THE MAIN EVENT III! Arrow vs. Moondog

[Der Kuenstler]

A couple of minutes of small arms fire and position jockeying goes by. Moondog's central artillery strike is over, and, though he managed to break and kill several footsoldiers, the two regular Shermans rode out the storm unharmed. Arrow backed them out of possible danger near the end of the strike. Now, at minute 15, a new threat appears - it is one of Moondog's stugs. Arrow's buttoned Sherman gets LOS just as the stug fires - a "Front upper hull partial penetration" - but no damage is done! A second later the Sherman fires back and sets the stug on fire - one shot, one kill!



And it's not over - a second stug comes knocking - hunting the same Sherman. The Sherman fires first - miss! The stug fires - the deadly shell whistles under the tank and into the ground behind it. The Sherman fires again - boom - and knocks out the second stug! The other Sherman on the left (not pictured here) never had LOS and was never in the battle - it was firing the whole time at the Germans gathering in the nearby house.



Looking back, it appears as if Moondog was trying to line up both of his stugs for a 2:1 advantage - but he mistimed his commands; the stugs showed up one at a time instead of together. Moondog's stock continues to drop with the Fuhrer, as well as his once bright hopes for victory.

But on the other hand, Moondog did manage a well-coordinated artillery drop in sync with a company advance - he is now very close to taking the central church flag back. This prompts Arrow to comment: "No good arty prep followed by Company sized rush, good strategy, better than anything I could come up with."



He also looks pretty good with his German company attacking at the Northern flag - if he keeps the pressure on he will at least neutralize it.



But the loss of two Stugs means that the armor advantage swings to Arrow, 4:2. Arrow can now tie up Moondog's two remaining AFV's and still spare a Sherman to go North and hit Moondog's infantry company with some tank HE. Are we witnessing a major upset here?

Moondog laments after watching his two Stugs go down: "Ebay, I'm selling my strategy. It's poor quality, broken and has had one stupid owner. No reserve, Happy Bidding."