Dog Fight - Ostkreig Tournament Round 1

[von Nev]

German Turn 22.

The Russian battalions that crossed the Dnepr are encircled. In looking over the Dnepr area it looks like a bridge was not build and instead the Russian units crossed with an engineer unit.

On the northern attack axis along the road the Russians reinforced the 300 VP hex. I blast the units in the hex disrupting all of them (if I remember correctly) and then started the operation to flank the 300 VP hex from the north. The green circles are the remaining hexes I need to take to be able to assault to isolate the 300 VP hex if my opponent has a stack behind the hex to prevent isolation. It may seem like a lot but I have the better part of a full division concentrated next to the VP hex so my firepower and assaulting options are a lot.

Down south I selectively take hexes and continue to beat up units where I can.

[Dog Soldier]

Russian turn 22.
08:00 AM July 11, 1941
Normal
Visibility 3km.


Victory points after the Russian turn twenty-two



The Germans grind on, but were unable to launch and assault on the victory point village. Russian reinforcements quickly moved in to replace the battered HQ and flak units. Now a full 1,590 Russian infantry are crammed into the village. I have stacked more reinforcements behind them. There will be no retreat. (due to over stacking in the only hex they can move to.) I may lose a lot of troops, but if I hold the VP hex there is still a chance for a Russian minor victory. A German minor victory will require many more kills even if the VP hex falls. So I am sure there is only time left for von Nev to play for the draw.
Secondly, all those Russian troops plus the ones in the woods nearby can direct DF on the Germans . I hope it will be enough to break up an assault. More Russians stand ready to enter the village next turn should it still stay in Russian hands.

376 Russian, 203 German infantry lost. Eight Axis vehicles and 27 Russian guns lost. The Axis gained 47 victory points. Not enough to worry about if I can hold the VP village worth 300 VP.
On all other sectors the Soviets retreat to avoid getting surrounded.
My crossing of the Dnepr was expected. I will lose the two units who tried. The Axis spent an air attack to disrupt the engineers. This prevents the one good order unit from ferrying back across the river. In any case it has diverted German resources from the main battle. Will it be enough?
My hope to hold the VP village is small. Three turns is a long time to hold any hex in S41 from the Axis juggernaut. Still I am doing the best I can with what is left of my forces.

Dog Soldier

[von Nev]

German Turn 23.

Only two more turns left. Turn 24 is becoming a very important turn.

Up north I took one of the two critical hexes that will eventually isolate the VP hex. Next turn the other hex will be taken and then we will see what opportunity I have to capture a lot of Russians. You will notice that all the units in the 300 VP are disrupted. I could have assaulted this turn to take the hex, but I am still going to hold true to trying to isolate the hex and trying to capture a lot of Russians. Even though my VP total is 1100 (Minor Loss), it really is 1400 (Draw) plus whatever more Russians I can capture.

Down south the fighting has died down as the Russian left flank is in full retreat and I am satisfied with just following and beating up Russian units were I can. There is little fire support available anyways for them as all guns are pounding the area around the VP hex.

The two Russian battalions that crossed the Dnepr were assaulted and hundreds of prisoners were taken.

[Dog Soldier]

Russian turn 23.
10:00 AM July 11, 1941
Normal
Visibility 3km.


Victory points after the Russian turn twenty-three.



705 Russian, 246 Axis infantry lost, 35 victory points for the Germans. The game hinges on the defense of one hex!
My Russians held again! It appears the Germans need too much direct fire to disrupt the defenders that an assault is not possible the same turn? Some very careful movements this turn to swap out the disrupted rabble for two fresh infantry Rgts. (relative term here for the Russians) and one flak unit. I now have three good order units in the hex this turn instead of two as last turn. I left the one disrupted infantry Rgt in the VP village since it has low fatigue and may rally if the Germans concentrate on disrupting the other three units. I was able to disrupt another Axis infantry unit attacking the VP village. There are two more good order Russian units in range in the village to the southeast which can move in on the last turn.
I tried to reinforce the northern flank of the VP village this turn. Unfortunately my units were disrupted by defensive fire moving into position. Bad luck and good shooting by the Germans.

Holding one more turn should greatly improve my chances of winning this scenario. A minor Russian win in S41 is quite the rare event. For most of the game it has been bat and piñata. I am sure you know who the bat is and who the piñata is.

If I am reading the Axis dispositions correctly, there are no reserves left to press the VP village except some disrupted 10th Mot infantry. If they do not rally this turn, it will help my cause as time runs out.

