SDN World 3 Commentary Thread I

[Minister of Pigeonry]

Thompsons were produced from '21, forward. The US didn't start using them until 1938, though.

[Steve]

I'm seeing some tank numbers being thrown around that are a bit steep. The most any player can have is 5 Armored Brigades, and that's if their Industry is 5 and their Army Tech is 4. That's maybe what, 250-300 tanks? 500 at most?

[CmdrWilkens]

Just to make a point of it in case anyone feels its an issue. I'm still learning SpringSharp so for the most part Mexico's exiting Fleet, particularly the pre-1920s ships, will be variants on actual Spanish designs. My working theory has been that since Mexico aided Spain n the war of 1898 the level of co-operation was sufficient for the two to allow cross breeding of ship designs.

So anyway if folks have an issue with me using home built variants on Spanish designs of the 1900s forward let me know. I'm still working on my full OOB but make no guarantees since the new kid (7 weeks and already 13lbs + ) is making my life extra hectic.

Long story short for those who want to plan based on rough calls the majority of my fleet is stationed out of either Veracruz or Santo Domingo. The Pacific and Baja fleets are there either for keeping an eye on Shroom's crazy Californians or for long range show-the-flag patrols in the Pacific supporting my trade in that region. All of my post 1920 Battlecruisers and Battleships will be in the Caribbean.

[CmdrWilkens]

I'm seeing some tank numbers being thrown around that are a bit steep. The most any player can have is 5 Armored Brigades, and that's if their Industry is 5 and their Army Tech is 4. That's maybe what, 250-300 tanks? 500 at most?

Figure 4 to a platoon, 4 Plt to a company, 3 Coy to a battalion, 4 BNs per brigade and a 5 Brigade max would yield something like 960 tanks.

[K. A. Pital]

500 tanks a max cap? Um... how much sense does this make? France had a 3000+ in 1920s of the FT-17 alone.

[Beowulf]

500 tanks a max cap? Um... how much sense does this make? France had a 3000+ in 1920s of the FT-17 alone.

Weren't, like, all of those tanks war production?

[Steve]

500 tanks a max cap? Um... how much sense does this make? France had a 3000+ in 1920s of the FT-17 alone.

Going by Wilkens' system if you had 5 armored brigades then you'd have 960 tanks. I was just horribly wrong about a brigade's tank strength. Though that strikes me as odd since in WWII some German armored divisions were reduced to like 100 tanks and that was considered brigade/regiment strength, I could be wrong.

[Steve]

192 tanks per brigade, going by Wilkens' system. I'll set the cap at 200 tanks per brigade.

[Beowulf]

I'm seeing some tank numbers being thrown around that are a bit steep. The most any player can have is 5 Armored Brigades, and that's if their Industry is 5 and their Army Tech is 4. That's maybe what, 250-300 tanks? 500 at most?

Figure 4 to a platoon, 4 Plt to a company, 3 Coy to a battalion, 4 BNs per brigade and a 5 Brigade max would yield something like 960 tanks.

Don't you have an extra pair of tanks at company level for the CC?

[K. A. Pital]

That makes no sense. The armored units define the number of tanks operated by said units. Not the overall number of tanks. In the 1920s, for a lack of theory of tank operations, many nations simply operated tanks within their infantry units.

Italy ordered 1400 Fiat 3000s - were it not for war's end, they'd be built. And if they are built, they are not just vanishing when a war ends. They continue service. And if there's a war looming, orders of 1000+ tanks are normal.

Going by Wilkens' system if you had 5 armored brigades then you'd have 960 tanks

Only if you had tanks only in said armored units. Like I said, that hardly makes much sense.

The USSR ordered 1000+ Fiat 3000 clones in 1927-1928 and actually constructed them over several years. Considering the Russo-Polish war in 1917-1920, and the production of Renault Russian in subsequent years as a wartime measure, I see nothing particulary outrageous about such a number of tank. I'm not building any new tanks.

[Steve]

You could have some of the tanks built, sure, but in active service with troops using them?

