It's a typical eastern front quantity-versus-quality situation with the Soviets attacking. They have the advantage of rocket artillery and three platoons of T-34s (as reinforcements), offset by lower morale and below-average leadership.

The Germans set up in the town, with their two StuG platoons dug in on the flank to provide fire support.

The Soviets advanced behind a screen of Penal troops. The Soviet off-board artillery didn't do much to soften up the Germans, and German Opportunity Fire took out half of the Penal troops. Their sacrifice was not in vain, however, as the regular Soviets made it up to the town intact.

A good German initiative roll allowed them to whittle down the Soviets before the assaults went in. The assaults, robbed of much of their power, made no headway against the German defenders, and the Soviets suffered heavy casualties, particularly among the leaders. Two leaders deserted after rolling '12' on recovery rolls. The Soviets were left with only one leader (the Captain) at the end.

The Soviet reinforcements came in on the second turn after they begin rolling for entry, and the infantry advanced to the town while the armor engaged around the edges of the town. The T-34's scored first, taking out half a platoon of StuGs. In trying for good shots, they ventured too close to the town and two platoons were assaulted by a platoon of German infantry. (The third platoon had been disrupted by German off-board artillery and was not in the fight.) The assault cost the Germans half a platoon of infantry, but it tied up the T-34s. This allowed the StuGs to set up a crossfire and take out two platoons of Soviet tanks.

In the end, the Germans held the town while inflicting over 20 step losses (tank losses counted double) on the Soviets. The Germans only lost four steps (one tank loss and two half-platoons of infantry).

German Victory

This was an interesting scenario. The rocket artillery was less effective than I expected, between its scattering and the fact that all the targets were in town. The loss of the leaders was really hard on the Soviets. They just couldn't do anything in the assaults, or bring up their reinforcements fast enough to keep pressure on the Germans. This scenario could easily have gone the other way with some better luck on the Soviet die rolls early in the game.

Author	triangular_cube
Method	Solo
Victor	Draw
Play Date	2023-02-03
Language	English
Scenario	TaBa035

German set up in this one is pretty obvious. Stack the town, and see where the Soviets deploy to move your HMGs into place. The Stugs sit outside the town dug in, in case something sets up in the field that needs to be flushed out, otherwise they are poised to swing into the Soviet flank as they move up.

Soviets have 2 bad options to start the game. They can either attack immediately and hit the town piecemeal, or they can wait for their reinforcements but potentially have half the game clock eaten up. Soviets decide to go in, trusting their artillery. They set up towards the Southwest of the town, so the Stugs are out of FoF with their 45s ready to pray for a lucky roll against them. The BM13s set up out of the way on 6.

Soviets move towards the town and score some disruptions to get adjacent in pretty good formation and order, but lose init on the crucial assault turn and are hit by German OBA and the whole thing goes belly up there. They never recover or get into a meaningful assault and wither away. Once a stack was fully demoralized, the Germans got aggresive and went for the knock out blow though, charging into assault with 3x INF and a leader. They arent able to fully clear the dem'd stack and Soviets pound it with OBA and BM13s with amazing rolls and end up with 5 of those 6 INF steps cleared off the board. At the cost of their own men too, but w/e.

This was enough for both sides to "win" and secure the draw before the Soviet reinforcements got on the map, as they had to wait until the free entry turn having failed all their reinforcement rolls.