8:15 AM, December 16, 1944: It is the opening day of the German Ardennes offensive.

Two towns sit on adjacent mapboards, each about in the center of its respective board. The eastern village holds Co. I, 12th RCT, 4th Division, and company L from their same regiment is stationed in the western village. Each company is 3 INF, 1 HMG and 4 leaders; I is supported by a 57mm ATG platoon, L by a 81mm mortar unit. Reinforcememt are due to trickle in, each arrving by die roll: One M4 Sherman platoon (start rolling Turn 5), Company C of the 12th (Turn 39), and Company F of the 22nd RCT, also of 4th Division (Turn 55.)

The outnumbered Americans, still recovering form the bloodbath of the Hurtgen Forest, are about to be assailed by a battalion-plus of the 320th Grenadier regiment, 212th VG Division. In some ways this scenario ia a mirror of the previous scenario I played (Scenario 39.) In this one the Germans are on the attack, arriving in two large groups - but each group must roll a die each turn to see how many units arrive. And the Americans here have the only tanks, whereas in the last one the Germans had the tanks.

So things stood at the outset. At the eastern town, an HMG and INF set up dug in two hexes north of town, the rest in town. The western town had all units set up in it, none outside. The first German battalion (10 GREN, 4 HMG, 1 81mm) began rolling on Turn 1 - entering in the northeast section of the map, north of the eastern village - and assembed in the light woods west of the main road. As they moved out towards town, the Sherman platoon - having arrived on its first eligible turn, Turn 5 - quickly moved forward to bolster the dug-in forward force and harass the Germans. It did a little morale damage, was assaulted by an HMG unit, and then escaped the assault and fell back into town. The forward-placed HMG and INF were demoralized and chased out of their position by OBA, the INF losing a step. Using the northeastern woods as cover, the Germans were able to run a couple of stacks into the east edge of town - one in an empty hex, one to assault an occupied hex. The assault began as 3 GREN (one reduced) and a couple of leaders against one INF, one 57mm ATG, and a leader. Over a few turns the reduced GREN was eliminated, but a full-strength GREN replaced it, and soon it was 3 GREN against one INF with leaders on both sides.

On the west end of town, 2 HMG and a GREN (in adjacent hexes with a "1" combat rated leader) wound up getting safely adjacent to a hex containing the Sherman, an HMG and a reduced INF (the latter formerly dug in outside of town.) But then I made a dumb-ass mistake. With initiative in the following turn, instead of blasting away at the American stack (a 24 strength combined shot, on the 22 column since adjacent but defenders being in a town hex) right away, I was caught up in the drama of the assault a few hexes away and activated that stack first. So the Sherman-HMG-INF combo got an adjacent 22-strength shot at the Germans out in the open, thus on the 45 column, and got a 2X. Despite the lone American OBA (1x18) also pounding away at them, the group managed to hang adjacent but had to spend some morale recovery time. One reduced GREN eventually fled, but in Turn 16 the remainder were able to get lucky on an 11-column DF attack, and eliminated the reduced INF. Then the German OBA (1x 16, 1 x 20), rolling on the 16 column, got an X and reduced the HMG - and demoralized the Sherman. So that all-powerful stack was suddenly very vulnerable, though it cost the Germans a couple of steps they might not have lost if it were not for my previous mistake.

The third American-occupied hex consisted of one INF and two leaders, and the INF was reduced and demoralized by some adjacent in-town Germans. It had to flee to the light woods nearby, the Germans in town advancing adjacent. The company in the western town stayed put, of course - no point in leaving their town empty for the taking to join the fight to the east. Their mortar fired from the security of the town center, but that was all to this point.

By turn 21, the Germans had cleared the eastern town. The assaults (with fresh troops fed in as needed) ground down the Amis, a few of whom - a reduced INF, the M4, and a few leaders - fled outside of town (from assault hexes) and were attacked again. Ultimately the M4 fled to the western town, where it recovered, and 3 of the 4 leaders made it as well (one falling victim to a "lone leader" situation.) So the Germans had the town, though at a cost of 8 steps (6 GREN and 2 HMG.) Those losses meant that the best the Germans could achieve was a draw - by holding all town hexes uncontested at the end.

There followed a lull of a little over an hour (5 turns or so), while the Germans consolidated and reorganized. Leaving a few small stacks (plus the 81mm mortar, moved up from the original entry area) in the eastern village to guard against later American arrivals, the Germans then moved out, spread out over 4 or 5 hexes to minimize enemy fire opportunities. Also, starting turn 28, the second group (7 GREN, 3 HMG) began arriving north of Town 2, albeit slowly (die rolls for this force's arrival are halved, rounding fractions up, for number of combat units per turn.) And, to shorten things up a little more, three consecutive turns ended on either the first or second FOW roll.

