A quick AAR on the game play.

Back in the middle of October I took 20.3 Scenario L for a spin from Kharkov battles.

This covers the action where the Germans attempt to retake Kharkov March of 1943.

Now that I was a little more familiar with the rules from a prior play the game flowed very nicely with minimal rules looks and most were refershers items for me. I of course missed a key weather rule for the open and Greg Blanchett was kind enough to not make look entirely stupid on my socila media post and he point that out. “No overruns in Mud!” -Reset.Which was very quick as I could just reference off of the full color setup charts.

Despite that error we kicked off aggressively with the LAH attacking the 48^th Guard.Supported by the Deutschland regiment from 2^nd SS

GD and Totenkopf pressed in from the Karlovka area.

Before you know it we have a steady advance across the line, and as Turn 2 shaped up the Soviets were under pressure. Below left out of frame the Soviets started to pull back but not fast enough, and the Germans trickled forward with no action or fighting taking place.

As the German player I was keen to cut the rail and road to stop any further forces supporting Kharkov. You can see above the lunge made by the Germans to do that. The woods top right proved problematic for the germans as a strong set of defences and decent Soviet units made for a fierce battle, forcing heavy losses.

The victory conditions are such that the Germans obviously must take Kharkov, but also Belogorod and Kupyansk for an auto victory. The German player was content to seek the end of scenario win vs auto victory. The Soviets were trying th keep their left open so reinforcements could get to Kharkov, but struggled to do so. Kharkov is under severe pressure.

This will not end well !!

The Germans chip away at the defenders, massing forces.

With Kharkov secure and units blocking the routes to Belogorod.

Kupyansk is literally a town too far, but we make a run for it anyway, as the forces could not make it to the fight for Belogorod before the scenario ends on turn 6 [starting turn 11 ending turn 16] Using a last precious air unit, and surrounding the town the Germans look for a big result.

So the game comes down to the final turn with a significant assault on Belogorod. Which fails.

The end state is a Soviet victory.

I suspect that with smarter lay by the Germans I could have presented better quality, and more units to both of the secondary objectives.

Similarly the Soviet play was sub par, their retrograde defence could have been much better handled, with a quicker move on their right to Belogorod, and smarter play around Kharkov.