Soviet strategy

[Kuniworth]

What is the best soviet strategy to use? I find it very hard to defend against an well prepared axis onslaught, which chew up your units and very quickly reduces your income.

And should you just mass corps or should you go for quality units? I mean it´s almost impossible to gain anything out of purchasing corps except buying some time.

[Guest Mike]

IMO you have to survive befoer you can think of doign anything else, so if Corps buy you time then yes, for heaven's sake go and get some!!

however if the German assault is not so good then perhaps look at more armies and tech.

and, as always, a major part of Russian strategy needs to be action by the UK and USA!!

[John DiFool]

Originally posted by Mike:

IMO you have to survive befoer you can think of doign anything else, so if Corps buy you time then yes, for heaven's sake go and get some!!

however if the German assault is not so good then perhaps look at more armies and tech.

and, as always, a major part of Russian strategy needs to be action by the UK and USA!!

The major problem is that the MPP production

scheme isn't pro-rated for the length of the

turns (as discussed in that other thread): hence

the Russians never get a breather (during what

would have been the rainy muddy and or snowy

months) when they can rebuild their front. You

will note that the Germans as a consequence are

under no obligation to attack in late May/early

June to get maximum bang for their buck (or

deutschemark).

JD

[Russ Bensing]

Originally posted by Kuniworth:

And should you just mass corps or should you go for quality units? I mean it´s almost impossible to gain anything out of purchasing corps except buying some time.

Well, that's exactly what you're doing. At the start of Barbarossa, your army will be about 1/3 the size of the Germans, and you'll lose half of that in the first turn. If you can, get your tanks, a couple of armies, and planes out of there, back to around Moscow. They're going to eventually be your reserve. Put a couple of other armies in Stalingrad and Rostov. You have GOT to secure that line. If the German player gets to the east end of the map, and probably the best place to do that is just below Stalingrad, all the resources in the Caucasus can no longer trace a route to Moscow, and you lose almost half of your MPP's. At that point, unless you can regain it, the game's over. (This probably ought to be fixed, btw.)

Build up corps around Kiev and Minsk, and one each in Riga and Odessa, to slow him down. They'll get eaten up, but they'll buy you time. Fortunately, you've got the river in the South; make a line there to protect those two mines. If you slow him down enough along the Minsk/Kiev Axis, you should be able to set up a fairly solid line of corps along the Smolensk/Kharkov Axis. The right flank should be anchored on the marshes.

From there on, it's fingernail-biting time. A smart German player will attack your line away from your cities, because you can't build replacements there. Defeat that by running units out from the cities and adjacent squares to plug any holes in the line, then rebuild corps in the those squares to take their place. Having a tactical reserve of even a couple of corps can mean the difference between plugging a hole and having your line crack open. Use the strategic reserve if you absolutely have to, but it's best applied if you have a chance to kill off an armored unit that's outrun its air cover. Be very careful of committing this force, but know also that, if things turn ugly, your Siberian force will come up and can form your new strategic reserve.

Probably the biggest part of your strategy is what Britain and the US do. The German player will invariably stick a unit in Brest. Bomb that sucker with everything you've got, and also hit him with ships. If you can destroy him, or even damage him significantly, you're going to cost the German more MPP's than bombing his resources will. If you hold out until the Western allies can open a front somewhere, the German player will have to start bleeding off the Eastern Front units. Stay on the defensive, build up, then hit him. It's unlikely you're going to be able to take the initiative much before mid-1943.

That's how I do it, anyway. It works like a charm against the AI -- at +2, it never even took Minsk and Kiev -- and it's been effective against decent human players.

[gorski]

At last! An intelligent discussion about pbem. I am in the middle of my first full length pbem game, so this is more theory than proven strategy. I don't agree with the many corps plan. I like armies/tanks with HQ's. The idea is to kill German tanks whenever they try to outrun their supply lines. I don't fight hard for the first half of the map. I just try to keep my units alive and slow the Germans a little where possible.

Gorski

[winkelried]

I use the corps plan myself. But it is important, besides the "second front" issue, to stay agressive. I attack the Germans along the whole front whenever I can, trying to destroy as many enemy units as possible (Panzer or not). In addition I also spend some points (if possible) on the Red Air Force, used in defense, rarely enough to fill them fully. This helps to wear off the German airforce in conjunction with a US/UK air offensive.

