Moscow '42 balance opinions thus far?

[ComradeP]

I'm guessing at least some of us here have some reasonable amount of experience with the game by now, so I'm curious what the verdict is on the balance of the main December-February winter campaign.

I haven't played the campaign to the end against the AI or human, but my limited experience with the game has shown some (theoretical) problems (that are in some cases also seemingly present in PzC/OC titles).

The biggest problem I'm encountering as the Soviets is that the Germans can trade space for time much more freely than they could in real life. The campaign notes and several posts on this forum refer to "forcing the Germans to stick to the roads" and "exploiting gaps in the front with cavalry", but there seems to be a very simple German counter to that: simply withdrawing 1 hex per daylight turn for the first few weeks in areas without bunkers, until forces have recovered some strength.

Now, that might sound like a crazy idea, but take a look at the map first. When the Germans retreat roughly 150-180 hexes (just as an example), fighting a rearguard action for a couple of turns now and then, the Soviets can still lose because the value of the objectives they can capture isn't that high and a lot of their victory potential depends on inflicting losses on AGC.

Without many assaults and with artillery having to move each day, German losses are not going to be all that severe and can be countered by a favourable casualty ratio in the 9. Armee sector and with artillery barrages at advancing Soviet units. You can use horse recon units in T mode to spot the Soviets and fire at them without the Soviets being able to do all that much about it. The Soviets can do the same thing to you, but usually less efficiently because unit-for-unit Soviet units can spot for fewer artillery units than their German counterparts.

Meanwhile, whilst your infantry is slowly retreating, your mobile units can take 2-3 weeks rest (you can race them down a major road in their sector after a couple of days, a bit longer for 2. Panzergruppe) and recover a significant chunk of their strength. Even though German initial replacement rates are not all that high, you have plenty of time before the Soviets get close to the hexrows that tip the objective point total in their favour. Slowly retreating also means that the Soviets will usually not be able to encircle or destroy units and that divisional cohesion can be maintained.

As I noted a while ago, German motorized infantry units move twice as fast as Soviet Rifle units, and in terms of terrain covered compared to the Soviets are thus faster than they would be in summer. Likewise, even though German vehicle unit MP's have been cut during Frozen turns, they're not terrible and Panzer divisions can recover strength normally over time.

The Soviets have no units aside from Tank brigades that can assault up to a distance of two hexes in clear terrain without being in T mode, which is a huge problem considering that you're supposed to be attacking and making breakthroughs. Soviet Tank brigades are also weak initially and they will be severely outmatched by the time the 13 German Panzer divisions recover some of their strength (particularly in snow weather, when the Germans also lose their Frozen vehicle MP penalty). The Soviets also lose (I believe) 5 Tank brigades over time to withdrawals, including some of their better ones (with KV's and T-34's).

The problem of the Germans being able to recover their tank strength at a seriously ahistorical rate is also seemingly present in scenarios like Normandy '44 and Kharkov '43, judging by AAR's and screenshots showing casualty overviews. The Soviets in Moscow '42 have no counter to 13 combat effective Panzer divisions and because their infantry units are so slow, they will have even more problem with getting away from the Panzers than they would have in summer (where you can at least leave a rearguard to keep the Panzers busy for a short while).

The Soviets have a large number of cavalry divisions, but those can't really be employed with good effect if you can't break the enemy line, something which isn't going to happen if the Germans simply withdraw 1 hex as soon as they see a large stack appearing next to them, thus preventing an assault.

Ski units, which are supposed to be your best units for assaulting, can't assault a target 2 hexes away either and are thus equally useless if the Germans withdraw, particularly keeping in mind that firing at German units is not efficient due to the significant German superiority in soft attack values.

On the other hand, if the Germans want to make a stand, the Soviets can grind them into a pulp at an ahistorical rate as well, so the scenario sort of has two extremes from my perspective.

Now, I have some ideas as to how to counter a German withdrawal, but the fact remains that not being able to counter it through applying pressure is a big problem. Pressure only works if the enemy can't withdraw without exposing some part of its frontline or a crucial objective, after all.

Not allowing tank units of both sides to draw replacements, or possibly the German units none and the Soviets at a lower rate than normal, would reduce the chance of an armoured backhand blow move by the Germans and a large tank attack by the Soviets, but that wouldn't solve the problem of the Soviet infantry, cavalry and ski troops having to essentially fight on German terms because they're so slow.

German rail movement also doesn't feel right at their initial frontline, but I'm not sure what could be done about that without it harming supply.

I'm interested in hearing your opinions, and perhaps balance suggestions if you feel something doesn't work well.

