Hearts of Iron 2; Axis Ardennes Offensive AAR

[Raptor1]

Double post?! You can start using emoticons when you get to octuple posts.

If your objective is to capture Antwerp, I'd concentrate on holding the line to the west while destroying the pocket. A drive to Paris seems rather risky, if those large stacks in the Allied salient are as powerful as they look, at least until the pocket is wiped out and all your units are on the front line.

[Krauter]

North and Center Army groups report success!

Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein +21



As can be seen, the elements that initially closed the encirclement have pushed hard for Lille. However, concerted allied counter-attacks means that control of the region is switching a lot, at once I saw us take control, 12 hours later to have it in allied hands, then 5 hours later in ours again!

Student, with help of one of the infantry korps of Army group center (can't recall the commander) helped gain control of Antwerp and eradicate a few divisions in doing so.

Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein +28



The pocket is crushed, thus freeing up many infantry units.

I plan on sending Student to capture Lille once and for all and using the other two units, the Volksturm units and that containing regular Wehrmacht units down to capture Luxembourge and Bastogne.

Hitler, being pleased at having us capture Antwerp gives us more supplies (we'd been running low on oil at the end of the last series of attacks) and orders us to stand firm!

Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein + 35



Beginnings of another encirclement around Bastogne. If I can break my units free of southern Germany and into Strasbourg I can possibly capture up to 25 enemy divisions

Should I stand firm after I've pushed back the Allied salient? Or continue pressing on to Paris and Troyes

[Krauter]

Just about to fire up Hoi2 soon,

Thinking of where to make my next move. I'd still love to end up pushing the Allies all the way back to Paris, but I know if I was making a full campaign attack (ie: In the road to war campaign with the entire map available) i wouldn't extend my forces that far without giving them substantially more secure supply lines.

As I see it; right now I have two options:

1: Keep throwing my infantry from southern Germany, as well as those in Collogne at the Bastogne salient and just push them back, while using my armor to push on to Paris. Hopefully with this option I don't waste too much fuel and become over extended.

2: Push 9th Panzer Korps out of Liege down into Reims and use the 5th to swing back south and East towards Germany to close a pocket around Bastogne and Luxemouge. The advantages of this plan is that I eliminate more allied divisions, but push two armoured units further behind the line from where I need them for if/when I attack Paris. That and they also have to attack across two rivers to create an encirclement.

Anyone else have any ideas, comments or suggestions as to what I should do currently as well as how I should further format this AAR?

I apologize if its not up to par with some others, but it's my first time doing this type of commentary

Cheers,

Krauter

[Egan]

Your doing fine! You know, I've probably wasted several thousand hours of my life playing HOI2 but I've never played anything but the grand campaign. This is most interesting.

If you go for Paris, are the allied troops in the north going to fall back and defend along the river? You could waste a lot of time, fuel and manpower fighting there. I think option 2 is the better one; every allied division you destroy now is one less you have to take on later.

[Krauter]

Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein +42



Good news and bad news once again.

Our units in the south of Germany have managed to take Strasbourg, although so far we've only been able to get a division of Fallschirmjager in place. I dont expect it to stay there after seeing what concerted allied counter-attacks can do (Lille is still being fought for in the north). Hopefully 5th Panzer Korps can get into Chaumont. Though at this stage it looks like they're bogging down for lack of fuel.

Bad news is that, as the Chaumont attack is a prime example; my armies are running out of fuel. In the north the Fuhrer Grenadier Brigade is a shadow of what it was at the start of the operation. Its units barely able to move due to lack of fuel. Even with the capture of two allied supply depots in Bastogne and Strasbourg aren't enough for my units.

Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein +49



As I predicted the Fallschirmjager Division wasn't enough to hold Strasbourg, hopefully Obstfelders Kampfgruppe will be able to last longer. Allied units in Chaumont are putting up stiffer resistance than I expected repulsing the 5th Panzer Korps twice before I needed to let them rest and wait until the 9th Panzer Korps could make it to the engagement.

On February 1st, the 9th Panzer Korps, with elements of the 10th SS Frundsburg Division with their King Tigers and Panthers attacked Chaumont a final time. Results were starting to appear better than before. However, the day after I ordered my Panzers into Chaumont to finish the noose I received news from OKW. Hitler considered this a strategic success and deemed that we had just lengthened the war enough for another assault into Eastern Europe in 1946.

[Safe-Keeper]

Nice AAR. HOI2 seems to have been a nice game, still happy I got 3 instead, though.