"Battle for Russia" Scenario Supporters Club

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

During the past weeks I played Kuniworth`s Scenario quite often, and I really need to admit that I love it. I played on 100%/+0, and I had to cancel the first two games because I was loosing... and I had to start again. What I would like to know is if you guys made the same experiences.. and what your opinions are.

I love the idea of a ceteris paribus scenario.. just see what happens when you leave Germany and Russia alone until one comes out of the Thunderdome. Of course certain things are modeled (Bombimgs of german cities), but it`s always the same every time.. so it`s more or lesse a "you or me" - Scenario.

What I like about that Scenario:

+ Map

It`s huge and very well researched. To name every landscape, forest and fortification must have been an awful lot of work. Thx for that. The space behind the Ural is not in, but if the german tanks appraoch Kuibychev, the game is lost anyway for the Russians, so I think the map is fine in that area. Just one note: can it be that Stalingrad is a bit too far in the North? Shouldn`t it be a bit more in the south?

+ Units

There is lot of research in it as well. I miss certain things (Tac Bomber, Anti Tank), but it`s still very good. In the beginning I also missed the double strike tanks, but I`m sure that game balance is difficult to maintain with 2 Strikes.

+ Pop ups

The feeling is unique. I`ve never seen that in a game. Very well researched and also good implemented in the scenario.

+ Balance

What happened in my games was very close to the historical developments until late 42 (as Axis I was able to capture Stalingrad, but it was quite tough!), but only because I knew what happened and I saved a few times. The Scenario is really difficult, and I like that. Has anyone ever won it as Axis on 100%/+2?

Anyway: there were very many points in that game where I had to make thoughts about my concept which seem to be very close to the thoughts the OKW did 65 years ago.. just move to the south and have Stalingrad in your back or take Stalingrad alone and have a tough fight for a worthless destroyed city.. or split up your forces and loose everything.

There are very few dislikes, and their importance is way smaller than the above stuff:

- Experience bars

All unit can (re)gain just one experience bar. I think that this is to avoid that certain units get too strong. I can understand that (although there were certain super strong unit like JG 52), but if this is needed for game balance, it`s okay. But wouldn`t it be possible to get 2 exp. bars? I know I can use the editor, but I want to understand what the thought behind is..

- Technology and Research

I know I can use the editor, but shouldn`t the prices for the different technologies be somewhat different? AA tech isn`t as important as IW or HT.. I would like it if there was a bit more structure in it and not 1000 MPP for everything.

But altogether: a great scenario. What do you guys think?

[PanzerMike]

I am a big fan of this scenario. In fact, I have not played any other scenario (not even Fall Weiss). This is the right scale for SC2. I wish Fall Weiss was done on this scale, but that may be a bit too much

[John DiFool the 2nd]

If Kuni is still lurking, I'll comment on a few points above.

Tac bombers most certainly should be added at this scale.

I'd prefer on-map Russian partisans but I can grasp the micromanagement problems with all the little buggers running around. The Yugo ones are bad enough...

Tech costs probably should be tweaked.

I'd also eliminate the "free" Russian chits in IW right off the bat, as it causes Russian production to "ramp" up too soon (yes I know about the MPP map events).

5 experience bars is certainly too many (arguably too many in the vanilla scenarios), but 1 is too few IMHO, as that is probably the only thing which will keep the Germans in the game past a certain point (eventually washing away anyway as happened historically).

I wish I knew why Kuni had all those "extra" free Russian tanks pop up in late summer, as they greatly exceed the hard build limits.

I'd like to see a 1942 scenario using the same map.

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

Thanks... that shows me that my ideas and wishes were about right.

About the on-map russian partisans: basically I was wondering why they don`t appear, but I was damn happy they didn`t!!

If you play against the AI: what difficulty level do you play? I use to play 100%/+0.. has anyone beaten the AI as Axis on 100%/+2?

[Kuniworth]

Hey Guys,

thanks for your kind words about the scenario. I do appreciate all sorts of comments and suggestions, keep'em coming.

I thought I should make a comment on the questions that have been raised here. Maybe we can work out some tweaks if that would be necessary:

- Position of Stalingrad tile 56,38

Maybe can move it to 56,39 or 56,40?

