Road to Berlin: The '34'

On the night of 30th June 1944, at the start of Operation: Bagration, a platoon of the 3rd Guards Tank Corps of the Red Army, led by Lieutenant Pavel Rak stormed across the bridges into the Wehrmacht-held town of Borisov. Despite throwing the German forces back in confusion, the Soviet tank commander found himself isolated as the rest of his platoon was destroyed and cut off when the bridges were blown behind him.

With only a small force of infantry to support him and facing overwhelming odds, Pavel Rak steeled himself to hold until relieved or to fight to the last man against the hated invaders.

This is the background of my final game of 2022, an asymmetric Bolt Action battle taken from the Road to Berlin campaign book. I would be taking on the role of the heroic Lieutenant Pavel Rak, and Matt would be commanding the nefarious faceless legions of the Third Reich.

The scenario dictated that Matt would have three times as many points as me (1800 vs 600), but I would be defending three bunkers (pictured below). The objectives were simple, Matt had 8-9 turns to capture the bunkers and I had to stop him or die trying.

You'll notice that two of the bunkers were actually coastal defences with hideous blind spots (this would be relevant) and for the third we created a strongpoint within the ruined factory. It made sense to us.

As stated earlier, the forces were somewhat uneven, but Matt and his Germans had a lot of ground to cover, whilst I had the benefit of sitting tight and letting him come to me. Given that I had to include a T-34 in my list to represent Lt Rak, I opted for quantity over quality for the rest of my force which was drawn from the Operation Bagration theatre selector:

Soviet Defenders (all Inexperienced unless noted)

2nd Lieutenant

Free Rifle Squad (12 men)

LMG Squad (10 men, 2 LMG)

LMG Squad (10 men, 2 LMG)

2 AT Rifle Teams (Regular)

Mortar Team & Spotter

T-34/85 (Regular)

Matt had more freedom but was required to use the Folorn Hope theatre selector which limited his choices to an extent. However, he knew that he would have to storm bunkers and deal with a T-34 and so could build his list accordingly...all 1800 points of it...

German 1st Platoon (1st wave, all Regular unless noted)

2nd Lieutenant

Forward Air Observer

Heer Grenadier Squad (10 men)

Heer Grenadier Squad (10 men)

Heer Grenadier Squad (9 men, Veteran)

Flammpanzer B2 (f)

German 2nd Platoon (2nd wave, all Regular)

2nd Lieutenant

Major

Heer Grenadier Squad (10 men)

Heer Grenadier Squad (10 men)

Panzerschreck Team

Panther Ausf D

Turn 1

I deployed my infantry squads in each of the bunkers, with the rifle squad occupying the factory strongpoint. The AT teams took up positions to allow them to try to put pins on advancing units and the T-34, Mortar team and officer were all hidden away out of danger.

Matt deployed most of his first wave on my right, around the stately home, with the air observer in an upper floor. We'd both overlooked the fact that the scenario began using the night fighting rules and so for now there was very little shooting possible.

On the other flank he deployed the somewhat terrifying form of the Flammpanzer. The fact that Matt has one of these is due to the fact that he has a rather large French army and there's only so many Char-1b tanks a single force can use.

I was very aware that if the Flammpanzer got in amongst my bunkers the game would be over very quickly and so the only shooting of the round came from and AT rilfe team and the mortar trying and failing to put pins on it.

Turn 2

The Flammpanzer continued to advance and the Panther failed to arrive from reserve, and so I brought Rak's tank out of hiding and, after successfully spotting the lumbering beast (it was still dark), opened fire.

BOOM!

First blood to the Russians.

I'd actually managed to put pins on the tank with the mortar and the AT rifle team in the same turn, but the T-34 shot was good and set the Flammpanzer on fire. Once the crew failed their morale test (which the pins helped with) we decided that the burning hulk should be a light source for the rest of the time that darkness lasted. It seemed to make sense.

Meanwhile, the German infantry scurried across open ground praying that it would get light before they found cover.

The veterans, however, revealed their superior experience of warfare by using the massive building to sneak up behind, aiming to turn the flank of the Russian defences.

