To understand just how badly I've fucked up this operation, one need only look to the "historical backround" pick in the last update. Apparently, in real life, as the tanks tried to come to the rescue, the Soviets still held Sokolovo. Me? Every unit I have is either destroyed or running like a bitch, with the exception of the newly arrived tanks. I don't control anything. The Germans still have 11 functional units. Facts need to be faced. There is no hope of retaking enough important squares to achieve actual victory. What we can do is use this tank platoon to run around and, hopefully, devastate as many mechanized units as possible before the tanks finally catch up to us. Obviously, APCs won't stand up very well to T-34s. They'll be pushovers if we can catch them alone.
To that end I head East, vaguely recalling getting attacked by a mechanized unit there. Then I remembered I was also attacked by armor in this general area, in that fight in which I burned up the one Panzer III then accepted the cease fire. Brilliant. I don't attack, since I'm pretty sure he's going to attack me.
WELL! That's that I suppose. I'm pretty sure this tank unit is Panzer IIs and IIIs. Panzer IIs are pretty much pushovers for T-34s. Panzer IIIs are more dangerous since they feature a real gun, but are still generally inferior. Thing about tank fights, though, is that luck plays a considerably factor. Sometimes you can get shot up and keep fighting. Other times, you'll take one hit, get caught on fire, and that's that. And they won't have any difficulties spotting us, even though it's becoming dark, since they have two units of APCs with them. This creates all sorts of problems, such as them flanking me with infantry to attack close range while the tanks keep me busy frontally, or the APCs that have cannons doing the same. All in all, we're completely outnumbered and outgunned and I reckon I've once again completely fucked up, and this operation will be coming to a close.
Here we are in Mirgorody again. I agonize over deployment. The first time we fought here, we sat in ambush in the forest, not bothering to move until I saw the tanks run far in the wrong direction, then re-emerged to capture the key point and slew the lone defending tank easily. This appeals to me here because I'm so outnumbered that the prospect of fighting a divided enemy sounds like my only hope. I could also put the square that's off the operations map to my back, ensuring I can't be flanked from that direction, then setting up my infantry forward as spotters, while my tanks stay back and be bigger, tougher anti-tank guns.
But that'd also kill the mobility of my tanks, sitting in the forest like that. It'd probably also lead to a great deal of dead infantry. I have another idea.
What I've done here is set up infantry in four corners around me to act as spotters against any incoming tanks or APCs. My tanks will sit in the middle until the enemy is spotted, then, being more mobile than shitty AT guns, will drive over to the enemy all at once and shoot them. This will be effective if they approach piecemeal or from different directions. It will be incredibly ineffective if they approach in a giant blob. It's tough to say. I've seen the AI do both. But even if they approach all at once in the same direction, we can attempt to use the houses as cover as much as possible, to inflict some casualties before we go down. The infantry will have hold fire orders so as not to get spotted and owned.
Let's DO THIS
That burned out Panzer triple and accompanying corpses, by the way.
It doesn't take very long for Mavrinskij to spot a tank coming his way. It's not really that dark out.
I move the tanks over. So far, we've got one Panzer III and one Panzer II. A few pot shots are taken, but they all land very short. Rage. Learn to shoot cunts.
The first shot that connects with Rahm owns his track. Excellent.
I was pretty nervous at this point. We temporarily lost sight of Dultz it would seem, and absolutely nobody was firing at him. He got two shots off that both connected and did some "equipment" damage. I probably would've killed myself if I lost a tank over something so ridiculous.
But two shots is all he gets.
They get shot up very badly, very quickly. Dultz, being on fire, is done for. Rahm's weapon no longer works, not that it'd matter if it did since we're all in proper hull-down positions, and his 20mm gun isn't going to penetrate anything.
The crews try to escape. Will they make it!?
No prisoners, bitch.
Now we've got that RUBIN asshole spotted. I've hated that guy since the moment I laid eyes on his fucking stupid name. He's approaching Mavrinskij from a different direction. Currently, the houses he's in are blocking the shot of our tanks. Need to move into position.
The enemy had meanwhile called artillery in this general area. We've had no real casualties so far, but Borisov's tank gets de-tracked by a lucky hit. Brilliant. He may be able to repair, but they probably won't start til they think it's safe.
Once again we have a Panzer II and a Panzer III approaching from this side, but also some APCs it would seem.
Rubin manages to get some shots off, but they miss. Probably hit a house or something.
The tyranny of Rubin has ended. Fradl drives into the forest, which makes it very difficult to shoot him. But by the same token he can't really shoot us.
Not sure where this guy came from, but there's a Panzer II right in our midst. He's heading towards Malchanov. Not really a big deal to be honest. It's not likely that he'll spot any infantry without infantry support himself, and he's not heading in the direction of our tanks so he won't get any juicy shots on our assholes.
Also Borisov's crew is now attempting to repair the track. It takes awhile, but he could easily be back in this fight.
Meanwhile Fradl's flanking maneuver fails. He's spotted and shot through the trees.
Over here this Roth guy is getting awfully close, but...it doesn't get into potato range and drives off on the trail through the woods.
Also multiple APCs are spotted coming from the exact opposition direction as the guys we're fighting now. They're not really close yet, though, and we've got business to take care off in our current position before we can jet.
Hordes of infantry try to make progress but are continually shot down by the tanks' machine guns. This is why we've never bothered attacking anything. Infantry out in the open just gets slaughtered by armor if it's not supported, and if we don't have many guns to counter it, then APCs are essentially the same as tanks for this purpose, if not WORSE because the can spot you more easily.
