps are generally a lot more fluid and variable, with brigades sometimes being removed from one division and used to form fresh divisions, but typically something like:

- HQ+INF+AA

- Two divisions of ARM+2xMOT+AC (one MOT per division may be replaced by SPART as war progresses)

- One or two LARM+2xMOT+AC (LARM from game start)

- One or two 2xMOT+AC+SPART

As in any other situation in this game, the composition and results depend on what country you play, how you use the units, and on personal taste (armor has a nasty metallic taste, in my opinion).

with so many mot brigs your armored force has quite high softness. i would advice using ARM MOT ENG and if you want to add some more punch or have situational divs SP ART/R ART. and ofc, if you add arty add another ENG. then your divs can go into any fight, and will do really good in defence.

 

[Kovax]

with so many mot brigs your armored force has quite high softness. i would advice using ARM MOT ENG and if you want to add some more punch or have situational divs SP ART/R ART. and ofc, if you add arty add another ENG. then your divs can go into any fight, and will do really good in defence.

In essence, the ARM is just for the Armor and Piercing value. The MOT are the heart and soul of the unit, manpower with rifles, only faster. I use Armor (4 Armor Corps, but only a total of 8 ARM and 6 LARM brigades in all of that combined, in my last GER game), but my infantry does the vast majority of the work. SPART goes into several divisions once I research it, but it's supply hungry, so I limit how many I deploy. ENG provides better river crossing and less terrain penalties, but AC provides a speed bonus for the whole division. I use those mobile assets for the maneuverability, not their firepower, but they "punch" well enough to close a pocket against concentrated efforts to prevent it. I don't care as much about their defense, because that's why I have MOT following in close proximity, and infantry behind those.

Typically, my supply needs are low, even deep into the SU. Last game, I had pretty much zero supply issues by the time I reached Kursk, Rostov on Don, and Leningrad, and very little trouble beyond. The only supply problems I was seeing were with garrison units in France and Netherlands, thanks to ridiculous supply routing that "misses" some provinces. It's not like GER has a manpower issue in this game; I had well over 1000 manpower by the time I reached Moscow, increasing rather than decreasing as the war progressed. Compare that to games where players build 50+ divisions of ARM and HARM, and stop cold when they run out of fuel and supplies at the front.

Normally, I play minor countries, and manage to stand toe-to-toe against the majors on limited frontages of 4-10 provinces. You simply can't research or build competitive armor, and licensing means units that are obsolete in a year, so I build competitive infantry, and it's all you need. The motorized units are a semi-affordable luxury (they use ordinary infantry techs, and roughly 2 extra doctrines), and armor is icing on the cake that only a Major can afford. The emphasis that players put on it is out of proportion to its effectiveness. When I do play a major country with "all the toys", that philosophy carries over, and I don't go overboard with force multipliers if I don't have anything to multiply.

As pointed out repeatedly, what works for one player may not be good for another. Multiplayer is a different animal, and you need to use different techniques to counter absurdly ahistorical and unrealistic tactics. Find out what works for YOU, develop and practice the best ways to use it, and run with it.

 

[yamato2cz]

In essence, the ARM is just for the Armor and Piercing value. The MOT are the heart and soul of the unit, manpower with rifles, only faster. I use Armor (4 Armor Corps, but only a total of 8 ARM and 6 LARM brigades in all of that combined, in my last GER game), but my infantry does the vast majority of the work. SPART goes into several divisions once I research it, but it's supply hungry, so I limit how many I deploy. ENG provides better river crossing and less terrain penalties, but AC provides a speed bonus for the whole division. I use those mobile assets for the maneuverability, not their firepower, but they "punch" well enough to close a pocket against concentrated efforts to prevent it. I don't care as much about their defense, because that's why I have MOT following in close proximity, and infantry behind those.

Typically, my supply needs are low, even deep into the SU. Last game, I had pretty much zero supply issues by the time I reached Kursk, Rostov on Don, and Leningrad, and very little trouble beyond. The only supply problems I was seeing were with garrison units in France and Netherlands, thanks to ridiculous supply routing that "misses" some provinces. It's not like GER has a manpower issue in this game; I had well over 1000 manpower by the time I reached Moscow, increasing rather than decreasing as the war progressed. Compare that to games where players build 50+ divisions of ARM and HARM, and stop cold when they run out of fuel and supplies at the front.

