Can't encircle USSR on Hard, am I screwed?

[Oski]

Two games ago I played HOI2/DD/AA 1.1 unmodded on Hard/Normal, as Germany, and pretty much dominated the map. I got bitter peace against USSR and was taking over China when the game became unplayable due to ghostfleets.

With 1.2, I decided to try DAIM as well for a more challenging experience. I set the difficulty to Normal/Normal just to make sure that I wasn't totally crushed. I ended up dominating early on. France fell in winter 1939, which gave me the general impression that I was just going to do too well, and that wouldn't be fun.

Note that since I quit that game shortly after crushing France, I never invaded USSR.

So this game I set it to Hard/Aggressive. I did quite well against Poland and France, and Italy/Nat. Spain/Vichy France under my control were doing well in Africa. I even took Ireland, and I'm competing navally in the English Channel.

So come May 1941, I've got Nat. Spain, Hungary, Romania, Croatia, and Italy in the Axis, and we've annexed all of mainland Europe except for Switzerland and Portugal. We hold the entire Med., and I felt totally cleared to invade USSR.

I have 142 Infantry, 16 Mot, and 17 Arm. I have some infantry defending the Atlantic, but Nat. Spain and Vichy France are helping out a lot there, so I probably had about 120 divisions of my Inf on the Russian front, as well as all my armor and mot. Hungary has 45 Inf/1 Arm, and Romania has 47 Inf/1 Arm, also all along the Russian front.

USSR had 441 Inf and 20 Arm to start with. Now those odds don't seem all that terrible to me, since USSR typically has worse doctrines and policy slider effects to my understanding, not to mention a whole lotta territory to keep defended with those units, unless they want to risk a surprise attack from Finland or Japan, right?

What I did two games ago at the beginning was one tank blitz in Grodno and another in Kowel. The Grodno group moves to Slonim while the Kowel group moves to Pinsk. Pinsk is swamp, which slows things, but there are swamps EVERYWHERE in the USSR. Avoiding them seems pretty much impossible. And with my tank blitzes (made up of 6 Arm/3 Mot) we're not usually challenged.

Well, this time I was...and that's an understatement. I tried about 5 times. First time, USSR attacked Suwalki from behind me while I moved with the encirclement. They succeeded, cutting off MY supply and encircling ME. Second time I tried to avert that by attacking from Konigsberg to Alytus but my infantry, unsupported by tanks, just couldn't handle it. Then USSR attacked the weakened Konigsberg and took it. And they took Sulwaki.

Third time I managed to reinforce Sulwaki with extra tanks, and Pinsk became the impossibility factor. The armor simply...wouldn't...move. Okay, I get that driving through a swamp is slower than driving on plains, but seriously, 1 kilometer per hour? I'm American, so I calculate in miles, and I don't know of a vehicle in existence that actually clocks at 1 mile per hour in any terrain, regardless of mud content. And I know enough to know that 1 kilometer per hour is actually SLOWER than 1 mile per hour. So yeah, it actually takes tanks about a week to move from Kowel to Pinsk. Infantry move quicker (leading me to conclude that the armor must have been moving by the people in them actually getting out and pushing).

Seriously, that whole encirclement strategy really did work in 1.1 unmodded. Has swamp movement been seriously slowed somewhere along the line?

By my fifth try, I feel like I can at least put all this knowledge to use. I'll blitz Grodno and Kowel, Send some tanks back to protect Suwalki, while the Grodno group grabs Slonim. Meanwhile, Infantry move into both Slonim and Kowel, and then they move into Pinsk; the tanks just support them in the invasion.

That failed to. This time the southern blitz at Kowel got repelled. I simply couldn't take it. The northern group did better, and made it to Slonim, though they couldn't take Pinsk. After about a week, it became clear that I wasn't gonna progress there.

Now I can make progress in other directions...just essentially random directions here and there, mostly with my tanks. I've got a decent-sized airforce, all set to ground attack, which does good damage to retreating Soviets.

But I don't see any possibility of creating an encirclement of any kind. USSR seems to have 40 divisions or more in any territory that counts, and there's just too much swamp to formulate anything in fewer than 10 provinces to attain an encirclement. I can't hold 10 provinces so I can't see even considering that.

So how do others take on the USSR? Is it just infeasible on DAIM/hard? Do people produce WAY more infantry? WAY more armor? Meaning do I just need to start over with a different build strategy? Is there some encirclement strategy that I'm missing? Any help would be appreciated.

