Grand Strategy Hearts of Iron

[PorkaMorka]

Hurr durr, lets look at 1941, best German tank deployed in Barbarossa is what, Panzer IV (Pz.Kpfw. IV)? 25t 10-88mm armor, 75mm gun. Best Soviet tank? KV-2 with 53t 100mm max armor and 152 mm (!!!) main armament. Its like comparing flies to elephants really - soviet tank could one shot any German tank directly from the front from huge distances while German tanks couldnt even penetrate soviet tank rear armor from point blank distance.

KV-2 = best tank in video games, not best tank in real life. They stopped making it for a reason. Read more.

 

[Malakal]

Hurr durr, lets look at 1941, best German tank deployed in Barbarossa is what, Panzer IV (Pz.Kpfw. IV)? 25t 10-88mm armor, 75mm gun. Best Soviet tank? KV-2 with 53t 100mm max armor and 152 mm (!!!) main armament. Its like comparing flies to elephants really - soviet tank could one shot any German tank directly from the front from huge distances while German tanks couldnt even penetrate soviet tank rear armor from point blank distance.

KV-2 = best tank in video games, not best tank in real life. They stopped making it for a reason. Read more.

On paper it looks extremely good what can I say Im not actually interested in the subject of ww2 era tanks. For me as rpg fan stats matter a lot and this tank does have them.

 

[Cassidy]

Not sure in other games, but the KV-2 was super shitty in Men of War other than for taking down field AT guns and static targets due to its superior range, because of it being terribly slow and its turret being equally terribly slow to rotate.

 

[PorkaMorka]

Hurr durr, lets look at 1941, best German tank deployed in Barbarossa is what, Panzer IV (Pz.Kpfw. IV)? 25t 10-88mm armor, 75mm gun. Best Soviet tank? KV-2 with 53t 100mm max armor and 152 mm (!!!) main armament. Its like comparing flies to elephants really - soviet tank could one shot any German tank directly from the front from huge distances while German tanks couldnt even penetrate soviet tank rear armor from point blank distance.

KV-2 = best tank in video games, not best tank in real life. They stopped making it for a reason. Read more.

On paper it looks extremely good what can I say Im not actually interested in the subject of ww2 era tanks. For me as rpg fan stats matter a lot and this tank does have them.

Yeah but that gun isn't a real tank gun and that turret isn't a real turret. Also, the movement allowance is printed in red due to mechanical unreliability. Play a system that models tanks at a sufficient level of detail and the problems with the thing should manifest themselves.

 

[Average Manatee]

There used to be someone on /gsg/ (or the one on the /v/ days, not sure) who posted a hilarious fanfic on Stalin, Hitler, Tojo and the rest playing HOI2 multiplayer.

Reminds me of this:

 

[Raghar]

Nazi Germany supported Finland.

Not during the Winter War. In fact, Nazi Germany supported the Soviet Union then by embargoing Finland.

I meant war of continuation, Finland lost the winter war and he was talking about some win.

 

[Raghar]

that turret isn't a real turret. Also, the movement allowance is printed in red due to mechanical unreliability. Play a system that models tanks at a sufficient level of detail and the problems with the thing should manifest themselves.

It works great as a mobile pillbox.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Nazi Germany supported Finland.

Not during the Winter War. In fact, Nazi Germany supported the Soviet Union then by embargoing Finland.

I meant war of continuation, Finland lost the winter war and he was talking about some win.

In the Continuation War, the degree of German support is something GarfunkeL can explain much better. Whether or not the war can be seen as a separate war as it's traditionally called can be debated, but a key difference there is that Finland had two years to prepare for the war. In case of the Winter War, the government had neglected national defense for much of the 30's. On the other hand, during the second phase of fighting after the interim, the Red Army was also much better prepared and led than before.

And the Soviets still got their asses kicked so hard in 1944 that they again decided that conquering Finland would be far too costly in men and equipment. The grand offensive then is another one of those things that will make any grand strategy designer shit their pants when it comes to designing functional gameplay around it.