My southern flank continues to give ground to avoid any larger losses. I left one very small unit out in front of the main line to stall the Germans with its death. The unit is disrupted and could not make it to good terrain. von Nev may try to use it in what I call the assault tail gate tactic. The tactic is to perform multiple assaults on a defending unit driving it between the defending stacks in an attempt to “ride” into hexes the attackers could not reach with normal movement due to ZOC. PzC players have to be careful to avoid this tactic when you have a weak unit that is alone and it can not run away.

It will be interesting to see where the Axis spearhead in the south tries to go next turn. I might get an opportunity on the last two turns to give that group a working over, only where it does not affect my ability to defend the VP village.

The massacre of the raiders that crossed the Dnepr continues. By holding out until this turn, they tie down German forces. These units do not cost me much in VP, only about 71 points. So they were worth the risk.

The German tactic of stacking companies has been trouble since it stops me from regaining any space. I use the artillery to damage whatever Axis unit appears to be the largest number of men.
I then concentrated a few direct fires against a single company sized unit so it would lose the advantage of recombining. I get a benefit from this tactic by preventing the companies from assaulting together without combining. Attackers in an assault use the lowest morale of a single unit involved for all units in the assault. By concentrating on a single unit, I hope to drive it out of helping with the assault, or lowering the morale of the entire Axis assault when it comes. Not much of a hope. In S41, Russian players have to look for anything they can do to upset the Axis juggernaut. The Russians can take pieces out of the Axis machine. Over time, taking out enough pieces will cause the Axis drive to stall. Even good Axis play can be attacked this way.

Dog Soldier

[von Nev]

German Turn 24.

The northern assault to isolate the 300 VP hex proceeds. You will see from Dog Soldier's post that the units in hexes 1 and 2 at the start of my turn 24 were all disrupted. I quickly assaulted 1 and moved units around the back towards 2 where I found that stack also all disrupted. I assaulted with an engineer unit and luckily the Russian unit retreated northeast instead of south which would have keep the 300 VP hex from being isolated.

Now that the 300 VP hex was isolated I concentrated all direct fire, arty and air attacks on the 3 units in the hex that were not disrupted. I held in reserve a full battalion (3 companies) of German motorized infantry for the final assault. Once I disrupted all three units I debated for a while with myself to assault with two companies and try another assault with the last company. I elected to use the whole battalion to make sure the assault was successful since in a previous assault with a single company was repulsed in a previous turn. You can see from the picture the result of the assault. The 700 prisoners and a gun I believe is nearly the maximum one can take in a single assault as it suggests that there are over 1416 in points in that hex. The max stacking is 1500. I was honestly surprised at the amount of prisoners but the amount does suggest that the Russians still have a lot of units out there that are close to full strength. Additionally, with the considerable strength in the hex it also showed that Dog Soldier was definitely trying to hold the hex. Maybe my strategy to hold him close succeeded!

Down south I eliminated a Russian unit that had its flanks unguarded.



Up north I assaulted and captured more of the Russians that are in the bridgehead.

Positions at the end of the turn.

[Dog Soldier]

Russian turn 24.
12:00 PM July 11, 1941
Normal
Visibility 3km.


Victory points after the Russian turn twenty-four.


1,345 Russian, 317 Axis infantry, 3 Axis vehicles, five Russian flak guns lost. 95 victory points for the Axis.
Whoops! I neglected to leave one undisrupted unit in the hex behind the VP village. An assault by a German bridge building company (of all things) cleared my rabble out and allowed the Germans to surround the VP village. Upon reflection I should have left the HQ of the 110th RD with the rabble. Even though in E morale due to being out of command I could have combined that unit with the engineers one hex further back. That would have given me two good order units there. Then again it might not of made any difference. The rabble stack behind the VP village would have been too large to allow the VP village defenders to retreat from assault. The Axis would still have collected prisoners. In any case I had no option but to hope the VP village units did not all disrupt. von Nev fired every artillery unit in his force on the village except a few which must have lacked spotters there. Direct fire from the large Axis stacks did the rest. I lost 703 infantry to the assault on the surrounded VP hex. This brought the Axis total victory points to within 52 points of the draw.

