Building forts?

[TheDoctorKing]

I'm still having trouble with building forts.

Four artillery batteries and four supply units, with a leader, located in Tsarytsin. I have full military control of the region. The build fortification button is greyed out.

What am I missing?

[Grouchy]

Manual isn't right i believe.

On page 21 it reads: This is only possible by spending 2 supply units and 2 artillery units present in the region.

On page 45 it reads: Build Fortification The Force will expend two Supply units and four artillery batteries to build a field fortification.

I couldn't get it to work with those numbers so i combined all my artillery and supply in a test case...something like 8 artillery and 5 supply. With that combination i was able to build the trenches

[caranorn]

I expect it's actually elements that are counted and that they have to be at at least 50% strength. At least that's what I recall from other recent Ageod games...

[Grouchy]

From the files:

UID = 5
Name = $stc_nam_FortifiedLine
Text = $stc_txt_FortifiedLine
Bitmap = FortifiedLine.png

Z = 2
IsFort = 1
Supply = 10
NoRazeLevel = 2
InCityScape = 1

EltSubType0 = $Artillery
EltAmount0 = 8
EltSubType1 = $SupplyType
EltAmount1 = 10
....
...

[TheDoctorKing]

Which file is that?

I think I will make a little mod of my own...

Edit: looking at the file 1fort.str, it is stated that forts cannot be built in RUS. I know in ACW that forts are very destabilizing.

[Grouchy]

It's the 5FortifiedLine.str file

You are right forts can't be build in RUS but fortified lines can be built in RUS.

[TheDoctorKing]

OK, changed the numbers to 4 and 4 in the 5fortifiedline.str file and sure enough, the button is now available.

Thanks!

[Cat Lord]

Ow, the costs is surely a bug.

Do you have a "redoubt" icon after completion on the region ?

Cat

[TheDoctorKing]

Yes, fortified lines were built. And it cost 4 artillery batteries and one supply unit (with four elements).

Those White bastards had better attack Tsarytsin now...

[Clovis]

Yes, fortified lines were built. And it cost 4 artillery batteries and one supply unit (with four elements).

Those White bastards had better attack Tsarytsin now...

Let us know results about; I feel your values are too low as you could possibly transform Russia n another WW1...

[TheDoctorKing]

Having gone on about a dozen turns since then, I might agree with Clovis. I built fortified lines in Kazan, Simbirsk, Tsarytsin, and Novgorod. The whites have been stopped in their tracks - they come up and look but don't attack. I was able to send about 1000 points of troops to the Ukraine front. The only thing that's holding me back from total victory is my inability to do partial mobilization (reported in Tech Support area.)

Maybe 4 artillery and 8 supply would be better-balanced.

[Clovis]

Having gone on about a dozen turns since then, I might agree with Clovis. I built fortified lines in Kazan, Simbirsk, Tsarytsin, and Novgorod. The whites have been stopped in their tracks - they come up and look but don't attack. I was able to send about 1000 points of troops to the Ukraine front. The only thing that's holding me back from total victory is my inability to do partial mobilization (reported in Tech Support area.)

Maybe 4 artillery and 8 supply would be better-balanced.

I would say 6 artillery and 8 supply.

Partial mobilzation: bug fixed, but costs vigourously raised. all the save I've studied show player has too much ressources with the RC2 : unhistorical, and Athena can't face that too very well. So players will have to use mainly regional Policies rather than options, for a higher cost and revolt risk....

[TheDoctorKing]

I played about nine months of the Drang Nach Osten scenario, using my modification of the costs of fort production (4 artillery and 8 supply elements). I built fortified lines in Rostov, Kiev, Baranowicze, and Minsk. They proved to be useful but not decisive.

The big German pushes came at Kiev and Baranowicze. In Kiev, seeing that he was hugely outnumbered by the onrushing feldgrau hordes, Frunze and Southwestern Front retreated into the fortified lines and were besieged. The Germans managed to sneak a couple of columns across the river and the Ukraine Front had a number of battles in the Kiev/Kursk axis, generally managing to keep the supply lines open. The supply stockpile in Kursk slowly decreased during this period but lasted through until winter. The Germans never assaulted the lines.

