Spring Awakening Axis AAR - historical campaign (settled for a Draw turn 93)

[ComradeP]

I'll quote the comments by my opponent Elxaime as well:

Hi -

Here are my comments on this, as Comrade P's opponent. As always, he is a formidable adversary and I learn something new every time we play! I was cautiously optimistic I would pull out a victory here, but made several miscalculations for which I paid dearly and we ended with a draw.

On the initial Soviet set up. I made a calculation at the start that the battle would be won or lost in the north, where the Axis would possess a formidable number of low strength but high-quality mobile divisions. I counted on the huge mass of Soviet artillery to wear down any offensive, and this proved to be the case in this area. Now to the miscalculations.

The big one was not suspecting the major Axis deployment to the W and SW areas. When the SS showed up and started hammering the Bulgarians, and eventually the Yugoslavs, I was taken completely by surprise. While the Soviets have decent rail capacity, it does take time to shift forces and I ended up playing catch up the rest of the game, able to feed in enough to slow down but not stop the encirclements that occurred.

The second one was deployment the Guards Mechanized and Guards Cavalry Corps into the flood plain east of Lake Balaton on the west end of the north sector, with their backs to a major river. I was actually planned a limited counteroffensive here, but then good weather hit and the Shermans started dying like flies, plus the cavalry and mechanized infantry were being vaporized by Nebelwerfers. A full retreat was ordered and I did manage to save most of both corps, although some units were lost and many survivors were badly mauled.

By mid-game, in the north things were quieter since many Axis mobile units were in the SW now. I was hoping the Axis would attack Nagyberény and Szabadhidbeg, as I was waiting for the Panzers with two of my three SU brigades, dug in with massive artillery and AT gun support (although the Soviet infantry was very battered). But he got a whiff of what was waiting for him and pulled back.

The Axis did launch two limited attacks in the north late game. But I had kept the Soviet 18th Tank Corps there the whole game and was able to deploy masses of T-34/85's plus the two SU brigades that were still up there. The late releasing Soviet 23rd Tank Corps, with its precious JS-1 unit, was sent to the west by then.

Meanwhile, the disaster in the west/southwest was continuing to unfold. One of my SU brigades had blocked the SS western lunge along the Balaton Lake, but in retrospect this brigade was underused and did not make the impact it could have. On the bright side, when they had a decent target, mass volleys of SU-100's caused satisfying results, such as vaporizing a small unit of King Tigers I caught late game in the west sector. The appearance of my lone JS heavy tank also gave the Axis some pause.

In late game, realizing time was running short, I decided to launch a counteroffensive in the north, since 2 of the 3 SU-Brigades plus the unscathed 18th Tank Corps were still up there. But the Axis was falling back, so although I managed to inflict some losses, including surrounding two Panther companies, it could not compensate for the mass encirclements of Bulgarians and Yugoslavs going on in the southwest.

In late game in the SW, by that time I was mass railing in reinforcements. I would have sent more from the north, but although the Soviets have rail capacity, it is only 13 and the journey to the SW for each unit takes 5 or so turns, counting for loading/unloading.

In the final VP count, the mass encirclements carried the day. I lost a lot of divisions but didn't lose any major VP hexes. So, a draw.

I agree completely with Comrade P's analysis of Axis prospects in the north between two relatively equal opponents - the Axis infantry takes too many losses from Soviet artillery to get far or hold what they have gained.

Looking back, I think there are a number of things I obviously would do different. I would play more cautiously around the west edge of the northern front, near Lake Balaton, as the Soviet defenses there are thinner and, as it proved in our game, the flood plain lacks natural defense points. A better use of the Guards Mechanized Corps would have been to deploy in depth to backstop the infantry - getting caught out by a Axis preemptive attack ravaged these excellent troops. I also would have just sent the Guards Cavalry corps to the middle of the map, and used them as a mobile reserve to watch for breakthroughs in the W/SW - as Comrade P pointed out, a few Soviet mobile troops could have worked wonders in backstopping the poor Bulgarians/Yugoslavs. Finally, railing in some engineer units to begin an early bridge destruction program in the W and SW would have helped a lot, as well as sending some of the otherwise idle front AT and AA units that way, to dig in behind the front to deal with breakthroughs. The northern front probably could also spare some Soviet artillery to send to the W/SW, as the amount of guns you have in the north is probably overkill.

That said, the Axis operational surprise in W and SW was expertly pulled off. I can't imagine how much unit shuffling and reattachments were involved! As those who have played him know, Comrade P knows his stuff, and I am not sure many other players could have pulled it off as smoothly. His draw was well-earned.

Generally, my sense is the campaign here is pro-Soviet. The constraining factor on the Axis is the weather and also unsustainably Axis infantry losses. In another game I played as Axis, I went with the historical straight ahead northern push, and even though I made progress, it was a bloodbath that left about half my Axis infantry casualties by mid-game. I think Comrade P did the only approach that has the chance of Axis victory. However, I think once you have seen this strategy, it gets harder to pull off a second time, as the Soviets, as I mentioned above, can do several fairly minor things early to lessen its impact.

Great scenario though. It is a true guessing game, and despite the Soviet advantages, the Axis have some truly potent units in play. Look forward to trying this once again. I do want the designer to fix the release bugs and also adjust some of the fixed unit mechanics on both sides. This discussion is on The Blitz forums: https://www.theblitz.club/message_board ... ?tid=76497. It is very hard to predict what players do, but I think the initial release did not take as fully into account what would happen if the main fighting was distributed more around the map, given the ability of both sides to use road/rail links to move mobile formations around.