VS live opponent.

The American player set up such as to appear to bunker down in the main town with some M8's on the hill to the S. The Germans entered in two groups as above. The American player made a desperate attack move out of the town towards the SE group in an endeavor to get a flanking bonus on the StuGIII approaching from that direction. This almost worked; a StuGIII step was hit, but the half step remaining made the 4 or lower required to remain in good order. This StuGIII then removed the impertinent, but brave ACs. After some assault combat with the INF unit that had also "moved out," the Germans then took the town albeit more easily now that their attention was not distracted. American OBA took its toll also.

The M4's entered on Turn ten or so, but with the 2.5 StuGIII steps lying in wait and with several turns to engage (that is, move GREN toward them to threaten assault), the M4's were killed off before the last turn, #16 and the Germans held the field.

The American gambit was risky and certainly made the end-game less intense than was the case in the solo played version. That being said, the bold attack by the Americans had the German player's blood pressure up during those first exchanges before the StuGIII's could engage.

This scenario does offer the American player some different ways to approach the tactical problem and victory conditions and thus, the German player with differing ways to try to wrest and hold control of the road. I find the victory condition though a bit artificial and prone to "meta-gaming" however, since the US wins if it can simply sneak any (undemoralized) step onto the road at the game end. I think I would prefer something more akin to the US having to hold/control a hex for, say, three consecutive turns, or three hexes on the last turn. Something to avoid the die-roll shootout mania on turns 15 &16.

Then again, maybe I just haven't learned enough about the game to quite figure this one out (although I was the German player here)?