The Russians were not through yet. Four infantry units rallied this turn, three were close to the VP village. I managed to disrupt the German bridge engineers, then break them and take back the hex with an assault by the 3/644th Mot RD infantry. The unit had just rallied this turn to do the job. Next I tried to disrupt the panzers directly south of the VP village. This did not happen, though I did kill a couple of PzIII tanks. There was still no clear path into the VP village to send reinforcements due to the slow Russian infantry movement (a factor of their morale). I could not move the reinforcements up from the village to the southeast of the VP hex since the Red infantry could not cross the stream twice and climb the hill into the VP village in one turn. The more I thought about my options it became clear von Nev could easily obtain another 50 victory points just from killing my troops in the VP village. Therefore, I had to retreat and give up the VP hex and its 300 points. This would leave the Axis 200 points short of a minor win.

Repositioning my troops now to prevent any further surrounding of my stacks should prevent him from obtaining those points. I used the rest of my artillery to target his infantry units around the VP village area in an attempt to further fatigue them. I hoped for a disruption, but could not obtain one. Note how von Nev has used his HQs in the trees north of the VP village to assault proof the rear of the large stacks facing the village. These HQ’s are A morale and can hold for at least one turn, which is all he needs. Even if they are out of command and B morale, it will be tough to disrupt them and assault their hexes since I have few Russian good order troops north of them. Axis HQ’s have only 100 men, my artillery would be better used to hammer his larger infantry units where I can get more casualty VP and reduce his strength for the last turn. I did bring in some units to shoot up the 10th Mot Divisional HQ. Maybe it will cause an out of command situation on the last turn further weakening the German force.

In the end it was a forlorn hope that I could hold the VP village. I had not been able to dig in there all game. I did not have enough good order troops in the woods to the north which was key to holding the VP village. My attempt to reinforce the woods with a Rgt of the 137th infantry, failed as DF disrupted the unit. This allowed the Germans to clear the northern flank of the VP village and assault the rabble behind it sealing the village defenders. Von Nev did a good job on me here.
Now we will see if he has one more trick to play to get those 200 victory points he needs for a minor win.

Dog Soldier

[von Nev]

German Turn 25. Last turn.

The Russian units on the 300 VP hex are forced to retreat to prevent being potentially eliminated. I take the 300 VP hex giving me around 1550 VP points but that is far from the 1750 I need for a "Minor Victory." Barring something unforeseen I think this may end up in a "Draw." I reinforce the 300 VP hex with numerous undisrupted units to make sure I hold it through the Russian half of this last turn.

Since it looks like it will be near impossible to isolate the stack that was in the VP hex this turn I elect to instead to do maximum damage on the remaining Russian units with direct fire. Elsewhere on the battlefield I do the same.

I have a couple of recon air missions left so I fly them behind Russian lines and uncover a couple of Russian artillery batteries. I use my last Stuka strike to pound the heavy Russian artillery battery. I just "hate" Russian artillery in S41. There are so many of them. They are massive units some with 30+ guns and they inflict significant damage to the foot sloggin' German lanser.

I eliminate the remaining Russian units that crossed the Dnepr.

I look around and make sure that the Russians can't get some easy VPs because of poor placement of my final postions and I then advance to the Russian part of the last turn and await the final outcome.

[Dog Soldier]

Russian turn 25.
14:00 PM July 11, 1941
Normal
Visibility 3km.


Victory points after the Russian turn twenty-five


The battle ends as a draw. The Russian forces are badly battered. I saw no reason to try and hold the 300 VP hex. The casualties that would have been sustained there holding the hex, would still give the same result of a draw, though maybe a lower victory point total. The Axis needed another 70 VP in casualties alone. I could prevent that.

I could not prevent the fall of the 300 VP hex. I could not reinforce the hex in turn 24. There were not enough good order Russian units left to create a corridor. In any case if I did create a corridor, rather than surrounding the hex, the Axis could just shove the enfeebled defenders out of the village. Same result, a draw.

It turns out the Germans are in no shape to go much further. In retrospect, I should have tried to retreat faster so I would not have lost so many units delaying the Germans. It is hard as the Russians in S41 to hold the flanks of a large stack, even on the second day. I think I should have been more patient and set up a reserve force early on the second day to guard the 300 VP hex. My front line units would possibly be broken since they would not have been relieved. It is hard to say if fresh units, dug in, would stop the Germans as the Germans in turn would be less fatigued.

For those who might think the Germans would have been better to split their force and threaten a greater area, that plan has risks. A good Russian player might concentrate on one of the two German divisions. There is enough Russian units to form a rear guard to hold one German division from breaking out on its own, while the remaining Russian forces hammer the less numerous Germans in the other division. If the Germans split up a passive defense will not work.

