Ghost of war

That's a great observation, you're of course right: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsimlyansk_Reservoir Hubert should take a look on this.

Hi Strategiclayabout. I have two fighters groups there, but Ivanov has two groups for escorting, so my fighters were neutralized. I was also surprised with the low supply level, since it is not the only rail-road to my troops approaching Leningrad. We'll see this turn how it is going to be . In terms of the Panzer concentration, they had their objectives set. However I will see what Ivanov will do and I'll react accordingly. Panzer war demands flexibility from the commander

Recent Soviet air activity in Leningrad area has worried OKH and OKW. Although Göring promised personally that Luftwaffe will dominate totally on the Eastern Front, the Soviet air forces managed to affect our supply lines. Well, let’s just say that it wasn’t the first time, when Göring promised something… Nevertheless, OKH has taken some steps to avoid such unfortunate events in future. We cannot reveal them now, but soon you will find out the effects of reorganization of the Army Group ‘North’. Seems like ‘Reorganization’ is the key word in this turn. In the central area of the Ostfront, the OKH has reminded Gen. Model that he should focus on planning the defense, rather than attacking Soviet forces. Obviously, we cannot afford full scale offensive in this area and Gen. Model has agreed with OKH. Therefore his forces limited their offensive actions this turn and they just destroyed Soviet army defending Kozelsk. OKH is well aware that the Bolsheviks’ forces are really numerous in this area and this cunning scumbag Zhukov sooner or later will attempt to attack us. Well, guess what Zhukov, we are looking forward to seeing you! In the South, our Panzer spearhead has attacked and again overrun Soviet armies defending Mikhaylovka. The majority of Soviet forces defending the city where destroyed. It means that Wehrmacht units are only about 180km away from Stalingrad. It is probable that the city will be ours before the end of summer! It seems obvious that the Soviet forces won’t be able to stop us now. We also managed to destroy Gen. Vatutin’s HQ. The Soviet general was really astonished when he heard German troops knocking at the door of his bedroom. But don’t worry, we didn’t kill him, just captured and took him to Berlin. We treat him well, he plays chess with von Brauchitsch. Gen. Hoth’s 17th Army is attacking the Stalingrad Front from the west and they approach Morozovsk at the very moment. With the cooperation from Luftwaffe they managed to destroy Soviet division and severly damage Soviet Tank Group. The Soviet forces are in classic encirclement now (do you remember Cannae, 216 BC?). German war correspondent has sent some photos from Rostov. Since the Caucasus front under Timoshenko is rather quiet, our troops defending Rostov had some leisure time recently. They rested and they are ready for possible attacks. That’s all for now!

Tough and epic battle, I agree . However, I am aware that Ivanov is very cunning player, he always has one or two aces hidden in his sleeve. So the battle will probably rage couple more turns... til our final victory!

German war correspondents inform in brief: Battle of Leningrad is not over yet, Army Group ‘North’ forces haven’t stopped the attack! In spite of heavy resistance of the enemy they managed to destroy one Soviet army and severely damage other two. Soviet forces in the city are on the verge of collapsing! Additional Luftwaffe Fighter Squadrons were sent to help Army Group ‘North’ in securing the supply lines and seizing the city. Our battery of heavy rail guns continue bombing the city, lowering the MPPs production and the supply level to 0. In the central regions of Russia, despite some losses Gen. Model’s forces continue their offensive against Zhukov and his armies. Their goal is to encircle the Bolshevik forces between Kozelsk and Kaluga. The elements of 14th Corps have encountered Zhukov’s HQ and managed to weaken the HQ units. What now Zhukov? You have no place to run! Gen. Paulus’ 6th Army have destroyed small pocket of Soviet two divisions. They achieved this in cooperation with our Hungarian allies. They continue pressing the left flank of Soviet forces defending Moscow. In the South, as we expected, the Soviet divisions defending Borisoglebsk were overrun by German tanks. However there is no joy in OKH because of that. We are well aware that the Soviets intentionally left some weak units behind. They sacrificed them in order to withdraw and build stronger defense lines around Mikhailovka, which will be the last major city before we reach will Stalingrad. That’s all for now, stay tuned for the news from the Ostfront!