 

[PkK]

I was in a simular situation in my current game (custom difficulty: +50% MP, + 40% IC, +30% resources for Comintern, +30% MP, +50% IC, +40% resources for allies, +10% research for Axies).

I have been building some IC early in the game and done some fleet and airforce buildup. I didn't conquer much, but allied nat. spain, portugal, finland, hungary, bulgaria, romania. When the war with SU started they had overt 400 Inf, I had about 100.
Interestingly Japan had done really well early, they had conquered all of India by then.

The war started in '42. SU was very strong early on. Soon I lost some provinces in eastern prussia. Then they made a breakthrough near the place where Hungarian and Romanian territories meet, their spearhead reached Vienna and nearly ut off my troops with another spearhead going northto the baltic sea and berlin. However I was able to cut them off attacking from Romania, encircling and destroying about 100 divisions. In finland I was able to use aircraft to destroy some SU divisions. In 1943 I was able to advance (encirclement, first by attacking at the middle, then moving south to the black sea); meanwhile Japan had attacked SU and annexed Mongolia and Tanna Tuva. At the end of 1943 I had advanced to Sewastopol, holding a line that went north from there then west to meet Köngisberg. Howver Japan no longer did so well. UK was able to take back India. A large Jaoanese spearhead got encircled and destroyed by SU in Omsk! USA has taken parts of China.
Now it's 1944. I have nearly reached Omsk. In the south I have just taken Baku. Since the Japanese still hold Vladivostok (having lost most of China to USA and all of the small far eastern countries to UK) I hope for bitter peace to fire soon.

Philipp

 

[Vlasta]

The movement 1km/hour is the minimum possible in the gameplay. In real life, it could be even less. Cars and tanks in swamps generally have trouble with finding a path, not with moving itself. Imagine that you would ride forward for, say, 5 hours and then realize that you can´t continue because the ground is too unstable to hold tanks (altough it normally holds infantry) and have to reutrn all the way back and try another route.

The swamps aren´t everywhere in USSR, just on the middle front. This is both an advantage and a disadvantage. Disadvantage because you can´t make any effective encirclement in them, advantage because the troops stationed in there can get out really slowly (especially if your TACs do some logistical strikes ). Blitzkrieg doctrine says: "Find a weak spot and strike there, then ride fast and encircle the strongpoints". Swamps behind a river are far away from being a weak spot. Weak spots are in Lvov and Stryj in the south and possibly in Altyus and Grodno in the north.

Which offers two possible offensive plans:
1) Strike in both places, whole airforce doing Interdiction to acheive a breakthrough, then ride Lida-Bobraisk-Zhlobin-Vyshgorod (all plains, the progress will be rapid), keeping most of Arm behind (rapid attack causes riding through almost undefended land, so a few mot will be enough) to fight enemy counterattacks. In south, vast plains of Ukraine are ideal for tank offensives, allowing you full projection of their speed and power. The destination of southern spearhead is Kiev. After succesfully encircling the whole swamp, you just need to crush SOV inf with infantry attacks and bombing, but it isn´t really a problem Then act accordingly with situation.

2) Strike only in the south, let all planes do ground attack to destroy as much as possible of SOV southern force, rolling all panzers east while keeping your middle and northern front in trenches. (the middle is behind a river, but spending IC to build a few land forts in Konigsberg and Suwalki doesn´t seem as a bad idea - just in case the SOV would like to attack on the north). During encircling and bombing most of SOV southern army you can get pretty far behind Dnieper with minimum resistance there. Then turn north and ride to Moscow. Protect your left flank as it can be attacked by soviets moving eastwards to recreate a front. After capturing Moscow SOV capital moves east, so if you make it to Archangelsk, whole SOV army gets encircled

In both cases, fight only battles you want to fight, your org regenerates slower than enemy´s. If you run out of it, your offensive is doomed. Also, use airforce on places needed by the army - there is no need to bomb retreating divisions that are going to be encircled with your faster tanks, but bombing armies on your flanks can save you lots of worry.

I tested both variants with Arm 1.2, DAIM, H/F, both worked.

 

[Oski]

Thanks for all the feedback. I'll make a revised effort later this week, based on the advice here.

 

[Oski]

Well, I tried again this past week. I modified my strategy to eliminate reliance on any swamp-based encirclements. I was limited in how much I could do to reform my strategy, because I already had my forces deployed for war along the eastern front at the start of my saved game.

