Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Gary Grigsby’s War in the East: The German-Soviet War 1941-1945 is a turn-based World War II strategy game stretching across the entire Eastern Front. Gamers can engage in an epic campaign, including division-sized battles with realistic and historical terrain, weather, orders of battle, logistics and combat results.

The critically and fan-acclaimed Eastern Front mega-game Gary Grigsby’s War in the East just got bigger and better with Gary Grigsby’s War in the East: Don to the Danube! This expansion to the award-winning War in the East comes with a wide array of later war scenarios ranging from short but intense 6 turn bouts like the Battle for Kharkov (1942) to immense 37-turn engagements taking place across multiple nations like Drama on the Danube (Summer 1944 – Spring 1945).

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Sorta
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Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by Sorta »

End of may '42 and planning for Tank HQ and new Front.

Have Cav in Shock HQ's attached to Volga and Ural MDs so able to move them around front line to counter-attack pzrs.

When do players put the Tank army HQ's?
In MDs give's them flexibility but assume combat negatives vs. being in Fronts.

Do players use the new Front in June to create a mobile fire-brigade eg some variation of Tank Armies plus a Cav army (or a Guard army)?

Thoughts?
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sillyflower
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by sillyflower »

#Historical purists look away now#

Frankly I don't buy tank armies as the small benefit is outweighed by the disadvantage of having only 15 command points.
I use the new front to reduce the number of inf armies under Stavka. Inf xxx and arty divs are what will destroy the Wehrmacht.
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Sorta
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by Sorta »

15 command points - didn't realise that. If you go over CP do you loose the tank army advantage as happens for shock armies?
hfarrish
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by hfarrish »

ORIGINAL: Sorta

End of may '42 and planning for Tank HQ and new Front.

Have Cav in Shock HQ's attached to Volga and Ural MDs so able to move them around front line to counter-attack pzrs.

When do players put the Tank army HQ's?
In MDs give's them flexibility but assume combat negatives vs. being in Fronts.

Do players use the new Front in June to create a mobile fire-brigade eg some variation of Tank Armies plus a Cav army (or a Guard army)?

Thoughts?

I am experimenting with using the Steppe Front to create an uber-mobile front consisting of an Inf Army (4 Cav Corps) and then 3-4 Tank Armies with a mix of Tank and Mech Corps. Really don't need more infantry and figured this could make a nice breakthrough force that could mass mobile units without mixing up fronts. We'll see how it goes.
Sorta
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by Sorta »

I was mulling that mobile force with the new front in summer '42 but may be too early.

Is anyone putting tank armies in the Military Districts?
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Flaviusx
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by Flaviusx »

The new tank armies are proving to be wildly unpopular, very few players are using them near as I can tell.

The real problem here is that Guards/Shock army HQs are too attractive an alternative. Giving them an admin bonus was a mistake. It makes tank army HQs very nearly redundant: essentially it is a choice between taking 3 extra command points over a +1 mech leader bonus, and most players prefer the extra CP in large part due to the severe shortage of APs the Soviets work under. Shock/Guards armies are free HQs and give very nearly the same combat performance as well as the ability to squeeze in an extra corps command. Spending 25 APs for a smaller HQ just for a mech leader bonus is difficult to justify and a very hefty opportunity cost.

IMO the admin bonus for Guards/Shock armies should go away and be replaced with something else. Everybody is using these guys as ghetto mobile commands for the very obvious reason that the admin bonus they give is best suited for this.

Alternately, just schedule in the 6 historical tank army HQs as free reinforcements with the existing rules for them. Then you'll see people using them, they very clearly will never actually build them until they don't care about APs, which won't happen until 1944 at the earliest if ever. In other words, you won't see them built until the issue has already been decided.

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delatbabel
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by delatbabel »

True, I never build tank army HQs. With a regular army HQ I can stack 4 tank/mech corps and a div, with a tank army HQ I can stack 3, and 3 brigades. A tank brigade is next to useless in the late war, so why should I bother?

In all of the games I've played as the Soviets, I've never ever seen a guards army HQ.
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by Sorta »

At the risk of showing off I have 2 Guard HQs at May '42..

I forgot about the Guard HQ plus so with 4 Shock and 2 Guard HQs there seems to be little advantage (and some significant disadvantages) to Tank HQs. So thanks for the info.

Final question - with the '42 counter-breakthrough armies (Shock for me at the moment but some tank corps when refitted) do you attach them to Fronts? Or the new '42 Front? Or to MDs. I'm using MDs for flexibility to cover the whole front and seems to be working OK but assume there are command negatives?
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morvael
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by morvael »

The bonus must be higher (and maybe not only to ADM skill), the price must be lower or the CP must be higher. One of these and the players will start to build those armies again. I would like the first one.
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by hfarrish »


Does going to CP 16 (i.e. 1 over) have a drastic enough effect to eliminate the advantages of the Tank Army HQ? With that you can get your 4 Corps in...
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morvael
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by morvael »

Assuming a leader with ADM 6 the test will be either Die(11)<7 (54% chance for an overloaded Tank Army by 1CP) or Die(10)<6 (50% chance for not overloaded regular army). This looks like 16CP is a viable option. But there is one caveat - the penalty would apply to other skill checks, where there is no bonus from the Tank Army and we don't know how many are there.
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by hfarrish »



Let's hope it's not too severe, since I built 4 of these things before realizing they had a lower CP cap! The dangers of not reading the manual...
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morvael
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RE: Soviet Tank Army Organisation '42

Post by morvael »

One can have only 11 regular Guards Armies plus 5 Shock Armies. By using Tank Armies one can get another 6 Guards (Tank) Armies, that's 37% more.
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