Turn 3

With the sun failing to rise again, German infantry swarmed across open ground hoping that they wouldn't be spotted. Unfortunately, the LMGs in the bunker opened up on them.

The pressure was added to by the T-34 using is machine guns to spray the squad, inflicting significant casualties and causing them to break. My T-34 was living up to the legacy of Pavel Rak.

However, despite the successes in the centre of the battlefield, Matt had brought most of his second wave on to my left flank. Two squads of infantry advanced and the ominous form of a Panther rolled in to view. The defenders of the factory facing them were a single AT rifle and a squad of inexperienced infantry.

Turn 4

The advance towards the factory continued apace. A smattering of riffle fire issued out of the strongpoint, aiming more to pin and slow down the assault rather than with any hope of driving it off.

And even if they were successful in this, another squad were coming up in support. Things looked bleak for the defenders of the factory.

Things took a turn for the worse in the centre too, where the Panther and panzerschreck team moved into range of Pavel Rak. Both fired, but somehow both failed to cause any damage.

More infantry moved out into the open, keeping the attention of the soldiers in the bunker fixed to the front.

Turn 5

During all of this the veteran squad had successfully turned the flank of the Soviets, causing the mortar team to redeploy, and the officer to move to defend the bunker which, as a coastal defence, had a massive blind spot. Again, veteran experience had enabled the Germans to spot this.

The officer made a valiant attempt to pin and slow the veterans but his fate was sealed.

Over near the factory, the flood of German soldiers continued and the AT rifle team was brushed aside with ease.

Meanwhile, another squad had made it into assault range of the entrance to the strong point. If all went to plan, the Germans would be in position to take two objectives in the following turn and the Rusians would not have the means to dislodge them.

Turn 6

Daylight finally came and inevitably the air observer targetted my heroic T-34.

On my right the veterans were poised to strike and assaulted the bunker. Veteran soldiers bristling with assault weapons charged into inexperienced recruits armed only with rifles. The outcome was inevitable, but the scenario gave the Soviets the fanatics special rule which meant that the fight was more drawn out that it might have been. When the dust settled there were six veterans remaining anf the bunker was in German hands.

Meanwhile in the centre another assault was being prepared but things weren't going to plan. The panzerschreck team managed to hit but did little more than jam the tureet of the T-34 and the Panther failed to fire after taking a pin from the second AT rifle team. At least the infantry were able to use their cover and get forward, killing the AT rifle team in the process and sweeping towards the bunker.

Over on the left there was a surprise turn of events when the rifle squad rushed out of their bunker with a cry of "Ura!" and swept the German squad away in a storm of fixed bayonets.

Turn 7

The buzz of engines overhead signalled the arrival of the Luftwaffe who somehow managed to miss the tank in the open and instead annihilate their own infantry, removing any chance that Matt had of actually capturing the central bunker unless he could get a HQ unit to relieve the veterans on the left.

In order to prevent this and realising he was on borrowed time anyway, the foolhardy Lieutenant Rak turned his rear to massive gun firing on him and opened up with his hull machine gun on the lone officer heading toward the bunker. The veterans wouldn't be leaving and, barring a disaster, the centre was secure from piecemeal assaults by small squads and HQ units.

With the now customary failed shots from the Panther and panzerschreck, all eyes now turned to the factory. 

Turn 8

The final German squad geared up to assault the factory and went in, SMGs and assault rifles at the ready. The fanatical defenders fought back ferocously and two rounds of combat were fought, after which Soviets were still standing. The remaining German officer tried his luck, but also died. The bunker had held.

Soviets 1 - Germans 0

The heroic tale of Pavel Rak finally came to an end when the Panther eventually worked out which way was up and took out the T-34. 

Rak had prevented the veterans from leaving the right hand bunker, but this was still firmly in German hands.

Soviets 1 - Germans 1

A smattering of Germans lingered near the central bunker which was still grimly defended by the Russians. Technically the scenario states that units within 3" of an objective contest it, but this didn't really make a great deal of sense, given that standing outside a bunker doesn't really do anything unless you're armed with a flamethrower.