Incidentally, one thing that was sorely missing in HoI3 was the ability to sell and buy equipment ready-made, not just production licenses. This is relevant to this particular subject of discussion because Finland bought material from Germany during the Continuation War, most notably Messerschmitts (incidentally, the highest-scoring non-German Ace of all time is Finnish, Ilmari Juutilainen) and StuGIIIs (Finnish StuGs had a prepostrous 1:10 kill ratio).

 

[mondblut]

And what exactly makes you think that research doesn't include cloning technology designed by others?

That gets better and better. 30-50 years with blueprints, using the HoI2 terminology.

Manhattan Project also cost (from my un-biased source of the first result on google) $23 billion dollars to produce a nuke. Several times what North Korea could spend given that that is several times their entire GDP.

2 times, to be precise, given the $12B GDP of NK according to google. And since the NK population is pretty much left alone to feed on whoever they can catch, their gubmint can spend half the GDP on nuclear research alone.

Nearly every other country should be able to develop nukes nearly as fast as the USA did if they invest as much money into it.

Even France and GB did not, despite up to date education and faciliies, a plenty of bright minds and first world GDPs. Because they didn't have Einstein, Fermi and Oppenheimer working for them, duh.

Sorry, you just can't turn Pepe the Village Priest into Oppenheimer in 12 years, no matter how many jewgold you pour into him.

 

[Raghar]

That gets better and better. 30-50 years with blueprints, using the HoI2 terminology.

From what I seen, NK started with military nuclear research in 96. The work was intensified after sanctions. They used theirs dual purpose nuclear plant to manufacture test materials, and well it took them few attempts to get it right.

They are actually better than US, because after few years they reprocess their spend nuclear fuel.

2 times, to be precise, given the $12B GDP of NK according to google. And since the NK population is pretty much left alone to feed on whoever they can catch, their gubmint can spend half the GDP on nuclear research alone.

Well they needed money on missiles as well, isn't it. And don't forget Fertilizer. That has been theirs major spending, and you can easily find how much they paid for (fertilizer) non nuclear stuff.

Even France and GB did not, despite up to date education and faciliies, a plenty of bright minds and first world GDPs. Because they didn't have Einstein, Fermi and Oppenheimer working for them, duh.

Sorry, you just can't turn Pepe the Village Priest into Oppenheimer in 12 years, no matter how many jewgold you pour into him.

Well this is actually a great argument for research teams in HOI. Occasionally a people without school education that had talent appear, and even piss poor country like MAO China, could have some geniuses.

 

[Riel]

That gets better and better. 30-50 years with blueprints, using the HoI2 terminology.

From what I seen, NK started with military nuclear research in 96. The work was intensified after sanctions. They used theirs dual purpose nuclear plant to manufacture test materials, and well it took them few attempts to get it right.

They are actually better than US, because after few years they reprocess their spend nuclear fuel.

2 times, to be precise, given the $12B GDP of NK according to google. And since the NK population is pretty much left alone to feed on whoever they can catch, their gubmint can spend half the GDP on nuclear research alone.

Well they needed money on missiles as well, isn't it. And don't forget Fertilizer. That has been theirs major spending, and you can easily find how much they paid for (fertilizer) non nuclear stuff.

Even France and GB did not, despite up to date education and faciliies, a plenty of bright minds and first world GDPs. Because they didn't have Einstein, Fermi and Oppenheimer working for them, duh.

Sorry, you just can't turn Pepe the Village Priest into Oppenheimer in 12 years, no matter how many jewgold you pour into him.

Well this is actually a great argument for research teams in HOI. Occasionally a people without school education that had talent appear, and even piss poor country like MAO China, could have some geniuses.

Erm didn't the US invent Nukes?? I mean information does leak, "reinventing" nukes over 50 years later than it was first done is far far easier than it was originally. Germany was researching nukes too during 2ndWW, they just picked the wrong research path and didn't get too far. NK knew well before they even seriously started which was the right path to make one, just needed to nail down those pesky top-secret details, not to mention top-secrets do end leaking regardless over time to those really interested in knowing them.

