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Yea, I believe that the M10 performs much better against Ost than OKW. It actually fulfills its role against T3 but against OKW it gets hunted itself. |
Thanks. I haven't played much this week so I have no updates. My US only farm netted me 1 US commander, and 3 vcoh commanders (2 Ost, 1 Soviet).
I've been playing as only US since WFA came out and so far have only gotten US and Soviet commanders (among other things like bulletins and victory strikes). I'm now ranked 29 Prestige 1 and have been lucky enough to get all 3 US commanders.
I think I read somewhere that if you play as one faction, then the chance of you getting something for that faction goes up. But I know a lot of you on here have put in way more time than I have so I guess it all depends on how nice the RNG gods are.
Maybe there's a counter or something in the code that keeps track of when the last time you get a commander, and if you switch around then that resets? Not sure.. 100% pure speculation.
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Did you get all the US commander by playing US only or was it random..? |
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With German combat equipment, there are trends prevalent through the Jentz/Spielberger :
-They were reactive to tactical armor demands and would react quickly to provide them small quantities of the item that was demanded. These were typically cobbled together in a short period of time with available platforms/chasis and delivered. Very often they would just build a small batch of these and never build any more ever again.
For instance the Sturmpanzer Brummbar had a Self-propelled 150mm armed predecessor STI-33B that was ordered as a result of needs incurred during the Stalingrad offensive.
The AFV was designed, produced, and delivered to the troops in 3 weeks. IIRC there were only 2 dozen.
-Many exotic AFV were simply built out of leftover or worn chasis. The elefant was built of unused chasis of porsche tigers.
The panzer III/IV are quite interesting items and reflective of the German armored mindset. Both vehicles were very expensive for what they did (same price point as the late war Panthers) but had really excellent ergonomics and visibility.
I have seen the inside of the Panzer IV and there are 10-11 view ports, resulting in a tank with much higher visibility than the comparably blinder Panther. The design of the crew layout is really good, and intuitive. The interior is fancy and it looks like the tank needs a lot of finely machined parts. It's not just a cast job like the T-34 or the Sherman. |
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With Kursk- just like the summer offensives of 1941 and 1942 the Germans bit more than they could chew and their conducted their operations without really knowing the size of Soviet reserves (eg. Steppe front) and their military ability. Soviet production and mobilization was just too much for them.
They were defeated very badly at Kursk even though they knocked out many soviet tanks. (which makes them look pretty cool to some people) The German panzer forces did not even penetrate the soviet operational rear. They only bloodied a surface.
There are actually pretty substantive counterarguments as to the timing of Kursk- basically they conclude that the Germans couldn't start it any earlier, anyway. Soviet fortification operations started in IIRC, in March or April of 1943.
The thing with the Soviets is their increase in defensive and offensive combat power- it increased dramatically starting from the winter of 1942 onward with the deployment of their first 2 Tank armies from their STAVKA reserve and the formation of their first Artillery divisions.
The Artillery divisions were vital for Soviet deep penetration operations, and were formed by combining various formations together into one synergistic entity. Soviet artillery divisions increased to around 38 or so and 2-3 divisions were often combined with newly formed Guards motor divisions (Rocket launchers) into Penetration corps.
As far as armor went, the Soviets also started transforming their hundred plus independent tank brigades, regiments, and battalions into their proper armored formations- their tank corps and mechanized corps. They used their first 2 tank armies in winter counteroffensive of 1942 and this armored force was eventually expanded to 6.
There were also dramatic improvements to their sapper armies and anti-tank artillery forces.
Kursk was very much a watershred for a new way of war for the RKKA- They finally had all the components of deep operations ready, they just needed to test it in full for the first time.
With the Germans, they were simply swamped both by numbers and Soviet military innovations.
They attempted to concentrate their artillery with feeble Volks artillery corps and the experimental creation of the 16th Artillery division but they simply did not have the resources to compete with the soviets. |
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Jentz and Spielberger books have a lot of reprinted documents and orders about the Panzers. They are freely available if you simply search their last name on a pdf search engine.
I think the Germans had enough problems supporting the tanks they had in the field, let alone more of them. Any reading of a divisional history is largely rife with breakdowns, delays, shortages of fuel and ammunition for the tanks they had. High tank quality was important to them.
They did have some of major advantages over the reds as far as equipment alone went, though. They had a lot more communications equipment, mechanized infantry (halftrack mounted) and motorized infantry (Trucks) integrated with their armored forces.
The Red Army, although its operating elements were twice the size of the Wehrmacht in the East, used roughly the same amount of motor vehicles (with the Wehr biased towards smaller vehicles) during the war until 1943.
I believe the competition to retain and expand armored offensive ability rested largely on formation quality rather than weapons production- As the war went on, the German mobile formations largely deteriorated due to the circumstances they were in while the Reds improved, but did so from a primitive level after the collapse of soviet armored forces. (From Tank brigades, regiments, and battalions to Tank Army)
On the other side, improving tactical defense abilities and progressively heavier armed Allied troops made armored offensive operations less and less potent.
There were political problems, as well.
IMO, Guderian's proposition of 400 tank divisions was probably more about command structure and his desire to keep the Panzertruppen retained as a strategic and operational weapon. Infantry Generals often had the opposite interest- they want the armored forces more spread out.
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Flak Emplacement
• Cost changed from 130/25 to 250/10
This will make lw doctrine even more common than it already is. |
Maybe. More on this issue: Flak: German Anti-Aircraft Defenses, 1914-1945, Westermann. Good material, which was published. This is the PDF of the transcript:
http://www.theblackvault.com/documents/ADA380153.pdf |
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Yea, I agree generally although the air battles of the west had a significant impact on ground battles in the east. The LW was a rip-off, and controlled by the power politics of Goering, who took a much larger share of resources than his arm's impact on the war.
The Luftwaffe as an operational weapon was largely out of the skies after their LF-4's offensive at Stalingrad and Operation Citadel. The LW was also the German military's most expensive organization, as it consumed immense reserves of raw materials and industrial capacity that completely exceeded all of Germany's armored forces.
Then the greater half of the LW became embroiled in the air battles in the west, and then the FLAK arm became a massive organization that bleed resources and manpower in order to provide a degree of air deterrence.
Then we have the LW field divisions and a lot of lavish waste on them.
As for heavy FLAK, I don't think they were used as much as anti-tank weapons as typically thought. They were considered second line AT defense, used to plug gaps in the front when the panzerjaeger (anti-tank) battalions of German divisions were inadequate. |
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War production peaked in 1944 due to measures taken by German industrial sectors earlier in the war, especially after the failure of Barbarossa. This is explained in the book 'Wages of Destruction'.
You're right, Speer took credit of this in 'Inside of the third Reich' and in public (Nazi production miracle), and even convinced American interrogators of this. It's a myth.
But this added production came coupled with shortages of strategic raw materials and could not translate into increased combat power. The troops and formations of 1944 were of a much lower caliber than those of 1941 and 1942 even if the technology of their equipment was better. Mobility and fuel in their formations decreased and were cut across the board.
On the allied sides, the Soviet, US and British army were trained, equipped, and organized in a much more potent manner than they were earlier in the war. Armaments also similarly reached a high level for them. In the case of the soviets, they experienced a massive increase in combat power between the fall of 1942 to the beginning of 1944. Their artillery firepower alone quadrupled in expenditure rates. |
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