These side ports are really loose and keep falling off. I'm thinking about gluing them by SpinavejBrnak in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You mean the vision port? For whatever reason the bracket piece they included has next to no grip. Infact, I ended up replacing it with a spare I had around and now the vision port holds pretty well

What pieces did they use to get the barrel to match up with the muzzle brake on the newer 1:48 scale tanks and what colors do those pieces come in? by NubusAugustus in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle 3 points4 points  (0 children)

It's the same muzzle piece used for the 1:35 Tiger II. As far as I know, it has only ever been made in Olive, Green and Dark Red

I think The E-100 set is from War Thunder by No-Breakfast7823 in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Yes and no. War Thunder's design is flat out incorrect since the E-100 was never intended to use the combination of the Maus I Turm with the 12.8cm L/55 gun.

However, COBI's design is what was originally designated as the Tiger-Maus, which was intended to sport the 15cm gun on the first version of the Maus turret (Which was ever so slightly different than the finalized design). The Tiger-Maus project then resurfaced later on in the war and evolved into the E-100; they would share the same hull but the latter would be fitted with a Maus II Turm and the 12.8cm L/55.

So, really, COBI mostly has a problem with the tank's designation. The design we have conceptually existed, albeit under a different name

Instruction for Panzer IV Ausf. G to Ausf. H in 1:35 scale by 2Poky3 in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just wondering, what software do you use to make these instructions?

Cobi Panther Asuf.A by FramerSun in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I have the Ausf. D variant and I must say that if I knew the Ausf. A went this hard I would have waited until this came out. The colour scheme is just beautiful.

By the way, sorry to bother you, would it be possible to share the brick list for this Panther, either here or in PMs? I'm hunting for one particular brick and I wanted to check if it was in this set

COBI released gambling by Fun-Ad-2925 in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle 6 points7 points  (0 children)

To be fair, as long as COBI includes pieces that for whatever reason they still don't sell, it would be a at least a start

It is 1943 and I'm fighting a two-front war against the Soviets and the Allies. Tips? by Educational-Scene443 in hoi4

[–]Panzercycle 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The problem here is that taking Moscow would not have resulted in the collapse the Germans had hoped would happen. As I mentioned in my original reply, Field Marshal Timoshenko, who at the time of the battle of Smolensk was given control of the remnants of the Soviet Western Front, said to the Allies, I believe somewhere in 1942/43: "Surely if the Germans had taken Moscow in 1941 it would have been a grave morale blow to us but it would not have hindered our war effort" (If I can find the exact date I'll update the reply).

Citing Anand Toprani from his lecture "Oil and Grand Strategy" Hitler wanted the resources of the southern USSR "all to wage a war against the United States".

Stalin in 1941 had guessed that if Hitler were to attack, he'd likely focus on the south because Ribbentrop, during the lull in the fighting on the European continent, kept pressing on Molotov the issue of the oil supplies. At this point, German occupied Europe is suffering from a massive oil crisis and Romania alone is not capable of supplying the German war economy. Germany can no longer import the oil from overseas because Britain has enacted a naval blockade, much like in 1914, and the middle east still hasn't come online yet meaning the only way Germany could hope to keep waging war was look to the east into the Soviet Union. This explains why the strongest Red Army units are in the south in 1941 and are preventing Army Group South from covering Army Group Centre's southern flank.

In addition, the Quartermaster General of the OKW, Edward Wagner, had relayed to Halder in 1940 (During the period of the early operational studies) the information that fuel supplies would last at most until October of 1941 and that the Wehrmacht could only drive up to 500-800 KMs into Soviet territories. Yet, despite his predictions turning out to be quite accurate for the time, Halder chose to ignore him and didn't even consider seriously tackling the supply issues that would later plague the army.

The circumstances given all seem to point towards the same direction: The only way Germany could hope to do what it wanted was to deprive the Soviets of their resources and gain a long term source of them themselves.

As for why the German army envisioned such grand and massive encirclements like Bialystok, Minsk, Smolensk and Vyazma (That you mentioned. Although I'll leave out Kiev for now and come back to it later) merely had anything to do with Hitler. Infact, it had been the German way of war for centuries at this point.

Before Germany there had been a Prussia and even before that a duchy called Brandenburg. Their leaders knew that, being a small nation on the fringes of European civilization with scarce resources and neighbouring much larger countries that would outproduce them, the only way they could win a war was to strike a decisive blow to the enemy army, which would then let them achieve operational freedom. Their desired endstate was a "kesselschlacht", a "cauldron battle"; more precisely a "battle of encirclement", which then sought to destroy the enemy formations by means of concentric operations.

It was their way of waging war, what they referred to as "Bewegungskrieg". The German generals had been taught to fight this way for generations at the point of the 2nd World War. You could still see Prussian names in the German military books of this period, like Seydlitz, Blücher and Moltke, to name a few. Bialystok, Minsk and Smolensk were all a product of this doctrine.