- Missing TAC Bombers and Anti-tank

Reason for not including anti-tank are twofold. First of all this is a corps-sized scenario and anti-tank units are simply too small for this scale, secondly the anti-tank unit was needed to create the Cavalry corps.

The tac-bomber is kind of a problem. I first intended to use them but I then faced a problem of what unit formations do I try to simulate. I use fliegerkorps for the germans and that would mean 5 tac bombers but this mean problem for Russia where air-armies are the used unit formations. Russians fielded 12-13 AIr Armies at the same time during the war and have all them in plus fighters would mean that the map would be swarmed with airunits. So I let the fighter unit symbolise both fighters and tac bombers. If this should change, my only real demand is that the scenario remain 100% realistic when it comes to OOB.

If we want a less swamped map germans can use Luftflottes but for the russians this still will be trouble. During the war the russians went from a diversed airforce split between front-duty to aircover until the Air-army unit was formed and then they kept it for the remainder of the war...

- Experience-bars

Too much experience are a killer, no doubt. Totally unrealistic too with 5 baras, maybe 2 could work? Im not sure how much 2 bars increase combat values, is it with 2 points?

- Tech Costs

I have no trouble with a change in tech-costs. Just one thing that is important is that too high tech levels can lead to slaughter too fast(see Spanish civil war scenario how they keep levels to 1-2 max) so I think maybe even level 3 in heavy tanks are sometimes too much.

- Russian pop-up tanks

This are the soviet mech corps that appear that historically fought the wehrmacht in 1941. Reason for them to pop-up is that I want the hard-build limit for russians to stay down as the Red Army's tank force was reorganized from almost 30 mech corps to 6 tank Armies during the war. With too high hard build limit the russians will have too many tank formationson the board plus it wont be historical.

For me realism is very important especially concerning the OOB. Until Hubert fixes it so you can put more units on the board than the hard build limit is set at, we will need those pop-ups.

- Russian partisans

Ive decided to keep them out as the scale of the game is corps-level. If we put them in at the real historical level the germans would need +10 corps just too fight the which were not entirly realistic. Not that the germans did not put in a lot of units to fight them(russians partisans were hundreds of thousands) but I am afraid that the focus would mess up the OOB that fought the conventional war.

Just look at Yugoslavia, I introduced partisan units as Tito historically liberated much of Yugoslavia on their own hand, but it still means problem when the german player need to divert lot of forces that actually fought the red army. If I on the other hand introduced all the anti-partisan forces players could use them to fight the russians as combat-formations which means balance-problems.

So it's a trade-off for sure.

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

Okay... good response. Here`s my opinion in Detail.

- Stalingrad

Not quite sure... in reality Astrachan is sligtly more in the south than Rostov.. and Stalingrad is a bit more in the North, but more in the south than Kharkov or Kiwev, it`s about on the same height as Dnjeprpetrovsk. I think if you adjust it slightly southwards, it`s fine.

The way from Voronezh and Kharkov to Stalingrad is a bit longer than from Stalingrad to Astrachan or Rostov. If you just have a look in a normal Map again (I`m sure you did that thousands of times already!), you´ll see what I mean.

- Missing Tac Bomber and AT

understood and accepted

- Exp Bars

Understood. I`d be happy with 2 or 3... this increases combat values already. And it gives some kind of reality, because esp. some of the german units were really vereran... JG 52 scored 11.000 air victories during the war. I`ll be happy with anything you decide unless it`s not one.

- Tech cost

High tech cost is fine and I would leave it that way. I think it is just wiser to increase the price for heavy tanks to i.e. 1500 and lower the price for ASW or similar useless stuff to 750 or 500... what I mean is: make important stuff expensive and useless stuff cheap.

I fully understand that mighty german or russian tanks are a problem and Lvl 4 or 5 would cause havoc in the game balance. One solution could be to lower then values for Lvl 0 tanks and then allow to reserach a higher Lvl.. this shouldn`t hurt the balance I think.

- Russian Tank pop ups and Partisans

I`m fine with the current model.. just wanted to know what the reason behind is.