In the West I run a minor invasion (like the Dieppe raid) to tie down forces ever now and then (e.g against SW France, Norway), even an incursion into the Baltic sea with one fleet in force (to hunt down the German Big Ships) helps a lot.

Another strategy which helped to buy time for the Soviets was to just after Barbarossa was to run UK or Free French troops through the baltic under the cover of the whole fleet. With this I was able to beef up the Soviet defenses by 4 to 5 armies/tank groups and to occupy the German Air Force and Navy quite a bit.

[ August 30, 2002, 02:38 AM: Message edited by: winkelried ]

[Niklas.Andersson]

defending Sovjet isnt really that hard. I tried all kinds of tactics but this one is the only one that guaranties a good survival precent.

Like the above statments, buy only corps and place them on a defensive line covering ALL the front lines. Make sure the Axies wount get a "3 space" attack possibility.

Spent the 2 fre research on Ind tech.

Forget about HQ´s, sounds strange but u will suffer to much from bying them by the lack of corps.

Get the 3 fighters to attack finns (usually German planes outtech u so they usless to defend the "line". Get the tanks also there to overrun the Finns. Afterwards I usually dispand the planes for MPP.

After sum turns U should have a "3 layer" thik defens line witch takes a loong time to penetrate.

And if the germans are stupied not to get total air superioty (5-10 fighters) they will have a hell of a time trying to break the line.

[Yohan]

Originally posted by winkelried:

In the West I run a minor invasion (like the Dieppe raid) to tie down forces ever now and then (e.g against SW France, Norway), even an incursion into the Baltic sea with one fleet in force (to hunt down the German Big Ships) helps a lot.

Another strategy which helped to buy time for the Soviets was to just after Barbarossa was to run UK or Free French troops through the baltic under the cover of the whole fleet. With this I was able to beef up the Soviet defenses by 4 to 5 armies/tank groups and to occupy the German Air Force and Navy quite a bit.

In our pbem games we have a house rule you can't enter the Baltic if Germany owns Denmark. The Med is closed for a reason and the Baltic should be too.

[winkelried]

Are these rules published somewhere ?

[Jollyguy]

That "don't enter the Baltic rule" doesn't make sense to me. If the Allied player wants to attempt to take out the German Baltic Fleet, let him. The Axis counter is to get air up there, and make him pay.

I've had Allied players move naval into the Baltic, and they leave bloodied. I've moved in as the Allies, and left bloodied. And the Allied player at the outset doesn't have a lot of MPPs to play with, so if you can give him a good licking, there goes 4, 5, turns of MPPs, perhaps more, that may not go to research, or preparing for D-Day.

We don't have Murmansk convoys in the scale of this game, so British/French forays into the Baltic simulate the committment of resources the Germans had to deploy to attack the Allied convoys committed to assisting Russia, and vice-versa.

This is a what-if game. But then again, their your PBEM games, and your aggreement. Prospective opponents can simply opt not to play.

[Lou Wigman]

I play at expert +1 (version 1.03) and have never had any troubke stopping the Axis. Retreat back to the line Riga-Minsk-Odessa and build a solid front with corps units. Be careful not allow the Axis a 3-way hit on any of your units. Use river/swamp to max advantage. The bad guys will batter your line furiously but inevitably lose more than you. Concentrate your airforce against the Finns and use your fleet to knock them out quickly. Your research should be on Industry to be able to replace the cannon fodder. Pull your armour units out of the line and into reserve as soon as possible. You can't afford to lose these. Your air force is also too costly to replace. Use it sparingly and only when it really counts. Use your infantry armies as 'anchors' for the weaker corps units.

After the Germans have knocked themselves senseless build a few infantry and tank armies and start picking off exposed German units.

In none of the games I have played to date have the Axis captured a single Russian city or resource. War is all over by end 1943.

What you do in France is also critical. It is absolutely essential that France be held for as long as possible. Typically I can hang on there until Nov/Dec 1940. This doesn't give the Axis any breathing space to build up a really powerful offensive.

[ August 31, 2002, 01:06 AM: Message edited by: Lou Wigman ]

[Rouge]

I find that for Russians as they get things cheaply, that the corps is a great alternitive. The Russian front is a large one and a large force of corps can spread out more, they are also effective in flanking manovers and garrisoning conqoured land. Pity when is comes to battle they are next to hopless against tanks. A case of a jack of all trades, master at none.