Although AGN is taking losses they are making good ground and pocketing swathes of Soviet forces at some expense.

It feels unusual to take this high a loss rate with the German Panzers. Note the two red 4’s. But each turn their is one armour replacement step!

Kliest presses home but not without losses.

 

 

Predictably the Soviets are forced to withdrawal, and their forced counter attacks cause gaping holes on the lines. 

Kliest presses towards Kiev and surrounds units to preserve strength.

Soviet replacements are not keeping up with losses and we realize after the game a minor error was made, but onwards regardless.

The start of the 5th turn sees the first FROST!

Kiev has fallen and the Germans seek to take Leningrad and more central terrain to consolidate before the effects of winter are called upon.

With a paucity of units on the board their will be no Soviet December counter offensive I think…

In fact the  lines are rather too thin!

Kharkov falls with barely a whimper and Stuka attacks continue to pound on the Soviets. I can see some of the thinking that Racier applied to The Dark Valley from GMT in this title. Perhaps this was a warm up for it?

 

Now forces start be whittled away and perhaps either I am lucky or this is too much weighted to the Germans favor?

 

The lack of command points really limits the Germans to 1 assault for either AGN/AGC or AGS in on region of the map, while the others have to suffice with movement focused efforts.  I like how CP’s here mitigate the abilities of each side over time.

Germans close in on the prize – Moscow!

 

Leningrad falls, and it is then we realize we have not really checked for victory as we are so engrossed in our now 3rd play of the game.

Rum units head for Sevastopol. 

With barely a unit on the board, we double check rules and believe its all legit! This is where I call the game.

The VP total was passed a little while ago but all in all a fun game that requires some significant thinking ahead for good play by both sides. Reflecting on this game I think it has a lot of merit to it and provides you with excellent decision points, excellent theme, and captures a lot of the historical  elements. While this particular play did not follow in the footsteps of history on this front, I felt that the Germans were very lucky and the early heavy losses for the Soviets really hurt them.

This might be a problem with the game or possibly how I played. In hindsight in this play thru it was possible for the Soviets to have done better with better choices of Chit actions and more effective use of the forces available.