Maybe Ivanov should answer this. He will have the most current data after his turn .

You may laugh at our Italian allies, Kamerad Ivanov. But it does not change the fact, that people on you previous photo are not Italians, but some bunch of gypsies that were hired by British War Propaganda Office. Probably they were the workers of this Office itself. Now let’s get back to the front. On the Southern War Theatre, Soviet forces were deprived of Konev’s skilled command and retreated eastwards. STAVKA claims that Konev is not dead, but our officers were certain about it. So the person they claim to be Konev is probably some Doppelgänger, they hired to raise the morale. The Communists are masters of lie and propaganda, so we can expect everything from them… Abwehr informed OKH about demoralization of Soviet armies around Borisoglebsk, so we decided to push towards the city, expecting that the Bolsheviks won’t be able to hurt us much. In the meantime OKH strenghtened the right flank (Rostov perimeter), expecting some action from the Caucasus Front under Timoshenko. Army Group ‘Centre’ managed to regroup and started offensive actions against Zhukov’s forces. The 6th Army on the right flank managed to overrun Soviet divisions defending Yeltis and push enemy to the north. Now let’s move to the north, to the left flank of Army Group ‘Centre’. OKH decided to move 9th Army under brilliant Gen. Walther Model into Vyazma region. They were strengthened by a 1st Tank Corps and launched successful attack on Zhukov´s right flank. They destroyed Soviet army and division. At the same time, our forces south from Kozelsk are rushing towards the city and heavily damaged Soviet Army defending the city. OKH never planned any offensive actions for Army Group ´Center´. Yet, aggressive actions taken by Gen. Zhukov have made us change our plans. Now we have an exciting situation, because our forces threaten Moscow! Offensive actions in Rzhev-Demyansk perimeter were held. Red Army lost thousands of men there and the remaining forces are severly demoralized, probably unable to take any offensive actions against us. Nevertheless we won’t pursue them, mainly due to inaccessible terrain. Instead, as we promised the last time, Army Group ‘North’ has launched a ferocious attack against Leningrad and the troops of 16th Army have seized the southern part of the city. This achievement was possible after we transferred heavy artillery from Crimean Peninsula. Our heavy guns started bombing the northern part of Leningrad, lowering Soviet morale and their MPPs production from the city. Withdrawing Red Army on the Ukraine again leaves plenty of its armored vehicles behind. For instance those tractors. Well, what did you expect from a peasant army?

I agree with Ivanov that this moment of the campaign is very important for the Axis player. We have couple of possibilities in the South: we can attack either Caucasus or push towards Stalingrad. Or we can do both things, what the Germans actually did in 1942, but it turned out to be a mistake and resulted in tragedy. Caucasus front under gen. Timoshenko seems to be quite strong and in our current situation it would be too risky to engage most of our forces there. Especially that the Soviet forces over the Donets river look numerous and capable of performing offensive actions against our Army Group ‘South’. Therefore OKH in it vast wisdom decided that the Soviet armies over the Donets need to be eliminated. This decision probably makes Stalingrad our next objective, leaving Caucasus for the future. Our troops under Generals Hoth and Kleist have started the offensive with great fervor. They crossed the Donets, completely destroyed two Soviet divisions and heavily battered Soviet Cavalry Corps which suffered 80% losses. They also captured and killed the Soviet Marshall Ivan Konev. OKH’s liaison officer by the 4th Tank Corps informed us that Konev’s last words before he died were: “Release the Cracken!”. I wonder what he meant… Army Group ‘Centre’ for couple of weeks has been facingSoviet offensive. Therefore we have made some rearrangements in our defensive lines near Vyazma, on Zhukov’s right flank. In joint Luftwaffe-OKH operation we managed to destroy Russian medium bombers base and severely weaken fighters unit. This will limit Soviet air activity in this area for the next couple of turns. We cannot reveal more information about our plans, because we prepare a lesson for Zhukov. You will find out more in the next turn. Meanwhile, north from Voronezh, 6th Army is successfully continuing the attack towards Yeltis. The situation looks like this: In Rzhev-Demyansk region we eliminated Soviet forces on the west Volga’s bank. Red Army suffered heavy losses, but they managed to withdraw orderly. We must admit that our operation of encircling and eliminating the enemy forces was a moderate failure. We underestimated the amount of Soviet forces and STAVKA’s lack of respect for the life of their own troops. The front will probably stabilize on the Volga river. We also managed to widen the space around Rzhev but they will be probably back next turn. On the far north we start to pressure Leningrad. We decided not to close the siege, but instead perform a frontal assault on the city. With the help of Luftwaffe, heavy artillery and our Finnish allies, we will hopefully succeed. You will find out more about this in the next turn! Our Italian and Romanian allies are important part of OKH’s plans. They are very eager to defeat ultimately the Communist hydra! Here you can see the descendants of Roman Empire in their rush towards battle!

