I played trombone as a child. It permitted me to spit in a school sanctioned event. Heck, I was able to spit so much they put something called a "spit valve right on the trombone. Plus, you could make sounds like a passing plane with a trombone, something you couldn't do with any other wind instrument (I suppose you could do it with strings but without a big hunk of metal making the sound it just didn't seem right...).

After a year of learning "positions" and scales, etc. it became apparent that the purpose of a trombone was to make purposeful sounds along with other instruments and thus to create "music", although anyone who has heard and suvived a grade school band concert would be hard pressed to identify the "music" from the concert. In any event, my parents thought I had talent (don't all parents?) and paid for private trombone lessons for me. In those lessons I was introduced to a metronome. A metronome is a longish metal rod sitting vertically in a wooden box. Attached to the rod is a weight which, when set correctly, will enable the metronome to swing from side to side in the exact tempo desired by a composer. In that way, the practicing student can measure exactly how badly they missed their cue or, far more rarely, hit the note on the correct beat.

Lessons were often an hour long and the metronome would be ticking back and forth nearly the entire time.

The metronome, however, was a mechanical device and would, on occassion, stop. My teacher, who was also the junior high band director, would have me play out the phrase and then try to fix the metronome. One unexpected aspect of the metronome, however, is that we would both swing from side to side in unison with the metronome as I practiced my pieces. As I looked at the swings in this scenario I was reminded of exactly that and how we would both stick on either the right or left side whenever the metronome "broke".

Obviously with such an intro, there had to be swings in this play.

As others have indicated, the Americans are tasked with piercing a highly developed fortified belt and push on to capture some town hexes in the rear of the belt. They have substantial armor, sufficient engineer support and a ton of APC support fire. The Germans in the meantime, have a minebelt, wire, AT ditches, strongpoints and some nasty AT weapons to hide in plentiful entrenchments.

The German plan was to force the American infantry wide and the armor to funnel towards the middle of the map where the AT guns could have a field day. Through the first hour this approach seemed to work as the infantry took some heavy losses from the minefield (a particulary rude "3" mine caused two step losses on one turn).

Tick, the Germans gain the immediate ascendancy (7-2 in losses at Turn 4).

The Americans, however had noticed a potential flaw in the German setup. Once the fortified belt was breached in the south, the Americans could use the light woods along the southern edge of the battlefield to approach the towns and avoid a couple turns of getting shot in the open. The Americans begin to take advantage of this by focusing nearly their entire force in the south and overrunning the fortifications there. The Germans noticed and moved some of their AT guns from the front line and pulled them back to defend the towns.

Tock, the Americans break through the fortified zone and approach the towns such that by Turn 12 the score is 37-34 Germany with the Americans clearly able to begin mopping up some of the entrenchments.

Of course, there is the matter of the German reinforcements, 3 StuG platoons and GREN platoons which took the overconfident and exposed Shermans in flank, destroying 8 armor steps in 2 turns.

Tick, at the end of Turn 16 the score was 57-46 Germans with a chance to hammer it home depending on the initiative in the following turn as the Americans had advanced what armor and infantry that was not tied up in assaults to an adjacent position.

The Americans got the initiative and were able to hit both remaining StuG platoons and get either disruptions or demoralizations and before the shellshocked panzertruppen could recover the American infantry had jumped in to provide the coup de grace. At the same time the 75mm AT gun which had been making mincemeat of the supporting APCs and tank destroyers was walloped by the American OBA.

Tock, at the end of turn 18 the score had flipped to 61-60 Americans.

At this point the metronome broke. In two more turns the score was 70-58 Americans and the Germans were out of answers. Both dead piles were massive but the Germans simply had no other answers. They were going to lose at least one more entrenchment and probably their towns as they had no remaining AT capability (a 75mm Inf gun wasn't going to do it).

This one was the first I had played with substantial field fortifications. It was a blast. I also learned to expect that my line would be pierced and where to defend if it does get pierced. I believe that the Americans have the ability to win most of the time due to their massive firepower through the 21 M3s provided in the scenario. I can only imagine the recovery after this action. I give it a "4".