[Fhil]

Hello,

I don´t have the personal experience with Moscow42 as I don´t own the tile yet, but I have experience with some winter combat in the east. This slow pace of Soviet infantry was introduced with the Kharkov´43 if I´m correct, and some games were updated with this values.

I know that for example in Korsun ´44, the Russian infantry is way too slow to actually break through and then march at the historical pace. The problem could be that not every winter on the Eastern front was so brutal in means of snow cover, and not every sector as well. No matter how big the snow cover would be, I don´t believe that the infantry was not able to move faster than 1km per two hours! It´s just 1 km, the snow would have to be over the head to prevent at least 2km/2hours movement. Otherwise there wouldn´t be any movement outside of the road communication during winters in the East.

That´s just my opinion from my experience. I would like to ask you CompadeP, German motorized infantry moves faster than Soviets on snow right? Do you mean that in deployed mode on clear hexes? Is that because of the morale bonus they get for movement?

[goomohn]

Sounds like another shoddily put together campaign.

[ComradeP]

Snow MP multiplier is 200%, clear terrain costs 7 MP's to move through when using Foot movement, German motorized infantry has 28 MP when deployed, so they can move precisely two hexes. The Germans have, I believe, 7 A quality Motorized divisions.

As the majority of the Soviet forces can advance only 1 hex per turn, and as the map is quite large with numerous roads suitable for use as interior lines for unit movement, when advancing in a historical manner they are open to backhand blows from revitalized German Panzer and Motorized divisions. The Germans have a significant advantage in mobility throughout the battle that didn't really manifest itself during the historical battle aside from a handful of instances where the Panzers cut off highly exposed Soviet penetrations.

The Soviets get a total of 26 Tank brigades I believe, 5 of which withdraw. After refitting, that's about 7 D quality Tank corps worth of tanks. The Soviets also get, I believe, 2 Tank divisions and at least one of their motorized divisions still has a Tank regiment. You'll have to fight 13 A quality Panzer divisions with them in a mobile war. Due to the numerous forests, there are not a lot of areas where tanks can be used to good effect, and the German armour is logically already concentrated in or near the two main areas where they could be used.

The Germans have (much) better units and can currently sort of dictate the pace of the Soviet offensive should they decide to withdraw. As the Soviets are still partially in a defensive deployment, concentrating and refitting forces for a decisive attack with mobile units will take 2-3 weeks, at which point German Panzer divisions of 3. and 4. Panzergruppe will have refitted. 2. Panzergruppe first has to pull back out of the Tula bulge before it can refit.

Currently, the historical standfast order probably won't happen, as there isn't much of an incentive for doing so. The damage you could do with a carefully prepared backhand blow with your mobile units outweighs the loss of a bit over a dozen or so 1000 point objectives.

goomohn: the campaign itself is of a high quality, it's just how it can currently play out that could use some finetuning. The short scenarios work well, it's just that in the long campaign the Germans currently have too many options to recover their strength for the Soviet offensive to be fought on Soviet terms, instead of the Soviets sort of walking into a prepared trap of German mobile units waiting for them at some chokepoint.

[goomohn]

If the Germans can withdraw 150km and push the Soviets back in '41-'42* and still be considered victorious in that campaign I'd say it is pretty shoddily put together. What is Fall Kremli like?

*edit

[ComradeP]

'41-'42 in this case. My example of 150km was just that: an example. However, all things considered you wouldn't be all that far off the historical withdrawal distance measured from 2,3,4 Panzergruppe's starting positions. Pushing the Soviets back after a withdrawal is also not an automatic event, the Soviets still have about 98 Rifle division equivalents, and ski battalions worth several additional divisions. The Germans can counter that with, I believe, about 53 infantry divisions.

The problem I see isn't that the Germans can somehow automatically be victorious after pulling back, it's that they can theoretically perform an ahistorical backhand blow at one (or more) location(s) of their choosing with their mobile units. The Soviets have enough problems with keeping their advance coordinated as is, which is historical, so they can't use German mobile unit backhand blows. The Soviets presumably won't normally be in a position to counter the backhand blow (as they would be in an offensive posture) and even if they were, the Germans would still inevitably destroy numerous frontline battalions by pinning them with ZOC.

So, to summarize:

1) German mobile units are currently too good.
2) Some way needs to be found to keep the initiative with the Soviets until at least mid January, instead of the Germans being able to withdraw and the Soviets reacting to them.

[goomohn]

Most obviously are high victory point locations at the German front line. So, that if the Soviets are able to push them back to Smolensk it should be a decisive victory. Crushing the Rzhev salient should be a tactical victory. Just making historical gains should probably be a marginal victory. Loss tolerance should be about even.