As Matt had gallantly assaulted the factory rather than loitering with intent but with the scenario rules being a touch weird we decided to call it a draw.

The Soviets still help two of the bunkers, but had no means of harming the Panther without leaving shelter and so would be pinned down until the veterans could be freed up to clear them out.

 Final Score: Soviets 1 - Germans 1

This was a really fun game to play with a very different feel to it. In retrospect I should probably have had slightly smaller squads and tried to have a few more mobile troops that I could use as a fire brigade. The AT rifles were a good choice, but the mortar was not the best decision against a mobile opponent and so I could easily have squeezed in one or two better quality squads designed for counter attacking.

Matt obviously wouldn't have brought the air observer and had terrible luck with his many failed attempts to destroy the T-34. Despite the points advantage, it's not easy to assault a fixed position and he had to keep moving throughout the game, whether he had cover or not or risk running out of time.

It's been enjoyable to get back to Bolt Action over the last few weeks and I'm hoping to get a few more games. I really enjoy the scenario gaming much more than straight fights and I'll be looking to ake good use of the campaign books over the coming year.

The Manchurian Tank Debate

It has been a good long while since I last played Bolt Action, and so to take a break from 7TV and Lord of the Rings, Matt and I took a trip back to the far east to pit my Soviets against his Japanese.

However, this time we wouldn't be revisiting the Khalkyn Gol incident in 1939 with tiny tanks and inexperienced troops. No, we would venture into 1945 and the Soviet offensive in Manchuria and Mongolia in which they declared war on Japan as part of an allied pact to finish off the war in the east.

This offensive pitted the might of the Soviet war machine, which had ground its way across Europe with increasngly large armoured vehicles, against the remnants of the Japanese Empire, which hadn't.

Let's play Tank War!

We played fairly fast and loose with the Tank War rules and the Manchuria Theatre selectors as we were working within the confines of what our collections would allow. Matt doesn't have enough transports (or tanks) for a decent sized game and needed to include somethings not from the selector, and I mistook an SU-122 for an SU-85 in my list building and put something in my list that shouldn't be there.

Hopefully writing about this on a blog won't result in the Rules Police knocking on my door charging me with crimes against historical accuracy.

We randomly rolled a Point Defence scenario and decided that due to the lack of transport and the fact that this was a massive Soviet offensive that Matt would be the defender, trying to keep me off three objectives.

Matt's force looked something like this:

1 Type 1 Chi-He Medium Tank (Command)

1 Type 97 Chi-Ha Medium Tank

2 Type 97-Kai Shinhoto Chi-Ha Medium Tanks

3 IJA Infantry Squads (15 men + LMG)

4 Suicide Anti-Tank Teams

1 Flame Thrower Team

1 Medium Mortar Team

1 Sniper Team

1 Type 1 47mm AT Gun

Arrayed against this I had almost all of my Soviet vehicles on the table, some of them for the first time, and a dearth of infantry, which would present problems later.

1 IS-2 Heavy Tank (Command)

2 T-34/76 Medium Tanks

1 SU-122 Self-Propelled Gun

1 SU-76 Self-Propelled Gun (Free)

1 Katyusha Rocket Launcher

2 Tank Rider Squads (9 men)

1 Sniper Team

1 ZIS-3 Divisional Gun

1 Truck

The game should have begun with a preparatory bombardment, but didn't because I always roll a one. It happens so regularly that I'm not even disappointed anymore.

TURN 1

Deciding to split my forces (which always go well, historically speaking) I advanced an armoured spearhead onto the left flank, opening fire to little effect. Their goal was to push towards the Japanese line, kill everyone there and allow the Tank Riders on the T-34 to capture the objective.

On the right (see above) I put almost all of my artillery: the Katyusha, the ZIS-3 and the SU-76. Their goal was to soften up the defenders opposite ready for the second group of Tank Riders and their T-34 to come crashing in from the flank later in the game. Unfortunately, their firing drew a blank, but the sniper, who was deployed amongst them was able to drop one of the Japanese AT gun crew.

