Kharkov '43 campaign game

[larsonney]

Well...we have Witblitz ready to battle...just need one more!

Jon

[Dog Soldier]

Thus the LSSAH Panzer Regiment will be at full strength by the time you say it is released. Eleven days starting at about 50% for its components and a 3% replacement rate. I am still curious. You did not answer my earlier question about this unit's status. How many panzers had the unit already recovered by the end of day 5 when this game ended?

Das Reich panzer "regiment" as you say appears to still be in the fight on day four (AAR thread post #30) which is where the AAR is at this point. The second image in the Center Front section appears to be the PzIV unit. Did it "die" on the yet to be posted day 5?

The road to Kharkov is totally open in the south-east and in the south. i was moving to the river crossings here our only reserve in the area, the Kharkov sicherung division...

So there were no longer any units behind the bridges on the main road to Kharkov that appear to clearly be retreating in the AAR post #30; the fourth image of the Center Front section? Where did these units go?

Jon shows a good image of the Russian 40th Army up north in his AAR on post #30. However, the four Russian rifle divisions appear in the image to be deployed across a 40 km front. They are only moving one or two hexes per turn depending on your team's delaying action. They are 20 - 25 Km from Belgorod, if that is where they were heading for the VP location. The only main road is 15 - 20 km south of their positions as reported by Jon in the day four AAR. That is at least a two to three day march for those divisions as long as they can not use the main road.

Belgorod may fall by day seven. It is at least another 40 - 45 KM to threaten Kharkov from the north. Not a big worry at this point IMHO with all that space to work with.

It appears you are in a pretty good position. Maybe Strela will be visiting this thread to comment on how this game progressed versus his design expectations.

Dog Soldier

[Arkan]

The LSSAH panzer regiment is at full strenght (more than 90%) since the end of day 4 i think. The strenght recovery was pretty quick specially in the beginning.

Yes, the PZ IV unit died encircled due to a stupid mistake i made... it hapenned during the night between the 4th and 5th day.

Maybe i should more talk about a clear undefendet path to kharkov instead of a "road". The main road is defended by LSSAH but there is still a big gap in our lines between LSSAH and the south front. This big gap is what i'm calling a "road to kharkov"

At the beginning 40th army have just 4 rifle divisions. But with days 5 6 and 7 lot of units are schedulled. Finally the 40th army is really strong with 8 rifle div, 1 tank corps, 2 tank brigades and lot of other russian stuff

With the help of grossdeutchland i was hoping to stop definitly russians in belgorod. I was thinking to make fast and strong counter-attacks on 40th army before all it's units come on the map. But our opponents surrender before it happened.

Yes our position was not bad but i could be much better too. THe biggest loose was the destroyed companies of Das Reich... between 12 and 15 if i remember well. 2 recon, 2 halftrack, i was crying when i lost them :-(, 4-5 truck rifle, 1-2 motorcycle, the entire stug btl (3 Co) was crying too, and the PzIV Co... the rest of the fighting units had a strenght of 20%-70% and fatigue closer to maximal fatigue than to minimal fatigue... only artillery was intact.

But finally, as i said before, that was just a question of morale... we were thinking that russians were stronger than they really were and they were thinking the same about us. We decided to continue to the end and they didn't.

Now the game is finished. If Jon is ok we can maybe upload our last turn in the forum and give the password. This way you will all be able to see the exact situation.

[raizer]

this game is all about the primary roads-nothing more,nothing less...without them the russian tank brigades will get too far in front-they cant push any line until the grunts get up to do the hard work AND protect the flanks of the armor, along with the arty. The cav is a good back up but,it too needs the foot soldiers to get to the line and push. The cav and the armor are not enough. We tried doing it without the infantry and we lost big; I lost myself 5 full tank brigades, and 2 full motorized brigades, then as a result of that gap, I lost an entire infantry division. All this due to arkan being able to find the armored and motorized brigades, encircle them in total, destroy them before the 1 hex per turn infantry could catch up.

Arkan's "road to kharkov", the gap to the SE of kharkov that he speaks of was open ground and undefended for a reason; only the roads count, which is why the open ground was left undefended and the primary's over the Donnets, still 15-20 turns away, were defended with bunkers containing LAH, GD, and Das Reich. The needed sov inf, the guys who will root you out of your bunkers and protect the flanks of the armor, and maintain a line that prevents the more mobile germans from sneaking through and performing isolation moves against the mobile soviets, only move 1 hex a turn over arkan's "road to kharkov" ; 40+ turns away.

Arkan you should try playing the soviets, maybe you could do better-I know when we first started this GC you mistakenly thought you were to be a soviet player and chose to not play, but when you were told that you were mistaken, and would be german, you wanted back in.