So I still essentially had to begin with the armor attack at Grodno and Kowel. From there, though, I exploited weakly-defended territories beyond, while bringing in infantry to try to secure what my armor siezed. The idea was to:

A) Keep Soviet troops in retreat and bomb them, and
B) Let encirclements develop themselves through breakthroughs and land grabs.

The strategy started off well on both angles, and I must have eliminated a good 40 divisions or more. That's completely a rough estimation, I didn't check numbers.

By the end of May 1941, though, org on my armor was just hitting bottom, making it tough to make progress, and the Soviets seemed pretty unending. They won a battle against 9 divisions of Mot, one of my backfill groups, and my retreating army made the complete assenine decision to redefine "retreat." Instead of moving opposite the incoming direction of the attackers, and instead of moving from the dangerous front lines to the safe German-controlled territory, my army of 9 Mot decided instead to move perpendicular to the direction of the attack, and into another at-risk territory on the front lines. So they were enveloped and eliminated.

In the end, it seems possible for me to win, but the micromanagement levels that I'd need to do, down to even ensuring that retreat routes meet the minimum qualifications of "logical" are a bit too much. I think I'll have to try it on the "Normal" difficulty level.

 

[bbasgen]

I have 142 Infantry, 16 Mot, and 17 Arm.

Ouch. Well, I can tell you already that you've lost.

USSR had 441 Inf and 20 Arm to start with. Now those odds don't seem all that terrible to me

What are you smoking? Those odds of 4 to 1 easily overcomes their ground defense penalty -- right off the bat. Not only that, but it overcomes any doctrine advantages you have -- momentarily.

Don't forget that war with the USSR is a war of attrition! You are playing right into their hands. Sure, at the outset of the war you can at least stand toe to toe, but that means you are screwed! You need to be able to totally dominate them at the outset, and preferably, never stop the domination.

Well, this time I was...and that's an understatement. I tried about 5 times.

He he he. Classic quote from a new DAIM player. Whenever someone tells me HOI2 is too easy, I tell them to play DAIM on hard: not very hard mind you, just hard. Seriously.

You see, DAIM is both good and bad. It is good because the AI builds extremely well: the closest you'll come to MP. Bad because, well, you have to be extraordinarily efficient in building and combat -- no flavor, no frills.

My first German DAIM game on Very Hard -- I lost to France. So don't feel too bad. :rofl:

Btw, reading about your losses -- that would be a good AAR. I mean, how often do people do an AAR about a loss?

Seriously, that whole encirclement strategy really did work in 1.1 unmodded.

LOL. You are playing DAIM now. Welcome to the big leagues.

Oh, and yes, you can definitely beat the USSR on hard. You really just need to learn DAIM. My most recent game on hard as Germany, I stopped playing July 28, 1944.

• Allies: Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Manchukuo, Mengkukuo, China, Spain, Romaina, Scandinavia, Siam, Vichy France
• Conquests: Post-bitter peace, all of Persia and Iraq; Eastern Canada from Texas all the way up to Minnesota to the entire USA eastern sea board
• Axis Conquests: Italy has all of Eastern Africa and the Middle East; Vichy has Northwest Africa; Japan has everything from India to Malaysia, Indonesia, and all of Australia
• Army: I had stopped making units for about a year or two, but I had 240 infantry, 23 CAV, 32 MOT, 9 MEC, 46 ARM, 13 MAR, 50 MNT, 17 GAR, 9 HQ, and 85 MIL.

 

[unmerged(56576)]

The Russians are tough even on Normal, the level I play, mostly due to their sheer superiority. I've already detected a few mistakes. First, attack them as early as possible; I do it on May 1941. Research Kampfgruppe doctrine before Barbarossa and ASAP, it will you get more needed ORG. Move slider to Standing Army, more EXP, more ORG. Interdict them constantly, etc... etc...

 

[Oski]

Thanks again for the feedback. I'll definitely try again within another month or 2. I'm debating whether to play it on Hard or Normal. I've generally felt that Normal is really just a bit too easy...I mean I AM looking for a challenge. But maybe that would be a good way to really make sure that I'm prepared for DAIM.

 

[e-stab]

I'm glad to see DAIM gives you a good bang for the buck.

 

[unmerged(103753)]

im my game on normal im seeing almost 360-380 divisions. ive got 187. ouch.