Best way to amphibious invade? Also: keeping Russia out?

[Hudson]

I lost a huge mass of troops trying to invade England. Sure, I got ashore, but what is the secret to securing a foothold? I take it I need a town or a harbor city to ensure supply, but which is it?

All my units ran out of supply which is my fault but what would I need to get them back in supply?

Secondly is there a way to have Russia NOT declare war in 1941 or is that set in stone?

I am playing the NON GS mod version of the game by the way

[Samhain]

If an invading unit has a surface naval unit touching it it will be in supply and so will all friendly land units touching it. Russia will enter the war late in 41 whether or not you declare war on them. (Even though I read somewhere that they wouldn't have been properly ready for war until 1944.)

[schwerpunkt]

(Even though I read somewhere that they wouldn't have been properly ready for war until 1944.)

There is actually a school of thought that suggests that the USSR was preparing an assault on Rumania, at the very least, in 1941. http://www.2worldwar2.com/russia.htm
Some of the arguements provided by Russian authors in particular are quite compelling, in particular the very heavy forward dispositions of soviet troops and air units which dont make sense from a defensive perspective.

[JyriErik]

There is actually a school of thought that suggests that the USSR was preparing an assault on Rumania, at the very least, in 1941. http://www.2worldwar2.com/russia.htm
Some of the arguements provided by Russian authors in particular are quite compelling, in particular the very heavy forward dispositions of soviet troops and air units which dont make sense from a defensive perspective.

There's also anecdotal evidence which I have heard from relatives & others I've known who lived under Russian occupation in Poland and the Baltic states that in the late spring of 1941 Russian soldiers were saying that war with the Germans was coming soon and all of Western Europe would soon be under proletariate rule. Might have been idle boasting, but was said too often by too many to be totally a lie.

Jyri

[Samhain]

It's the first I've heard of this. A good plan no doubt, better than the strategy Stalin came to use, "We'll attack them everywhere and eventually we'll break through somewhere"*. The article did forget to mention of course the army purges of 1935 that devastated all ranks of Soviet officers. Without Zhukov for example the Soviets may well have lost I think. Anyway, if the code allows this (which I doubt, although computers and forums are not my strong point, tut mir leid anyone who I played by email**) it certainly would be better than the current Soviet entry which I can't understand. Then of course there's the problem of what the conditions for this would be which is another headache.
*The May/June 2010 issue of World War II magazine.
**I wasn't sure whether to send back the file they sent me or send a new file. Worse yet my hardrive was in a dreadful state.

[richardsd]

Except you are missing one crucial point, its designed as a simulation of WWll not a 'free' go at the period.

Which is not at all to desparage your ideas

[Plaid]

I lost a huge mass of troops trying to invade England. Sure, I got ashore, but what is the secret to securing a foothold? I take it I need a town or a harbor city to ensure supply, but which is it?

All my units ran out of supply which is my fault but what would I need to get them back in supply?

First of all, if you play non-GS game you don't have amphibious invasion caps and can easily overwhelm England with lots and lots of troops invaded all over the coast, England simple has nothing more then 4-5 good (non-garrison) land units. Secondary, surface ship (CV, BB, DD) supplies all connected troops to level 1, any english city captured will rise it to level 3, London gives 4 i guess.

Also, about Soviet Union. In GS its logical that soviets start their hypothetic european campaign in late autumn aiming for winter fighting, since at winter soviet units have advantage in attack and so are stronger. And historically question about soviet assault (especially in 1941) is really argueable. Yes, troops were deployed close to borders in offense-like formations, but they were poorly trained, reequipment with modern weapons were in progress and forces were peacetime - style spread (barracks with soldiers at one town, stockpiles with weapons and ammunition at another and transport/fuel at 3rd and so on)

[Samhain]

Except you are missing one crucial point, its designed as a simulation of WWll not a 'free' go at the period.

Which is not at all to desparage your ideas

It's far from free :) and that's an unmissable point. Or maybe it is but I play a lot of very open-ended games so it seems sort of deterministic to me in fact.
The winter, of course. I'm a little messed up today somehow.

[gerones]

It's the first I've heard of this. A good plan no doubt, better than the strategy Stalin came to use, "We'll attack them everywhere and eventually we'll break through somewhere"*. The article did forget to mention of course the army purges of 1935 that devastated all ranks of Soviet officers. Without Zhukov for example the Soviets may well have lost I think.

This is quite certain. The Stalin´s purges made the Red Army lose good officers. So, when the war with Germany began, the less experienced loyal officers plus the poor training and equipment of the russian soldiers made possible such an horrendous losses suffered on the first days of Barbarossa. There was a total chaos on the Red Army on the first hours of Barbarossa because of the unexperienced command of the russian officers loyal to Stalin.

Furthermore, as we all can read in the article attached by schwerpunkt, only 32% of the russians soldiers casualties were losses in combat. The rest were massive "surrenders" without almost fighting or simply they avoided being engaged in battle, running away far from battle. I mean "surrender" because many of the soviet soldiers didn´t want to fight on the Stalin´s side and in many locations of Ukraine the germans were welcomed as liberators.

Only the overwhelming USSR manpower allowed the Red Army to recover from such losses as well as the german supply problems plus the winter effects over the Wehrmacht.

[Hudson]

Well at any rate, just wanted to know how to keep my troops in supply.

So basically park a ship next to them?

[richardsd]

yes!

[patton]

Well at any rate, just wanted to know how to keep my troops in supply.

So basically park a ship next to them?

More than that, that all have to trace an unbroken line of hexes to a ship. If you can do that, one ship is enough. If you want to land somewhere that won't be connected, you need another ship for that corps.

[Hudson]

Ok cool. Last question

What kind of ship? Anything but a sub i assume?

[patton]

Yes, any surface ship. In the mod, Germany gets two (one BB and one DD). I think in the vanilla game it only gets the BB, but I haven't played that in a while.

The important thing is to make taking a port your first priority since supply one is really terrible. With Sealion, tou can't take London that easily in one turn or even two turns with supply one so it's best to start somewhere else. In the mod, the obvious choice is Southampton. In the vanilla game there is no Southampton and I go for Cardiff.

[Hudson]

Alright I have a small foothold on england, the problem is I timed it wrong and it looks like if the weather is bad I cannot disembark on some occasions?

[patton]

I think that weather only applies to "contested" landing, that is, offloading into an unfriendly hex. You cannot do that. However, you can offload in bad weather onto a hex you already control. So once you are ashore and you capture a few beach hexes, you should be able to bring in the rest of your army.

You can always offload into a port, which you should have after turn one or at most two of the invasion. When I play the mod, I use naval attacks and bombing to ensure that I capture Southampton the same turn that I land.

[Peter Stauffenberg]

That is not entirely true. In bad weather you can only unload from or adjacent to a friendly port.

[patton]

OK, thanks. That explains why I can always offload my troops in England, as every single corps tends to do through or adjacent to Southampton/Portsmouth. I didn't know about that rule. I just assumed that you could offload into any friendly hex.

[Hudson]

Ah ok I thought so. Dang. I need to expand my beachhead.