STAVKA has been recently spreading rumors about Army Group Center collapse. As usually, it turned out to be Soviet propaganda and has nothing in common with reality. Soviet offensive hasn’t surprised us, our defense lines were well prepared and in spite of some tactical success the Bolsheviks didn’t manage to hurt us much. Their advancing Tank group was pushed away many kilometers back towards Moscow, along with one of the Soviet armies. Additionally, OKH has ordered Gen. Paulus 6th Army to strike at the Soviet left flank from Voronezh. Poor Soviets received heavy beating and are retreating without looking back! What now Gen. Zhukov? Have you already noticed that your daredevil actions didn’t bring any good? You’d better watch Moscow, because Comrade Koba may see our Feldgrau uniforms from his Kremlin office’s windows really soon! Gen. Paulus is vigilantly watching the battlefield and knows all of your dirty tricks Zhukov! In Rzhev- Demyansk area, the Soviets are tired, hungry and lack supplies, yet, they still fight and resist the German armies! We must admit that their resistance is almost superhuman. It is worth to mention that they engaged three HQ units in this area to provide better supply level and logistical support for their units. Within the next couple of turns we will see if they succeeded in it. Army Group South need to be reorganized due to 6th Army’s relocation to the north. In this turn we consolidated our lines between Voronezh and Rostov. Although the Red Army lost this battle, they managed to withdraw most of their forces over Donets river where they are real threat and it would be silly to attack them at once and without the proper preparation. There for we limited our activity to Rostov area, where our forces have gained and expanded bridgeheads on the other bank of Don river, defeating some Soviet forces defending Don’s bank.

On the Southern front Gen. Ruoff’s troops have finalny seized Rostov- the gate to Caucasus! They also managed to destroy two Soviet anti-tank units. It was acknowledged by OKH as a great achievement, since these units were serious threat for our Panzer Corps and they were blocking our progress in this area. During a day-long panzer battle near Rostov our forces managed to defeat Soviet Tank group and make them retreat over Don. We also increased the pressure on Millerovo, which is another important city in this region. For some reasons our military intelligence, the Abwehr, didn’t inform OKH about Soviet Army to the north-east from the town. Therefore our Italian allies were ambushed and suffered heavy losses. This disinformation was caused by a Russian spy that turned out to be a German officer in the Abwehr. He was already caught and put in front of the firing squad. However Führer was really upset with Abwehr’s performance and personally informed its chief, Adm. Wilhelm Canaris, that such incompetence will not be tolerated in future. Canaris agreed with Führer that this was unacceptable and one of his subordinates anonymously told me that he was extremely angry after he came back from Führer’s HQ. Moving North, our forces managed to capture Pavlovsk and Voronezh, which was achieved thanks to the daring maneuver of the 3rd Panzer Corps under Gen. von Weich. He decided that they should be moved south and attack Voronezh frontally, as the Soviet forces defending the city were already weakened by Luftwaffe. It turned out to be a great success and the remaining Soviet forces around the city will now have serious problem with the supply. Some parts of the map were classified by the Abwehr. After the recent slip-up they are overcautious and decided not to let you know too much. We were really surprised by the Soviet resistance in Rzhev area. Once again STAVKA proved that they don’t value human lives at all as they made their troops attack our tanks almost with the bare hands! Probably the Soviets transferred additional NKVD divisions which stand behind these poor Russian soldiers and shoot them in the back if they don’t attack us! I believe that Russian soldiers are more afraid of NKVD than of the German troops. Well, anyway our armies are continuing the push, although we didn’t manage to close completely the corridor through which the Soviets are evacuating their armies. Surely they will suffer heavy losses, but I must admit that they will probably manage to withdraw some of their forces. All quiet in Leningrad area. And in Sevastopol we are currently reorganizing our forces. Soon we will reveal what steps will be taken by the victorious Gen. Manstein’s 11th Army!