This GC is a hard nut to crack...we were smoked as the russians-could be bad luck, bad play on our part and great play on the germans part. I think the GC needs more testing. Supply levels, arty set up nullified, alt. indirect fire resolution- and no vst. We will see. The map is awesome as is VMs artwork and Jison's map mod...great potential. But that's all it is-potential. We opted out after 50 turns of a scenario that was played for the first time-there will be others that will do the same. We can try different optional rules and make some changes to make this scenario a keeper-right now I think its unbalanced in the germans favor.

And I repeat-Its about the primary roads and the soviet infantry getting to into contact with the germans; without either of these, its a brutal slog of constantly swiping at a force with superior mobility and supply and morale, while the plodding along at 1 hex per turn

[larsonney]

I am working on a final update...from day 4 to where it ended. I should be able to post that soon...there was some heavy action on day 5, especially in the south.

I am not convinced that the game is slanted one way or the other...I think we need more lengthy play to determine that.

Perhaps the scope is daunting in and of itself...I know I was always freaking out that I had huge areas that were "unknown"...nothing like having 3 panzer divisions stretched across 60+ kms and have their left flank hanging out open...I mean WAY open!

Jon

[Strela]

Hi Guys,

All interesting posts and examples of how little things can make a big difference over time. If I was going to make some immediate tweaks it would be to tone down the German replacement rate back down to say 1% (it was upped to 3% in the 1.01 patch) and also the bunker building percentages. I also think the alt artillery rule is a good leveler but it works both ways.

This is a difficult campaign to get 'right'. The elite German formations have to last the whole campaign with little in the way of reinforcement while the Soviet player does get further forces over time. That said it also allows the Germans to hold a lot further forward than they did historically and to do some a-historical things such as GD's rub out of some of 69th armies components as shown in the AAR. The German's had the mobile forces that are present as they had a lot of terrain to cover.

Raiser has it right though, particularly on the north map you have to move mainly at infantry speed. Ideally the Soviet focus on clearing the fast roads and have the infantry then coming forward 5 hexes a turn. Big sweeping advances with the Soviet armor will have you losing it (as Popov found out) unless you have a way to bring infantry forward quickly as well. Please note that it took close to two weeks for the Soviets to get to Kharkov and it was only 40th Army's gradual build up that turned the balance. So rushing ahead at least when facing the SS is not necessarily the best idea. That said, it can be used that way when not facing the SS etc as was historically done to 298th Infantry Division.

In the south it is appears to be more problematic. The German's have a lot of firepower with the Panzer Divisions present with more arriving pretty quickly. In some respects it has allowed the players to launch pre-emptive strikes before the Soviets got a chance to move forward and get established. It may be that adding 100 points of fatigue to all the Panzer Divisions on entry would suffice to make the German player more reticent. In our play tests players were cautious about using the Panzer Division's too aggressively due to the spread out terrain they needed to hold, but it appears in the AAR their superior mobility is being used to move forward, attack and retire.

The Soviets probably needs to work out how to be where the German is not in the south also. Sending one tank corp off to the south west will force the German to think twice before grouping his forces too tightly and committing them all in the Slavyansk area.

Finally, all the above highlight how different play styles can have different effects. The Panzer Campaign system does allow players to push their forces harder than in real life. Many of the play test team were of the more 'conservative' variety and tended to try and maintain their forces for extended operations. But the game does allow players to blitz for a day or two and if one player has become extended then they can be defeated in detail. Keep in mind the historical advance rates and don't try to rush except when you know you are in clear space. I am guessing this game was half way through Feb 6th day. It is worth reading the historical notes (in the players notes) to see what was happening on that day - the Soviets were only just reaching the Donets south west of Kharkov (Pechenegi) and had to wait three whole days (30 turns) just to bring enough infantry and artillery forward to try and break through here. The same was happening in 40th Army's territory where the infantry were on a broad front to spread the German 168th Infantry out and it was the Tank Corp that finally turned it's flank.

So consider the few parameter file tweaks (replacement rate and bunker creation) and be very aware of the Soviet speed of advance - it wasn't the breakneck pace all are assuming. That said it is obvious that people have really enjoyed the variety here and it would make sense for the teams to reverse positions and try again - see what the feedback was like after that!

Thanks for sharing though - it gives us an idea of what has to be considered when designing scenarios and some of the things that players will get up to!!

David

[larsonney]

Ok...Arkan & I are anxious to get another Kharkov '43 campaign going...

We have Witblitz in the opposite corner already...just need one more!!!

Who is man enough???Anyone???

:smoke:...Jon

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That said it is obvious that people have really enjoyed the variety here and it would make sense for the teams to reverse positions and try again - see what the feedback was like after that!

David

I don't know about Arkan, but I would be willing to swap...but I think the Russian team has already got one going as the Germans??

Jon

[Witblitz]

I will play any side. Just point my gun in the right direction.

[Arkan]

Jon, if you prefer to swap and take russian side there is no problem for me.
Look like we are searching one more german player then :)

[larsonney]

Agreed...looks like we need only one German player...think of all those panzers you get....:whis: