Soviet force launch and early attack on Christmas morning in deep snow and across frozen rivers hoping to catch the Finn's unawares. The Soviet force hampered by terrain and the snow make slow but steady progress throwing out two flanking columns while taking lightly held entrenchments along the only road leading to the town. Initially the Finnish defense was slow to react and just fell back however a charismatic and enterprising leader (Lut 11-2-2)and took charge of a counterattack on the Soviet Western flanking column. Accurate fire followed by a wild charge soon sent the Russkies heading back to the relative safety of the dense woods. The easternmost Russian attack had now flanked the town and were infiltrating the suburbs. However accurate artillery fire combined with terrain meant that there a trail of disrupted, demoralized and just plain lost Soviet units leading southwards and only two platoons had reached the town. Russian artillery was very inaccurate causing as many casualties on their own side as the Finns and the Commissar had to use deadly force to get the cowering infantry back on the advance. By the time Finnish reinforcements arrived the battle was almost over, quickly retaking the one area of town which had been occupied, the Finns slowly pushed the Soviets southwards. Although some ground had been taken and held this was another costly attack by the Russian's in this Winter War. *A solid scenario illustrating how tough the Soviet forces found it that winter of 39. The entire board apart from fields and towns is wooded and with visibility being one hex for most of the game there were many friendly fire incidents on both sides. If you can imagine the many terrain changes this scenario is well worth a try though if FtF the Soviet player has a tough old time of it *