HQ upgrades for Moscow 41

[Agent]

I'm playing through Moscow 41 on Classic in prep for Stalingrad (I never got around to Moscow 41 for some reason) and I'm hoping someone can fill me in on which HQ upgrades are key down the line as it doesn't look like you get a ton of points to spend after the first conference. I know one or two of the HQs mention that bridging is necessary but what about other stuff? I vaguely recall someone in the past mentioned you really want the upgrade that lets you reorg stragglers for free on one or two of your HQs?

Since Stalingrad is coming soon I'd rather not play through 2/3 of this one and realize I want to start over as I did the HQ upgrades wrong. So any tips?

[EgoVermin]

Recently played through on classic for all gold medals and milestones (but not every bonus objective). Here's my personal opinion:

Bridging is pretty necessary on either Southwestern Front or Southern Front for Barvenkovo - while you can technically get the primary objectives on time without it it is extremely difficult. Due to the sheer number of units you might lose in that mission it's may be best to get level 3 org for Southern Front as well. EDIT: Bridging is also useful for Northwestern Front for Demyansk and on STAVKA Reserves/Volkhov Front for Lyuban Offensive but I found it unnecessary.

Because Western Front is used most often, I would recommend getting maximum range on it (12 hexes) - this will be very useful for the ultra-wide front in the Rzhev offensive. The Kalinin front might need that too and the Northwestern Front finds max range useful in the Demyansk offensive.

Other than that, it depends on what you're going for; if you want to just win scenarios then the above advice should be good enough for both Right Wing Offensive and Left Wing Offensive as they are the only scenarios you might struggle with on Classic for victory. The rest have easy enough primary objectives. For gold medals, the bridging for Southern/Southwestern is pretty crucial and Set Piece Attack for STAVKA Reserves/Volkhov can help with the Tikhvin Offensive. Most other primary objectives you either start with or start close to so gold medals aren't too bad.

But if you want perfection then I'm afraid I can't help you: the Demyansk, Kursk-Orel Offensive and Kerch Landings have some utterly brutal bonus objectives and you're best off watching Night Phoenix or Hexaboo on youtube for advice on those as they are the only guys I know of that play for perfection on Classic and above.

Ultimately the only other advice I can give you is to not put anything into the Leningrad front - it has a mostly supporting role for both of the scenarios it appears in and suppressive fire is good enough for it already. And don't forget the artillery preparation card! Used correctly (usually on the first turn) it can wipe out multiple elite german units in a single turn and completely shift a scenario on its head - it allowed me to take Demyansk on turn 3 on classic on my very first attempt because I was able to wipe out three different german divisions near it on the first turn. The Bulganak Bay objective in Kerch Landing gives you one so going into that scenario with 2 will give you 3 for the final set of missions.

Good luck and have fun!

[Agent]

Thanks for the advice!

I played all the previous scenarios up to this DLC for perfection and all gold medals but I'm kind of intimidated by how hard everyone says this one is. I played until the second conference and kind of winced when I saw you don't get any extra points to upgrade HQs and buy specialists and steps, which I'd been counting on.

We'll see. Y'all are scaring me off the perfection goal though!

[Agent]

I didn't get offered the artillery prep card when I played through to the second conference but I'm going to start over until I get offered it at the first one this time. It does sound powerful!

[Agent]

My gold with bonus objs on Defense of Moscow cost 140 step losses.

lol.

[Soullessweare]

I may misremember, but I don't think Night Phoenix made anything near perfect choices for his HQ upgrades and he still succeeded. I think it's mostly the absurd casualties that makes people say the DLC is too difficult. Properly channelling Stalin will get you far.

I have nothing new to offer strategy wise.

[Agent]

Makes sense. I was frustrated at first because I was trying to use many of the same practices the other games taught us to use and the results were predictably non-optimal. Once I understood that I only need one more soldier than the Germans have bullets I have been enjoying myself a lot more.

[Agent]

All gold + bonus objective through Kerch Landing so far, I have 3 artillery prep and an airborne card so I'm feeling pretty good. I'm sure I'm about to take approximately 17000 step losses though.

[Agent]

Demyansk wasn't particularly difficult IMO compared to what I expected from the DLC's reputation, though given that the NW front had neither set piece attack nor feint and there were multiple cities with fully entrenched veteran german units and inherent supply on the city hexes.... let's just say it was a very bad day to be a Russian Sapper.

