Well tonight I got to use my Late War Soviets for the very first time... Bucking the trend of newly painted armies, they quite literally steamrolled the German defence into the ground...
To begin, let me state that the German commander, Cyril, had one of his bad days with the dice... and I mean bad even for Cyril. So that helped the Russians a great deal!
The game started with a Soviet preliminary barrage that managed to pin all the units on the German right flank, most importantly a PaK40 covering that side of the table. Due to this, my initial probing force consisted of three T-34/85s with tank riders arrived opposite these pinned units and screened from the dug-in 88mm on the other flank. To oppose that, I sent in a party of Russian snipers to generally annoy it for the entire game... My initial turn saw me race forward while my snipers picked off crew on the 88 and my 120mm mortars kept up a constant barrage on a pre-registered target point on the crossroads, putting harrassing fire into the area every turn.
Sadly for the Germans their response was slow due to the pinned units and just as they unpinned, they then lost their Sdkfz 222 to a direct hit from an 85mm round and the tank riders leapt off the tanks to assault the poor unfortunate Pak40 crew, leaving no survivors. In return the Germans picked off one of the enemy snipers...
This kept up the theme as the rest of the Russian arrived later in the game. The tanks raced into the now undefended German right flank, able to race over the hill and take up position to ambush any arriving German reinforcements. More T-34/85s dashed forward and the entire Russian army poured into this gap. The only unit that remained on the Russian start line was a 203mm Howitzer that was brought into direct fire action in order to deal with troops in the first building pouring
MG fire at the infantry. In a rather shameful set of good dice, the howitzer not only hit the building with several shells, but did enough structural damage to cause it to collapse, killing all but one of its occupants.
Finally the German reserves arrived and a platoon of Volksturm decided rather rashly to charge the waiting Russian tanks. When the dust cleared one T-34/85 was burning from a Panzerfaust hit, but virtually the entire Volksturm platoon was cut down in the open by the tank
MGs and their supporting tank riders. For the Germans it got worse when the morale chit pulled for the tank loss was 'Endkampf' causing the Germans to take another handful of chits! Obviously the massacre of the Volksturm was too much for the men to stomach.
It was now almost all over... Some more Germans raced ont the battlefield in their Sdkfz 251s but it was to little avail. The German Puma tried in vain to attack the Russian heavy gun, only once again to suffer more ridiculous luck on the part of the Russians, and the 203mm howitzer somehow managed to hit the Puma with an HE round. Suffice to say, little was left... As the Russian tanks and Assault Engineers piled into the factory complex the Germans finally broke, taking a huge 51 morale points against their Break Rating of 47.
The Russians... They finished the game on a total of 5 morale points... Through a combination of good combined arms tactics and a hopeless and unlucky german defence! Tomorrow night though, is the second game... I think the Germans may decide to bring a tank this time!