Crap. Those dudes are getting close and they're attacking in force. I'm worried that they may see and attack Borisov before his tracks are repaired.
Our work over here is pretty much done. A heavy APC is spotted, very far away, but I decide not to worry about it. It's pretty far even if it decides to come over here. We score a hit on it but don't bother finishing the job. More pressing matters. Also, the reason it's so light in some of the screenshots is because for some reason it becomes light whenever I pause.
Time to go! If they keep attacking, I'm confident Mavrinskij can handle the remaining infantry.
They've spotted Lanin by now and have inflicted a few casualties. Hold on pal, we're coming.
Hello friends! Also German artillery appears to be landing in this general area, which is good really. Might get some friendly fire.
Burning APCs, coming up.
This guy was de-tracked somehow, and he's sitting next to Lanin's house, firing his machine gun nonstop into it. The casualties are mounting. He doesn't have a cannon fortunately, but communism shacks can't withstand even lower caliber fire.
We actually take a hit at this point, from Fritz. His APC has a cannon on it. I tell everyone to focus on him rather than take any chances.
Bam. With him out of the way, the rest of these fools will get mopped up easily.
In other news, Borisov is back in action and we've been offered a cease fire! Well, I guess I'd better take it...
LOL JK
I'm going to hunt these fuckers into extinction. We may never have a victory like this again.
I get one of my tanks to go right over to the APC and save Lanin's squad.
It takes like four shells for some reason, during the firing of which he was still laying machine gun rounds into the house, but it's finally toast and we can begin mopping up this mess of infantry and GAYPCs.
Oh hay, look at this. Apparently, some infantry slipped by Mavrinskij and is heading down the road past Molchanov now, to an unknown destination. They got very close without seeing him. TOO CLOSE. Open fire!
Roth drives back, and eats a potato this time. No effect.
He's moving to support the ambushed infantry squad, and in so doing exposes his backside to my tanks. I begin moving them over. The infantry is mostly dead now anyway.
Dude's totally gonna die in one shot.
Or not. He actually manages to turn around and return fire.
Without being attacked by the tank, Molchanov has killed almost all of the enemy infantry without taking a single casualty.
We're now firing point black at Roth. Every shot penetrates, but we don't manage to inflict any real damage. It's getting strange.
Now he gets really close, and for some reason not only do we not do damage, but we just stop hitting. He manages to get a few side shots in on us with his 20mm cannon. I start sweating. His cannon is weak as shit, but we're also extremely close and I had difficulty initially getting my tanks to face him directly, so he was hitting the weaker side armor.
Like this. Fuck.
Okay, now we've got a guy flanking him. He'll surely die now.
Or not? The man just eats shell after shell, point blank, without abandoning the tank.
God FINALLY. I wish these screenshots accurately conveyed just how long that took. Shit was ridiculous. I want to say it took 20 shells to take this fuck down, and he's only a Panzer II. This is like that things I was talking about.
Also, I had Borisov run off on his own to intercept a commander APC that I had spotted trying to escape. Job done.
Suddenly Borislov is fired at. Turns out it was that heavy APC from the beginning. Rather than turn and run, I decide to close some ground and destroy it. Should be okay. A few good hits are scored, but it's not dead yet. I have the other tanks start heading over, when I turn back to see that for some weird ass reason Borisov has turned and exposed his side to the enemy. What? He should've just been sitting still.
I didn't see it happen since I was ordering the other tanks, but Borisov takes a hit and abandons the tank. FUUUUCK. Victory was almost flawless, and then pow. Lose a tank to pure fucking bullshit. To APCs no less. I raged.
Two of the tanks take forever, and another one arrives on the scene alone. I pay attention to him constantly so he doesn't turn away. Soon the first heavy APC goes down.
There's a few more APCs left undestroyed, but they're going to have to stay that way because the enemy retreats! VICTOLY!!!
Our casualties. Lanin's squad ultimately took 7, and he's now broken. One of the others took 3, probably from artillery, and we lost a tank. Borisov's saga is a sad one, and it really, really takes something away from what is otherwise probably my greatest Achtung Panzer battle ever. Let's look at the Germans.
The tank and recon units are broken, dead, gone forever. The one unit to survive is the mechanized infantry.
And these are the survivors. One APC with accompanying infantry is broken, and so is one heavy APC. Another APC survived but lost all of its infantry. I'll take it.
Back on the operations map, two of our lost units resurface. We have control over the one to the north, but the bottom one is AI I believe.
We replace Lanin's broken squad with another tank, and Borisov's busted tank with a tank as well. That's the extent of our replacements for this unit. Anymore tanks lost are gone forever. On the bright side, next battle we'll have 5 tanks on the field.
Remember Jaros? He's alive, but has a whopping one rifle squad under his command. I have no replacements to give him. Against mechanized units, he'll still be useful for calling in artillery and killing off their infantry, as he so successfully once did during the tragic battle of Sokolovo.
This is the AI unit. I don't have much hope for them. They're encircled so they can't replace their numerous losses and ammunition shortages, but at least they'll temporarily distract some of the German units, and hey, they may even do some damage before they die.
I'm torn between what to do now. I can't see very far on the map, so I don't know if there's any German units in range to assist these fags up north. My problem is that I really want to attack the mechanized unit and destroy them, one on one, but doing so may screw me because there's no way that Jaros isn't getting attacked by those tanks. It also may screw me because the Germans may be able to bring up units to assist the mechanized infantry, which'll then pit me as tanks at night, obliged to go on the offensive rather than repeat what I did last battle. Yet the prospect of easily crushing another German unit without losses is tempting. What to do? Well, that's for next update.