Slitherine

DLC Grand Campaign '41

Selected level of difficulty: Fieldmarshall

I) Belgrad

1. Prestige at start: 3000
2. Bought Units: 2
1*Sdfkfz 232/8
1*Panzer IVE
3. Upgraded Units: none
4. Enhanced Unit strength: no
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading:
6. Scenario Result: DV in 14/18
7. Prestige at Scenario End: 2694
8. Impressions: Lost 1 Aux Inf while counterattack in rounds 5 to 6. Brought the 2 romanian Horse Units without great losses to belgrad. At first I thought that there is too much prestige, but the following scenarios of the campaign were harder than this one and I needed all the 'saved' Prestige. I think is an interesting not too difficult start of the campaign.

II) Metaxas Line

1. Prestige at start: 3644
2. Bought Units: Bf 109 F
3. Upgraded Units: none
4. Enhanced Unit strength: all possible units
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading: 1367
6. Scenario Result: DV in 12/14
7. Prestige at Scenario End: 843
8. Impressions: There is not much to say: Interesting scenario with bunkers and some english Units.
9. Special: Conquered Keranoti 26,14 --> get Captured Matilda II

After that I had the choice between naval and arirbone Invasion of Crete: Selected Airbone.

III) Crete

1. Prestige at start: 1693
2. Bought Units: -
3. Upgraded Units: -
4. Enhanced Unit strength: -
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading: -
6. Scenario Result: DV 10/15
7. Prestige at Scenario End: 423
8. Impressions: It is going more difficult: Had some problems to keep on living all core Units, but after overcome this crisis I won very fast. I think that this scenario was a little bit too easy in the end (for Fieldmarshall).
I did not conquer all cities.

I'm a little disappointed with the scenario start: I hoped that i become some aux Fallschirmjäger and decided for my self where to land this units, but all this units already palced and the greatest part of my core also can be placed on Crete.

IV) Minsk '41

1. Prestige at start: 1923
2. Bought Units: JU 87 R
3. Upgraded Units: Nebelwerfer to Wurfrahmen
4. Enhanced Unit strength: none
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading: 1
6. Scenario Result: DV 18/20
7. Prestige at Scenario End: 152
8. Lost Units: 2*Recon, 1*JU 87 R (grrrr!)
9. Bought Units after losses: 1*Recon
10. Impressions: I concentrated my attacks in the north. Captured one T34/40 (forgot where it was), but this one ist a stealth unit: it has no driving noise. The scenario itself was very interesting. I lost Brest-Litovsk after a counterattack while round ~13-15 from the woods south of the bridge 17,25. It took some time to retrieve some units to reconquer Brest-Litovsk (Conqured Minsk in round 15)


V) Smolensk

1. Prestige at start: 1402
2. Bought Units: Become a SE Panzer IV F
3. Upgraded Units: none
4. Enhanced Unit strength: none
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading: 36
6. Scenario Result: DV 17/21
7. Prestige at Scenario End: ?
8. Lost Units: 1*Recon, 1*Inf Wehrmacht
9. Bought Units after losses: 1*Recon
10. Impressions: Splitted Core into three groups:
first part (2 tanks 1 inf 1 art) gone straight north and at the top off the map go east to conquer vp city in the north,
the seccond small part (2 tanks, 3 inf, 1 recon) attacked over the bridge northeast of starting position (lost the inf on the bridge),
and the third and main part of the core attacked the east bridge, went over it, and helped the center group and merged with the center part to go finally to smolensk.
This one was hard. The counterattack from the east was easy too handle with 2 tanks and 1 tactical bomber but there are many tanks over the whole map - had much to repair and no really good weapons against the T34 or the KV near Smolensk (only the 88 is effective). And then the massive defensive line before smolensk: 3 (4?: i don't remember) Katjuschas... Had much fun with this excellent scenario. Think about buying another 88 and replacing the Mathilda II because it is too slow.

After that i had the choice between Kiev and Leningrad.

I selected Leningrad.

VI) Ostrov

1. Prestige at start: 2186
2. Bought Units: 1*Bf 109 f + 1* JU 87 R (To have a weapon against the heavy russian tanks)
3. Upgraded Units: The captured Matilda II was definetly too slow (3 field Movement) in the last scenario, so i replaced it here with an PZ III H
4. Enhanced Unit strength: none
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading: 125
6. Scenario Result: DV 16/18
7. Prestige at Scenario End: 300
8. Lost Units: 1*Recon + SE Pz IV F (Outschen!)
9. Bought Units after losses: none
10. Impressions: I went north with splitting my Core Units into 2 Parts: the west group was a little bit smaller then the east group.
The difficulty increased: I lost the SE Tank while the massive counterattacks of russian tanks and had some problems repairing because I had not enough prestige.
But this scenario was only a foretaste of what was threatening me next:

VII) Novgorod

1. Prestige at start: 1800
2. Bought Units: 1*Recon
3. Upgraded Units: none
4. Enhanced Unit strength: artillery + 8,8 + fighters to maximum
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading: about 100
6. Scenario Result: Work In Progress
7. Prestige at Scenario End: Work In Progress
8. Lost Units: Too Much
9. Bought Units after losses:
10. Impressions: You start in the west to conquer the towns in the East. In between are two rivers. And swamps. And heavy tanks. And much more. It's a little bit like 'bagration'.

First Try: In the sixth round I lost the 3rd Core Unit and had no prestige for redeploying. I supposed that I was going too fast or did something wrong and restarted the ecenario.

Seccond Try: After restart it was better. I'm in round ~10? (Fighting In the center and near novgorod)
and 'only' lost 1*Grenadiere and a Recon. But my prestige is 0. And I have 2 tanks with only one lifepoint and much more strucked units. There are massive Counterattacks - Huh! Just another KV! .
Is it ment to win this scenario?
to be continued....


Edit:
I just read the report of Longasc (viewtopic.php?t=29223 also playing on Fieldmarshall), and wonder about my bad results with very little prestige. Have to think about my tactics....

VII) Novgorod (Final)

1. Prestige at start: 1800
2. Bought Units: 1*Recon
3. Upgraded Units: none
4. Enhanced Unit strength: artillery + 8,8 + fighters to maximum
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading: about 100
6. Scenario Result: DV 18/19
7. Prestige at Scenario End: 201
8. Lost Units: 1*Grenadiere and a Recon
9. Bought Units after losses: none
10. Impressions: I finished the seccond try and have to say that after the counterattacks (from round 11-13) it's getting easier. So I will summarize: great scenario.

VIII) Leningrad '41

1. Prestige at start: 1701
2. Bought Units: 1*Recon, 1*Wehrmacht INF with SdkfZ 251/1
3. Upgraded Units: none
4. Enhanced Unit strength: only some airplanes
5. Prestige after Buying and Upgrading: near 0
6. Scenario Result: Dv 19/21
7. Prestige at Scenario End: 492
8. Lost Units: 1*recon
9. Bought Units after losses: 1*Recon
10. Impressions: After having fought my way through the 4? kv it went easy. The mass of artillery makes this scenario easy. But I like the idea to place the artillery in special positions. I just find it odd that they can be placed there undisturbed.