"All Hitler wants me to do..." - TOAW III AAR

[Crécy]

[Apparently it is only possible to open up the latest sitrep CSV file. Using the CSV processor found in the matrixgames' forums. Output file is in html format, but the guy made a file to make it possible to have it in .txt format instead. The instructions are so vague that I didn't get it how to do that.]

December 19th, 1944


6th SS Panzer Army sector

In the morning of December 19th, a motorized regiment from 1SS Pz division and an armoured battalion from Führer Begleit regiment launched an attack against St. Vith and took it with ease, finally connecting the 6SS Pz Army with the 5Pz Army beyond Our river. The attack left a pocket South of St. Vith including a mechanized battalion from 9th Armoured division.

12SS Panzer division eliminated the small engineer company located in Malmedy and captured it in the afternoon, while KG Peiper moved westwards. Skorzeny's 150. Panzer brigade was turned into a normal combat formation and it advanced towards Vielsalm with 1SS. 9SS and 2SS Pz divisions will be forwarded to Vielsalm. After taking it, the 9SS Pz division will turn North and take Trois-Ponts.

Near Monschau, 326. Volksgrenadier division pushed back 746th Tank battalion and trapped the 38th Cavalry squadron. 3PzGrn division made a move in the far north and started advancing towards Rötgen. Rötgen approach should relieve some pressure from the weaker line East of Monschau and Höfen.

Also Von der Heydte's Fallschirmjägers finally got in touch with own troops.




5th Panzer Army sector

116. Panzer division dashed West thirty kilometers ending with taking the important town of Manhay. Advancing further West would only result in getting cut from supply so the division will be used to either help taking Vielsalm or Trois-Ponts.

Most of the American troops of 106th Infantry division in the Schnee-Eifel pocket East of St. Vith surrenderd during the day, freeing the two infantry divisions keeping the pocket closed. They will be sent to close the St. Vith pocket. In the Southern half nothing really happened. Panzer Lehr will attack the heavily bombed Clervaux in the morning and hopefully make some progress in that regard.



7th Army sector

5FJ division cleared some ground around Ettelbruck. In the East the American combat command took the railroad bridge East of Echternach. Those sneaky combat commandses...




Positions at the end of the day


Things are looking reasonably good for now. I have around two days before Patton's first major reinforcements start to arrive from the South. Capture of St. Vith and Malmedy was a huge relief. Unfortunately Panzer Lehr's failure in Clervaux has bogged down the attack in the center too much and bastogne can be forgotten. For now on Panzer Lehr and 2. Panzer division will act as a buffer between Patton and the divisions advancing West North of Houffalize.

The gap between Houffalize and Trois-Ponts is starting to open up and after Vielsalm is taken dash to the West is a go. Trois-Ponts might prove to be strongly defended and might be thus bypassed but we'll have to see how 9SS Pz Division fares. The Americans have to be pushed across Werche river to screen the gap.

Allied forces have made only few attacks, mainly in the North and South. They've mainly settled for bombarding the German forward positions.

[Stealhead]

Originally Posted by Crécy

That's true. I only yesterday realized how to get access to the log files game generates. News and battle reports. Quite handy, especially the battle reports as it seems to be impossible to take a screenshot from the game, at least with Fraps.

My EVGA card came with a GPU control program it allows me to take screen shots.With a game like TOAWIII I just fully expand the window as it takes a desktop screen with this game.Most other games it just takes a shot form the game not the desk top even if it is windowed.

You could try pressing ALT+PrintScreen that should a take a screen of your active window that is default Windows no extra program needed.Maybe try that in a fully expanded window and you can zoom in on a certain point when you want to.Of course after you take the screen you will have to open Paint or a similar program paste and then save the file.But you could do that to take screens of a battle as it happens.Though arrows have this same effect without taking lots of screens.

[Crécy]

Originally Posted by Stealhead

You could try pressing ALT+PrintScreen that should a take a screen of your active window that is default Windows no extra program needed.Maybe try that in a fully expanded window and you can zoom in on a certain point when you want to.Of course after you take the screen you will have to open Paint or a similar program paste and then save the file.But you could do that to take screens of a battle as it happens.Though arrows have this same effect without taking lots of screens.

