McGuba wrote: ↑Wed Apr 17, 2019 11:39 pm
Although it might seen a bit nasty, I think it makes sense. In fact it is a built-in trade off with a purpose. Basically the Axis player has two choices: he either commits the majority of his units to the frontline to ensure a quick advance, but risks losing the control over the area behind the front, or moves forward somewhat slower with more units in the back to keep the partisans at bay. And of course the more successful he is, the possiblities are greater for the Allied player to make trouble in the back due to the large number of occupied cities. So it creates a more balanced gameplay even if the Allied side is about to lose as he can still strike back. Actually I was a bit surprised to see that it was fairly easy to find empty victory objective cities to retake with partisans and renagade regular army units as there were only a very few units left behind for occupation duties. Maybe a few more should have been left behind, even at the cost of a bit slower advance.
(Historically the Germans deployed a significant force for occupation duties: hundreds of thousands of Axis soldiers were stationed in occupied France, Norway, the Balkans, the Ukraine and Belarus. It may have made a difference if more of them were being used in the front instead, but only at the cost of losing even more of the vital supply lines to partisan attacks which could had had an equal or even worse effect.)
It was an interesting psychological effect, when you seem to have won in the East, but you do not feel this victory.
Use these notes, I hope someone will get better results in the next games.
I think that although I formally defeated the partisans in every single battle, strategically I lost the anti-partisan war.
I doubted if I had enough troops to finish the campaign in the East, so I could not single out the troops from the front. There were also losses all the time that there was nothing to compensate for.
Even if I selected a part of the units they would not be enough to guard all VP.
Therefore, I chose the tactics of mobile groups in the rear.
These were not proactive, but reactive actions.
When the partisans showed themselves this area was blocked by mobile units on the trains. And then the operation began to search&destroy the partisans.
Of course now I would act differently. If I had prestige (which was not at that time), I would buy more cheap security units.
As far as I know, mainly the occupation troops had a lower degree of combat capability, the quality of soldiers (old, with no experience, etc.) low level of weapons.
Therefore, they were not assigned to participate in important combat operations. These were conditional combat units. The so-called garrison divisions.
And of course, I think that after the capture of all points of victory, after a delay of 5 or another number of turns, the units of the Soviets should be disbanded.
Otherwise, it is possible to capture the VP on the last turn.
McGuba wrote: ↑Wed Apr 17, 2019 11:39 pm
Actually I did not even expect that the Axis would attempt to capture the Middle East after the capture of the Caucasus. Interestingly, a few turns earlier, when the Axis forces were aproaching Baku, Intenso wrote something that due to some of his ground units visible to me were already upgraded to desert versions, I could have learned about these plans. However, I honestly do not remember seeing them, but even if I did, in multiplayer game one can never be sure of the opponent's real intentions. As for example, what if he only upgraded them to desert versions to make me believe that he intends to invade the Middle East, in order the force me to reinforce it, instead of moving against Rommel's forces or to Tunisia? With other words, what if it is only a deception? "Seeing is believing" is not always the case in multiplayer. Which is of course one of the things that makes it much more fun than single player.
Yes, I remember how I showed a tank with a desert camouflage when repelling a raid on Dieppe, which I then went to the Caucasus and Iraq.
McGuba wrote: ↑Wed Apr 17, 2019 11:39 pm
But then again, as it is usual in multiplayer, the practise is always different from the theory: the forces that I sent to Tunisia were quickly discovered and eliminated near Tripoli as I did not expect it to be a major supply point swarmed with fresh enemy units (I was expecting that the most of the enemy reinforcements would be sent directly to Tunisia in the shorter route like I did and not to Tripoli in the longer but somewhat safer route)
Besides the fact that it was a safer way, unlike the McGuba game for the Axis, the Allies at this game had an advantage at the sea.
I used Tripoli as a short shoulder.
I upgraded units already in Tripoli, so as not to waste time on upgrades in Germany, as well as not to upgrade twice.
Because the sea route to Africa is quite long and during this time new models of units may appear.
It also reduces the risk of wasting prestige if the unit is destroyed during the transfer.
Also, when a unit arrives in Africa there is a choice to send it for an upgrade if time permits or to immediately enter it into battle.
Despite the fact that the ground path from Tripoli to Tunis takes time.
There were no huge numbers of enemy submarines near Tripoli
McGuba wrote: ↑Wed Apr 17, 2019 11:39 pm
and the Germans sent an expeditionary force down from the Caucasus immediately after its capture. In the end, the German forces reached Baghdad even before the British reinforcements could arrive there (as first I wanted to upgrade most of tanks to Shermans in Alexandria, but had to wait a bit until they became available) and thus at first I was disadvantaged. And then instead of attacking the Caucasus I had to go on defense to keep the Iraq somehow.
In the end, I think the German invasion of the Middle East was a strategic mistake: in my opinion those units would have been better used to help to finish the Soviets off, or even being used for occupation duties to ensure a faster defeat of the Red Army. But of course it is always easier to be smart in the end.
Yes, now it seems a mistake.
I also wanted to use strategic air recon to reconnoiter the zone of the Suez Canal, but I was able to do it only now, when a free recon unit appeared.
Since this is a test game, I wanted to try this option.
At that time, I did not yet know about the threat of partisans. And also if the war in the East as a whole could have been completed by turn 50.
That would be an opportunity to reinforce forces in the Middle East.
McGuba wrote: ↑Wed Apr 17, 2019 11:39 pm
Partly as a result of this, I have decided to reduce the hard attack value of most artillery units by 30-40%. Which means from now it will be harder to fully suppress an enemy tank unit with artillery and force surrender it. Even though in this particular case, it took me two attempts to do so. A few turns earlier I also encircled and almost fully suppressed it by bombarding it with 4-5 artillery, 1-2 bomber and a ship. But due to its high ground defense it still had some unsuppressed strength and despite a promising battle prediction, my attacking unit failed due to an unlucky dice roll. As a result in the next turn I lost like 2-3 units which were right next to it. Nevertheless, I decided to give it another go and this second time I was more successful. But I lost my own Tiger unit under very similar circumstances near Moscow in my Axis game. And the suppressive fire of enemy artillery was the main cause of many other tank units of both sides in this match and it describes the heavy tank losses of the Axis side. Which is not very good, I believe. I would rather see tank units being weakened first by air and ground units. I do not think it is right or very realistic to lose a full strength heavy tank unit in only one turn due to enemy artillery bombardment. Artillery shells should have little effect on heavy tanks. And even if we assume that a tank unit in the game also contains some soft and vulnerable supply elements like trucks and such, the tanks themselves should still be able to fight back after a heavy artillery bombardment.
I also think that perhaps it is also also be worthwhile to review and increase the combat capabilities of Soviet AT units.
In my mod, I planned to make a certain gradient for AT units. At first it is an ordinary unit, then a unit with Cammo trait and then it is a unit with AT support mode (like artillery).
The same is planned to be done in the PZC2.
Then such a unit can be a passive defense against the actions of tanks. He will be able to suppress part of their attack.
Of course, the range should be = 1.
This should be a multi-switch unit with a normal AT mode.
McGuba wrote: ↑Wed Apr 17, 2019 11:39 pm
Intenso claimed that he fears that German heavy tanks would become really invincible as a result of this, but I do not think so. Air units like strategic bombers and later war Allied heavy tank hunters will still be able to fight these, just as battleships. And artillery will still be able to suppress them, just not always fully. So that it would not be so easy to destroy them in just one turn.
Yes, I still think so

We did not have prestige to buy more such units.
But if he doubled. Having a few such powerful units together will be a very powerful force.