In this scenario a very outmanned German force is charged with denying the Americans the ability to move quickly up a road, take some high ground and the town behind it. Helping the Germans will be the arrival of two Tiger platoons at some point. The Americans (supported by a British Crocodile platoon) will be moving along a road in some very nasty mud.

Up to this point my play of the Americans has shown me little in the way of ability to move quickly. Their attacks have been deliberate with heavy reliance on artillery and massive direct firepower. The distance to cover, the mud, the lack of sufficient transport and the Germans ability to delay the American advance all seemed to argue against an American victory. This is particularly the case since much of the American power is captured in the ample numbers of tanks provided which are totally inadequate in a stand up attack against the reinforcing Tigers.

The Germans set up with some forces on the 40 m hill off the road and three delaying forces in the woods along the road. The Americans, forced to eliminate the forces on the hill off road need to divide their force immediately, thus reducing their ability to move quickly through the woods to get to the town. Two companies of Shermans lead the advance and reach the first blocking point (a strongpoint) on turn 2. Normally I would deploy and use the Shermans' firepower to destroy the location but there simply isn't time. With one company in the lead I activate both companies. The lead to assault and the following to move and cross my fingers for the assault. The morale advantage is a big one and the strongpoint is eliminated permitting the second company to leapfrog and move forward.

Meanwhile the force sent to deal with the off road hill is having trouble getting set up in the muck and mire.

The second delaying point is a platoon of GREN supported by an HMG and the mortars. The American armored cars loop around to their left to approach the mortars from the rear and three halftracks full of American HMGs find their way forward as the tanks keep a wary eye on the Germans. The American HMGs supported by the DF of the halftracks quickly wear down the Germans and a subsequent assault eliminates the German GREN and HMG while the armored cars deal with the mortars.

Back on that hill the first German hex is taken and the second flees from the American artillery and mortar fire.

The crews of the two Tiger platoons hear some odd noises from their front and resolve to move sometime soon to see what is going on but not quite yet.

Back on the off road hill the forces attempt to get back to the road while the armored cars mop up the demoralized German survivors from that fight.

The Shermans take the lead again and find the last delaying point in the heavy woods just in front of the town. They use the same tactics as before to eliminate the stronpoint (surviving a close in AT shot in the bargain) while the INF and HMGs which were involved in reducing the second delaying position mount back up and drive up in the rear.

As the Americans approach the town the German 75 strikes knocking out one of the Sherman platoons and the Tigers arrive, moving ponderously down the road to get to the town. The 75 is dispatched by an accurate OBA strike (I rolled a 2!) and the Shermans close in and one hex of the town is taken by assault using the Crocodile.

The Tigers finally make it to town, mud-spattered and annoyed at having to leave their comfortable laager and start to make the Shermans bleed. It was at this point that my experience with the Soviets kicked in. It wasn't that I had better tanks, I just had an awful lot of them with reasonably high AT values so I shot them all and got one hit on a Tiger. That was enough to Demoralize that platoon and permit the rest of the assaults to go forward. The remaining Tigers and Volksgrenadiers were handled in urban assaults and the town was left with enough wrecks that it would take quite some time to make it passable for vehicular traffic.

I found the American force to be much more flexible than I was used to and the leapfrogging attack was a powerful antidote to a delay strategy. The mobility of the American force and the shuttling of transport permitted the Americans to have an overwhelming force available at the town within 12 turns, much faster than I would have expected. The armored cars were quite worthwhile in clearing up the rear. Yes there were plenty of wrecked Shermans surrounding the Tigers but the Americans had complete control of the battlefield and one expects that many of those Shermans were quickly put back into service.

I had a blast playing this one. It is very tough for the Germans to win but the process of learning some new capabilities for the Americans made this a great experience. I give it a "5", not for the balance but for the fun of it. The German player has little to do after the initial setup so I would not suggest this for ftf necessarily.