Please help me understand

[ElizabethWizard]

Am ickle newbie, came here because I needed something above Close Combat and I am growing bored of the Paradox games. Plus, ya know, this particular war is an interesting historical artifact that is often couched in the "triumph of good versus evil" and defined military arms and tactics for the next, well, it looks like about a hundred years. Anyways, I want to love this game that's sucking me in for the $80 I dropped on it but...

I can't even access half the game right now because the Air Interface is super arcane. Like, I am talking about "have the manual open in multiple copies on my second monitor and still cannot figure out how to assign any air directives at all" levels of arcane. This isn't even a huge deal for me, because whatever I still have enough to learn in the ground phase, and tbh if I do the ground phase well enough I shouldn't even need to worry about the air phase. That's a bonus side project for future me.

The ground combat though. I cannot wrap my head around this ground combat. The combat information the game gives me... seems to have absolutely no resemblance to reality? Here's some screenshots from my opening moves on Velike Luki:

https://imgur.com/bFoAuWT

I'm reading this and thinking to myself, "ok, so I've got 3-1 advantage here. My goal is 2-1. I know there's some wiggle-room, but to be honest, this attack is mainly so that I can hammer down the fort, because that's a level 2 fort and I would like to dislodge them so I can surround the city."

[Note, this is the *third* strategy I've settled on. I don't follow the tutorial strategy because it *doesn't work* on the default game settings... you can't win the battles and at least one movement it calls for isn't possible. That genuinely makes no sense to me. Also the manual claims it's not attacking with the 9th guards which LMAO I lose this fight about half the time if I attack with 3 guards units and the non-guards RD, so idk how they're doing it without the 9th.

It's fine if this strategy I'm using "doesn't work." I want to know *why* it doesn't work, but to understand that I have to understand the mechanics.]

https://imgur.com/5tGg5Tf

I have literally no fucking clue where the numbers 186 and 75 are coming from. I'm guessing we underestimated their strength and overestimated ours? So that's a fun feature of the game, it feeds you bad information. I'm not sure I'm ready for "the uncertainty on initial combat value is up to 60%" but ok, that's fine. Note to self: attack with everything because the game is a goddamn liar.

https://imgur.com/7Ee5SRF

Ok. So now the game is saying to me, "look, Lizzy, you cracked the code! If you go by the WORST case scenario, half your CV is 8.75 and twice their CV is 4.4 and that's still in your favor."

My friends,

I have lost this fight.

I have lost the first fight and failed to drag the fort down to level 1.

I have lost the first fight, dragged the fort down to level 1, and lost the subsequent fight.

I really want to love this game but the combat has, so far, felt mainly like one side is "grab all your troops and roll the dice and pray" and the other is "hee hee I looked at your thrice-fortified unit twice so your entire line collapsed." This is all the while I am trying to do the things it feels like the game is encouraging me to do: pick good fights in the context of the rules for winning and losing. Except... the only "good" fight is *sometimes* if I send *everything* I might get lucky and earn 1 hex at the cost of a third of my men and all my CPP.

What am I missing.

[M60A3TTS]

Not sure where you want to start but we'll go to your first screenshot.

The defensive combat value shown of 6.8 reflects the fact that the unit is in clear terrain and in a fort level of 2.1.

What it does not take into account is from where you are, or more exactly what is between you and your target, namely a minor river. That always will help the defender. So when you attack with units that have to cross over a river you can expect to need better odds in order to be successful, especially as a level 2 fort is always harder to bring down than a level 1 fort.

Next, you want to know where the values 186 and 75 come from.

The 186 for the Soviets is the combined combat values of all participating units, in this case 59+55+11+50+11.
These values for the on map units you see are multiplied by 10, so the first unit with a value of 59 will appear on the map as most likely a 6 (5.9 rounded up). The same thing applies to the defender. 50+17+5+3=75. You will note some artillery support units have a combat value of zero. This is not unusual. They still participate in the fight, damaging enemy units.

