Part 44: Turn 41: March 26, 1942

Sorry for the delay in getting this turn up, I've been incredibly busy lately and haven't been able to devote the time to getting some turns done.

No reinforcements this turn but we do pick up a new Guards Rifles. Since the % limit is based on manpower and not number of counters we can sneak in a few extra Guards formations if our oob temporarily swells or the number of men in Guards counters falls for a turn or two.



Speaking of number of counters, there are 25 cavalry corps in the Red Army and 17 of them are Guards status. Of the ones that aren't guards yet only a handful don't qualify, they're just waiting for the dice to roll their way.




The commander of the 56th army on the Volkhov front gets promoted. This guy is actually pretty decent, if he had a better initiative score and another point in inf or mech he might have been given a front to command.




This front is kind of a quagmire. In the north near Leningrad the lines are locking in, it is absolutely impossible for me to make any progress but the Germans will be able to dislodge me in a few months if they put their minds to it. In the south along the Volkhov front we're still making slow progress but if the Germans entrench into the hills a few miles behind the lines it will be incredibly hard to dislodge them until much later in the year.



The Leningrad and the Northwest front switch over to a completely defensive posture. With the mud starting next turn its time to consolidate our gains up here by digging fortifications back behind the lines. The 2nd shock army continues to relive the forces in Leningrad, now that we have 3 armies in the city I'm able to actually pull forces off the line to refit.

Also doing this hurts my eyes for some reason, I think it's all the purple highlights.



The Volkhov front on the other hand continues its offensive. The German line here is very lightly manned with only a few hard points that we're just going around. The question is can they continue to gain ground after a month or two of mud? Regardless for now they're in great shape and have linked back up with the Moscow M.D after being seperated by that lake which I don't know the name of.



And we continue our tour of the foreign regiments serving in the German army.




The Germans are gaining ground here but at a cost, there are huge gaps/weak points in the German line from where they've stripped troops for the offensive. Unfortunately I can't really exploit this because of the coming mud but it shows that this German offensive is a paper tiger.



Probably the weakest part of the German line right now. 6 divisions have been tasked with defending 100 miles of the front from 4 Soviet armies. I'm curious as to how they're going to respond to this, they desperately need more counters here or something disastrous is going to happen.



The Kalinin front adds depth to the line, if the Germans manage to continue to take ground here during the mud they will create an enormous budge that will be completely untenable. I think they're going to strip troops from this attack to shore up the ludicrously weak flanks here.



On the Western front we've got more weak German lines. We blast aside any resistance and flow through the gaps. With the mud coming the Germans will likely have to give up lots of land to fix these lines, dislodging my breakthrough forces would be extremely difficult.




Another huge German army here, again supplied by stripping the flanks.




The Germans here are in terrible condition and we're still making steady progress against them. There simply aren't enough counters to go around here and so weakened divisions are getting thrown into a meat-grinder over and over again to try to keep a coherent line.



More breakthroughs on weak sections of the line, this one nearly bagging some Romanian divisions. With the mud setting in I might get these counters even though I didn't manage to close the pocket.






The German offensive in the south is put to a stop as the southwestern front rips into it's forward elements. These Germans need to be refit, they are in no shape for continuing an offensive anymore.

With the land taken stopping this German army we are now 140 miles from Kiev.




The Transcaucasus front has been slowed to a halt by stretched supply lines and increasing German resistance but it looks like open season for the Crimean front.




The Crimean front advances virtually unopposed, all the formations in front of them are understrength, Romanian or both. I also snap a shot of the Grossdeutschland 'regiment.' They're nearly as strong as some divisions right now and the only thing they're lacking is tanks.




The southern front continues the trend and routes most of the units standing in their way, the only formation to stand firm is a hex containing the L.A.H and a panzer division. Even with less than 50 tanks these guys will be hard to budge from their fort.



The Transcaucasus front takes a little more ground but this is the end of it, they are completely exhausted and most of their forces desperately need to get off the line. I'm rotating in 2 armies, the 4th shock and the 18th to relieve them.



While doing my weekly tour of the front I run into that tank division I spotted a few weeks back. They've lost a third of their tanks and they've never once been committed to the frontline to suffer attrition, these losses are all from reserve activations. Well, activation, they've only been in a single fight since that last screenshot. On the plus side this is the last division sized tank formation in the Red Army so hopefully they'll get upgraded to a brigade soon and stop hemorrhaging tanks.



Near Moscow our campaign to keep the Red Army from being overloaded when the CP cap lowers next turn is creating a surplus of infantry divisions. I literally do not have enough armies to fit these units into so these guys will sit here for a few turns while some HQ counters I made unfreeze.




The mud sets in and the ice starts to melt, the fun is over. We had an incredible run this winter and now we've got a few weeks to refit and dig while we wait to see what the Germans are capable of this summer.



In the south a bunch of motorized divisions materialize out of nowhere and cut off an overextended division. Theres no risk of these guys being forced to surrender next turn but it is annoying.

And that's it for the Germans, I really didn't miss the mud.



Our line has transformed this turn to a much more defensive footing which is fine since offensive operations right now are basically impossible. We're going to consolidate our gains and prepare for summer.

We launched 46 attacks this turn with 38 succeeding and the Germans responded with 7 attacks and 2 victories.