Seriously, Stas, we're all meant to share the same limits and obey the same rules. You really expect me to give you all those active-service tanks?

[K. A. Pital]

You could have some of the tanks built, sure, but in active service with troops using them?

You think France moved their 3000+ light tanks alone to reserve at war's end? I modelled my tank force somewhat after the real life Soviet Union (IRL the USSR could not build a thousand of FT-17s, but it ordered a 1000+ run of Fiat 3000 in the late 1920s), minus the civil war problem.

*hums* I have no problem in shifting most of my tanks (say, 80%) to reserve anyhow and bearing all the cost and time required for restoring them to frontline service.

In fact, had you noticed, those tanks, as well as their crews, are all kept in barracks in Moscow smack in the middle of Russia, nowhere close to any frontlines, and require a minimum of three months to bring anywhere.

Hell, the USA built 952 FT-17 clones since 1918 when the World War I already ended. Why? For what reason?

[Lascaris]

192 tanks per brigade, going by Wilkens' system. I'll set the cap at 200 tanks per brigade.

That's rather excessive. By comparison a French DLM had 259 tanks, with two 95 tank armored regiment and 69 light AMR tanks attached to the infantry regiment. A DCR had 163 tanks and a US Armored division 269 (3 tank btn of 59 Sherman and 18 lights each plus 29 lights on attached formations)

So I'd say a logical armored brigade for our purposes would be 2 tank and 1 mechanized infantry battalion (possibly using halftracks, the Citroen-Kegresse is already around for some years, or alternatively armored cars/a company of light tanks) or perhaps even only one of each in the style of the US combat command.

In any case no more than 120 tanks or so.

[K. A. Pital]

I'll be kind of abscent because my wife's condition suddenly got worse. War's postponed.

[Lascaris]

In fact, had you noticed, those tanks, as well as their crews, are all kept in barracks in Moscow smack in the middle of Russia, nowhere close to any frontlines, and require a minimum of three months to bring anywhere.

Hell, the USA built 952 FT-17 clones since 1918 when the World War I already ended. Why? For what reason?

We can always add independent tank battalions at corps level and it also makes sense allowing to attach tank battalions to infantry divisions after game start. The grand majority of French tanks after WW1 were in such independent battalions after all. Just need limits on the number of such battalions allowable at the start of the game.


On another note I just note on the rules that it's supposed to take 6 months to mobilize a reserve division. Since in reality it took about 2-3 weeks to complete general mobilization and then the reserve divisions were immediately thrown into combat without particularly notable differences in effectiveness something is... shall we say very problematic in said 6 months?

[Siege]

I thought the six months until full mobilization was only for peacetime mobilization, basically turning a reserve division into a permanently active one. In wartime presumably the activation of reserve divisions would be far quicker.

[CmdrWilkens]

192 tanks per brigade, going by Wilkens' system. I'll set the cap at 200 tanks per brigade.

That's rather excessive. By comparison a French DLM had 259 tanks, with two 95 tank armored regiment and 69 light AMR tanks attached to the infantry regiment. A DCR had 163 tanks and a US Armored division 269 (3 tank btn of 59 Sherman and 18 lights each plus 29 lights on attached formations)

So I'd say a logical armored brigade for our purposes would be 2 tank and 1 mechanized infantry battalion (possibly using halftracks, the Citroen-Kegresse is already around for some years, or alternatively armored cars/a company of light tanks) or perhaps even only one of each in the style of the US combat command.

In any case no more than 120 tanks or so.

I disagree and not just because I wrote the darn back of the envelope analysis. The problem is we are using the Brigade system when virtually all armies of the era used the regimental system which makes analysis difficult. A Regiment is almost universally compose of 3 Battalions (in turn composed of 4 or so companies or 3 or 4 platoons)...what is a Brigade composed of?

In the modern US system usually about 5 Battalions of various troops plus a Battalion of support personnel but we call that a brigade combat team. One must assume that an Armored Brigade will be composed exclusively of Armored BNs with perhaps some support troops. The number of tanks on the platoon level is an American practice so it wouldn't apply across the board however once we take that as a start point the rest of the math proceeds inevitably from there.