Dog Soldier

[von Nev]

The End - German Epilogue

Overall, this was a fun, suspenseful and challenging scenario. The scenario was even made more challenging with the excellent defensive play of Dog Soldier. He did exactly what needs to be done to contain German offenses in S41 (or any other PzC title). He used his numerous infantry units to create numerous defensive lines which contained any break in the first line to just a local threat and he used his artillery to pound the German spearheads. These two strategies in S41 do not guarantee a Russian victory but it makes S41 a very challenging (and sometimes frustrating) title for any German player.

In retrospect I would not have dramatically changed my strategy or my game-play. The first blows west of the Dnepr nearly destroyed the entire Russian 172nd Rifle Division and the subsequent two pronged attack once over the Dnepr were close enough that I could rapidly reinforce each axis while (hopefully) far enough that the Russian foot infantry could not do the same. Also, both the 10th PzD and the 10th Motorized Divisions were relatively worn out by the end of the game. After looking over the Russian OOB at the end of the game it was apparent that the Russians still had more forces and some were very fresh. If I would have divided the German forces I think the German divisions would have had a harder time of it. One could argue that a different crossing point was better, but success at an alternate crossing point still predicated on getting a breakthrough. With the excellent defensive play of Dog Soldier I think that would still have been in doubt. All in it was a balanced scenario.



Summary of how the game played out.

[Dog Soldier]

Russian Epilogue

An excellent game was played by von Nev for the Germans. While you may argue the southern approach is the most difficult due to terrain, enough of the Russian Army is in the north to slow a German assault there until help arrives. Von Nev did an excellent job of keeping his forces together where he could reinforce any success each attack axis would encounter.

This scenario is like a game of chicken for the Russian commander. The Russians have to wait for their units to release. During this time, watch the German deployments carefully. You will have precious few turns when your army becomes mobile, foot mobile that is, to determine where the German main thrust will be centered. Until the Axis forces are committed fully to an attack axis, the Russians can not necessarily concentrate their forces. If the Axis wait to long to commit to a concentrated effort, then they will simply run out of time. An attrition strategy for the Axis will not work either. They must pick a place to concentrate early on the morning of the second day of battle. Any later and they risk running out of time.

A smart Russian commander must always keep some fresh units up until the end. The positioning of these reserves is vital. The Russians can not shift easily a long distance, so make sure you position your reserves in the most likely place where the Germans are going. The guessing game for both sides is what makes this scenario enjoyable. Remember this is long scenario. Do not try and commit all your infantry to the front lines. Defense in depth is the name of the game here. Try to set up strong points with a large stack of good order infantry to channel the German drive. Sure, the Axis can mow right through the best Russian stacks, but at a cost of time, casualties and fatigue. Alternatively, look for an opportunity to counter attack weaker Axis units holding “quiet” sectors. If your troops can not get to where the main action is, try and destroy some of the German units left behind the main drive. You may be able to force the Axis player to send help weakening the main thrust. Or you might get a break in his line and be able to rollup and destroy some units. German units are worth more VP than Russian ones so you may be able to do much damage and keep the VP totals in check.

Preserve as much of your Russian artillery as you can. The big guns are what eventually wear down the powerful German 10th Panzer and Motorized divisions. The Axis will come after any guns they can catch with everything they can. The Russian artillery in a priority target for the Germans when spotted.

A final note. The Russian 172nd division is an excellent force in the Russian 13th Army. It is in an exposed position defending Mogilev at start. Most Axis attacks will follow the pattern of von Nev's opening moves, just to take this Rifle Division out of play while fixed and grab the VP hex in Mogliev. Do not worry too much about this. This scenario of Smolensk 41 demonstrates the paralysis of the Russian command by fixing most all the Russian troops for the first seven turns. Just try and be ready for where the Germans go next morning. That movement will set the stage for the rest of the game. If the Germans forgo an attack on Mogilev, the Russian commander is faced with a choice.
• Abandon the city and the 100 VP hex and move this division into a position for the end of the second day’s fighting or move into reserve for the third day.
• The other choice is to sit tight, reinforce the Mogilev bridgehead and when the time is right, strike the Axis rear and destroy his bridges over the Dnepr. Very risky, but a big move if the opportunity is there.

I hope now some of the blitz members who have been following this AAR will post their comments on the game played, volunteer their own strategies, or just comment on the scenario in general. This scenario is now what I would consider a gem!

Dog Soldier