Yes, that works. Though the procedure perhaps would bog me down eventually: Prt Scr->Paint->Ctrl+V->save change to allied loss screen: Prt Scr->Paint->Ctrl+V->save. With the battle log file converter I can see turn's every battle and the losses for each side. Of course that's not the most optimal solution as it only tells which battle report is which by giving hex coordinates.

[Crécy]

December 20th, 1944

6th SS Panzer Army sector

A grim day for all fronts. Decisive Allied counterattacks push pack German forces while Germans gain only minor advances.

Allied motorized regiments with the support of armoured elements broke through near Schleiden east of Höfen. In the morning a weak engineer company plucked the gap but they were easily beaten. 3PzGrn started its attack in the far north.

Von der Heydte's Fallschirmjägers were eliminated completely and 12SS withstood a few attacks near Malmedy. Peiper's heavy Tiger battalion took heavy casualties south of Stavelot and they were forced to retreat. 9SS surrounded the American mechanized battalion in the morning but they were relieved in the afternoon by overwhelming attacks from the south-west.

2SS started its advance towards Vielsalm advancing five kilometers. Führer Begleit is short of supply and will wait for replenishment. South of Elsenborn the Volksgrenadier regiments are dealing with the remnants of the Schnee-Eifel pocket which are pestering the area. Peiper's armoured regiment crossed the river near Trois-Ponts to get in contact with the surrounded 116Pz division which suffered heavy casualties in the Allied counterattack.




5th Panzer Army sector

Counterattacks against all forward positions. As said, 116Pz division was surrounded and forced to retreat. 2Pz took casualties and was pushed back towards Houffalize. 26VG division took heavy casualties as well. Engineer company holding Gouvy was destroyed and the supply lines to 2Pz were cut. Americans also captured Hosingen and apparently crossed the Our river.

Panzer Lehr finally took Clervaux and will move towards Bastogne at once. Too little too late. Failure at Clervaux and failure to get more divisions west through Gouvy put the 2Pz and 116Pz at jeopardy. It doesn't look that good. And I fear I'm unable to send anything west at least for a day or two. And Patton is coming...



7th Army sector

Führer grenadier regiment arrived to the frontline in the afternoon. They will take care of that combat command and then prepare for Patton with the infantry divisions. 7. Army sector is the only sector where major setbacks didn't happen. Mostly because the Americans don't have enough forces to do really anything there. Neither do I on the other hand.




Positions in the morning of December 21st


It all seems to depend on how quickly Vielsalm-Gouvy gap can be opened. Doesn't look good. Doesn't look good at all.

[TorpX]

Did the SS throw in the towel, or run out of petrol?

I was kind of interested in this.



I take it there are other WWII battles in this game. Could someone maybe comment on the mechanics and such in this game.

[Crécy]

Originally Posted by TorpX

Did the SS throw in the towel, or run out of petrol?

I was kind of interested in this.



I take it there are other WWII battles in this game. Could someone maybe comment on the mechanics and such in this game.

No, towel hasn't been thrown yet. Though considering what kind of an utter and complete failure the offense has been it probably should be thrown. But I'll continue and get smashed by Patton.

There are scenarios for TOAW III from 19th to 21st century. And of course tons of user created scenarios which expand the scope even further. Over two hundred scenarios are included in the game. Scenarios vary on scope and detail. I think this particular scenario has the smallest scale with its 2.5km hexes (not sure though) and half-day turns. Then there are monster scenarios like Fire in the East which covers the entire eastern front from 41' to 45'. Any major battle or conflict, historical or semi-historical, most likely can be found in the scenarios.

If you have ever played tabletop wargames this is somewhat similar to those. Of course, as it's on computer all kinds of calculations is done by the computer and thus allows greater detail like keeping track of single vehicles and squads. Otherwise I'd call this a virtual board game. Game moves on in certain phases. Movement phase, combat phase, supply check phase and so on. Like in board games. Basically a turn goes on like this:

Movement phase: player moves his units, orders attacks, entrenchment, local/tactical reserves, air support etc. This is where all of your actions take place.

