The German steamroller plowed on into the Russian interior. Army Group South encircled numerous Soviet armies and appeared unstoppable. Local Soviet forces resisted but were either crushed or bypassed as Von Rundstedt pursued his goal. The Soviets under General Tyulenev attempted to blunt the attacks and use terrain to do so. Rivers are hard to cross for an army. Defended rivers are very hard to cross.
While the Bug and Dniester were major river crossing operations there were also smaller crossings.
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The typical method of crossing rivers involved heavy artillery and air power. This was effective but does not necessarily make for a tactically interesting game. We decided to use stealth. In doing so we had to come up with some additional rules. There is always a risk that without playtesting we could end up with a lopsided or disaster of a game. Luckily, we embrace disaster.
The objective of the scenario is for the Germans to seize and destroy the bridge demolition equipment hidden in one of the river front houses before the Soviets could blow the bridge. They have three natural turns ( those not ending by COC dice) after the alarm sounds to do it.
The attack starts pre-dawn in darkness. Light arrives at the end of three natural turns.
The Soviets start with only a few pairs of sentries and a Junior Leader. A Jump off Point located near the bridge is inactive until the alarm is sounded. Three additional JOPs are located at Russian table edge also inactive
The Germans have four jump off points at their own table edge. These will be inactive until the alarm is sounded The Germans also have a batch of half tracks and trucks. These start the game entering the table on the German side They each can carry a squad or Machine Gun team and also assault rafts
Visibility is limited to 16” but the Soviets have flares and a search light. By using a COC die the Soviets can send up a flare and double the visibility to 36” until either the turn ends or the Germans use a COC die to extinguish the flare (it was a dud.)
The search light acts like a flare but is directionally specific. A random die roll will aim the searchlight. A COC die will allow for a more specifically placed beam.
Flares and searchlights don’t mean automatic sighting Whispers of “get down” and “make like a statue” might enable detection to be avoided. Vehicles and moving troops are more easily spotted and heard.
The Board
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| The possible objectives and Jump off points |
The Germans have several avenues and methods of attack The woods on their right allow for protection from observation but could be slow. Additionally, it was decided that the river flowed from the German left to right and if the boats drifted off the board they would be wrecked and the unit in the boat would have to swim back to the shore (We used the river assault rules out of the Lardies Blitzkrieg book.)
The Germans could also go for the bridge but this is a more open route subject to being spotted. If the Germans rush the bridge they could catch the Soviets napping (literally) but it’s likely they would be seen or heard and the alarm sounded.
The Battle
The German (and Hungarian) attack would be stealthy Six half tracks and three trucks crawled slowly forward, loaded with assault rafts and soldiers. (Suspend belief-these are very quiet half tracks if moving at slow speed.)
The Soviets placed their four sentries led by a Junior Leader near the bridge and Searchlight. The rest of the Russians snoozed away.
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| Everything is black and white at night. Look it up. |
The Axis troops spread out. Three half tracks drove for the woods while the trucks carrying the Hungarians and three other half tracks drove up the road and kept to the left. Immediately a turn end was rolled. Two more turns and it would be light
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Everything was going smoothly for the attackers when they again rolled an end of turn. Only one more turn until daylight.
The Germans entered the woods to the right and quietly unloaded the rafts Two squads of infantry and a medium machine gun crew would try to quietly slip across the river to the shelter of woods on the far side. The other six transports became tangled in a traffic jam and moved very slowly up the road and a yard to the right of the road.
Just as the rafts were about to touch water the searchlight popped to life and threw a beam of light into the woods. The Germans froze to avoid detection but through the miracle of rolling a one, a soon to be highly decorated (possibly posthumously) sentry spotted the Germans and the alarm was sounded.
The stealthy advance was over. The Soviets roared into action. Infantry poured from bivouacs in the rear of the riverside village and raced for the river.
A Maxim machine gun crew that was playing cards (probably) in the village poured out of one of the houses and was quickly throwing fire at the Fritzes in the woods.
The Maxim was highly inaccurate in its firing at the lit up Germans. Elsewhere the Axis forces dropped the stealth and rushed forward. Even though the alarm was now sounded it was still too dark to see anything. In an effort to keep it that way the Germans in the woods and a newly arrived pair of German tanks tried to shoot out the searchlight. They failed…multiple times.
The Soviets were now on the move. Infantry platoons rushed towards the river and a dreaded KV-2 (and a not so dreaded BT-7) showed up.
Note: For this campaign a high tech 21st century method was deployed. Three giant envelopes-one for each army-were filled with pieces of paper each representing one of the tanks or towed anti tank guns in the group’s collection. Before the start of each battle players draw two slips of paper to represent available assets. If a tank is destroyed in battle its slip of paper is removed from the envelope The KV-2 (of which there are two) has been pulled for both battles. So far only one of the five T-26s has been pulled. Two of three 38Ts in German service have been destroyed so far…by the KV-2.
The Soviets were waking up and pushing forward towards the river.
Note: it was at this time a discussion halted the game and numerous modifications to rules were discussed. With so many new rules there were bound to be miscalculations and this was coming to fruition. The biggest issue was that one of the group has a nasty habit of rolling sixes in droves and ending turns. This means that much more quickly than usual turns were ending We could go (real life) weeks without anyone rolling three sixes and ending a turn. In this game three turns were ended by rolls an hour into the second week of the game. We also addressed changing searchlight rules and Jump Off Placement rules.(more on this in another post….)
And so it was that the sun rose and the Axis was way behind schedule. The rafting Lancers were still on the near bank and the Hungarian trucks were barreling towards the bridge and the very frightening KV-2.
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| Who leads an assault with trucks? |
The trucks were in a bind so why not hit the gas? A rare double turn allowed the first truck in line to disgorge a squad of Hungarians who immediately rushed forward to sweep up two sentries and take cover behind a large building that was immediately to their front. The second and third truck tried to tuck in behind the first truck.
Next came the moment of the battle. It seems there is one of these in every fight. The KV-2 took aim and fired at the second truck in line. A hit was scored. A high explosive shell crashed into the truck and the Soviet tank rolled its 13 dice. Rolling two fives was bad for the truck, rolling three was lethal. Instead every soldier who could see the event watched as a very large shell poked a clean hole through the canvas truck bed cover and exited harmlessly out the other side. A grand total of one 5 or 6 out of 13 was rolled.
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| Meanwhile…paddle paddle paddle. |
That was the highlight of the attacker’s night. Hordes of Soviets poured out of the village. Two infantry squads swept the disembarked Hungarians from the bank and rifle and machine gun fire did what the KV couldn’t. Bullets ripped into the second truck sending it fleeing back across the bridge with several wounded piled in the back.
The third Hungarian squad exited the last truck but was brutally dispatched by two more Soviet infantry squads who charged into them.
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| The fleeing Hungarian truck takes fire. |
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| A few Germans |
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| A few more Soviets and a building containing a detonator |
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