Across the Narva

[mikeh]

All setup and ready!

[mikeh]

Map of Estonia showing the location of Narva up by the Gulf of Finland. For this game the battle runs from just north of the City of Narva and follows the Narva River to just before Lake Peipus in the south.

Stalin wanted to take the Narva Isthmus and the northern areas along the Gulf of Finland to launch Air and Naval attacks on Finland.

[mikeh]

Pretty slow start tonight, the Soviets get a free first turn activation for 2nd Shock Army which activates the HQ of the 122 Division which just moves it's units closer to the Narva River crossing to the far south of the line down by Lake Peipus.

Even though it's winter the Germans have kept the usually frozen river open by way of explosives so the Soviets will still need to capture a bridge or ferry crossing to get across.

[Whiterook]

Blowing up an iced-over river… now that’s bad assed war tactics! Must have taken a lot of dynamite! This is a great looking game… amazing what you can get in a zippie game! I’ve seen some people dis ziplock games, but they can be such a good deal…surprising what a box adds to the game cost.

[mikeh]

Soviet 2nd Shock Army attacks a ferry location with a mass of air support.

Hey Em, I guess they actually did this on that section of the river.

As for not liking zippies or mag games well, I feel sad for them. If it being boxed really matters to them they could make a box for it. The videos are on YouTube.

[mikeh]

Saw that coming, the Soviets blow through the 277th Grenadier Regiment causing a step loss and a retreat of 2 hexes. The Soviets immediately advance to the other side of the river.

Soviet air power is powerful at the start here. 6 air units to 1 for the Germans. And that's where it remains for the rest of the game. Depending on how used in the turn they can either return after 1 or 2 turns.That last attack used all their attack values for the attack, they will return 2 turns from now. That still leaves the Soviets 4 units.

[mikeh]

German only get one activation chit in turn 1 and it was drawn after the 3 chits if the Russians. No action chits were drawn at all.

Air, armor and infantry push a Soviet unit back across the Narva north of the city itself.

The color of the counters may be a problem for some folks. Also imo anyway the map colors could be turned up a notch or two.

[Whiterook]

Yeah, that background color choice on each side is pretty close.

I love simple factors on games’ counters, which is why I love so many older games… it seems there are so factors on some of these modern day game counters that it’s hard t9 keep track of.

[mikeh]

Reinforcements for both sides pouring into map now. German coming down from top right are piled up on the railroad and rollbahn. If this game only teaches me one thing it's going to be road and rail discipline. If you are not on a road or rail you are probably in a forest or worse a swamp.

[mikeh]

Soviets begin build up on Narva's NE side against SS Nederland, between the SS and the Prepared Defenses this will be a tough nut to crack

[Whiterook]

Now I have to admit, I have never had to learn tail discipline in a wargame… that’s actually very, very cool!

[mikeh]

Jul 22, 2022 16:45:14 GMT -5 Whiterook said:

Now I have to admit, I have never had to learn tail discipline in a wargame… that’s actually very, very cool!

Well part of the problem is the Germans are not pulling the needed activation chit. But I tried sending to much forward by rail, now it's quite the mess.

[mikeh]

Russian artillery hammers away pinning two German units and causing a step lose and retreat to another.

[mikeh]

Made a mistake with the Marine infantry unit, while it still remains retreated I need to take it's step lose back as it was in a city hex when bombarded, first step lose is ignored in that situation.

[mikeh]

Well, after stumbling and bumbling my way through 4 turns I have decided to reset the game and start over. I should have known better then to post this first game as this is pretty much the way they go for me. On the plus side I now know where I went wrong in a few spots actually, so onward and upwards as they say.