But by Turn 32 - the mid-way point of the game - the second town attack was on: one assault (a GREN & leader against the M4, with more troops poised to join up) underway, more units adjacent to the village, and one defending INF already reduced by a lucky OBA shot on Column 16. Plus several GREN and a couple of HMG from the new arrivals were closing in from the north.

The western town fell much quicker than the eastern town did, aided immensely by the arrival of the reinforcements. The third American company passed its first arrival roll on Turn 39, by which time the US combat troops in "Westville" had been reduced to one reduced INF unit. The western village was cleared the next turn, with 4 leaders escaping (some of whom had come west when "Eastburg" fell.)

The new American company (3 INF, 1 HMG, 3 leaders) entered on the roads leading through the large patch of woods on the eastern map. Another major lull commenced, as the new Americans advanced securely through the woods to within a few hexes of the east village, while the Germans rearranged their forces to give both towns sufficient strength. The Americans could have placed a leader at the edge of the woods and called down OBA on the units transferring between the villages, except that a random event depleted the American OBA ammunition. For the second game in a row! (Random events also brought about a winter storm - the table says thunderstorm, but I'm calling it a winter storm - for a couple of turns. It reduced visibility and increased movement costs, but in this unusual situation the impact was minimal.) The new company edged to within visual range (though LOS was through one light woods hex) once, and promptly lost a full-strength INF platoon to OBA. So much for that; they pulled back deeper into the woods.

It thus developed into kind of a standoff. Combined strength of the two towns was 12.5 GREN, 6 HMG, 1 81mm mortar and 1 x 16, 1 x 20 OBA. The Yanks had 2 INF, one HMG and a bunch of leaders, and it would not be until Turn 55 that the final US company (another 3 INF & 1 HMG) rolled for arrival. Yet the Amis could almost be said to have the advantage. Their best plan was to hold off until the game was almost over, move adjacent to one of the towns under cover of night, hope to survive the OF and OBA, and launch an assault on the final turn. If even one unit survived, that would secure a win from what would otherwise be a draw( the Germans having lost nine steps to that point, for a potential US victory, but holding all town hexes, for a German victory) because the Germans would not be the sole occupants of every town hex.

Until the last US company arrived, the Germans would not know which town it would approach, so both needed to be held in strength. They considered a pre-emptive search-and-destroy mission in the woods, but realized the Americans could probably avoid this pretty easily, since every foot unit except leaders can only move one woods hex per turn. But the Volksgrenadiers came up with another option: Forego OF or DF when the Americans moved adjacent, and engage them in assaults outside the village limits.

The final company arrived on its first roll as well, in Turn 55. From then until the beginning of the last hour (Turn 61), the two Americans juked and faked a little bit, both positioning betwene the two towns (under cover of darkness, which came as of Turn 48.) They then made a move on the western village. They were met with stiff resistance at the efge of town - selective opportunity fire, OBA, and assaults launched out of town, with other units moving up into the vacated town hexes to provide occupation (so no US unit exiting the assault could sneak into an empty town hex) and potential reinforcement. Help also rushed down the main road from the eastern town.

But, in an incredibly unlikely turn of events, the beginning of Turn 63 saw one lone American INF platoon - and a leader - in an un-engaged hex adjacent to the village...and the US won initiative, thus pre-empting a German out-of-town assault. So, though it faced tall odds, the platoon moved in. It lost a step in the first assault, but survived two successive German assaults (in that turn and Turn 64), and was even good-order - not disruptedb - at the end of the game. (And the final German assault was on the 24 column!)

So, by denying the German victory conditions, the Americans won. This was easily the longest PG scenario I've ever played, but with the relatively small forces on board at any one time, and a coupe of major lulls (thus quick turns) forced by the changing situation, it played reasonably quickly. I gave it a 3 because, like Scenario 39, it seems to me that the best the attacker can achieve is a draw (due to the need to conquer towns while minimizing losses, a hard thing to accomplish at best.) But it was a lot of fun, and the difference between draw and US victory came down to the last turn.

Losses were:

US - 2 CAPT, 3 LT, 1 of 2 81mm, 1 of 1 57mm ATG, 2 of 2 M4 steps, 20 of 24 INF and 5 of 8 HMG.

German - 8 of 34 GREN, 2 of 14 HMG.

It was the story of the opening days of the Bulge in microcosm - small, scattered US units desperately holding on and delaying the German timetable.

(Also - there is another disturbance in the space-time continuum in this scenario. The Turn numbers and hours of reinforcements do not match up in several cases, given the start time of 0815. In all cases i went with the turn number...)