I played this one solo setting up the Romanians in three clusters, each of which was placed midway between boards 8 and 5. I planned for an attack straight up the middle along the road. It took the Soviets about an hour and a half to move into position. During that time the Romanians managed to kill a couple of tank steps using those much maligned 47's. Of course, crappy BT-7's don't take a whole lot of abuse to begin with. Killing a couple of half platoons wasn't a big deal.

The Soviets used their artillery to "soften up" the line but without any notable success. The PBI managed to fight their way into and through the (strongest) middle position. The cost, while not exceptional, was enough to throw the whole assault into disarray. Meanwhile, the flanking Romanian companies fell back to the western side of board 8. The northern company got chewed up but the southern company remained relatively intact.

At this point, about halfway through the scenario, I realized that both sides were nearing physical exhaustion. I was also getting a bit tired of this one as well. Consequently, I decided that while both sides had inflicted moderate casualties, I would award the win to the Romanians. They had enough men left to put up a stiff fight, at least for a couple of turns. The Soviets were becoming more disorganized as casualties took their toll on the advance. I figured that the Soviets had indeed pushed back the Romanians, but not by a whole lot. That matched the after action report in the scenario book.

All in all, it was just another day at the front for both sides.

Setup: The Romanian setup three roadblocks spread out across the road on Board 8, with their force equally split into the roadblocks. Each roadblock has a 47mm gun, a HMG, and a few infantry to stop the Soviets from clearing the road.

Play: The Soviets enter on the first turn on the eastern map edge, moving along the road so that the slow moving HMG's can keep up with the rest of the force. At the edge of the first 47mm's range, the light tanks hold back and the infantry and lone T-34 move up the first roadblock. As they approach, the Soviets split off half their group to launch an attack against the second roadblock.

The Romanians take opportunity fire against the Soviets, but the Soviets survive well. The next turn, the Soviets are able to demoralize the gun, and it subsequently fails its morale check. After this the Soviets move up their light tanks and the T-34 moves up to aid the attack on the second roadblock. The light tanks and infantry assault the first roadblock as the other group approaches their target.

The T-34 led group arrives at the second roadblock and begin direct fire at the Romanians, again destroying the gun. Soon after they begin they assault as well. Two of the assaults go well for the Romanians, and require backup to finish off, while the other two stall, but eventually the Romanians crumble. The Soviets take an hour to recover their morale before moving to deal with the final road block. The Soviet repeat the same tactics as the first roadblock and quickly destroy the final Romanian roadblock, while taking an equal number of steps lost.

Result: Soviet Victory.

Romanians set up in two lines of defense. The forward line contained the AT units, the HMG's, and some infantry, while the second line consisted purely of infantry. The artillery and mortars set up behind the second line. The Soviets entered and moved west with their tanks using the fields in the south to cover their advance and their infantry split into two groups, one in the middle and one south with the tanks. The Romanian artillery was accurate, and the Soviet BT-5's and 7's were no match for the Romanian 47mm AT guns, so the Soviets took two AFV step losses in their advance. Also, with many turns ending prematurely due to fog-of-war, the Soviet advance was slow. Eventually the Soviets reached the Romanian defenses and eliminated all the AT guns via assault. They then moved through the Axis defenses systematically, eliminating each unit in turn. As the game approached the halfway point, both sides had eliminated ten steps of their enemy, the only question was whether the Romanians would be able to hold out until the end. As the turns passed the Soviets whittled away the Axis defenders so that by turn 28 they had all been eliminated, securing the Soviet victory. All in all not a bad scenario, but the Romanians need to hit the Soviets hard during their initial approach, as they simply don't have the numbers to hold on for 36 turns.