First blood to Mother Russia.

TURN 2

The defensive fire came in hot as a mortar shell smashed down onto the the ZIS-3 killing two of the crew and causing the rest to run. Although I still had plenty of firepower on this half, I was concerned that they would be very vulnerable to enemy tanks making any kind of counter attack, an although Japanese tanks aren't very heavily armoured, I wasn't sure that an inexperienced SU-76 would be able to stop them.

Japanese Chi-Ha tanks did begin to trundle on to the battlefield, but their shooting proved to be somewhat inaccurate, and the when the Soviet tanks countered, the light hull armour of the Chi-Has was no match for the IS-2 or T-34.

However, despite losing two tanks in quick succession, the Japanese had lost barely any infantry. If I was going to stand any chance of driving them off, I would need those big units to be softened up before the Tank Riders got there.

To make matters worse, Matt had rumbled that I wasn't going to push for the central objective and began to advance the infantry he had there towards my left. He also realised that simply firing at my T-34 would force the Tank Riders to dismount, severely slowing them down. 

TURN 3

With the Tank Riders dismounted and the Japanese infantry in the centre advancing, I decided to push the T-34 towards the middle to counter the threat. Whilst this was happening, the IS-2 span its turret and managed to thread the needle and detonate the Japanese command tank, severely reducing the threat of a push towards my artillery.

With their armoured wing in disarray, the Japanese infantry stepped up to meet the threat. In the centre they charged the T-34 and narrowly missed hurting the tanks due to the difficulty of hitting moving tanks. On my left the infantry advanced to the crest of a hill to pour fire into the dismounted Tank Riders, further focusing on slowing the advance, whilst suicide anti-tank teams snuck forwards.

TURN 4

At this point in the battle, things looked grim for me. One unit of Tank Riders was pinned down miles from its objective, whilst the other had failed to appear from reserve. The origami Japanese tanks had folded, the infantry was still rock solid and on the attack, support by guys with bombs on sticks.

However, it was at this point that the dice gods decided to simultaneously repay me for the failed bombardment roll, whilst cursing Matt for some heinous crime he had committed in a former lifetime. Given what was about to unfold, Matt had done something REALLY bad.

Firstly, his squad of 12 men armed with anti-tank grenades only managed a single hit (needing 4+) on the T-34 and were subsequently sprayed with point blank fire from the tank, cutting the unit in half.

The final Chi-Ha arrived, and having worked out my fairly obvious plan, set about driving full steam towards the artillery park. However, it didn't last long and my reserves arrived, with the T-34 taking out the Chi-Ha in short order.

To make matters worse, the Katyusha managed to score a hit on the Japanese infantry on my right and then the Tank Riders dismounted, their SMG fire ripped through the defenders, leaving just a single man defending the objective from the Soviet horde.

However, all was not lost. In a bid to make the unit flee, I had used an exception hit to remove the sergeant, leaving the LMG in place, which passed its morale test and began returning fire. The AT gun turned in place and took out the T-34, leaving the infantry unsupported, and the sniper repositioned to add fire and try to whittle down the Tank Riders.

On the right, my attack was further stalled by a well-placed mortar shell hitting the SU-122 and some of the infantry, further pinning them in place. My IS-2 focused its might on killing the suicide bombers wending their way towards it.

Finally, and ominously, the flamethrower Matt had been holding in reserve entered the field, took aim at the Tank Riders on my right and...missed. My chances of capturing the objective would all depend on who drew a dice out the box first.

TURN 5

Whatever Matt did in a former life must have been REALLY, REALLY bad. I got the first dice and my Tank Riders on the right executed the flamethrower team and advanced onto the objective. All they had to do was weather the storm from the scattered remnants of the Japanese left flank and I would be guaranteed at least a draw.

Matt saw that the fight against the T-34 in the centre wasn't crucial and would ultimately be unsuccessful thanks to the casualties he'd taken and so with drew to pour more fire onto the stranded Tank Riders on my left.