Combat phase: all attacks are resolved. Now, after combat is resolved you might get a message saying, for example, "40% of your turn remaining". The amount of turn remaining depends on how much time your attacks took. If you move a unit its full movement allowance and then conduct an attack with it, it will eat up your whole turn and when you hit 'resolve all combats' -button your turn ends after they are resolved. This is because it takes so long to move that distance and then to conduct that attack. So you should first conduct and resolve attacks with units that didn't move as it takes the shortest amount of time. Only then give units that moved attack orders. Thus you get the most out of the combat phase. I didn't realize this until couple of turns ago when I browsed through some TOAW guides.

After all combat is resolved it's enemy's turn.

Well, that explanation was a tad messy. Hope you got even a slight idea of the basic mechanics.

[TorpX]

Thanks for the rundown.

I have a couple more questions:

I assume many enemy units are hidden, so, if you order a panzer rgt. to head along a road for the next town, a hidden enemy unit could pop up, and there would be unexpected combat (or an ambush). Is this so?



How would you rate the AI? Does it provide a high degree of challange?

This seems like a pretty good game. I used to play various board games, like Avalon Hill's Battle of the Bulge, but have little knowlage of computer strategy games. I do have WitP, however, it takes way too long to finish that one, and the AI seems weak.

[Crécy]

Originally Posted by TorpX

I assume many enemy units are hidden, so, if you order a panzer rgt. to head along a road for the next town, a hidden enemy unit could pop up, and there would be unexpected combat (or an ambush). Is this so?

Yes, there is fog of war and what you see depends on your air reconnaissance capability and other various things. If you move your unit from A to C through B and there is an unseen enemy at B, your unit just stops in front of it. No combat, unless you order one.

Originally Posted by TorpX

How would you rate the AI? Does it provide a high degree of challange?

In my opinion it's reasonably good. At least I hope so, otherwise this complete failure reaches another level . It's nothing like Command Ops Battles from the Bulge level, which has the best AI yet seen, but nothing to complain. I haven't played that much in the end so consider these as first impressions. Perhaps someone else more experienced can give more insight on this.

Originally Posted by TorpX

This seems like a pretty good game. I used to play various board games, like Avalon Hill's Battle of the Bulge, but have little knowlage of computer strategy games. I do have WitP, however, it takes way too long to finish that one, and the AI seems weak.

The Operational Art of War III is somewhat generic though. You don't get a certain feeling for certain battles and scenarios as they pretty much look like the same. But on the other hand it would be unreasonable to expect stronger thematic feel for each era and battle in a game which can model three hundred centuries of warfare. And which game can do that? None. Also the air and naval operations are quite abstracted so for example the Pacific campaigns don't feel very Pacific. Still, TOAW III is a great game and more you get into it, more you'll like it. It's also fairly cheap, around 40e (for a matrixgames' game anyway) now and if you wait for a few weeks for Matrixgames.com holiday sale it'll be on sale.

[Crécy]

December 21st, 1944


6th SS Panzer Army sector

Monschau sector is mainly secured now. Allied forces were apparently redirected South towards Elsenborn where a fallschirmjäger regiment holding it was forced to retreat. The three SS divisions (1SS, 2SS and 9SS) advanced few kilometers. Allied 7th Armoured division came in through Vielsalm to reinforce the St. Vith front. It'll be hard neigh impossible to get through there in timely fashion. 116Pz division is cut off along with Peiper's panzer regiment.




5th Panzer Army sector

Allied combat command occupied Houffalize and cut off 2. Panzer division. Panzer Lehr dashed West but is too short on supplies to conduct any effective attack. Allied 3rd Armoured division appeared North of Gouvy and eliminated any chance of getting 2. Panzer division quickly back on supply. Recently arrived 15. Panzer Grenadier division will move to Bastogne sector rather than Gouvy.

Meanwhile Allied units are creating pressure in Hosingen where I lack troops. 26. Volksgrenadier is badly beating and ineffective as a fighting formation.




7th Army sector

Führer grenadier brigade forced the allied combat command to retreat and then moved South of Ettelbruck. They will eventually move West with 5. FallcshirmJäger.




Positions in the morning of 22nd



Offensive has been a complete failure. Bastogne should have been the target of the schwerpunkt. I should have concentrated forces there, pocketed Bastogne to not to give in to inevitable costly battle of it and drove West around it. Now I have only two divisions near Bastogne and most of my most effective fighting formations locked in and around St. Vith. Not to mention Patton who is knocking on the door already. Or the weather which is starting to clear...