In Belarus, on the other hand, Tukachevsky saw that the first German army approaching was equivalent to his in size, so he remained outside the fortified lines. The first 15 days of battle saw heavy losses for both sides, with two battles judged Red victories and one German victory. At the beginning of the next turn, I saw another German army approaching (gotta love those recon planes) and so Tukachevsky chose a conservative defensive strategy. The first battle was still a Red victory, but in the next we retreated before combat. I had left a garrison inside the fortified lines, hoping that they would interfere with the German advance, but on the next turn the Germans assaulted and cleared the position without enormous losses. Their tanks appeared to make the job easier for them.

Falling back to Minsk, also the site of fortified lines, Tukachevsky drew in a reinforcing army from the Northern Front (the Balts still being neutral) and dug in. The Germans took a turn to reorganize after their capture of the Baranowicze lines, allowing Tukachevsky's engineers to get him to a level-3 fortification. Some wandering Poles attacked at this point and were slaughtered, knocking another 7 or 8 NM off of Germany's total.

Then, the big German offensive developed in early August, with over 100,000 Germans assaulting the Minsk front in three large battles. Tukachevsky's defenders numbered about 75000 at the beginning of the battle. All three were Red victories with Germany losing something like 20 NM in all and about 40,000 troops. Tukachevsky made up all his artillery losses from the earlier defeat and more so by capturing some fine Krupp pieces (including a siege gun).

The Germans again attempted to move around the Minsk position and interfere with supply, but Stalin and some newly-raised troops were able to come down from Moscow and contain them around Mogliev. At this point, German NM is down to about 45 and Red NM is 180. I think it would be rather difficult for the Germans to do more.

The lesson about the forts is that the AI can and will assault them successfully, if they have a large superiority in numbers. If not, they will settle for a long siege. As long as the defending forces can be supplied, the forts will stop the movement of attackers very effectively. Putting them at choke points like river crossings is a very effective strategy.

I generally concur with Clovis' compromise in the RC3 of making forts cost 8 supply elements and 6 artillery elements. Using the cheap Red 75mm pieces, that's something like 20 WSU for a fort.

Edit: if you use Tachankas as the artillery elements, then forts are almost WSU-free. Hmmm.

[TheDoctorKing]

Oh, and I noticed that the elements you use for fort construction don't have to be done being produced. So if you see the enemy bearing down on you, and you are in a city where artillery can be manufactured, you can build six artillery units and two supply units, combine them into a stack, and build a fort with them in the same turn.

I don't know if this is WAD but it makes sense in a way. If the guns are going into static positions maybe the troops don't need so much training right away, or else they'll get their training while the fort is being built. Or something. This is an advantage to the defender, however.

[Alexor]

So...where are we now after several patches? How many art and supply to build a fortified line ? 6 and 2 ?

[daemonofdecay]

I generally concur with Clovis' compromise in the RC3 of making forts cost 8 supply elements and 6 artillery elements. Using the cheap Red 75mm pieces, that's something like 20 WSU for a fort.

That sounds good to me. I've played games where myself (as the Reds) and the southern whites spent more than a year in one long stalemate, a large chunk of my forces keeping him bottled up. Not only would more permanent fortifications have been created there, but the ability to do so would have been fun from a gameplay standpoint.

It also can help by giving the player a potentially failing strategy of investing in static forts and large garrisons while ignoring more mobile elements. Something I am prone to doing.

[Yarpen]

Actually, what is the difference between a "redoubt" and "fortified line"? According to my files, one needs 8/6 artillery to supply ratio and the second one 10/8.

[TheDoctorKing]

Redoubts exist in spaces that don't have a town while fortified lines are in towns. You need to go into the .str files in the gamedata\structures directory and edit both of them to require 6 artillery and 8 supply elements. Presumably this will be fixed in an official patch - this was the intent, and its this way in the manual.