It's Photoshop!!!! Women were much more decent in those days.

Thank you Ivanov for keeping the attention of our audience while I struggled during my family feasts . I must admit that I didn't pay enough attention to many changes, you were writing about. After three days of constant feasting, my bowels suffer from a murderous blitzkrieg, believe me. But let’s go back to the battlefield, traditionally starting from the southernmost area, Crimean Peninsula. With a little help from Gen. Manstein’s HQ we managed to capture main Sevastopol area. There are still some coastal guns left, but surely it is a matter of time when we break their resistance. Gen. Manstein has got some thoughts he would like to share with us. Well, I really advise you Erich, you’d better keep such thoughts to yourself, unless you want Führer to send you to the Eastern Front. Oh wait, he had already sent you there. Well, anyway you’d better be quiet. Now, going north, our forces in the Ukraine are rushing east. We managed to destroy some Soviet forces and push them further east. Although I must admit that Ivanov is withdrawing his troops orderly and without panic. We weren’t able to encircle some of his armies in the forest south-east from Charkov, although we really tried. Nevertheless, the 17th Army is closing to Rostov and it seems that the city’s days in Soviet hands are numbered. South of Pavlovsk German 6th Army under Gen. Paulus is driving a wedge between the Soviet armies. Our Italian allies are the spearhead of this brave offensive maneuver. In the central region, the 2nd Army under Gen. von Weichs has observed many weak spots in the Soviet defense line, therefore we decided to take some offensive actions in the area to north-west of Voronezh. Our troops destroyed some Soviet units and we are encircling Voronezh from the north. What happens next? It’s hard to be certain, since we don’t know the exact size of the Soviet reinforcements in this area. We are pretty sure though that we will see some action soon. Further north, in our favorite Rzhev- Demyansk area, we are attempting to close a large group of Soviet armies in the pocket. Although Ivanov has recently claimed that Gen. Zhukov managed to convince Koba to let them go back, it seems that they were a little bit late with this. It is obvious that now they have large problem with supply lines, which won’t let them withdraw quickly to the east. We started our offensive to cut them off. Is the fate of thousands of Bolsheviks sealed? You will find out in the next episode!

There may be some ladies on the forum, Ivanov. But they are probably hiding afraid of being exposed. And I am not that aggressive player. I’d prefer you to say “very dynamic” . As we already mentioned, the southern front will be the main area of our offensive. On the Crimean Peninsula 11th Army under Gen. von Manstein started the offensive against Sevastopol Fortress. They were strengthened by Luftwaffe’s VIII Fliegerkorps under General Oberst Wolfram von Richthofen’s command (yes, from “these” Richthofens, cousin of famous Red Baron): The Soviet forces are entrenched and in this turn we were unable to break their resistance. However Gen. von Manstein promised to defeat the Soviet forces in the next two turns. Going to the North, the cities of Rostov and Voronezh are naturally our first objectives. After reaching Donets perimeter we will reveal our further plans. Here is the situation after the first turn. The Soviets didn’t suffer very big casualties so far and in their turn surely they will be able to deploy more troops in this area. But our Panzer Divisions are like a steamroller! They crush and destroy all the resistance. We expect the Soviet line to break in the next couple of turns. In the Centre, we have plans of aggressive defense, but basically we will hold to the initial deployment line… unless we decide to attack [or Ivanov decides to do so] . So there is no screenshot this time, as nothing important happened there. There are plenty of interesting events in Demyansk-Rzhev region. We managed to widen the corridor to our besieged troops in Demyansk. We also pushed back one of the Soviet armies endangering our southern flank below Rzhev. There are more to come, as we rearranged a couple of things in our lines: All quiet on Leningrad front. Thank you for your attention and stay tuned for more!

