MAIN EVENT VII! Ratzki vs Joonny....

[Der Kuenstler]

After a couple of forgettable minutes, Ratzki gets one of his T34/85s in great position for a shot on the German overwatch bullies from the North side of town. What a job positioning this tank! Only the one stug has LOS to it because of the house - the other two AFVs are left out of the picture. An exchange of shells ensues...



Resulting in one gun damaged stug - he pops smoke to avoid being totally destroyed...Zukov high fives and chest bumps Stalin from HQ.



Here is an overall shot from minute 12. We can see after three minutes of fire Ratzki has been unable to get Joonny's German SMG platoon out of the church. In fact, his lead rifle squads are really getting bloodied against the superior SMG fire and are pinning and panicked. The SMG platoon has only lost about a man per squad and their only fear is running out of bullets. In addition, they are backed up by Joonny's HE firing AFVs. We can see more AFV's coming up to the cliff edge. Looks like one of Ratzki's rifle platoons gave up trying to get the 100 point flag vs. 3 firing Stugs andis going south to help the struggling church force.



To the North, we can see Ratzki has gotten his infantry about as far as they can go under cover. We can see his FO has plotted a target and is firing smoke. All the Russians behind that hill will try to run through the smoke into town. A lone maxim to the North is shooting at the German overwatch group to try and keep them buttoned.



Cycling through Joonny's forces, it is amazing how few casualties he has. Only eight men lost and one vehicle gun damaged. Soon Ratzki's hopes will ride on the smoke to come...



A message from Joonny:

"Quick progress report.

Casualties are minimal, all but one of the flags has fallen under my control or is at least being contested by me. I seem to have inflicted a decent amount of damage so far, looks like I roughed up his infantry pretty well in that open ground to the east of the town. He seems to be setting up MGs to fire upon my armour on the high ground, but the range is just to great for it to be much of a threat.

I can see him trying to Manoeuvre some armour in the dead ground on his side, looks to be some t-34s, i'm guessing they have the 85mm gun which makes them a bit of a threat, but at that range the biggest threat is of gun damaging as already happened to one of my StuGs."

And from commander Ratzki:

Well, the smoke is just starting to fall, I guess there is no better time then the present. I will be advancing my men over the hill in the smoke and into town, hopefully without getting shot up in the process. I think that I will hold off on my tanks for a turn and see how the infantry do before I make the mad dash. I noticed that the one SP Gun seems to have a damaged gun. I doubt if Jonny has a covered arc on this unit. I will go for the damaged gun, it's as good as dead.

Jonny has moved his one Panther in to the houses and the 2-storey building on my right. This is good, I plan on assualting his position soon from that direction so I should be out of it's LOS. On my left flank, I am still awaiting the maxim's to arrive before I start to duke it out here. I am sensing some SMG squads in the Axis forces, as he is able to do some damage to my squads with few shots. This is bad news over here, if this is the case as I will have to get in close due to the terrain. I did notice his squads were also bobbing up and down quite a bit, so he either has poor quality troops or my two LMG's per squad will pay off nicely. I am trying to move my 122mm gun into position to just catch sight of one of Jonny's SP Guns in the centre of the map. Terrain is difficult to navigate, but I am hopefull that I might be able to get a shot off without being shot at.

In the town I should have a company sized screen around the 2 big flags next turn, this should prevent Ratzki from being able to sneak any infantry teams past me to get at my armour. If he can get his armour in close to the town then the StuG could be in trouble, but I have found some pretty nice keyhole positions for my T34 and with that great frontal armour they should be ok."