On the last screenshot of 17.5 to 2.2, I would always make that attack. Sometimes you lose and want to punch the monitor. Just take a breath, wait a minute and go onto the next battle. You will win the great majority of those battles. Again, just be mindful that cross river attacks will always require you to add a little bit extra to get positive results.

[K62]

I don't think you did anything wrong, it's just that the game gets patched all the time and the tutorial scenario gets tested/updated more rarely. It is indeed a tough fight in the latest version.

I can't even access half the game right now because the Air Interface is super arcane. Like, I am talking about "have the manual open in multiple copies on my second monitor and still cannot figure out how to assign any air directives at all" levels of arcane. This isn't even a huge deal for me, because whatever I still have enough to learn in the ground phase, and tbh if I do the ground phase well enough I shouldn't even need to worry about the air phase. That's a bonus side project for future me.

You should be able to get 80% of what you need from your air force by only using Ground Support directives and learning how to move air groups. Section 17.3.4 in the manual talks about moving air groups, and ground support is hopefully pretty straightforward.

I have literally no fucking clue where the numbers 186 and 75 are coming from. I'm guessing we underestimated their strength and overestimated ours? So that's a fun feature of the game, it feeds you bad information. I'm not sure I'm ready for "the uncertainty on initial combat value is up to 60%" but ok, that's fine. Note to self: attack with everything because the game is a goddamn liar.

186 is related to the 21.2 estimate you see before the attack. It starts at 212 (since CV in battle reports is 10x the CV displayed on map) and gets slightly reduced due to factors such as tanks attacking into fortifications and being damaged by minefields.

75 is similarly related to the 6.8 you see before the attack. This is actually a pretty good estimate as the two German on-map units in the hex have a total CV of 67. They get an additional 8 CV from the two support units (werfer and flak battalions) that their HQ commits into the fight. (There's also a StuG battalion in the same HQ that has a CV around 30. Fortunately for you it stayed out of this fight.)

So you start with a ratio of roughly 186/75 = 2.48 : 1. Then two more things happen. First, the leader rolls are made. This will probably favor the Germans at this stage in the war as they have better leaders. (Unfortunately, there's no good way that I know of to find out the actual leader rolls for a combat.) Second, the combat happens. As you can see, the Soviets suffer more casualties than the Germans, due to having less experience (50 vs 70) and being on the attack. (You can see more details if you click the "Show Details" link.) Between these two factors your final CVs get modified to 72 and 42 respectively, which is an insufficient odds ratio to win the fight.

As I said above, this is a tough fight in the current game version but I believe you can get a good chance to win it if you do something like this:

1. Bring the 1/2 MC brigade to the hex west of Velikie Luki. This will prevent any defenders from retreating into this hex.
2. Bring the 257th Rifle Division and 28th Rifle Division to the same hex as 21st Guards.
3. Deliberate attack with 5 out of 6 divisions, leaving out 357th Rifle Division as you did.
4. The initial CVs should be around 36.1 to 6.8, which is a 5.3:1 ratio. This is still a bit chancy at this stage of the war; my rule of thumb for the Soviet attacks is 4:1 in the open field and 6:1 against entrenchments. But 5:3:1 it should work most of the time and, if you want more certainty, you can certainly use the 357th RD as well.

I hope this helps, there's a lot more complexity to the game especially with regards to logistics, but that should not affect you very much in small/short scenarios.

[ElizabethWizard]

Hm. All of that makes sense though I would love if the UI and/or tutorial were a little more clear about that. I dunno how to change it mind, just that as an impression of a newbie it feels a lot like the game gives me something like a third of the information available and gives it to me wrong (like idk... If I'm planning an attack it would be nice if it realized I was crossing a river for the attack (it knows this for calculating movement points) and let me know what kind of penalty I can expect for that?) And then smugly crosses it's arms and goes "gotcha!" After I make a mistake based on the information the game itself gave me.