Thanks Hubert for creating the new thread. Alright Ladies and Gentlemen, summer of 1942 is coming really quickly. After the failure of Barbarossa plan, Oberkommando des Heeres is aware that this year it will be impossible to repeat the events of 1941 and launch a massive strike on all the fronts against the Soviet Union. We should focus on one front, and, according to gen. von Manstein, it should be the south: Well, I couldn’t agree more with good ol’ Erich. The terrain around Moscow does not look very friendly and will surely affect our supply lines seriously. Moreover, Abwehr informs us that the Soviets really think that we are going to attempt to attack Moscow again. Therefore they concentrated a formidable amount of forces around their capital. South then! At the beginning of the game we receive a present from OKH. They allow us to deploy the following forces: 3 Med. Bombers 1 Tac. Bomber 2 Artilleries 4 Infantry Corps 2 Mech. Infantry Corps 4 Tank Corps 2 HQs (Gen. Hoth and Gen. von Kleist- both rating 7) Of course we should not spread them all over the map, they should be concentrated and ready to strike like a snake! For well known reasons we are not going to reveal their position now, not to make it easy for our opponent. Apart from our activity in the south we expect some heavy fight in Demyansk-Rzhev region: The Soviets will surely try to eliminate completely the Demyansk Pocket and we will simply not let them do it. The Fuhrer declared Demyansk as a Festung and Feldmarschall Goering promised that Luftwaffe will provide all the supply that is needed. Therefore no step back, no way out but forward! Our situation in Rzhev region is not easy too, as Soviet High Command STAVKA has planned and launched massive offensive, attempting to encircle our forces. They must be stopped and we will achieve it with no doubt! Further north, the city of Leningrad is under siege, however we never really managed to close the siege completely. It is unlikely that we will manage to do it this year, in spite of the help that our brave Finnish allies provide. Nevertheless we plan some minor activity there too, to make life of our opponent harder. HISTORY: German Fall Blau offensive’s main strategic goal initially were Caucasus Oil Fields, however this goal was changed in the Summer of 1942 in Führer Directive No. 45. It split Army Group South into two smaller army groups: Army Group A was to continue further into Caucasus and Army Group B was to attack and seize Stalingrad. Changing strategic objectives, while the operation was already in full swing, wasn’t a good idea. First of all it caused major logistical difficulties for the divisions changing their routes and supply lines. Secondly, none of the two Army Groups was strong enough to achieve its objectives. Nevertheless no one dared to oppose Hitler which finally led to a catastrophe you all know about. Demyansk Pocket actually existed between February and April 1942. Inside there were 5 Wehrmacht divisions and 3.SS Totenkopf Division trapped (about 90000 men). Hitler ordered them to hold their positions, mainly because H. Goering, the chief of Luftwaffe, ensured him that Luftwaffe was able to create an “air bridge” and provide daily supply of 240 tons. It actually turned out to be true, mainly because Soviet air forces were very weak at this moment and the weather was making such a massive air operation possible. It led Hitler to believe that Luftwaffe was able to repeat this successful operation for the encircled German forces in Stalingrad. Well, let’s just quote the classic: History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.

One time I decided to give Trieste to Italians and I really regretted it. First of all, there were multiple mutinies and most of my front-line AH units lost 1-5 points of strength. Experienced Entente player may use this well if Russians are strong enough. Then there were riots in main AH cities (Budapest, Wien and some more, I don;t recall now) and their supply value dropped to 2. I was unable to transfer units between Serbian Front and the rest of AH. And of course NM dropped by 25, which may be a problem, depends on how heavy beating AH took before. So in my opinion long term benefits, like no Italian fleet or lack of additional front for AH, are not good enough to decide to let Trieste go. Entente fleet is usually superior at this stage of game so couple of naval units less won't change anything in favor of AH. In terms of Italian front, I usually send 2-3 German units to AH-Italian border and fortify them in the cities. Italians are weak at the beginning, they don't have heavy artillery and their HQs are of half strength and it affects supply. So CP player don't need to panic, there are still couple of months to defeat Serbia and pull those units back to punish Italians .