Rgds

[JerseyJohn]

I played an AAR game with Kuni using one of the early versions of this scenario. We played our game after revisions were made as a result of the Kuni-JDF2nd AAR game. As in that one, we stopped because it needed further revising; as that version was the Germans had impossible supply problems and the Soviets became too strong too quickly.

I enjoyed the game scale and Kuni's ideas on units, etc, really enjoyed the AAR which was Ludendorf vs Batman

It was the only time we've played but I've always been an admirer of Kuni's scenarios and his AARs (two classics in SC1 vs disorder ).

I didn't know most of the bugs were removed from the scenario. Looking forward to having another shot at it after what appears to be another round of tweaking.

I've always felt Hitler's fatal error was in not sweeping the entire Baltic first, including Leningrad, before turning south on Moscow & Kiev. His main offensives would have been travelling with, instead of against, the onset of winter weather. I'd like to play this idea on an historically reliable Eastern Front scenario. As has already been said, Kuni's done a huge amount of research on this campaign and I trust his view of the situation and also his ability to put it into a game mod. :cool:

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

@ JerseyJohn:

I did expect that this scenario was very difficult to balance. I remember that I read a thread about the early stages of the secnario and a major tank battle at Mogilev were the russian tanks destroyed many german tanks units early in the war.. game over in that case. So what I want to say is: obviously the scenario has already a very long way behind itself, and everything what should be tweaked is just smallish now.

Concerning what you say about the general path of the war Hitler`s plans I have two comments.

As Hitler gave the orders to attack Russia, the High command wanted a quick campaign (with fully equipped and supplied forces to minimize losses) to destroy all russian units and force a quick surrender. Hitler changed these plans, because he wanted a more economic war (he changed his path a couple of times later!), that means gaining ressources.. so he made the whole plan bigger, but there were not enough ressources for that plan. Almost everyone in the High command knew that the german ressources where not enough to conquer and occupy Russia, to what they wanted was a quick and decisive victory. The german Secret Service was quite poor by that time, because they expected the european part of the russian forces to be around 200 Divisions in total (they destroyed more than that until the start of Unternehmen Taifun late 41), but the russians had way more. And the biggest strategic mistake was their misjudgement on russian willingness to survive. Every western democracy would surrender after loosing a few million soldiers, but the russians didn`t.. they were fighting for their existence. Simply take Byelorussia, the Baltic and the Ukraine and then go for peace negotiations doesn`t work when you tell the other side that you plan to wipe it out completely in your book.. and the treatment of the people in the occupied territories was another even worse mistake. The whole plan was wrong, because it based on the idea of a quick surrender... and I think the russians wouldn`t have surrendered even in case of loosing Moscow. The only alternative would have been to attack and take all objectives until September or October and then stop and regroup... and start negotiating. With the industrial power of the Ukraine under control Germany would have been way stronger (lots of steel and coal, and the germans were experts in creating fuel out of coal) than before. But the last final attack on Moscow was very costly, because they lost many experienced units there.. which were on poor supply levels. So what I want to say is: the whole plan was wrong, and Stalin`s will to sacrifice another few Million soldiers finally doomed it.

What you say about your wish to play a historically reliable Eastern Front Secnario with your ideal wars path: then you need another engine. SC2 puts two much weight on land links.. the supply routes between Germany and Finnland worked pretty well even without a land link, because the russian fleet was trapped around Leningrad (german engineers created a huge minefield not far away from Kronstadt so no Naval unit came out until early 1944), but this cannot be modeled in SC2. Therefore Leningrad in SC2 is way more important than it was in reality. Basically I think that Army Group North could have taken Leningrad if they just wanted to, but they decided that it`s just not worth the necessary ressources so they simply let the city die... or tried it. So your wish won`t work unless SC3 is approaching

[JerseyJohn]

Hyazinth von Strachwitz,

I think that tank battle around Mogilev was in the game between myself and Kuni. The Axis, up to that point, was fending the Soviets off in the south while pushing hard in the center and north. A lot of Soviet units were being cut off and destroyed but at the exact time the Soviets should have been forced to defend they suddenly had units to spare and the Germans, especially in the north, had no supplies. I was trying to figure out where my play went wrong when Kuni stopped the game and said the scenario had to be worked on.

