TOAW4: Road To Moscow AAR and Review

 

TOAW4: Road To Moscow (Turns 4- 12)

Toaw4 is a classic wargame simulator that covers a large range of conflicts from WW1 to Modern era. I personally had the pleasure to get a copy of TOAW2 during summer holidays in August 2000. After that, TOAW3 and TOAW4 came with new interfaces and innovative dynamics.

I think it is time to dedicate a deep and detailed AAR to TOAW4 and explore its tactical and strategic capabilities. First, lets start with a relative short scenario of 26 turns, each turn represents a day and each hex represents 10 km.

The scenario deals with the attack of the Army Group Center with the objective to destroy the Red Army and reach beyond Minks as fast as possible.

The forces deployed for the AGC are quite well reproduced in this scenario:

Order of battle at formation for the historical AGC deployment

• Army Group HQ troops

537th Signals Regiment

537th Signals Regiment (2nd echelon)

• Panzer Group 2 (Guderian)

• XXIV Panzer Corps (Geyr von Schweppenburg)

1st Cav. Div., 3rd Pz, 4th Pz., 10th Mot.Div., 267th ID

• XLVI Panzer Corps (von Vietinghoff)

SS “Das Reich” Div., 10th Pz. Inf. Reg. “Gross Deutschland”

• XLVII Panzer Corps (Lemelsen)

17th Pz, 18th Pz, 29th Mot.Div., 167th ID

• XII Army Corps (Schroth)

31st ID, 34th ID, 45th ID

255th ID (Reserve)

• Panzer Group 3 (Hoth)

• V Army Corps (Ruoff)

5th ID, 35th ID

• VI Army Corps (Förster)

6th ID, 26th ID

• XXXIX Panzer Corps (Schmidt)

7th Pz, 20th Pz, 14th Mot.Div., 20th Mot.Div.

• LVII Panzer Corps (Kuntzen)

12th Pz, 18th Pz, 19th Pz

• 4th Army (von Kluge)

• VII Army Corps (Fahrmbacher)

7th ID, 23rd ID, 258th ID, 268th ID, 221st Sec.Div.

• IX Army Corps (Geyer)

137th ID, 263rd ID, 292nd ID

• XIII Army Corps (Felber)

17th ID, 78th ID

• XLIII Army Corps (Heinrici)

131st ID, 134th ID, 252nd ID

286th ID (Reserve)

• 9th Army (Strauss)

• VIII Army Corps (Heitz)

8th ID, 28th ID, 161st ID

• XX Army Corps (Materna)

162nd ID, 256th ID

• XLII Army Corps (Kuntze)

87th ID, 102nd ID, 129th ID

403rd Sec. Div. (Reserve)

 

 

Road To Moscow: -Preliminary Strategic Assessment- Turn 0

See a closeup view of the North area of Army Group Center composed of 9th Army and 4th Panzer Army.

 

 

Closeup view of the South Area with the 3rd Panzer Group and 4th Armee. A total of 11 air wings composed the 2nd Luftflotte as air support of the Army Group center. The total number of planes is around 1,000 including Bf-109, Bf-110, Junkers J-88, Heinkel He-111 and two Ju-87B Stuka air wings.

Bf-109 Fighter

Bf-110 Fighter-Attack Bomber

Ju-88 Level Bomber

He-111 Level Bomber

Ju-87 Stuka Dive Bomber

 

Global view of the front line. The final objective line is denoted in pink continuous line at the right hand side beyond Minsk city.

 

 

Road to Moscow: Turn 1

Severe loses for the Soviets after first turn. A 10% of the total rifle infantry squads and artillery.

 

 

Road to Moscow: Turn 2

After turn 2, the German panzers advance to encircle soviet forces at Minsk. An inner encirclement will be formed by the 4th and 9th Armies.

 

Road to Moscow: Turn 3

Loses after turn 3, mostly done in South area, in an encirclement of multiple Soviet divisions in a town close to border. The total loses of Rifle infantry squads are now close to 50% of the total force. The tanks divisions suffered severe loses, and more than 66% per cent of T-26s tanks were destroyed or captured. The armor forces are therefore reduced to 100 KV-1 and 200 T-34/76 tanks and some hundreds of lighter BT-7.

BT-7 Soviet Cavalry tank

T-26 light infantry tank

 

KV-1 Heavy Tank

T-34/76 Medium Tank

 

Situation after turn 3. In the north, the Germans are near Vilnius. They just need to turn southeast to reach Minsk around 100 km away.

 

In the South, the resistance of Soviet tanks at Pruzhany is broken. However, the damaged and broken railways can be a problem for German supplies. How fast the Germans can repair these railways is still unknown. So far very interesting game! I can’t wait to move forward. Any hints/ideas for strategic operations are welcome! Just write something or forward to friends interested in TOAW4 wargame too!

 

 Next: TOAW4 AAR Road To Moscow (Turns 4 -12)