However, this left the T-34 free to move to intervene in the other flank and if I kept control of the objective I'd already captured, there was still an outside chance of me snatching a win. The final Japanese infantry unit, hunkered down behind a hill was a massive obstacle to this and the IS-2 was unable to make a significant impact on it.

Enter the Katyusha. It repositioned and unloaded at the tightly packed infantry. Two sixes were rolled, one for the unit itself, and one for the suicide bomber stood with them, allowing me to overlap templates. The impact was devastating and the remains of the unit fled, leaving the objective clear. 

He clearly did something REALLY, REALLY, REALLY bad.

TURN 6

The intervention of the T-34 ultimately secured the right hand objective for me. It killed off the crew of the AT gun, and combined with the Tank Riders going down for survivability, a sniper and a lone LMG were not going to clear them out.

To add injury to insult, the SU-76 finally managed to hit something and wiped out the sniper team with a point blank shot.

 

Now came the long shot, and sequencing was everything. I had to wait until the end of the turn to try to remount to Tank Riders as going to early would allow Matt to dismount them again simply by shooting at the SU-122. However, this exposed them to potential further pins from the few units Matt had left.

The IS-2 helped out by removing the threat of the mortar with its massed machine-gun fire and the remaining infantry unit misfired and failed to score any hits.

The orders test was passed and the Tank Riders remounted. The SU-122 also passed an orders test and advanced as far as it could go. All I needed was for there to be another turn...

...but there wasn't.

RESULT - DRAW

AFTERMATH

That was a really fun game although Matt suffered from incredibly bad luck in turns four and five in  both the sequence of orders dice being drawn and in the dice rolled on both sides.

My flank attack worked as planned, just, but I was far too slow advancing, meaning that I was too far away at the end of the game. I was also severely hindered by a lack of infantry units, meaning that I had no redundancy and Matt just had to stop one unit to prevent a loss. Were I to play this again, I'd put a squad of infantry in the truck, rather than use it to tow the ZIS-3.

Matt was intent on stopping me, and almost did, although it cost him all but about 10 men. We got a taste of the Manchurian campaign, such as it was, as the Japanese were unable to stem the tide of Soviet armour, although fought doggedly in defence.

I like this little played theatre of the World War II. The relatively open terrain makes for a very different game to slugging it out in across fields of France or through the densely packed cities of Eastern Europe. I've never played Bolt Action set in North Africa, but I'd imagine it has some of the same feeling to it.

Defence of the Tractor Factory

24th August 1942. The 16th Panzer Division has burst through Soviet lines into the northern suburbs of Stalingrad, Rynok and Spartanovka.

However, waiting for them at the Tractor Factory is a cobbled together force of NKVD, People's Militia and hastily built T-34s from the factory itself.

This scenario from the Stalingrad campaign book features two 1500 point armies trying to cross a river with three bridges. Ostensibly, the Germans were attacking, giving them a preparatory bombardment, whilst the Soviets had trench lines and sandbags, but the victory points were the same for both sides. 1 VP for each enemy unit destroyed, and 1 VP for each unit on the other side of the river by the end of the game.

16th Panzer Division

Second Lieutenant

Medic

Panzergrenadier Squad

Heer Squad

2 Pioneer Squads (one with flamethrower)

MMG Team

Anti-Tank Rifle Team

Sniper Team

Heavy Mortar with spotter

Medium Howitzer with spotter

Panzer IV

Panzer III

SdKfz 222

Truck

Everything was regular except for the Pioneers which were veteran.

NKVD & People's Militia 

Senior Lieutenant

Commissar

Medic

Forward Artillery Observer

2 People's Militia Squads

3 NKVD Squads (one with SMGs)

Sniper Team

2 Anti-Tank Rifle Teams 

Medium Mortar with Spotter 

ZiS-3 Anti-Tank Gun 

ZiS-2 Anti-Tank Gun

2 37mm AA Guns

2 Tractor Factory T-34s (no optics)

The theatre selector allowed me to replace the usual free squad with 2 free inexperienced AA guns. The Commissar, People's Militia and T-34s were also inexperienced, everything else was regular.