I agree with what you're saying regarding the existing game engine and the strategy I'm talking about. Certainly the Germans could have done that, easily, in the Autumn of 1941. Leeb's panzers were resupplying with the infantry catching up when ordered all of Army Group North's armored units south at the same time he was ordering Army Group Center's panzers south also to create the Kiev pocket. If he'd allowed North and Center to proceed to their objectives I'm sure he'd have taken Leningrad quickly and Moscow shortly afterwards.

While capturing those objectives wouldn't have led to a Soviet surrender it would beyond any doubt have badly disruped the Soviet transportation network, linked Finland to the rest of the Axis and reduced the northern front to a minor theater. Additionally, the loss of Moscow, in my opinion, would have placed the entire Soviet Southern Front in a very precarious position with a springtime Axis offensive in a good position to move south, east of Kiev and on to the Black Sea, creating a pocket of Soviet infantry in the Ukraine that would have dwarfed the historical Kiev pockets.

But, as you so accurately pointed out, Hitler kept changing plans and as the looted resources, principally oil and motor vehicles taken in France and other western nations, became exhausted his campaigns were ever more directed at taking control of the southern Russian resources. There was nothing wrong with those strategic goals except, as you said, the Axis didn't have the manpower or the resources to attack on that entire north to south line of battle; it couldn't take the south till it secured the north and center.

Agreed entirely on the outright stupidity of Hitler's horrific abuse of the Russian and Slavic populations and, of course, his outright tragic insanity regarding the Jews. The Nazis turned what should have been many millions of people working for them into a hostile population spawning partisans and sabotage. At the very best their occupation policy produced corpses, can't get much productivity out of the dead.

In the field every fieldmarshal, particularly von Manstein and even the avid Nazi Richenau, objected to the anti-Slav/Russian policy and, especially, to the presence of SS death squads operating behind the front lines. As has often been said, with considerable truth, if Hitler had left the campaign to his generals he might have succeeded.

Regarding Soviet surrender, once again I have to agree with you 100%. The only Axis policy that would have worked was to offer the Soviet citizens (Russian and other ethnic groups) something better than the Soviet tyrany that was, as the Nazis knew, already eroding the Soviet system's ability to survive. Instead he gave them an even worse tyrany, one of total hopelessness with the promise of eternal slavery for the lucky few who weren't worked to death, starved to death while the food they'd harvested was siezed and transported west, or executed outright in reprisals.

Two things Hitler said stand out in my mind. The first is his remark in early 1941 about kicking in the Soviet door and the whole rotten house would fall down. I believe he was correct but he didn't understand how to cause its collapse; he didn't understand human beings -- just like his paintings showing fine landscapes and buildings with a scattering of robot-like pedestrians who seem indifferent to each other. Second is something he said to Mannerheim at their meeting in Finland during the war (this was on the hidden tape that some people don't accept as genuine). It was something to the effect that if he'd realized how strong the USSR actually was he would have reconsidered things and, perhaps, not invaded when he did.

And, of course, along the lines of what you said, even before the start of the 41-42 winter, the German forces in the USSR had done the equivalent of defeating France several times over; that this didn't cause the collapse of the Soviet Union would have shocked everyone, Axis as well as UK and USA, but it made perfect sense to the Russian people who were simply offered no choice other than to fight the murdering invader many of them had initially welcomed as liberators.

As always, very much enoyed your extremely insightful post, particularly the way you relate history to the realities of gameplay. :cool:

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

@ JerseyJohn: agreed 100%.

In my eyes there was just one person between Mr. Hitler and total domination of Europe: Mr. Stalin and his iron will. Of course he had no other choice, but other people would have surrendered.. or something else. But Stalin better liked to kill 20 Million of his own people instead of even thinking about it... and I`m pretty sure that this is the most important fact when looking at the russian theater. And of course there is one things not to forget: I´m 100% sure Russia would have collapsed without the MASSIVE economic help from the US and UK, and this was also not foreseeable. But better german intelligence would have solved that matter even better..

