A mechanic slid from out underneath the tank and wiped grease on to his coveralls. He didn't need to but he was aware that there were certain conventions that applied when working on a vehicle, he actually kept a small pot of grease on hand for this purpose.
"I think that's got it, Herr Hauptmann," he reported. The hauptmann looked a little concerned.
"You think?" he asked. "You're not sure?"
"It's a Russian tank," replied the mechanic. "All the instructions are in Cyrillic. I've been using a youtube video for assembling models. Are you going to be driving this?"
"Not now," replied the hauptmann, "what about the flamethrower?"
"Oh that definitely works. You remember the fireball in the maintenance shed? Kleinschmidt forgot his cigarette lighter."
"I was wondering what happened to his hair." The hauptmann gestured to a rather nervous looking tank crew lurking in the background. "All right, get in."
The tank crew radiated a distinct disinclination to go anywhere near the hulking vehicle that squatted in the work shop dribbling fuel from an oversized nozzle sticking out next to the 76mm gun.
The hauptmann lost patience, "Get in or I'll cut off your supplies of pervitin."
There was a scramble for the vehicle and both the hauptmann and the mechanic stepped well out of the way as, after a certain amount of trial and error, the engine was started and the tank lurched forward.
"Well done," said the hauptmann as the tank made its somewhat unsteady way towards the front German soldiers scattering to either side as it did so. The hauptmann left to round up his troops and the mechanic watched for a moment before pulling a small piece of metal from his pocket.
"What's that?" asked the newly bald Kleinschmidt who had just joined him.
"Firing trigger for a flamethrower. It fell off while I was testing the turret traverse"
"Should we tell them?"
"They'll find out soon enough."
Dave Wilson and I have settled down for another Ostfront city fight. This time in Stalingrad, a battle so storied that it has generated about seventeen campaign modules so far with another fifty three in production. Being minimalists Dave and I settled for a simple scenario ITR-4 - Tough as Nails. It's Stalingrad so you already know what's required, a bunch of Germans have to crawl forward about a hundred yards and capture a building or two to enable them to crawl forward a hundred yards and capture a building or two. I, commanding the defenders of the Motherland have decided that a nail factory is the particular ditch I am prepared to die in.
As the Germans Dave has to capture a pair of factories deep in downtown Stalingrad. To do so he has a wide array of tools at his disposal. He has three squads of 838 assault engineers, eight elite squads and nine squads of first line troops to act as expendables. These guys have two heavy machine guns, two medium machine guns, five light machine guns, two antitank rifles (why?) two flamethrower, four demolition charges and a radio connecting him to an 80mm mortar battery. This force is led by seven officers ranging from a lowly 7-0 to a planet conquering 10-2. Circling in the skies above are a pair of stukas eager to dispense with their bomb loads and get back to their airfields where they can fondle long haired dachshunds or each other depending on their inclination.
Twenty squads of superbly led troops with artillery and air support being deemed insufficient (the scenario designers have obviously never seen me play) Dave is reinforced on the second turn with another dozen first line squads, a medium machine gun, four lights and another four officers including a 9-1. Oh yes, and some armour. More specifically, a PzIIIH, two PzIVF2s, two StuGIIIBs a StuGIIIG and the fire brigade. The fire brigade consisting of two captured Soviet tanks, a KV-8 and a T34M43(Fl) each carrying a terrifying flamethrower in addition to their main weapon.
So what do I, champion of nail factories everywhere, have to resist such might? I'm glad you asked.
I have sixteen elite squads including five 628s who are definitely not assault engineers for any useful purpose. These guys are supported by six conscript bullet catchers and have an hmg, two medium machine guns, five light machine guns, a pair of antitank rifles and two molotov cocktail projectors. They have four officers including my own 10-2 and heavy support in the shape of two 45mm antitank guns, a 76mm artillery piece and an 82mm mortar. I also get fortifications in the form of a roadblock, 24 factors of AP mines, 4 factors of AT mines, a dozen concealment counters and a booby trap capacity which I completely forgot about (have I mentioned I'm not really great at this game?). In addition I can fortify four building locations.
But wait, never let it be said that Stavka leaves its troops in the lurch (believe me you'd better not say that). I too receive reinforcements in the form of six squads, half elite and half first line carrying a grand total of two light machine guns and urged towards the fray by a battle hungry 7-0, I also get six more concealment counters.
Below is the set up. Basically Dave has to capture the two factories in the middle of the board. The forward one I expected to fall pretty easily to I garrisoned it with dummies and conscripts in the hope of slowing him down a little. Having set up the roadblock to prevent his armour roaring straight down the most direct route and placed the AT mines on the two flanking roads where they achieved precisely nothing. The rear factory was my "die in a ditch" location, I fortified a couple of hexes, placed the 76mm and a pair of mmg armed squads led by my 10-2 HIPed where I thought they could do some good (wrong). The two mol projectors were out on the flanks hoping to get a rear shot as the German armour went by.
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| At start, the red circles indicate where I have hidden my guns |
A close glance at the map will indicate that I have already cocked something up and the game hasn't even started yet. I obviously don't play with factories enough as I kept forgetting that they don't have any intervening levels between the ground floor and the roof. I persisted in setting things up on a mythical first floor which would come back to bite me badly later.
Dave started his attack and immediately invalidated a fair amount of my defence. I thought the rubble, roadblock and stalwart defenders would force Dave to go for a flank but he didn't, he lined the bulk of his troops up and sent them straight up the middle. My expendables in the forward factory would do all that I could ask of them breaking some troops and simply existing for a couple of turns but to the left Dave's main drive punched forward through the ruins towards his second target.
