Author	Fanghawk
Method	Solo
Victor	Germany
Play Date	2020-04-11
Language	English
Scenario	PGdm003

The Russians dug in in the fields in front of the town with the artillery southeast of town in the orchards. The plan was to harass the approach, tie up as many units as possible and keep feeding bodies into town if necessary to keep the Germans from getting a toe-hold. The Germans came straight at the dug in infantry at first but then skirted the dug in position with the StuG and a stack of infantry.

I made a lot of mistakes in this one, both in terms of tactics and the scenario rules. I misread the rules and thought the Germans got one aircraft per turn instead of on any one turn. It didn't make too big a difference as I kept rolling 1s and 2s on the accuracy rolls. I played this over several days and halfway through forgot that the woods in the southeast were orchards and wondered why I'd dug in with the units there. I randomly missed giving the Dug In units First Fire which may have turned the tide. Finally, I missed dropping the German initiative after their second step loss.

Tactically...as the Russians I exposed the 76.2mm too early which allowed the Germans to drop artillery on them. The wagon was demoralized or disrupted the entire game so the gun was never able to re-position. The positioning in the orchards meant the StuG could use the town as a shield to approach from the northwest with no real threat. With the Germans I got overconfident and tried to drop artillery on the town the turn before the assault to soften up the defenders...it worked but I also landed friendly fire on the assault force. I also spread the assault force out too much (in large part because the Russian artillery was harassing the approach) and ended up with the Engineer out of position, the HMG out of position until the last turn, and the two 81mm mortars out of position.

Despite that, the scenario was a really fun play with momentum swinging back and forth. The German's goal was to pin the screening force in the fields, cut off the retreat/reinforcement to the town, and then flank the screening force and town having a couple turns for the assault with at least one turn for extra troops to jump into the assault hex if needed. Things more or less went according to plan, aided largely by the AT gun being out of position, but the defenders were tough, often giving better than they got and were assisted by OBA raining down on the attackers. The Russians kicked butt in Assault. Turn 9 the Russians lost a couple steps in the Assault and the subsequent leader casualty check fatally wounded the 10 Morale Lieutenant who up until that time had shrugged everything off. It looked like the Russians might be able to hold on for the Draw when the Demoralized SMG was able to recover but the Germans were able to get a 2-step result on their last assault roll in the town to clear it. All the remaining Russians were either locked in close combat in the fields or had fled to the orchards.

It was a fun scenario that showcased a little bit of everything. It was a great way to get my feet wet again after a long layoff from PG and explore a couple of the nuances of the 4th ed. rules.