[Elxaime]

I haven't played the winter scenarios, but have played one of the hypothetical Fall Kreml summer scenarios. Unfortunately, in order to presumably make it more of a "game" e.g. increase the Germans chances of taking Moscow, the Germans have been seriously overpowered and/or the Soviets under-powered. The main issues are unit quality disparities. Unit quality on the German side, per usual, is all A or B except for the minor Allies and some Cossacks. But most of the Soviet army is D quality, with a sprinkling of C. Added to this is a massive disparity in infantry firepower which, again, to me seems a bit overdone. The result is more akin to France 1940, where the terrain and time are the main German obstacles.

[Liquid_Sky]

You bring up several points which I have seen in different (PzC) games.

When I defend a map, the first thing I do is add up the victory points in objectives that I can surrender to the enemy. I then compare it to the actual victory levels. If I can get a victory by pulling back, I will pull back. Some scenarios you can evacuate the whole map and win.

I seem to play the Russians a lot. Kharkov '42 and Stalingrad '42 being the largest and I noticed some movement issues. Non Guard Russians usually cannot assault after moving one hex. As Comrade stated, that means the Germans can back up a hex a turn and minimize any damage to just one round of shot. In Stalingrad, it usually meant that I had 1000+ Russians shoot once after moving..and after a few turns would end up breaking the retreating Axis units, so in that case it may not be a bad thing. When I play Moscow I would probably do the same thing..except there they usually have terrain.

Another movement anomaly I noticed was that Russian foot on (non primary) roads do not move any faster in travel mode then in non travel mode...if you take into account losing 1/3rd of your movement to leave the mode. And that doesn't even factor in the windiness of the road. Or the fact that your division will end up strung out along the road.

As well, I noticed the same thing about being unable to meet actual historical objectives in the historical amount of time. While I believe the game favours the attacker..it does seem to favour the defender for delay. During Operation Uranus, it took the Russians from the morning of the 19th to the 22nd to encircle the Germans. Being generous I call it 40 turns in game. But the distance the army has to travel to do this encirclement is 100-120 hexes. Without any enemy units on the map, infantry cannot make the distance in the right amount of time, let alone make it while opening a bunker line.

And yet, on a much finer scale.....it would be ludicrous to give Russian infantry tactical mobility as it would imply an ability to react to changing conditions.

At the very least, all infantry should be able to assault after moving one (open) hex. They should be able to shoot if they move two hexes.

Objectives (in HtH play) should be put down on the map with end turn conditions in mind. I find it very silly when a 750 turn scenario (like Normandy) has objectives that fall on the first day. Really...500 points for a beach hex? I know the AI needs the help though. It should also be possible to achieve a Minor victory at least by objective points alone. Make the defender want to defend them.

As for casualties coming back...I did notice that in Normandy I could regrow some of the German divisions in a couple of days to full strength. In some ways that is good, as it keeps the pressure on the attackers up, and gives an incentive to pulling back and resting units.. But you have to give the attackers the ability to overcome this rate. And the problem I found in Normandy was the German soft attack and assault values were just too high...causing the allies far more causalities then they could do in return.

[ComradeP]

Liquid Sky: the Panzer replacement issue also seems to be present in Normandy '44 as in a screenshot (I believe you posted it) the Germans had lost almost 2500 vehicles, whilst the Panzer units were in fairly good shape according to the comments. The historical Germans were about done for after losing, I believe, around 1700 AFV's.

The problem in many wargames with a replacement system mostly based on time spend on refitting is that in a full campaign game, the defender can generally pull back, trade space for time to recover and still win. The problem is amplified if there's a large gap in quality and mobility between the attacker and defender. A setup where the defender has more mobile, higher quality units than the attacker is going to be very, very difficult for the attacker even without terrain aiding the defender.

On the other hand, it is important to keep in mind that casualties from regular combat are so high that if the Germans try to make a stand, they will suffer greatly.

As to capturing the objectives along a historical timetable: it is probably possible for many objectives close to the initial frontline (you would have around 10 days to clear the greater Klin area for example, as well as a similar amount of time to capture Kalinin and surroundings), but with a refitted enemy, the objectives in the rear are going to be more difficult to take.

We thus have the odd situation in Moscow '42 that the Germans will be hard pressed to achieve a historical result in many smaller scenarios, but are at an advantage in some ways in the full campaign.

The replacement modifier needs to be generous in some ways to cope with the higher losses during attacks, but it is problematic in a larger campaign. Depending on the firepower of both sides, casualties can end up being higher than historical losses by a significant margin. In a recent discussion of the historical outcome of France '14, for example, the casualties as quoted for the advance to - and the fighting at the Marne seemed to be two to three hundred thousand above historical losses for both sides.