Turn 1

The game opened with a preparatory bombardment which dropped pins all along the Soviet lines and managed to kill both the sniper and the medic. Largely ineffective fire flew back and forth across the river.

The most significant move of the turn saw a blitzkrieg attack from a Panzer IV straight towards the factory, gunning down the crew of factory workers manning one of the AA guns.

Turn 2

With a Panzer IV heading directly for them, the Soviets desperately tried to find something that could at least slow it down, including an artillery strike, and give time for the T-34s to roll out of the factory to the rescue.

The remaining AA Gun traversed on its turntable, took aim at the exposed flank of the enemy tank, fired and blew it up at the first time of asking. One German thrust had been halted.

However, now a Panzer III rumbled across another bridge. To add injury to insult, the German Howitzer found its mark on the ZiS-3 covering that bridge and despite the crew hitting the dirt, only one of them survived.

Turn 3

Once again the factory workers traversed their AA Gun. Once again they fired at an onrushing Panzer. Once again they blew it sky high. Heroes of the Soviet Union, every one of them.

With the enemy armour neutralised, the arrival of an incomplete T-34 suggested a shift in fortunes. Possibly allowing the Russians to go on the offensive.

Turn 4

Sensing a weakness on the German flank, Soviet armour and infantry pushed towards the railway bridge past the burning hulk of a Panzer. However, the T-34 was hit by a lucky mortar round, halting it in its tracks.

German infantry saw an opportunity to push across the central bridge behind the destroyed Panzer IV, using the wreck as cover.

Simultaneously, the SdKfz 222 arrived on an outflanking manoeuvre, getting behind the Soviet lines, but failing to make an impact against the dug in infantry.

It was met by an equally, if not even more, ineffective T-34 which managed to miss its target from point blank range.

Turn 5

With time beginning to run out, the People's Militia left the protection of the factory and advanced towards the central bridge. Pouring fire into the isolated German infantry as they went.

The inexperienced T-34 crew were either unwilling or unable to get their vehicle moving under heavy mortar fire and so the infantry pushed on across the river without armoured support.

However, further outflanking forces arrived behind the Soviet lines but were prevented from disembarking from their transport by massed rifle fire, not by the T-34 that managed to miss the anti-tank rifle team with both its MMGs.

Turn 6

Pioneers clambered out of the truck and the flamethrower used up all of its fuel incinerating much of the infantry packed into the trench. Even with 'encouragement' from the Commissar taking another life, the rest lost their nerve and fled the charnel pit.

More pioneers rushed across the bridge but were caught in the open by an outflanking NKVD assault squads. Eleven SMGs opened fire at point blank range and gunned the Pioneers down to a man.

Repeated shelling from a heavy mortar finally took its toll on the stalled T-34, but in return AA Gun fire into a building destroyed the German sniper team.

In a shocking breach of the Geneva convention, the People's Militia assaulted the German medic and the the remains of the squad hiding behind the tank, before pushing on over the bridge, where they took heavy fire.

Meanwhile, the Soviet assault across the bridge ran amongst the buildings of Spartanovka looking for Germans to kill, but a mortar strike took out the enemy howitzer before they could get there.

Turn 7

Four Soviet squads had made it across the river into Spartanovka and eight German units had been destroyed.

However, the German flank attack had got three units across the river, despite losing the truck to a tank shell at the last minute. Added to the 10 Soviet units destroyed the final score stood at 13-12.

The narrowest of German victories.

This has to be one of the closest games of Bolt Action I've ever played, and it was also one of the most enjoyable. We could point to at least a dozen moments which would have tipped the balance one way or another.

My MVP has to be the free inexperienced 37mm AA gun which took out two tanks and a sniper (made even better by the fact that Pete 3d printed it for me). The star of the German show was probably the heavy mortar which prevented a T-34 wreaking havoc in their lines.

The next scenario sees my Soviets on the attack against surrounded and outnumbered Germans, low on fuel and low on ammunition.

Seems fair.