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| End of turn 1. My forward factory holds for now |
By the end of the second turn Dave was swarming all over the forward factory but a couple of brave Soviet conscripts still clung to the odd corner. Dave's armour turned up and one of his captured flamethrower tanks busted its FT on the first shot. This is why you don't buy tanks on e-Bay. Technical difficulties notwithstanding Dave's offensive was proceeding nicely although my hmg did manage to break one squad that pushed its luck a little far. In the previous game I spent a lot of time cursing railway tracks and the increased time it took my armour to traverse them. This time it was Dave's turn to curse as his tanks picked their way over the rails.
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| End of German turn 2 |
In a strange way the delay of his armour actually helped Dave a little as with his tanks not yet committed I didn't feel I could pull in the troops on my flanks in case he sent them looping around my flanks once they were unguarded. My own reinforcements arrived just in time to be welcomed by the Luftwaffe who bounced a 200mm bomb off some of them. This went about as well for the recipients as you can imagine but frankly I got off rather lightly.
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| End of Soviet turn 2. Bomb victims in the rear |
With the forward factory cleared Dave pushed forward and proved how silly I had been to place all of those troops on the flank as his vehicles threaded their way through buildings and rubble to join their comrades in the centre (except for one which bogged far to the rear in a pile of debris). Fresh from their triumph at the front factory the remainder of Dave's troops joined his comrades in monstering my remaining factory. I wasn't terribly concerned. It had taken him three turns to get here and I still had a decent number of troops and hidden guns but disaster was just about to unfold.
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| Dave is ready to attack the rear factory |
Remember that I said earlier that I tended to forget that factories don't have interior levels? Well I had forgotten that again with my defence of the rear factory. I had a hidden 76mm gun on the ground floor and a pair of squads with mmgs (and the 10-2) hidden on a mythical first floor above them. With Dave's forces closing in from all sides I decided the time had come to unleash some firepower at which point Dave noted my error. He was very kind and allowed me to keep all of my troops in the ground floor location. I attacked a kill stack commanded by his 10-2 with a 16+1 shot to no effect. I fired my 76mm at a flamethrower team across the way to no effect. In the next fire phase Dave rolled a three with his flamethrower and crushed the lot. Such things are burnt across my soul and Dave had to give me a minute or three while I got up off the floor, wiped the tears from my eyes and indicated my willingness to continue.
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| Disaster!! |
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| Probably my best turn of the game |
Over on the left I was holding my own as I brought my flankers in to reinforce my hmg post. In the centre and on the right though my defenders were facing a sea of blue. With troops to burn Dave hurled his men forward across the street. I broke a goodly number of them but a couple managed to gain a foothold. To increase the pressure he drove a tank straight into the factory. My defenders watched in despair as the thing promptly dropped through into the cellar making a mess of their porn stash and hydroponic dope plantation.
In my turn I managed to smuggle a couple of squads into the factory through the sewers which resulted in four squads and a 10-2 being overstacked in the one location I could still consider secure. My 10-2 finally recovered from his flamethrower induced nervous breakdown and rallied his troops. Not before time as Dave sent a second wave of troops across the street to build on the small gains he had made in his first attack. This time there was no stopping him and he was solidly lodged in the factory.
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| One chance left... |
Things were not yet completely black for me. Overstacked or not I still had five squads in the factory (four led by a 10-2) and even overstacked four squads is a lot of firepower at pointblank range guided by a 10-2. Dave only had four squads in the factory himself with a pair in the fortified location that still contained my abandoned mmgs. Well they were abandoned until Dave picked one up. I decided to take out this position and then hopefully advance into CC to deal with the remainder. With time running out hopefully this would set Dave back too far back for him to recover. I hit his pair of squads with a 30+1 shot. One of the squads broke. The one that didn't returned fire with a 16+1 shot and broke everything I had in the hex including the 10-2. At that point I conceded. To be honest I screamed, wept, threatened suicide, made a number of wholly unjustified assertions about Dave, his parentage and his proclivities then I conceded.
In case you're wondering about Dave's artillery incidentally. Once the forward factory had been captured his 7-0 obediently lugged the radio up to the roof, called up the battery, brought down a single fire mission and was then shot dead by my sniper. My sniper was the most productive asset I possessed. A sniper number of five will do that for you.
Much thanks to Dave for the game, this was the second ITR scenario we played and they were both excellent. Being slightly scarred by the second experience I have reverted to type and insisted that we play a scenario with Italians in it next time but we will revisit the Into the Rubble pack again in the future.
The mechanic flicked a little dust from the obersts kubelwagen and stretched, it was almost noon. Time to finish for the day. He turned to look for Kleinschmidt and found himself face to face with the hauptmann he had spoken to earlier. The hauptmann did not look happy. The mechanic looked around swiftly to see if there was any grease he could wipe on his overalls but Kleinschmidt had taken the pot for his own purposes.
"How did it go Herr Hauptmann?" he asked hopefully. There was no sign of the tank he had "worked" on earlier.
"Not bad," replied the hauptmann. "We've captured a couple more buildings. At this rate we'll have captured the entire of Stalingrad by 1985. About that tank you repaired."
"Did it give you any trouble?"
"A mortar blew its tracks off."
"Ah well you see, mortar fire isn't covered by the warranty Herr Hauptmann. I'm very sorry but there's nothing I can do."
"Can you at least go and pick it up?"
"Kleinschmidt does the pick ups."
"I saw him, he was covered in grease and, well I didn't want to interrupt."
The mechanic rolled his eyes.
"Since its you Hauptmann I'll go and get it as soon as I've had dinner. There's another exit if you don't want to pass Kleinschmidt on your way out."
"Thank you," replied the hauptmann with visible relief.
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