I wonder how the world would have developed without the attack in June 41.. just imagine you play SC2 and russians don`t join the allies in late 41.. what would you do? Take North Africa and the Middle East? Not a problem, when you send two full armies down there. Rommel had 100k german soldiers in front of El Alamein, just imagine what they would have done with 2 full Armies.. first take Gibraltar and don`t care for old Franco (if he doesn`t allow it, sack him and take whole Spain which brings you more ports), then send german U-Boats to the Med and kill all supply convoys for Malta, finally take Malta, then wipe out all UK forces in the Med.. it`s like kicking ducklings.... and you get the whole oil. Bring a few minors in like Irak and so on.. having Spain and full oil supply you`ll have a nice fortress Europe.. without the need to have 2/3 of the Wehrmacht being deployed in the East, no D-Day is possible... and with all the Jagdgeschwader guarding the Reich, no bombing of german cities would occur.

You know what I mean

[JerseyJohn]

Hyazinth von Strachwitz,

Interesting scenario. I've always wondered why Hitler didn't actually redefine the Axis to include the USSR when Stalin wanted to become a member after the fall of France. That was what the Molotov trip to Berlin was all about. Stalin wanted a warm water Norwegian port with a land corridor reaching it from the USSR -- entailing a strip running across Finland and Norway to build a railroad on. Hitler became incensed with this idea, leaving Ribbentrop to small talk with Molotov while he went off and sulked. He'd already decided on Barbarossa and wasn't interested in anything that would alter that plan.

But, if he'd picked up on the opportunity, he could have done exactly as you said in the Eastern Mediteranean. Without an eastern front it would have been possible to bring troops and air units back to France, pressuring Franco into reconsidering and he'd have joined the Axis. The main reason he didn't in the summer of 1940 was because Admiral Canaris had advised him that Germany already committed itself to invading the USSR and couldn't also invade Spain.

So -- Gibraltar and Malta fall, there's no Axis supply problem in North Africa and in addition they're free to send massive aid to Iraq in ousting the British. It isn't consceivable that by the end of 1942 the Axis would have controlled all of the Mediteranean and Middle East in addition to continental Europe.

The USSR, presumably, would have gone through Afghanistan in Northern India and, even with the possibility of the United States entering the war, the UK would have been on the ropes.

As you said, no Allied invasion of continental Europe would have been possible and with Gibraltar and the Suez Canal in Axis hands the only Allied landings likely to succeed would have been Morocco -- and even at that it should have been easily reinforced by the Axis and the landing forces, distant from lines of supply and with little air support, would probably have eventually had to be withdrawn.

The historian Steve Ambrose discussed this situation, of an Axis where German and the USSR cooperated, with Japan in Asia, and in his view it would have ushered in a "New dark age of fascist dominance." I think that's a sound assessment.

-- One of Hitler's reasons, totally erroneous, was that the UK would, sooner or later, turn to a pro-Axis government and become part of his alliance after he'd conquered the USSR.

In late 1940 that view made sense not only to Hitler but to many other people as well. It's understandable that they underestimate the USSR and also failed to see the Nazi's self-defeating policies regarding the tens of millions of newly conquered eastern people. I'm convinced that, had they treated them sensibly the Axis could well have succeeded in the USSR. By succeed I mean conquering all of European Russia and forcing peace on what remained of the USSR. As it was, the German ranks were replenished with approximately 1,000,000 troops raised from the conquered eastern territories.

I guess the way to simulate a sensible occupation policy in a scenario would be to not include Soviet Partisans.

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

@ JerseyJohn:

Basically Hitler wanted the Russians to join, but (as you say) the Russians wanted to much territorial gains for themselves. You mentioned that Norway/Finnland issue.. I read about that as well. But after what I read the Russians wanted even more. There is a northeastern part of Romania (today Moldawia) called Bessarabia, and they wanted that as well (funny enough they wanted it since quite a long time.. the Crimean War started also due to a territory quarrel about that area). But giving it to the Russians means giving them access to Ploesti, and Ploesti was VITAL vor Germany (that the USA bombed to it to dust in 1943 was a severe blow for Germany, because they could not create the high-octane fuel for the fighters from coal in the same way as it can be created from oil). So there were no negotiations possible about that. AFAIK these negotiations ended in late Autumn 1940. Hitler gave orders to create a plan for Barbarossa in July 1940, but he officially gave to order to prepare for the campaign in Dec 1940.. so just a few weeks after the negotiations ended.

