Grenadiers vs Strelkovy - Mid War Game II

I had a buddy come to town from Edmonton this weekend.  Some of you may remember me talking about him at one of the tournaments.

AKA: Cheating Nik and his god damn Cheating Americans.

Since I had minimal time between hocky and going to see "The Thing" that day, I decided to just use the armies I had prebuilt. The good old Grenadiers and Strelkovy.  The classic match up.

Grenadiers - 0
Strelkovy - 1

Nik decided he wanted to be the Grenadiers because he wanted to try out the Tiger.

Last time Nik and I played I came up against him in the worst possible situation.  My Konigs Kompanie fighting his Cheating American paratroopers in No Retreat.  Almost impossible for the KT's to win.  And sure enough compounded by the fact that I forgot about his ambush, I was slaughtered.

Curtis - 0
Nik - 1

Besides the fact, that he's a cheating bastard, Nik is a fun guy to play.  I knows the rules probably better then I do with out looking at the rule book.  I know the rules pretty well, but I probably can't do it with out a rule book.  And he remembers them correctly...which a lot of people don't.

So, we began by rolling for which scenario we were going to play....Trench Fight.  Oh, very cool, I haven't had a lot of chances to use any of my Fortifications.  And then we rolled to see who would defend...SON OF A...that cheating Nik strikes again...I have to come the long way across the board with Strelkovy to attack a dug in Nik, with Fortifications.

He took  a couple of barbed wire, a few trenchlines, and 2 MG Bunkers.

After the set up I was feeling pretty confident.  His Germans looked pretty piddly.  Then after my preliminary bombardment, I was feeling even better.  I half wiped out his MG's and his PAK 40's that were in ambush.  YES, Strelkovy were looking in fine form...

That was about the only time the whole game I was happy.  Things just unraveled from the start.

I deployed my largest Strelkovy Company away from his MG teams.  Unfortunately we played where the hill was rough terrain so I couldn't move them at the double.  I had my god of War at the back which barley fit spread out.  I was going to rush my other Strelkovy Company right up the middle where there were no obstacles.  I was going to rush my SU-85's down the right flank to try and take out the barbed wire, so that my middle strelkovy could quickly change direction and head to the swamp objective.

First turn went as planned, except the god of war stunk to high heaven.

On his turn he revealed his ambush, which I sort of did and sort of didn't forget this time.  Just didn't think he would have revealed so soon.  And the Pak 40's crushed my Su-85's. 

Not really a whole lot more to tell.  He slowly dwindled me down with those MG bunkers

I did make it to the barbed wire, and tried to assault with my large 32 team Strelkovy company.  How ever they failed a moral check.  So, my Commissar shot a team to have them real roll...then the Strelkovy said F-This and shot the Commissar back.  I don't know if I've even heard of that happening never mind to me.

The whole game pretty much went like that.  The God of War was totally useless.

I did have 1 bright spot in the whole game only to have to take away from me.  Just out of spite I tried to kill his tiger with my 57mm.  I think I only had one left at the time too.  And it was a super long shot.  I think he was just in the 32" range, and he had concealment.  So, I was going to need a 6 to even hit.  And I had just moved so my RoF was 1.

1 Roll = 6

Now I think I could only bail him out at this point, because he was over 16".  But, even for that to happen, Nik needed to roll a 1.

1 Armour Save = 1

Now I just needed to make my Fire Power test.  I'd already beaten the odds, and I only needed a 4+.  That's 50/50.

1 Fire Power Test = 2.

SON OF A...That is how the whole battle went.  My large Strelkovy Company ran away the first chance they got seeing how they had already killed their Commissar.  Leaving my HQ all alone to cover the whole left flank and tank on the tiger by himself.  I think even blew him up instead of assaulting him.

So
Grenadiers = 1
Strelkovy = 1

Very fun game, despite it being pretty much lopsided.

Thanx a lot Nik.  I don't get much time to play these days.
At least now I know its not the Americans that Cheat....its just you!