Summer Offensive 1915 Concludes
Almost four million losses for both sides. After a little more than a week of action, the total campaign casualties come out to 4,210,058 from the Central Powers and 4,167,371 on the side of the Entente. Of course, Verdun and Tannenberg only simulate intense front line combat, which was not the standard state of affairs during the war. A week's hard fighting since we last posted on June 15th has increased the total count from around 1,000,000 per side to 4,000,000. How does that tally up with the actual battles?
Well, for comparison, France had roughly 1,000,000 killed in action during the entire war, with 4,000,000 wounded. Germany ended the war with closer to 2,000,000 killed to 4,000,000 wounded, while Russia had somewhere in the region of 2,000,000 killed to almost 5,000,000 wounded. These numbers also don't account for captured soldiers taken prisoner, which were huge numbers in some cases - for instance around 92,000 at the Battle of Tannenberg, or perhaps as many as 250,000 during the Gorlice-Tarnów Offensive.
If we use a 1:4 ratio of killed vs wounded, and count perhaps 20% of the Central Powers 'kills' as captured troops with a smaller value for the Entente (as mentioned, a large number of Russian soldiers were captured during the Gorlice-Tarnów Offensive), the following numbers might emerge:
| Entente | Central Powers | |
|---|---|---|
| KIA | 640,000 | 800,000 |
| WIA | 2,560,000 | 3,100,000 |
| POW | 800,000 | 100,000 |
Historically...
In the actual battles, the total losses were closer to 480,000 for the Entente compared to 220,000 Central Powers casualties. If you missed it before, you can read a bit more about the history of the [url= https://steamcommunity.com/games/242860/announcements/detail/2420069741601592816 ]Second Battle of Artois[/url] or the [url= https://steamcommunity.com/games/tannenberg/announcements/detail/2394174043724297174]Gorlice-Tarnów Offensive[/url] in our previous news posts.
As for the balance of losses for each side, historically the Germans lost far fewer troops, despite their very successful offensive in the East. In contrast, in our campaign, the Central Powers have actually suffered about 37,000 more losses than the Entente. Maybe the Germans committed less of their artillery to the Eastern Front, and the Russian defenders were better able to hold their positions - it's even possible that the fortifications at Przemyśl would have proved more consequential if the Germans hadn't brought up their super-heavy guns.
Alternately, the Tsar was more decisive in ordering an initial withdrawal alongside urgent fortification of rear areas. The Russians fell back in good order to solid defensive lines, and the Germans overextended their strength, at the limit of their supply lines and unable to capitalize on their huge advantage in artillery pieces due to supply issues. There might have been a good deal of land captured, and the pressure on Austria-Hungary would still have been lifted, but Central Powers could have been far greater and Russian losses far less. Probably still a Central Powers victory, but not nearly as decisive as historically.
Do you have any theories about how the battles could have gone differently to explain this almost 1:1 casualty rate? I haven't touched on the Western Front here, but there are surely possibilities there as well!
We hope you all enjoyed this surprise event! It's been great to see people chatting about the event and the history of the two battles we were inspired by. Remember you can always visit the #history channel on our WW1 Game Series Discord to talk to other fans about WW1. There are some cool images and facts to be found there!
Verdun Shadowgaming Tournament!
Looking for more events? Shadowgaming (previous hosted by E4i) contacted us with the following initiative that we are happy to share:
More info to come on this one...
We'll end with congratulations to everyone who earned a Gold Summer Offensive 1915 Veteran medal!
And credit to player echo1 for the cool screenshot below!