Also, 30CV stug battalion?!?! My all-toe>95% Guards infantry corps with 2 attached tank brigades and 1 flame battalion (granted this one is at 45% TOE but still) maxed out at like 21-27 CV with 100 cpp!! (Turn 4 I haven't taken Luki yet... The goal was to poke holes in the line first and see if I could gut their interior then come back and take Luki later, but the fash built a solid line and the panzers are now able to commit to reserves... The goal now is to bleed them by making them defend via reserve in the snow under the assumption that if the game is forcing them to spend movement points then the game is assuming they are moving through those snowy fields and I heard that breaks down panzers).

Next question: I know isolating units makes them fight worse, but I really don't understand the rules for this. If they are still supplied (say, by Luftwaffe dogs flying freight in, or sitting on top of 4000 tons of freight shipped in by train before cutoff), does each turn diminish their effectiveness or are they just consuming the supplies? In other words, is there any advantage to letting the pocket sit while trying to add to it, or should I just clear the pocket first?

I think based on the map situation I will be able to do things after clearing the city (probably take the northern objective, but not much else... I couldn't clear them from the light woods effectively). Also, I figured out that I can assign and re-assign support units... Which is why my main attacking units have armor attachments and my defensive units have AT (for every panzer my guys disable or destroy they get an extra ration of vodka).

So... Third question: historically AA guns were often used as (impromptu, but effective... Turns out firing shells a thousand meters into the air means that same shell has a fair bit of energy on it when fired 300m from a tank) anti-tank weapons. Is that still the same here?

And fourth question: Do support units deploy from the HQ as reserve units? I've just been stacking arty (hee hee taste my guns) but if I can leave attached tanks in the HQ and be able to rely on them fighting I might do that.

[ElizabethWizard]

{whoppsies double post sorry}

[M60A3TTS]

Hm. All of that makes sense though I would love if the UI and/or tutorial were a little more clear about that. I dunno how to change it mind, just that as an impression of a newbie it feels a lot like the game gives me something like a third of the information available and gives it to me wrong (like idk... If I'm planning an attack it would be nice if it realized I was crossing a river for the attack (it knows this for calculating movement points) and let me know what kind of penalty I can expect for that?) And then smugly crosses it's arms and goes "gotcha!" After I make a mistake based on the information the game itself gave me.

I agree it would be a nice thing, but the terrain hex a unit is on determines what the AI displays as the defensive CV. A river is not a hex, it is a hex side, so that is the fine distinction and source of your frustration here.

Also, 30CV stug battalion?!?! My all-toe>95% Guards infantry corps with 2 attached tank brigades and 1 flame battalion (granted this one is at 45% TOE but still) maxed out at like 21-27 CV with 100 cpp!! (Turn 4 I haven't taken Luki yet... The goal was to poke holes in the line first and see if I could gut their interior then come back and take Luki later, but the fash built a solid line and the panzers are now able to commit to reserves... The goal now is to bleed them by making them defend via reserve in the snow under the assumption that if the game is forcing them to spend movement points then the game is assuming they are moving through those snowy fields and I heard that breaks down panzers).

It sounds like you may be mixing and matching what is displayed on the map and what is displayed in the combat result. Your on-map corps may show a CV of 21-27 but a StuG Bn showing a CV of 30 on the combat result is multiplied by 10, so on map it is really only a 3.

Next question: I know isolating units makes them fight worse, but I really don't understand the rules for this. If they are still supplied (say, by Luftwaffe dogs flying freight in, or sitting on top of 4000 tons of freight shipped in by train before cutoff), does each turn diminish their effectiveness or are they just consuming the supplies? In other words, is there any advantage to letting the pocket sit while trying to add to it, or should I just clear the pocket first?