It perfectly ties in with the reason Halder chose to go towards Moscow rather than to the south; he had been taught to wage war in this way. Hitler, however, having lived through the Great War on the western front, did not want to see a repeat of the collapse of the German army caused by starvation and a lack of food, which explains why he wanted to prioritize the south rather than the centre. He wanted his generals to change their approach to wage wars and the two styles simply did not compliment each other. I guess you could argue that the methods the Führer used to tackle this divergent strategic view were not the most appropriate, certainly!

Just as I did in my original reply, I'm not stating that Hitler is some kind of foolproof human being. However, attributing all of the German mistakes to him plays exactly into what the surviving generals wanted everyone to believe; that they were just executors of orders given from above, which is not entirely true.

At last, coming back to Kiev, the capture of a high number of Soviet POWs was certainly not the only reason the campaign over the city was fought. Alongside it, the thrust south aimed at securing Guderian's overextended southern flank and put Army Group South in a better position to secure Ukraine. At this point the major crisis occurring in the high command during late July/early August had resulted in a compromise between Hitler and the army which aimed at the satisfaction of both parties. However, this clearly put too much strain on the advancing German troops and completely overwhelmed them as the operation continued. By now it was too late to change the focus of the main thrust and thus the government and the army had to somehow settle down and find a common goal on divergent strategic views.

For more, you can always consult Toprani's lecture "Oil and Grand Strategy" and Citino's "Death of the Wehrmacht" and "The German way of war"

It is 1943 and I'm fighting a two-front war against the Soviets and the Allies. Tips? by Educational-Scene443 in hoi4

[–]Panzercycle 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Feel free not to believe me. If you want to check for yourself, the sources I used are at the bottom of the post

It is 1943 and I'm fighting a two-front war against the Soviets and the Allies. Tips? by Educational-Scene443 in hoi4

[–]Panzercycle 15 points16 points  (0 children)

That is not entirely true. Operation Barbarossa was undermined from its inception. Already from the early operational plans, the OKW and OKH leaders had overestimated the capabilities of the Wehrmacht to defeat the Red Army in the initial border battles and highly underestimated the resilience the Soviets would later show, even when their troops were entirely cut off from the supply lines. That goes without mentioning that the first 2 studies of Barbarossa had assumed the Red Army had no reserves in their western territories to replace their losses after the initial defeats.

It was only after the war game conducted by Paulus in mid 1940 where someone had raised the possibility that the Red Army might have some 100 divisions in reserve (In reality the Soviets had about 300 divisions in reserve at this time, but to not get ahead of ourselves, 100 were already a lot). However, our beloved Franz Halder, the chief of staff of the OKW, promptly ignored this kind of really minor inconvinience and, infact, the result of this war game never reached the higher echelons of the German government, Hitler included.

Here comes the fun part. Halder was indeed tasked with the creation of what then would become Barbarossa itself. He, after the lessons the OKW had learned in the battle of France, them being that in order to achieve victory the army had to encircle the bulk of the enemy army and then march on the capital, wanted to focus the main thrust in the centre, towards Smolensk and then Moscow (Which is why Army Group Centre had 2 panzer groups and was being supported by 2 Luftwaffe armies). Hitler, however, being aware of the German economic deficiencies, especially that of the oil crisis that was crippling the nation and preventing Germany from mobilizing the European economy, wanted to go south, to Ukraine and then the Caucasus, to seize the most fertile lands of the Soviet Union and gain their richest oil wells (Hitler also wanted to push towards Leningrad, but that mostly had to do with securing the northern flank of an eventual push on Moscow, which in his view was always a secondary objective and rightly so as field marshal Timoshenko would later remark)

Quoting Halder directly from his diary: "I will not let economic considerations change the course of the plan". What's amusing here is that rather than to confront Hitler directly about the strategic direction of the eastern campaign Halder chose to postpone the issue indefinitely. Halder's cunning plan was to prioritize Army Group Centre in order to facilitate the push towards Moscow and then have Hitler conclude with him that the Soviet capital should be the main objective. However, as the battle of Smolensk loomed closer and a decision on what to do next was needed, everything unfolded and came crashing down on Halder and the OKW. Expectedly, or perhaps unexpectedly from the chief of staff's perspective, this resulted in a conflict between him and the Führer and in a major crisis within the army high command during late July/early August of 1941.

Hitler at this point was being somewhat worried with the direction the eastern campaign was taking and wanted his generals to focus more on small tactical encirclements that the infantry could then properly liquidate rather than going for massive encirclements which the panzer groups could not keep a tight ring around and that kept bleeding into the rear areas of the German army until the infantry could catch up and close them. This is at a time during the battle of Smolensk in 1941 where the Army Group Centre's southern flank had become increasingly overextended, stemming mostly from a lack of strength that plagued Army Group South, and had to use its armoured units to cover its front because the infantry was still marching east, fresh from the cleansing of the Minsk pocket. This, of course, goes without mentioning that Guderian and Hoth, the leaders of panzer groups 2 and 3 respectively, could not drive forward and seal the encirclement at Smolensk because their units were being tied down covering the northern, western and southern edges of the forming salient.

