AAR 1943 Eastern Front: North of Luchki by Mark Luther

The route from Luchki

German players come in from lower left. Soviet armor starts behind back ridge and the remnants of the 6 MRB is in gully to the lower right

Rolling open terrain

Das Reich units entered from the lower right, the highest ground on the table. Their job was to get across the board to the opposite corner.

View from the 21st Guards Tank Brigade deployment area

The Soviet armor started out on the reverse slope and had to cross grassland and fields to get to the Germans.

First action

Brian's T34s managed to get halfway across the table before Rob's tanks fired back. The Panzers had the advantage of veteran crews and a 'blitzkreig' card. Tanks themselves were an obvious even match, but the superior training allowed the Germans to cause more damage and get more shot off.

Soviet advance

Rob's tanks charge towards the enemy T34s. Instead of giving every radioless tank a card, I broke the companies into 3 sections of 3 to 4 tanks. When their card came up, all could move in the same direction, but Rob had to roll a 4-sided dice to see how many could fire. With over 40 tanks in the game, we really couldn't afford the time that 20 more cards would entail.

Capt Sloboda's most excellent ambush

Edward had placed his infantry units among a gully. One platoon was in the front and the other was further back to the right along a ridge. The MMGs were also further back in the center. Tim had thought to use the cover of one of the rises to move his Panzergrenadiers around to the right. He didn't spot the the Russkis until they opened up at short range. The mortars also managed to land their shells among the grenadiers. This ambush pretty well took out the Panzergrenadiers for the rest of the game and forced Brian to send his PzIII over to help rescue the survivors. Well played Captain Yuri!

Did I do good, Dad?

Edward looks at his dad, Tim, after administering the punishment. Brian leans in to see the massacre up close. And just what is Rob measuring?

Panzer to the rescue

Brian sends his PzIIILs over to help out Tim's Panzergrenadiers. This will tie them up for several turns and allow Tim to evacuate the survivors. Looks like one panzer will have trouble shooting.

Heroic soldiers

Capt Slododa attempted a heroic act when he led his squad of tank killers personnally to assault the PzIII on the right. They managed to get right next to the panzer with some nice movement rolls, but then rolled six ones and twos for their strike dice, causing no damage to the target. Subsequently the accompanying German MMGs section wiped out the tank killer squad leaving Captain Yuri to dash back alone to his remaining troops.

PzKfw-T34(r) vs T34

Brian's T34s are taking a toll on Rob's attackers, but he now has one main gun out of action and another tank immobilised. He still hasn't spotted the other group of T34s moving to the right. The T70s ae also moving around his right. Meanwhile the overall Soviet armor CO has gone to the rear to switch tanks since his has been beat up. As soon as he got into the new vehicle, it was hit, and the engine caught on fire. His luck improved when Rob rolled a '6' to successfully put the fire out. The following turn he dashed out to direct the rest of the unit and his tank was once again disabled with a jammed turret and immobilzation hit. Bad day for Boris Chikovsky!

Stuka attack

Despite the air support card coming up quite often, the Luftwaffe was not on their game today. The first few turns there was no movement by the Russians, so the Stukas needed an '8' or higher (2D6) to spot. No luck then. When they did see something, I then rolled to find out what was coming in. On a D10, 1-4 meant a JU87D, 5-8 was a JU87G, 9 was two JU87Ds and a 10 was two JU87Gs. The two times when a Stuka did show up, it was one JU87G and both times they totally missed their target. No Hans Rudel there. Notice the T34 crepping up the slope to the left. They can't go hull down though:  not their doctrine and the gun can't depress enough.

New threat

The PzIIIs move to face the T70s coming around the right flank. There is still a group of T34s that have not been spotted yet.

More Ivans to the right

Brian moves his T34s to take on the tanks going around his right and heading towards his PzIIIs.

Pak 38s arrive

Two Pak 38s from the 12 Schwere Kompanie move up into a saddle in the center. They immediately have targets as some T70s move across their front, followed by a group of T34s

Closer

Rob moves his T70s and remaining T34s at the black cross covered T34s

Danger to the right

Rob sends another group of T70s towards the center and directly towards the flank of the paks.

T70s as suicide bombers

In a gamey move, Rob sends two of the T70s directly at the PzIII to draw their fire away from the T34s. Since I had to take over for Brian at this stage, and run the panzers, I didn't think I could impartially rule out this move. They of course met a fiery fate. Meanwhile other T70s are making a beeline for the Paks, (which were also hidden from their line of sight). One of the PzIIIs has also gone up from a hit from the T34s.

Last of the T34s

Rob's remaining T34s engage the PzIII from the next ridge. They are losing this exchange of fire also.

Last Turn

We ran out of time and were rapidly running out of tanks, so we decided to call it here.

Das Reich had two abandoned T34s at the end of the game, none totally KO'ed. The PzIIIs had one vehicle destroyed. The Panzergrenadiers had taken heavy casualties, with the entire platoon gone. No telling how the attempted overrun of the Paks would go: the ATGs had three cards in the deck to one of the T70s, so they could've swung around to take on the light tanks.

The remnants of the 6th Gd Rifle lost about half one of one platoon, one mmg and the tank killer squad. Captain Yuri Sloboda is due to receive a citation.

There were at least three runners among the Guards T34s and five T70s were still around.

The Soviets succeeded in stopping the Das Reich in its advance, but would lose almost all its mobile assets on the table.