What you say about Hitler`s view on England: keeping in mind that he had racist view on people, he regarded the english people as kind of brothers.. the english kings come from Hanover (Lower Saxony), and guess who was Emperor Wilhelm II.`s Grandma? Right, it was Queen Victoria, also known as the Empress of India And I wonder why he just thought the english are our brothers.. the Germany and France have been one empire for a few hundred years, but noone would regard the french as our brothers

Quite a few historians say that the evacuation of the B.E.F. from Dunkerque was allowed and wanted from Hitler to enable the UK to keep its face and enter peace negotiations afterwards (but the underestimated Churchill`s iron will; obviously he did that mistake quite a few times, right?) Churchill`s famous "We Shall Fight on the Beaches" was held on the 4th of June 1940, directly after Dunkerque ended. By that time the english population didn`t want to fight, they wanted peace.. but Churcill didn`t let them. I`m damn sure that just without one of these two people the world would look different today..

What you write about the "sensible occupation policy" in the east: yes, that should mean NO more partisans in the USSR, but I think that is an issue for SC4 or SC5. But there could be even more: efficiency of the cities and esp. the two mines should be at 80% instead of 50%! Honestly I dislike attacking Russia in SC2, because the risk/reward relationship is not what I prefer.. but the game is done in a way that you have to deal with Russia. When I play the AI, I usually play VERY defensive in the east until I achieved everything else... and until then usually the Russians bleed themselves white. I usually play on 100%/+2, and if you see the red hoardes trying to storm Warsaw with 40+ units, it`s good fun.. usually they have so many units that they step on each others feet.

Anyway: very nice discussion.. and I`m happy that some of the people who usually kill every good discussion haven`t yet discovered the thread.. writing is much easier when one can have a strictly focused-on-the-topic discussion and don`t have to deal whith wise comments like "if you can read, thank God and Uncle Sam for it!", if you know what I mean

But I think we`re a bit of the track, I wanted to discuss Kuniworth´s marvellous Scenario. And one interesting thing about this Scenario (and why I like it): it`s more like plain Vanilla SC2 than WaW.. I carefully read what Terif wrote about Waw and why he doesn`t like it, and I begin to understand that he`s right. Almost every Fall Weiß game I played develops in the same way (research Tac Bombers, get experience and whack Russians until they´re bled white, research U-Boats and sink the whole Royal Navy, then drive along the english channel in Lvl 5 strength 15 U-Boats with the crew having a party because the Allied planes cannot hurt them anyway), and it has certain similarities of trench warfare with completely rigid fronts. I loved playing in North Africa and the Middle East, but it is no fun anymore because everything takes ages down there.. which is ridiculous, because when you see Rommels advance in 1941 and after the fall of Tobruk, these were some of the quickest advances ever. Once I leave Amman to the east to conquer Irak, Iran and Saudi Arabia, I should tell all the soldiers in that Army group to shag their wives one last time, and they`ll see their sons being able to walk when they come back... IT TAKES AGES!!

Of course there is Arty and AA in this Scenario, but to me it feels more like Plain Vanilla SC2. What do you think?

[Kuniworth]

Hey Strachwitz how about a MP-game?

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

I need to admit that I`m a total MP noob.. but why not? I think I`ll learn a lot..

The only problem with me is to find time.. I think friday evening might work.. since you live "european hours" as well, it might be possible..

I would prefer TCP/IP, and it might occur that you have to help me a bit..

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

Anyone in?

[Kuniworth]

Hello how about a game on saturday?

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

Sounds good... during the afternoon? My private E-Mail is mkollmann@t-online.de - the other one only works while I`m at work.

But be prepared: I have no facking clue how to start that.. I only played PBEM ages ago, and I didn`t like it. But I`m confident you`ll tell me!

[Kuniworth]

Hey Strachwitz, I need to cancel todays game. Maybe we can decide on a new time. Do you icq?

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

No, I have no ICQ... Just let me know when you have time.

[Kuniworth]

Originally posted by Hyazinth von Strachwitz:

No, I have no ICQ... Just let me know when you have time.

jawohl, pz-divison commander of Stalingrad.

[Hyazinth von Strachwitz]

Cool video by the way