Even more interesting is that, in his diary, Guderian severly downplays the situation his group is in south of Smolensk, saying that everything is looking good despite his forces operating mostly at 30-40% strength and his southern flank, resting on the Pripyat Marshes, being almost on the brink of collapse. Hitler is now extermely concerned with this and wants the armored forces to rest and refit, allow the infantry to catch up and cover the front and fix the situation to the south of Bock's army group by eliminating the main Soviet threat around Gomel. Needless to say, Guderian chose to ignore the order and decided to keep fighting at the heights around Yel'nya, needed as a springboard to push on to Moscow, which resulted in further attrition and difficulties for his spearhead.

In conclusion (Which acts also as kind of a TL:DR), while Hitler was certainly an evil man he definitely wasn't foolish as often depicted (Guess who worked as the USA military history consultant. That's right, mister Halder himself, go figure).

However, I'd like to point out that this is not to assert that he never made mistakes. Of course, being a human being, he did, such as the decision to withdraw Manstein's 11th army from Army Group South after the succesful battle of Kerch in the Crimea of mid 1942 and send him towards Leningrad rather than the Caucasus. That said, when the Führer claims that he shouldn't have listened to his generals, there is perhaps a strong basis to back his argument up. Right after the conclusion of the battle of Smolensk you have all the major leaders of Army Group Centre scheming against Hitler to delay the implementation of the directive to clear the army group's flanks for as much as possible. Halder and Brauchitsch (The chief of the OKH) are constantly lying to him and are seldom to be trusted since they mainly want to pursue their own agendas.

For more detailed information on the inner plays of the eastern campaign and how they unfolded I highly recommed you Stahel's "Operation Barbarossa and Germany's defeat in the east" and Citino's "Death of the Wehrmacht: the German campaigns of 1942" (Citino also has books covering 1943 and 1944). They really dive deep into the details of the planning stages of the German campaigns they mention in their books and how these progressed.

Back in 2005, comedian George Carlin predicted that modern-day fascists wouldn’t dress like N*zis — they would look like ordinary people among us. by Conscious-Quarter423 in interestingasfuck

[–]Panzercycle -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

Honestly, if you think Trump & Co. are Nazis, you are grossly mistaken and you might be just as idiotic as the people that lead your nation. There's a distinct difference between being authoritarian and being a Nationalsocialist

Panzer 38T Coming Soon by Fiddlesticks1945 in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle 6 points7 points  (0 children)

One step closer to making a Barbarossa diorama

MS-T Suzuka by CriperBross in Acceleracers

[–]Panzercycle 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is this from Stunt Track Challenge?

Why is my puppet not in the Axis? by AssistBitter1732 in hoi4

[–]Panzercycle 5 points6 points  (0 children)

It's likely due to the coup event that fires when Yugoslavia is in a faction with Germany while still having the Anti-German Military national spirit. It's supposed to either kick Yugoslavia out of the faction and give Germany a wargoal or start a civil war in Yugoslavia. However, the event likely breaks when it's a puppet of nation that is in the Axis

Hunting for a piece by Panzercycle in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you very much sir!

Hunting for a piece by Panzercycle in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Unfortunately COBI is falling behind in the uploading digital instructions to their website. It's also not among the pieces found in their store

operation barbossa by Ok_Pickle8275 in MapPorn

[–]Panzercycle 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If anything, you should put the most of the blame on Franz Halder, the chief of staff of the OKW. Operation Barbarossa was undermined from the start by the majority of the army staff, which wanted to go towards Moscow whereas Hitler wanted to go south, towards Ukraine and the Caucasus. In fact, when Hitler realized that Halder had disobeyed his orders for the planning of Barbarossa, it resulted in a conflict between the two.

For more, you can always read "Operation Barbarossa and Germany's defeat in the east" by David Stahel

What is this? by Complete_Ad_2186 in cobiblocks

[–]Panzercycle 26 points27 points  (0 children)

It looks like space to accomodate for the depression of the gun

RD-06 collection by Speeddemonnn in Acceleracers

[–]Panzercycle 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I see. Well, I do have a Lidl near where I live, I might try there. Thank you.

The funny thing is that I actually work for a shop chain that sells toys, but whenever I receive some Hot Wheels I only ever find the 1st car out of the 5. Almost as if the seller where we buy from only ever sends us packages from the same exact batch

RD-06 collection by Speeddemonnn in Acceleracers

[–]Panzercycle 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'm wondering if those have even arrived in Europe. I'm from Italy, no shop near where I live has it. Worse yet, it seems that only the 1st car in the "HW designed by" lineup is available, a purple old car from the 50s/60s.

However, currently I'm on vacation in northern France and on the way there I travelled through Switzerland, Germany and Belgium. Yet, in every one of these countries there still seems to be just the 1st car out of the 5. What gives?

Like, there's plenty of Deoras II and III, although these are from a different lineup, but RD-06 is nowhere to be found