Isolated units should always be on an isolated hex and when you hover over that hex with your cursor, that is what should appear at the bottom, i.e. "Isolated Hex." If an airdrop delivers 500 tons of supply, a temporary depot is created and that unit is no longer isolated. Isolated or not, an enemy unit can only retreat if an open hex is available to it. If there are none, the unit will surrender if it loses. The additional supplies will allow it to fight better and reduce the chance of surrender if it has an option to retreat. But this is only a chance, it can still surrender regardless.

I think based on the map situation I will be able to do things after clearing the city (probably take the northern objective, but not much else... I couldn't clear them from the light woods effectively). Also, I figured out that I can assign and re-assign support units... Which is why my main attacking units have armor attachments and my defensive units have AT (for every panzer my guys disable or destroy they get an extra ration of vodka).

So... Third question: historically AA guns were often used as (impromptu, but effective... Turns out firing shells a thousand meters into the air means that same shell has a fair bit of energy on it when fired 300m from a tank) anti-tank weapons. Is that still the same here?

Don't understand the question exactly but AA units can hit and kill/damage/disrupt enemy ground units.

And fourth question: Do support units deploy from the HQ as reserve units? I've just been stacking arty (hee hee taste my guns) but if I can leave attached tanks in the HQ and be able to rely on them fighting I might do that.

They are not so much reserve units as support units but in that context they do the same thing, yes. There is a chance the HQ will commit them to the battle, where assigning the same unit directly to a combat unit will ensure it.

[K62]

If I'm planning an attack it would be nice if it realized I was crossing a river for the attack (it knows this for calculating movement points) and let me know what kind of penalty I can expect for that?)

This should be included in the estimated CV before you attack, i.e. if you weren't attacking across a river your CV estimate would be higher than 21.2.

Also, 30CV stug battalion?!?! My all-toe>95% Guards infantry corps with 2 attached tank brigades and 1 flame battalion (granted this one is at 45% TOE but still) maxed out at like 21-27 CV with 100 cpp!!

I know this is confusing, but I was talking about battle CV and I think you're talking about map CV. The battle CV of your guards corps should be 210-270.

Next question: I know isolating units makes them fight worse, but I really don't understand the rules for this. If they are still supplied (say, by Luftwaffe dogs flying freight in, or sitting on top of 4000 tons of freight shipped in by train before cutoff), does each turn diminish their effectiveness or are they just consuming the supplies? In other words, is there any advantage to letting the pocket sit while trying to add to it, or should I just clear the pocket first?

There are some longer term consequences like gradually losing morale and getting fatigued but most importantly the CV suffers a 50% penalty (unless the enemy lands 500+ tons of air freight in the pocket, for which they shouldn't have enough transport planes in the VL scenario). Note that enemy units don't become isolated immediately but only at the beginning of the enemy's next turn.

So... Third question: historically AA guns were often used as (impromptu, but effective... Turns out firing shells a thousand meters into the air means that same shell has a fair bit of energy on it when fired 300m from a tank) anti-tank weapons. Is that still the same here?

Yes AA guns are very effective in ground combat but mostly on the defensive as they suffer a big penalty on the attack.

Do support units deploy from the HQ as reserve units? I've just been stacking arty (hee hee taste my guns) but if I can leave attached tanks in the HQ and be able to rely on them fighting I might do that.

I'm not sure I understand the question. The support units from the HQ have a chance to participate in combat based on leader initiative. The chance goes down with each unit that gets committed. If you want to maximize participation in a given battle you should attach everything you can directly to the units i.e. attach the tanks to the infantry formations and leave the arty in HQ (as it can't be attached to units).

[ElizabethWizard]

Also, 30CV stug battalion?!?! My all-toe>95% Guards infantry corps with 2 attached tank brigades and 1 flame battalion (granted this one is at 45% TOE but still) maxed out at like 21-27 CV with 100 cpp!!

I know this is confusing, but I was talking about battle CV and I think you're talking about map CV. The battle CV of your guards corps should be 210-270.