Yeah, exactly. Not sure if everyone noticed but this scenario actually is ahistorical. So why should it stick to historical timeline in terms of the USA joining the war?

Hi Bill, during the game I saw the events saying something about Preparedness Movement in the USA. Nevertheless in the middle of 1916, the Americans were still below 80%, it grew very slowly and it didn't change every turn, but every 2 turns. When Americans join it's not probable that their army will show up in Europe sooner than after 6-8 months. However the Entente player can use their fleet and MPPs for diplomacy (i.e. to press Holland and Norway) and there would be significant morale boost. Without USA, playing against AI makes the game challenging and gives Entente some chances for winning. But playing against experienced player from this forum changes the game into "How long will Entente survive?".

I have just finished playing Triple Alliance (PBEM) as Entente, the result was my defeat in the middle of 1916. I had the impression that this campaign favors CP too much. In my game USA didn't join the war and probably it wouldn't join until 1917, like they did in in reality. I'm not sure if Triple Alliance was meant to be that tough for Entente player. If not, in my opinion, in well balanced game the USA would become more active from the moment when Italy joins the war. So my question is: are there any scripts that 'activate' the USA earlier or is it the same script as in Call to Arms?

There is a turnbased Starcraft (a board game): http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/22827/starcraft-the-board-game Look at the gallery. Some units look awsome .

I had the same problem with old games under Win7 64bit and I recommend virtualization. Virtual Box is pretty easy to configure and it's for free: https://www.virtualbox.org/ If you still have WinXP or Win7 media, you can create virtual machine and use it for running the game. If you have Win8 64bit, your PC is probably resourceful enough to handle this.

I agree with Ivanov. Let's not forget it's a computer game. And I'm against extreme historical accuracy if it affects playability of the game. What is the big advantage of Russian Civil War and the majority of SC WW1 campaigns is that they're well balanced for both sides and if they were more historically accurate, then probably one of the sides would always lose. One of my favorite strategic games of all times, Panzer General 2, is hardly historically accurate. Despite that I keep playing it, even it's been 15 years since it was issued.

Such a great bug . Why the good things always happen to the others? Damn.

Sure thing. Playing SC WW1 is like playing chess- there are many debuts, though in both games there are things that should be avoided during openning. I agree that some players may find attacking Ukraine in 1919 useful for the Reds. In my opinion however, this step however gives the Southern Whites more possibilities. For instance they have more MPPs every turn now and they invest in research. Without Ukraine they are unable to do so.

In terms of Baltic states, Bolsheviks need them only for total victory (only Tallin). So in my opinion, they could limit their activity to defense in this theater. Although they mustn't totally neglect it, as gen. Yudenich at some point has 3 Northern Whites corps, 1 upgrade Freikorps, 1 artilery unit and 3-4 divisions. They also have experienced British HQ. So the siege of Petrograd is normal after a while, though it will be hard for the WHites to occupy it.

If you encourage Ivanov... It's a bit too early for this, but I was thinking about creating some kind of summary for this AAR, a list of 'Dos' and 'Don'ts' for each of the side. Looking at the AAR so far I see one thing that Bolsheviks should not do (or even must not do)- attacking Ukraine early in 1919r. I played this campaign as the Reds and noticed that avoiding the attack in 1919 brings more profits. First of all, they avoid creating another front, while their units are really needed elsewhere i.e. in Tsaritsyn or Ural. Secondly, if Bolsheviks don't attack Ukraine, Southern Whites will have to pay 150 MPPs later to force Ukraine into war at the Whites' side. It's a huge ammount of MPPs for Southern Whites economy and they need it more for research or reinforcing units. In terms of 'Dos' at the begining of the game, the Reds may remove most of the units from the northern front, especially the part where the British and Americans advance. In may opinion one division entrenched in Vologda will be sufficient to fight them, there are more important fronts, like Tsaritsyn and Perm, which should be defended at all cost comrades! No pasaran! As I wrote it's too early to summarize, but we could start .