Moscow 41

[Krak]

Can anyone provide an opinion on the play balance of the Typhoon campaign scenario in Moscow 41 for HtH play. It looks to me like the Germans might be up against it on face value. I am contemplating taking on a Russian in this scenario. Are any of the variants adding additional German forces a good idea for play balance if the game is indeed in favour of the Russians? Thanks for any info.

[FLG]

Can anyone provide an opinion on the play balance of the Typhoon campaign scenario in Moscow 41 for HtH play. It looks to me like the Germans might be up against it on face value. I am contemplating taking on a Russian in this scenario. Are any of the variants adding additional German forces a good idea for play balance if the game is indeed in favour of the Russians? Thanks for any info.

Yes the Germans are up against it. Initially they have an advantage but the Russians soon gain beaucoup reinforcements. This is the historical version. Some of the variants try to make up for this disparity. IIRC there is one in which the Germans get the 7th Parachute Div.

[Krak]

Yeah I thought as much. I like the look of the German maximum effort but maybe this goes to far?

[Ricky B]

Sgt Fury and I have reached around turn 130 in the max German effort. Moscow has fallen, casualties on BOTH sides are immense, but in the German's favor. I am trying to hold as Russian until he starts getting hit by supply drops, which I hope will allow the Russians to counterattack - right now, the victory level is over 30,000 points, which is something like triple the major victory level, so it will take a lot of clawing back to even reach a draw.

It may be a little too much, but I will be happy if I can counterattack successfully, I am not worried about the victory levels at this point as long as survival is possible.

Rick

[Krak]

Wow Moscow has fallen! At first glance I thought that an impossibilty even with max German effort.

[Grrr]

I'm playing the German Max Effort scenario with the No Crete option as the Germans (Against Smedley) and we have managed to complete 77 turns.
Originally, my thoughts were similar to Krak's. But I have found that this scenario, at least in our case, has been pretty balanced. At the moment, I hold a minor victory, but the battle has been back and forth and it can easily swing against me as the Russian strength increases as we head into December.
Because I expected things to be particularily tough for the Germans, I planned on conducting a very conservative campaign. Playing for a victory on attrition points more than one on capturing objectives, like Moscow. This strategy worked well during the first 30 turns, as my tired troops got a chance to rest. Also this allowed me to bring up reinforcements in the south. Instead of dropping the 7th Flieger on turn One near Moscow, I held them back for more than 20 turns and dropped them behind Tula. This worked well, as it caught Smedley by surprise and facilitated the relatively easy capture of Tula. With his left flank turned, Smedley began a retreat north to the Oka river with elements of AOK 2 and PzAOK 2 in pursuit. At this time, seeing an opprotunity, I became more aggressive and realized that Moscow might be reachable. Because of the weather, terrain and pockets of enemy units, the pursuit was slow going, allowing Smedley to create a line along the Northern side of the Oka river. While PzAOK 2 chased the Russians along the Eastern edge of the Map, elements of PzAOK 4 moved through dense terrain in the West, assaulted and captured the town of Serpukhov, which sits along the Oka at the bend where it turns northward. The fighting was intense and brutal, but my forces managed to capture the town and a bridgehead over the Oka. At this point (turn 77), elements of three German Army's are poised to push across the Oka at several points.
But like I said, this game has been back and forth, and the bad news for my forces has been the situation at Kalinin. It was a mistake for me to stubbornly try to hold it. Elements of PzAOK 3 were pummeled and forced to retreat. At the moment, the Russians continue to advance and my forces continue to give ground. A sort of tit for tat has developed with the Russians advancing in the direction of Rzhev in the North and the Germans racing towards Moscow in the South. In between, both sides have both gained and lost ground with no particular advantage to either side.

Here's our current score;

Russian Loses; Men: 102,924. Guns: 700. Vehicles: 1422. Air: 37

German Loses; Men: 86,848. Guns: 644. Vehicles: 653. Air: 41


Total points first side (Axis); objective points; 7700. Net points; 7260, German minor victory.


Of course we have only finished 77 turns of 421. Plenty of time left to see the situation change.

[Sgt Fury]

In my game against Ricky were at turn 127 and here is the damage we've done so far:

Russian Loses; Men: 277,607. Guns: 1918. Vehicles: 1843. Air: 18

German Loses; Men: 147,413. Guns: 1045. Vehicles: 1436. Air: 28

VP's are at 32,658 or major axis victory. As Rick said, I have captured Moscow and have managed to cashier a couple pockets of Russians.

One annoying thing I have noticed is that there are protected entry hexes in Moscow which have managed to nuke a couple nice battalions of mine :-( Probably these entry hexes should not be protected. It is very difficult to make sure all units are always outside of them.

We'll see how things fare for me in the next few days with supply drops happening. One thing I have found is that the Frozen turns are not terrible for the Germans. In fact, the additional mobility due to frozen streams may be to the German's advantage. I'll report in again later.

Fury

[Krak]

Thanks for the reports. Very Interesting. I think I will make this my next Pzc game to play. I thought those protected hexes in Moscow might cause a problem if someone did well enuf to get there. I have just won a victory in my Stalingrad 42 game. Basically I took all my Panzer and Mot div's south and smashed the Soviet southern pincer. Then withdrew about half of them back to the eastern side of the Don to check the northern pincer and keep him on the western side of the river. Worked a treat against an unsuspecting Russian.

Gonna have a slight break break from Pzc now and have a go at Jena Auerstaedt. But Moscow 41 will be next, just have to convince my buddy to allow me the German Max effort. Cheers

[Dog Soldier]

Interesting comment about the protected hexes in Moscow. Guess it was not foreseen that Moscow would fall before the reinforcements arrived. Did the Russians just boil up out of the sewer system to surprise the fascist invaders?

I think there was a fix with HPS for this type of event that came from the Crete campaign in S43 where the Greek partisans were being supermen and destroying German FJ units by just appearing on the board.

Dog Soldier