Ah. My tank battalions still feel too weak, idk... Feels like a pile of t-34s should be roughly equivalent to the same pile of stugs rather than 1/2-1/3rd as strong but I'll concede that's probably due to some combination of exp and morale that I'm not seeing

Next question: I know isolating units makes them fight worse, but I really don't understand the rules for this. If they are still supplied (say, by Luftwaffe dogs flying freight in, or sitting on top of 4000 tons of freight shipped in by train before cutoff), does each turn diminish their effectiveness or are they just consuming the supplies? In other words, is there any advantage to letting the pocket sit while trying to add to it, or should I just clear the pocket first?

There are some longer term consequences like gradually losing morale and getting fatigued but most importantly the CV suffers a 50% penalty (unless the enemy lands 500+ tons of air freight in the pocket, for which they shouldn't have enough transport planes in the VL scenario). Note that enemy units don't become isolated immediately but only at the beginning of the enemy's next turn.

Ok. Suppose that VL is already a depot with 4k supplies. Do they still need to deliver 500 tons of air supply to make it not count as isolated?

So... Third question: historically AA guns were often used as (impromptu, but effective... Turns out firing shells a thousand meters into the air means that same shell has a fair bit of energy on it when fired 300m from a tank) anti-tank weapons. Is that still the same here?

Yes AA guns are very effective in ground combat but mostly on the defensive as they suffer a big penalty on the attack.[/quote]
Excellent! I had been attaching AT to my RDs that I didn't have tanks for and using those to anchor specific points on the line (I have one in the north holding the far side of the river in the marsh, for example: it has a defensive CV of like 150 and I figured only a massive attack would dislodge it, and such an attack would necessarily require enemy tanks, which the AT battalion could murderlize... My experience with CC has told me that "attacking with tanks is risky and expensive if the enemy is fielding AT."

{Operation #2 of the Cross of Iron GC... 2 bunkered 76mm AT guns killing 30+ tanks P:. I'm assuming that's a massive overperformance based on that game's quirks, but I assume the general principle holds: slow moving tanks in swamp/snow conditions are slow, loud targets for hidden AT guns to do their thing}

It's cool to know that AA works that way too... Especially because I would love to shoot down the Luftwaffe planes that try to deliver supplies in and around VL. Yes, come feed your friends... And while you're at it, maybe your pilots could hold on to some extra bullets we found lying around? Don't worry, we deliver

Do support units deploy from the HQ as reserve units? I've just been stacking arty (hee hee taste my guns) but if I can leave attached tanks in the HQ and be able to rely on them fighting I might do that.

I'm not sure I understand the question. The support units from the HQ have a chance to participate in combat based on leader initiative. The chance goes down with each unit that gets committed. If you want to maximize participation in a given battle you should attach everything you can directly to the units i.e. attach the tanks to the infantry formations and leave the arty in HQ (as it can't be attached to units).

Yeah so my understanding of reserve units is that they're units which sit behind the front line, but during an attack they can move forward and defend. (NOT the national reserve, ofc, just the units in the map set to "reserve").

I have been *guessing* that arty is better attached to the Army HQ than the Front HQ.

Ok! All that's left now then is to wait for my motor corps to be ready, hit the city with all I've got, fail at securing any further objectives, take my minor victory, and play through Soviet turn 1 GC again.

(Read that Axis Turn 1 is the most played turn in the game and idk my goal is to get reasonable at the game without ever touching that turn lol. I'm weird.)

[ElizabethWizard]

So update, and good news, we got it:

https://imgur.com/NCKGIgi

and with time to spare to charge up our forces for another attack.

