ok.. well I spent over an hour writing notes on my phone to post on the blog…poof.

 

This is the cliff notes version of that thwarted effort. Regardless of how hard I leant on the software she would not co operate. Bitch.

Well first off bringing in Reinforcements turn 1 is looking like a bad choice.

Correct it is a bad choice.

Unless you can force the Soviets to activate or PASS.
[in my game the soviets are facing losing a HQ so they might pass here..]

Since they only have two HQ (NOT THREE), they are spread out and many units cannot activate at all! This means allowing Soviets the chance to bring 12 new units on board and possibly more HQ is a BAD IDEA! Yeah bad all around. 12 extra units on the board is going to make the force balance very very poor for the Axis opening game time.

BOOM re start. Looks like the best option.

This is possibly shaping up to be a puzzle game. Play many times, solve once and shelve? This is a question I want to resolve. Replay value is important to me, and while I enjoy the puzzle game (John Hill was a master of these) it is not my preferred go to  style of game.

Lets take another look at a re start, and see what we find out on our first full play.

Now we need to know can the Axis function against the highly dispersed weak Soviet army  where they have just two HQ elements (1 in the North ; Sobennikov and 1 South – Konev).

This might adjust our game plan also.  The value in the plan may well be in avoiding the messy terrain of the North, and head 100% South, force closing the ‘borders and Lines of Communication (LOC) and starving out the bulk of the Soviet forces. Then thrust to the Southern VP towns. The more towns/cities we capture the less places reinforcements can show up. But first cafe –

ok lets do  this, and see what happens.

After some searching and re-reading of rules that are worded carefully but in multiple places…. we get down to this reboot!

Impulse 1 moves for both sides shown above. The Germans drive Hoth NE, and Guderian East and SE from Smolensk.  The Soviets shuttle/shuffle slide a little further North.

At this stage after two impulses the Axis are swarming villages and towns to prevent reinforcement and to isolate Soviets. The Soviets fixate on moving their Northern forces back when really a simple move to relieve Vyazma could have been achieved by moving a unit forward from North of Tula perhaps?

The entire soviet front is encapsulated by controlled Axis areas.

From a history perspective I have no issues with the broad brush approach. I’m sure we can quibble about exactly when and how much was isolated and how big a factor attrition was to the OOS units.

We need to seek some counsel on rules accuracy and game play. Poor Soviet player is in a bind. Partly of his own making…partly due to history.

At this point the Soviets pass and move one units, but still suffer attrition losses. the Axis pass also and look to Turn two to take on a Logistics pause. Where they will be able to count up VP locations, Non Heart level (exhausted HQ’s and Soviet losses to garner HQ replenishment, Replacements etc.

With 6 Logistics points, for both HQ and Replacements the Germans losses are replenished, and HQ’s rebooted to full.

The Kiev unit is released to the pool and the Germans take NO reinforcements, as they want to hold that initiative chit. Screw the Air… I’ll wait until the mud sets in, to get reinforcements and then go from there. Guderians team are threatening Tula, which could not activate and build defenses or be reinforced. The rest of the Soviets waste away. Hmmm. feel weird to you?

Black discs denote area control. The Germans fixate on city /village control to prevent reinforcement. They also prepare to lunge to Vorenezh. This cant be accurate, what are we missing.

The Soviets muster a counter attack, seeking to block supply for the Germans or at least put up a token resistance.

It is at this point that I realize that in the Logistics phase the Soviets and Germans both get reinforcements REGARDLESS of the initiative disc!! – Rule 5.0

• Recharge HQ
• Replace lost steps
• Reinforcements from the pool

Equivalent of your Logistics Value can be applied to EACH element above. So Germany – 6 HQ pt, 6 Rpl pt and 6 blocks.

Ok. Now this feels a bit better. We can wind the clock back to here:

Adjusting the lost units and checking a couple of other pics I took we can re create the correct situation.

We will work off of the Logistics value of 6 for the Germans and 8 ( I think it is ) for the Soviets. This is great as I was seriously concerned we had a big fricken hole in this game. Its not the game (yet)…..its just me being a dumb ass!

More soonest.

UPDATE – found another error. Suffice to say a reset is or was required. Sometimes being a moron is so painful.