Normally, I play minor countries, and manage to stand toe-to-toe against the majors on limited frontages of 4-10 provinces. You simply can't research or build competitive armor, and licensing means units that are obsolete in a year, so I build competitive infantry, and it's all you need. The motorized units are a semi-affordable luxury (they use ordinary infantry techs, and roughly 2 extra doctrines), and armor is icing on the cake that only a Major can afford. The emphasis that players put on it is out of proportion to its effectiveness. When I do play a major country with "all the toys", that philosophy carries over, and I don't go overboard with force multipliers if I don't have anything to multiply.

As pointed out repeatedly, what works for one player may not be good for another. Multiplayer is a different animal, and you need to use different techniques to counter absurdly ahistorical and unrealistic tactics. Find out what works for YOU, develop and practice the best ways to use it, and run with it.

thats why i pointed out to take one mot from your armoreds. most people have high soft attack divs. mot is not really that high, but still, its pretty alot if you have two in single div. might as well do full 35% divs. either AC for plains of ENG for whatever else carry really big punch. just try it out and see for yourself. i will try to use your pattern too. but i¨m used to more light divs. 2-3 brigades in divs are enough for me because i carry lots of designated ones. micro as hell, but it will beat any general pattern.

 

[kilen2015]

Saving manpower is good too

yeah its decisive,
i guess the real key is in the appropriate size of forces, first (globaly, all types)...
but mainly good use from to limit losses of MP.

also, of course, obtain all events giving u MP is absolutly necessary too (there are 900or1000MP to have from 1938to1941, if i remember well...?)
its absolutly necessary to have them all with Germany.
and also necessary to do geopolitical choices aiming MP gifts such as u aim main real purposes, etc...
there are other tricks (good management, good choices, etc, etc)
but, on long period of time (some years of war, all fronts concerned), the real economy of MP comes from good use of troops, i think.

even with very effective strategies and managing,
if u use infantry (and all light troops. opposed to all armored troops, i mean) to attack, the cost in MP is just simply enormous (even with brilliant and expected victory).
so, its necessary to use them well and limit (more as possible) light troops use for defense, hold passive frontzones, support -only !- attacks (when necessary), act with IF no other choices, etc...
and really foccus on armored troops to strike hard and make strong attacks.

in offensives, cost in MP with armored troops can be about 10to20 times less important (it varies, depend of many contexts/datas, of course)
but if u use properly armored troops to strike more often u can and light troops to defend, it can works. (till end of game)
...coz, on long term, it really counts (more than any other aspects around MPs) ! (y)

of course, it must not be "strict". (such then u resign occasional/tactical/operationnal effectivness, i mean... thats unsain, more than expensive victories)
priority stay to prevail in battles, thats clear...
but use correct troops for correct use (and though it BEFORE -no impro !- with good preparation of each wars/offensives. rightfull troops in rightfull positions before engage the offensive, etc, etc) is clearly necessary...
its best way to economize MP and hold longer with Germany, i think... (more than any other way) (y)

++

 

[Kovax]

the real economy of MP comes from good use of troops, i think.

This is a key point. When I make an attack, I make certain beforehand that I've got a drastic local advantage in firepower, and hit from three directions if possible, so the opposing units suffer catastrophic losses of ORG and Strength, receive penalties to their own combat, and break with very little time or ability to do damage in return. I'm after rapid break-throughs by massed infantry, with my armor initially held back and then shooting through the gap to perform overruns and encirclements. The idea is NOT to sit there and try to kill as many troops as possible in combat, but to eliminate as many units as possible with a minimum of combat. The mobile units that follow the armor hold the line of the encirclement long enough for regular INF to take their place, while the armor again moves on to encircle a few of the units attempting to break the first encirclement. I'd rather win the war than see how many officers I can advance to 5 skill through sustained combat.

As Secret Master pointed out a year or two ago, success is not making overruns or encirclements, it's overrunning units while you make encirclements.

Beginning the attack on the SU in April in my last game as GER, by the time movement ground to a halt in late November, the Soviets didn't have enough units to form an unbroken line. Unfortunately, the winter gave them time to deploy another several dozen divisions, but on the bright side, that spread their existing Officers out over more divisions, resulting in even weaker divisions than before. If I hadn't destroyed those initial divisions, and pushed them back instead, I'd be facing them again, fully recovered, along with all of the new units. THAT kills your manpower.

 

[Me262inWarthunder]

How interesting, @Kovax . You always get me thinking.

Slightly OT, how many different division types do you use as Germany? Do you specialize a lot, or do you have a single type for each category depending on your tech levels?

I have a couple staple division types, Panzer: 4 brigades of light/medium/heavy. Not usually mixed. And infantry, just 4 infantry brigades. Some have Rocket arty. Also, I like putting 1 infantry brigade with 1 Maus brigade.