The idea is to push up through the north, but retain the operational flexibility to redirect to the south if things go wrong:

https://imgur.com/fOV4NLg

I have made sure that all the tanks are doled out after making sure each TOE had at least a dozen tanks in it. As a veteran of many CC games... as a general rule of thumb, bring at least one tank if you can. Preferably a few tanks, actually. They are tremendously useful tools... which is why losing 54 tanks in the fight is I'm thinking I'll attack on turn 6: this is turning into an axis "major victory" (I'm guessing because they have time to retreat) but...

https://imgur.com/62IhcZR

Punching them in the gut this turn seems like a reasonable idea. Force the reserves to come out of hiding and then next turn see what the guards can do in the south?

https://imgur.com/MZKs20o

Like a bowling ball blasting the center pins back. This should force a bit of a reckoning along their lines, and get me ready to slam into something next week.

Or this week. TBH that guards corps still seems tough enough to hit it then back out, and I can always bring that RD underneath it to defend if things go pear shaped. I may not be able to exploit this week but next week there won't be much of a fort there and the mechanized units in the north will be ready. This turn though I'm going to leave them on reserve: it looks to me like the force they can bring against me in the north is in the range of ~18, which is about where each of those unit stacks is at.

That corps at the top is a little surprising... I'm *pretty* sure I merged 3 rifle brigades and got a corps back? at 35% TOE too lol, so that makes more sense. Still, at least now I can assign support units

https://imgur.com/9yQMaVp

THUD! was the sound that attack made. It went better than I thought it would (I figured they would hold) but one of my mechanized corps had to join the fray and it cost a few precious tanks Still, it gets my guards division and corps off the front line so they can recover some CPP this turn and follow up again either next turn or the turn after.

https://imgur.com/DripwZv

This was... a mistake. On the one hand, it makes the front a little bit larger, but on the other I would have preferred to do this NEXT turn with my mech a little more prepared, with the possibility of breaking the ZoC lock on slipping through with an attack.

Enough to make it less of an axis "major victory"? We'll see. But I was asked to take Velikie Luki and I did so *nyeah*.

https://imgur.com/YVaERBx

I'm not gonna lie, I can see myself being strategically VERY happy with this result. IIRC, Smolensk is on that double-line south so they just lost a HUGE amount of rail throughput in this region. Plus I've got a pretty big threat there to the south: that's two whole rifle corps and three motorized corps... if the motorized corps get loose (say, behind a guards rifle-corps induced linebreak?) they can cut a LOT of rail... which in this snow? Two months with very limited supplies for that army or it has to run out of here. If this were the situation in a real game I would try to build an infantry line to the south on the single rail and see if I can't beat this flank and roll it northward, where my infantry are a- fairly well-massed (if I were to do this over that corps at the top would be a division and I'd have the corps itself in the south to smash through) and b- dug into VERY favorable terrain... the weakest spot is actually that pair of divisions with 8CV listed, by a fair margin.

As it is, once more unto the breach dear friends, or let them fill their walls with our soviet dead:

https://imgur.com/q4Zcj8x

Lmao 0/10 that cost me almost 60 tanks.

And with that, I have fought the AI to... a draw.

Hayup.

Honestly I wish I had been more aggressive after my initial success, or massed my infantry more wisely. I'm guessing the Estonians should have been in the north and I shoudl have taken that opportunity to cycle the lines and swap in the resting tank units.

Questions for the audience: Do separate tank regiments refil faster from being reassigned to the army? Or is that just the NR?

[exalted]

Don't worry on the tank losses loosening them is only a problem if you can't replace them. Sometimes the soviet loses 1000 to 3000 tanks in a turn.

[K62]

Congrats on finishing your first game! A draw is a pretty good result considering the scenario is quite tough on the latest game version IMO. With regards to your question, if you want SUs to receive lots of reinforcements you should place them in refit mode in an HQ on top of a supply depot with lots of freight. This could be a NSS but it's not necessary. If you want certain SUs to have priority in receiving scarce equipment the best way is to send them to the reserve TB and place them in refit there.

[Killmaster851]

Please remove this thread its in the wrong forum and bann mr elisabeth