First Panzer Battles Tournament

[10-3 SquadLeader]

After viewing the axis turn and before the Russian Command Report there were the following messages;

1. Scenario map file has been altered
2. Scenario oob file has been altered
3. Scenario pdt file has been altered
4. Nation dat file has been altered

I have replaced the scenario file with the new one.

Can I continue?

[Strela]

After viewing the axis turn and before the Russian Command Report there were the following messages;

1. Scenario map file has been altered
2. Scenario oob file has been altered
3. Scenario pdt file has been altered
4. Nation dat file has been altered

I have replaced the scenario file with the new one.

Can I continue?

We have seen this message if you have a different encryption setting to the player sending the file to you. Please check whether you have 'PBEM Encryption' selected under the settings menu.

Whatever the setting 'select' it and then reopen the file and see whether you get the above messages again.

David

[Dog Soldier]

That is: if the German player doesn't use smoke in the older version. That's the big difference. Now, only one unit needs to spot you for an entire battalion to activate.

IMHO, using smoke to prevent units from activating seems a little strange. It appears to be a waste of smoke. The old smoke levels were way to high for the medium and small scenarios considering the size of the map.

Dog Soldier

[ComradeP]

Perhaps they were too high, perhaps they were not. You do need a liberal amount of smoke for it to have a real effect on an area.

Using smoke in the first turn limits return fire and the number of units the Soviets can spot, which is nice. You don't want the Soviet artillery to hit your assault stacks immediately. It limits releases of Fixed units as a side effect.

As numerous scenarios show, the Soviets face few constraints when it comes to moving their units around aside from their units being Fixed. There's no reason for them to stay in their initial bunker if it's in a quiet spot, so they can pile most of a battalion into 3-4 bunkers and give the Germans hell. This is what limits German breakthroughs as it's nearly impossible to counter due to using equal stacking limits and having a limited amount of good HA direct fire units. Sheer weight of numbers will mean you'll get through, but your troops might not have much fight in them.

First bunker cleared on turn 4. The loss of a number of Marders will probably hurt on the long term.

[ComradeP]

We're at Soviet turn 7 now. 5 bunkers have been cleared. Soviet losses are around 750 men and mine are a bit over 500 (presumably) by the end of the Soviet turn.

How are you guys doing?

[Ricky B]

Up to the start of turn 15. German losses have been heavy but making progress and taking out a lot of Soviet guns that I now know I should have been moving away earlier. The Germans are poised on the hills overlooking the first 100 pt objective and observing the further group of 100 pt objectives.

[Strela]

Sounds like you're all moving along quite nicely.

This scenario is a good tutorial for breaching bunker lines and exploiting beyond.

This day (July 6) was significant because the speed of breakthrough was so rapid that the Soviets decided they had to switch 5th Guards Tank Army from the exploitation phase to the defense phase. The SS had probably the longest advance made by the Germans in this particular battle.

David

[Landser34]

Ricky B's (Russian) and my (German) game ended in a draw I got close to all the 100 pt objectives but couldn't get them to fall Ricks great defense and the lack of the German Panzer regt. doesn't help.

[ComradeP]

Yeah, those two tank brigades can cause some serious damage if used properly.

I'm wondering how the people that played Pokrovka got such good results as the Germans, with only a handful of battalions. At least in Yakovlevo, you can throw about 6-7 battalions worth of companies (after losses) at them.

What were the losses like in your game Landser34 and RickyB?

[Landser34]

Our Losses

German Russian
Men 2887 2866
Guns 40 225
Veh. 47 30