As an aside when WWI started divisions were almost always 12 Battalions (in 3 Regiments of 4 BNs or vice versa) and were down to 9 BNs by the end so that would account for some difference (though US Divisions were usually 18 BNs).


*Addendum* I wanted specifically to address your point about US Armored Divisions. Note what you stated yourself: 3 tank BNs plus units attached to other formations. 3 Tank BNs wouldn't be enough to form a single cohesive Armored Brigade under the system we are using.

[Steve]

I'll be kind of abscent because my wife's condition suddenly got worse. War's postponed.

I'm sorry to hear that Stas.

[Bluewolf]

I hope she gets better Stas. Take all the time you need.

[Lascaris]

*Addendum* I wanted specifically to address your point about US Armored Divisions. Note what you stated yourself: 3 tank BNs plus units attached to other formations. 3 Tank BNs wouldn't be enough to form a single cohesive Armored Brigade under the system we are using.

The British were the only ones using the brigade system in the current sense. And no western nation ever organized an armored brigade of 3 tank battalions.

Besides which the 200 tanks per brigade leads to obvious absurdities. That's roughly as many tanks as an armored division had. Put it together with a motorized infantry bde and you've instantly established an armored division no different than the German, French or US WW2 ones.

And when armored divisions come to being they will be what? 600 tanks each?

[Steve]

So my original impression was right? I figured 100 tanks/brigade was the proper amount.

[Beowulf]

An armored division that operated at the Corps level (as in with infantry divisions) would likely end up with their battalions cross-attached with the infantry divisions. An separate armored division must have infantry components.

[Coyote]

We need to remember that at some point, historical accuracy has to take a back seat to the ability to keep track of points. So when we're down in the weeds to the point of having to count tracks on the ground per battalion (and lets remember that there were differences between Company-size elements, too) we're just going to have to suspend reality for the sake of convenience.

We could, I suppose, create a system where we have "US style" divisions, "Asian style", and then "Western/Eastern European style" and think up the advantages and disadvantages of each, but then we're back at turning this into "Accountant tycoon".

[Norade]

Yes but 100 tanks per brigade limits industrial nations which have no reason not to have a larger amount of tanks.

[CmdrWilkens]

Making a couple points there is a bit of a problem here which comes to how we label things:

Lets start by substituting Regiment for Brigade since its easier for me to work with the former, take form it what you will:

The modern US 1st Armored Division contains the equivalent of 1 Armored Regiment (4 BNs), 1 Mechanized Infantry Regiment (4 BNs), 1 Infantry Regiment (4 BNs), 1 Artillery Regiment (4 BNs) and an Aviation regiment (4 BNs). All told that is 12 "Line" battalions, 4 arty and 4 aviation (helo). The Armored battalions will use the 4 per Plt, 3-4 per Coy, 3-4 per BN arrangement HOWEVER not all 4 Companies at the Battalion level will be armored. A given armored company usually counts roughly 14 tanks (3 Plts plus HQ pair) however even Armored Battalions will only include 2 or 3 companies (out of 4) that are armored as such, the others will be mechanized infantry using IFVs. So a modern Armored BN will only include 28-42 tanks...however a modern Mechanized Infantry BN will include at least one Tank company so they will have at least 14 tanks.


The point of the above, and its not designed to be some long string of math to perfect an analysis is that in almost all armies things above the Company or Battalion level are seldom clear and concise. Since we decided to go with the Brigade system for accounting we don't have a method to recognize that some armies might have fully armored BNs (that is 4 companies of Armor) while others might have mixed Armor/Mechanized BNs. The numbers I gave Steve were designed to reflect a nation that has such pure Armored units. The 960 maximum would represent an absolute saturation point for the 5 brigades you can start with.

So the question is going forward: Do we delve down to the BN level for cost in which case its easier to get a representative balance but which will make bookkeeping much more difficult OR do we continue to work with the Brigade system (and probably up the IBP cost) and let folks RP their degree of tank saturation.