Back to soviet Vs german tanks I just wnat to point two facts:
1) Before you start an argument about what is best it is *best* if you define what the hell best is. Best could actually mean what tank suits better for you to go to your wedding, in this topic I supose no one was thinking that but certainly some were comparing tanks 1 Vs 1 and others were comparing them with other criterias, hence the differnet judgements. All in al I think soviet tanks were generally earlier available than their german counterparts and easir to produce, while german tanks were far superior 1 Vs 1 once in the field.
2) I'v read german tank drivers thought Panther >>>> Tiger and at least in my wargaming experience I will take a Panther G over any other tank anytime.

Last KV-2 sucked, at least the virtual one I've played, it had the mobility of a bunker.

 

[gunman]

Yes, KV-2 was meant to be infantry support to blast through fortified lines, not meant for tank vs tank engagement.
T-34/BT tanks on the other hand were superior in mobility to their German counterparts, especially in rough and soft terrain, due to suspensions and lower ground pressure (PSI).

As for which tanks were better in 1941, I don't know why this is still debated by know. Can't some people search the net for some basic facts? There is a reason why Germans tanks avoided direct confrontation with the Soviet ones
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_encounter_of_Soviet_T-34_and_KV_tanks

 

[Overboard]

Can't some people search the net for some basic facts?

Can't some people click on the previous page to view a site with information from reliable sources instead of using wikipedia as their bible?

 

[gunman]

Give me a break, if there is something wrong with the specific article in Wikipedia just state it, otherwise bashing wikipedia just because an article doesn't suit one's views it's as absurd as having wikipedia as a bible.

 

[Corporate_Jew_Master]

Either way, the Soviets decided to focus on their current designs and mass produce them rather than upgrade them or invent new ones, much like the germans did. With their larger population and relatively safe industrial base it did serve them well.

Germany on the other hand had far less manpower but far more experienced and tactically skilled officers and veteran cadres. They could not afford to lose them or they'd lose their tactical edge. (which happened after Operation Citadel and the Battle of Kursk)

Claiming that in the beginning of Barbarossa german armor was superior to the soviet one is retarded. Stats overwhelmingly prove the opposite. But an army whose leaders are chosen based on their loyalty to the regime and military amateurs force their way into it's top echelons, from command to military production, is bound to suffer catastrophic defeats. That trend reversed itself as Stalin allowed his generals more autonomy (and Hitler did the opposite, with ghastly results) and allowed the experts he so brutaly persecuted in the purges to continue their work.

 

[Malakal]

More experience? And where did the German army supposedly get this experience? Polish campaign was 7 days of blitz and 28 days of sieging Warsaw and hunting down the rest of Polish army, in fact about 10 days of normal mobile campaigning there. French campaign was about 10 days of warfare and about 30 days total. So where? Denmark, Norway, Lowlands? German army being more experienced is a myth really. Soviets had a lot of time to test themselves in Finland on the other hand.

I am more inclined to agree about German leadership being better. But you know what? German army had HORRIBLE organization. Separate normal armed forces, SS, luftwaffe divisions, kriegsmarine divisions (like wtf air force and navy having their own armies?), with separate leadership and supply, and Hitler having to micro manage everything on top of that...

 

[Corporate_Jew_Master]

Poland, France and 1-2 years of crushing Russians in the epitome of Blitzkrieg is far more experience than what your Russkie recruit had. After all, the pre-war army was completely ahnilated in the first 2 years of the campaign.

 

[PorkaMorka]

More experience? And where did the German army supposedly get this experience?

The experience level of the Red Army officer corps declined precipitously during the Great Purge.

The purge of the Red Army and Military Maritime Fleet removed three of five marshals (then equivalent to five-star generals), 13 of 15 army commanders (then equivalent to three- and four-star generals), eight of nine admirals (the purge fell heavily on the Navy, who were suspected of exploiting their opportunities for foreign contacts),[28] 50 of 57 army corps commanders, 154 out of 186 division commanders, 16 of 16 army commissars, and 25 of 28 army corps commissars.[29]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge#Purge_of_the_army

 

[darkpatriot]

Why do people just keep looking at armor thickness, gun size, and maybe mobility to determine which tank is better? There are other factors that contribute greatly to how combat effective a tank is. Early war Russian tanks were weaker in several areas because they focused so much on getting thicker armor and bigger guns.