Orders of Lenin all around! Posthumously of course.

[3Form]

I haven't got round to playing much Moscow 41 (I definitely want to) but I remember not being able to do any sort of HQ activities in the defence of moscow mission because my HQ was constantly having to reorganise stragglers.

Does this make the third level of force pool upgrades worthwhile enough for other missions?

[Agent]

In my experience it would be useful for defense of Moscow on the West HQ and I could PROBABLY have spared the 50 it would cost, but I did it without the upgrade. The prestige or whatever its called is at a premium at the first conference so it's iffy. 50 cost is a KV-1 or a 203mm and a 76mm and the Russian units are total butt without the specialist steps so not sure if it's worth the upgrade just for Moscow.

I haven't gotten to Barvenkovo or a couple of the other post 3rd conference battle where the Level 3 HQ upgrade for stragglers is supposed to be more important so I can't comment yet, I have been saving those for last.

What does make things super mega more doable is as others have always said collecting Artillery Prep cards. I got one at the first conference, another at the second conference, and got a third for a bonus objective in Kerch Landing. Theoretically you could also buy one at the 3rd conference I guess but I didn't see one and you get a free Airborne card for another bonus objective at Kerch so you'd have to pass on that.

A bunch of your HQs should have Suppressive Fire only costing 1 command point post 3rd conference. That means you will get 7 or 8 free shots with artillery the turn you use the card (usually turn 1) and can simply obliterate 2-3 German units of your choice right off the bat. The only question to me is which scenarios to use it on. I used one on Demyansk and used another to start off Kursk-Orel but I think that maybe is a mistake as I'd only have one left for Rzhev and Barvenko, and those are supposed to be tough.

Maybe I'll try Kursk-Orel without using the Prep card. Those panzers are scary though! I have garbage units except for some cavalry.

[Agent]

Oh, the Russian Sappers had another glorious battle clearing entrenched-in-supplied-city veteran german units at Kursk-Orel. I would throw a parade in their honor but there really aren't enough left, it'd just be a couple of maimed vets limping down the street.

[Agent]

I gotta say I don't much recommend Kursk-Orel without Set Piece on the SW front, if you're keeping track for the future. It's certainly possible but you have to have a near full strength veteran unit with a sapper that you're willing to basically suicide into Belgorod. Because even a 7 step regular with a sapper gets 5-0 against the dug in troops there, and if you don't cause at least one step of suppression you don't reduce the entrenchment level. So you gotta suicide in the veteran engineers, then suicide in a set of regular engineers.

Alternatively you can play roulette with Suppressive Fire hitting the 25% to breach the entrenchment before it hits the 30% to ruin the city. I didn't want to risk it so I'm not sure if you can clear the city at that point.

On the other hand with Set Piece taking the city is trivial. So I think getting Set Piece on the SW front is a no-brainer.

[Agent]

I missed Zaporozhye by 1 turn on my first attempt at Barvenko (got the rest). It's obvious in hindsight that it's the only really difficult obj to meet in this one but whaddyagonnado. I'm sure it's possible to get there a turn earlier and just smash into the city human wave style but I'll probably use the airborne card I've been hoarding to cut it off on turn 3 since it THANK GOD isn't one of those cities with its own supply center, and that should mean it falls on 6 instead of 7 even without super optimal play. Assuming I can keep the airborne from disappearing from lack of supply anyway.

[Agent]

Finished it! I would also suggest getting set-piece for the Kalinin front before the final scenario (so at the 3rd conference). You can do it without it like I did, but taking Rzhev without it is pretty bloody and the city center has an elite german unit entrenched so you need a bit of luck to suppress a step with artillery without smashing up the city.

You CAN use the other HQ (West) in the battle to clear both Rzhev and Vyazma (I think it is) with set pieces and that's completely doable with planning ahead, I just messed up and had the veteran+engineer unit I brought over from Vyazma in the wrong spot through complete mismanagement. It's probably worth the prestige points to get set piece on Kalinin HQ so you don't have to worry about that and can start moving into Rzhev much earlier than I did.

I would have been suuuuper unhappy if I nuked the city on turn 10 and had to start over because I moved one unit to the wrong place on turn 9.