I decided to take a quiet drive in the country after being cooped up in the cellars of Stalingrad for so long. So I hooked up with Alan Saltzman of Fayetteville, NC in Hill 253.5. He had the Russians and I took the assaulting Jerries.
He had his mines in the center and on top of the main ridge. Wire was thoughtfully placed on the road and woods on his right flank. His 76L AT guns were on top of the ridge. One in the middle-back to the first ridge and the other on the front of the second ridge. I tried sending a leader and two squads and a Panther on my right board-edge, two groups of two squads and a leader along my left flank and the rest with the 9-2 and 10-2 leaders up the gut. I used my halftracks as minesweepers, where they excelled. They did not do so well as MOL sweepers though. I sent probing HSs forward to search for mines. All clear. I found the mines two times by advancing stacks onto them during the APh. (Stupid move. Advance a unit at a time. Aaarrrgggg!)
After weathering the Russian's FFE, which immobilized a Panther, killed an 8-0 leader with a FT, broke two squads, I struck back by cutting the rout path of the Russian 628 with FT and DC. I needed to regroup and work my way out of the minefields. My first FFE:1 drifted onto the spot most desired by the Russians, nailing both of us. Luckily, FFE:2 nailed only the Russians and broke the back of the forward defense. Good thing as the sniper eliminated my OBA observer.
Alan used the 76Ls to place smoke on my stronger stacks a couple of times, but with decent shots from my Panthers from both flanks they were soon knocked out. The Russian reinforcements were not bothered by me on their turn of entry, since my stukas had not shown up yet. The Russian planes (only 1 showed up) on their first turn. I got mine on my third or fourth try, but I got 3 when they did arrive. This was probably the difference as the Sturmovich shot two down but malfunctioned his MGs on the next to last German MPh as my 10-2 and 8-3-8 with FT raced up to toast one of the Russian KVs. The other died from a critical hit from a bounding fire shot by the Elefant.
A number of times I thought my attack was completely doomed as I only had 3 or 4 good order squads. But once I slipped through the defensive fortification belt, these few squads kicked Commie hiney.
Overall, the game really hinged on about 3 DRs. Taking both KVs out in the AFPh with low odds shots certainly frazzled the Russians. And gacking the strafing roll saved a couple of critical units for me from a nasty attack of 8 (-2).
While the smoke shots certainly forced my units to move elsewhere for their shots, I really think this scenario screams for them to be located in the woods on the flanks to get side or rear shots against the German armor.
Anyway, Hill 253.5 is another classic ASL slugfest. A lot of neat toys, possibilities of dogfights, FTs and DCs, engineers, OBA, minefields, wire and not too many squads. Many decisions are critical for both sides.
Chuck