T-34 had a turret crew of 2 men(this was a decision made to be able to put more armor and firepower in the turret). This makes the commander also the gunner. This drastically cuts the tank crew's situational awareness(since the tank commander would normally be focusing on keeping situational awareness and directing the efforts of his tank). It also drastically cuts their ability to tactically coordinate and act as a unit(with the platoon leader needing to also focus on gunning instead of just leading his unit). This was exacerbated even more by the fact that the early T-34 had no radios.

As a result the ability of a T-34 tank platoon to fight effectively as a platoon was pretty low and German tank platoons were able to run rings around them tactically and outfight them quite handily. German Infantry platoons were able to run rings around them tactically as well.

And as for the KV series. It's mobility and mechanical reliability issues greatly reduced it's combat effectiveness. How impressive a tank is on the battlefield is much less important if you can't get it to the battlefield and keep it there reliably.

That's not to say that the T-34 didn't have innovative design features that became the standard later on but it had some serious design flaws that made it inferior to contemporary German tanks that didn't have those flaws.

If the Russian tanks were as great as some people want to think they are, They would have a better combat record. And it isn't just experience and training that made their combat record bad. Even when the experience and training levels evened out between the Germans and the Russians the Germans tanks were still getting better kill ratios and performed better in combat.

 

[gunman]

The myth here is that the German tanks were the best. From my experience, whenever I asked somebody with a slight interest in WW2 but not a layman in military history, he answered that he learned that the German tanks were the best.

In fact even in 1944, when the Germans have brought in to the scene their heavies, their engineers considered their tanks inferior to Soviet armour. I post here some documents from my personal collection in order not to be blamed I quote from Wikipedia.

Source:

Translation: discussion between Romanian engineers and Germans detaches, one from Wafen Amt (lt.col Ventz - designer of Hetzer) and one from OKH. The German engineer stated that the Soviet armor is superior both in quality and in quantity.

However such kind of discussions are futile, especially on Codex, it's like running the special olympics.

 

[Overboard]

You're right, anecdotes and opinions are more compelling than actual kill ratios and statistics.

You're certainly a good fit for the special olympics, since you don't realise we're not laughing with you, we're laughing at you.

 

[gunman]

You keep bringing in the statistics as argument when the majority of tank losses during the war were against infantry. To make a tank vs tank kill ratio during the entire war is impossible, one can only present particular encounters, and there are plenty in favor of all sides. Therefor the opinions are relevant, especially coming from a military engineer. Use your head and stop imagining things.

 

[Overboard]

You keep bringing in the statistics as argument when the majority of tank losses during the war were against infantry.

So the best tank was shit against infantry, therefore it was the best tank? Did you even bother to look up the previously mentioned site?

To make a tank vs tank kill ratio during the entire war is impossible, one can only present particular encounters, and there are plenty in favor of all sides. Therefor the opinions are relevant, especially coming from a military engineer.

So your premise is that nobody knows anything, therefore uninformed conjecture is the best option, yet it is your sources that are the best? May I suggest you explore a novel concept known as critical thinking?

 

[gunman]

So the best tank was shit against infantry, therefore it was the best tank?

You twist statements like a professional internet troll. Did I say somewhere which was the best tank? Perhaps you have the answer to this, you look very knowledgeable in this subject.
No, what I meant to say is that it is not correct to compare the total tank losses (no matter what type) as the guy in that site does, to say that German tanks were superior to Soviet tanks, because the majority of the losses were not from direct encounters between tanks, but from a multitude of other factors such as enemy infantry, artillery, aircraft, lack of fuel, breakdowns etc etc. I didn't know I have to explain like for a twelve years old, I'm sorry.

 

[Overboard]

it is not correct to compare the total tank losses...because the majority of the losses were not from direct encounters between tanks, but from a multitude of other factors such as enemy infantry, artillery, aircraft, lack of fuel, breakdowns etc etc.

So the SUPERIOR tank was worse against 'enemy infantry, artillery, aircraft, lack of fuel, breakdowns etc.' compared to INFERIOR tanks. What was it better at then? After all, if 'majority of the losses were not from direct encounters between tanks' then what exactly is your SUPERIOR tank doing?