Barrie & Steve's Spevverband defending Orsha from Jim & Richard's Strelkovy from Dobryna.
Free For All. Germans out of supply & dropped a Morale class, but had Festerplatz defences. 1500pts + 2 Firestorm troops each, 8x6 table.
Germans: HQ, Sperr Pioneers, 2xSperr, 75mm Inf Guns, 155 Battery, 4Pak40, 2Hetzers, 3 SPAA + 3 Stugs,& P/grens Firestorm Troops. They deployed infantry on both objectives behind minefields, artillery in rear centre, Stugs in left corner, Hetzers in right corner.
Russians: HQ with pioneers, 3coy Strelk, 2coy Strelk, 2coy Pioneer, 4Ziz2, 4 ISU122 + Hvy Battery & 5SU76 Firestorm Troops. They advanced Strelk & Pioneers through wood towards both objectives. The ISUs & Zis2's advanced in the centre. The SUs held back to cover the right, art in rear.
While Steve hunkered down on the left & played with his artillery, Barrie launched a counterattack on the Russian right with his Stugs. The Russians lost a SU76 discovering how useless they were v. Stugs & pulled them back out of sight behind a village. They called off the infantry attack on the centre to defend the right as Barrie supported the Stugs with Infantry & SPAA advancing from the centre.
On the other flank Jim's attack ran into a brick wall. As soon as the pioneers left cover to deal with the minefields they were mown down by a hail of hmg & mg fire. The ISUs popped the Hetzers, but then found their lack of rate of fire made them pretty useless against infantry with anti-tank of 5. A Sperr Pioneer counterattack under smoke destroyed one ISU & intimidated the rest.
In the centre, the pioneers turned right to attack the German infantry advance, destroying them. They had a chance to take out the SPAA while one was bailed, but 6 shots got 6 hits & they were beaten off.
But it was on Barrie's flank that the battle was decided. The Russian artillery failed to even hit a Stug firing at them every turn after the 1st. The SU's came out to play when the Stugs were at close range, but soon died taking just 1 SPAA with them. The Stugs took the objective, but were pushed back off it with one loss by an infantry counterattack. The Zis2's had been manhandled across to help out, but a village severely restricted their field of fire. The Stugs retook the objective & the Zis's bailed up the one on the objective, but it was only delaying the inevitable. Next turn 2 Stugs & 2 SPAA held it & the Russians didn't hit any of them.
The Germans had lost 2 platoons - Hetzers & Sperr so a 4:3 victory, but they threw 2 6's for Firestorm casulaties & the Russians lost both of them. The Germans lost none. The Russians could carry on about bad luck & useless equipment in the usual fashion, but in fact they were outplayed - Barrie's counterattack was exactly the right thing to do & Steve's defence was rock solid.
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