Aw nuts!

Sunday, June 28th was our regular "Ranger" Flames of War game at Adventure Games in Oshkosh.  I had only been back in the USA for three days, but despite feeling like I was still at 20,000' and flying at 300 knots, I went down to try out my Americans.  Hopeful of getting more players we agreed on 2500 late war points.  In hindsight, a mistake.  Mission was "Hold at All Costs" so the Germans had half their force off table while I had all of mine, but they were dug in and had a unit in ambush mode.

When I arrived we had a new player (1st game) name Kyle who brought his Soviets.  He wanted to play with them so I pulled off stuff to allow for some of his mass of armor to play.  In retrospect, we had too much stuff crammed into a 4x6' table.  Made the defenders task easier.

Over-crewed Panzerwerfers await.

Initial set, Soviets on the left.  Looks promising, nicht wahr?

Able to take out some Panzergrenadiers early and pin the 88s.

Italian campaign TDs don't get to teleport, so they wait for good
targets to appear.  Air support is frequent, but ineffective.

A Panther platoon ambushes the Soviets from cover.  Hen and Chicks!

Some token success, but motivation tests succeed and Soviets are
quickly eliminated.

Moving on an objective as, in one of his few dice failures, Paul
doesn't get reserves immediately.

US engineers in the center use their HMGs to combat the 88s,
eventually killing one.

With the Soviets all dead or run off, aircraft can ineffectively
attack.

German reserves begin to pour on and take a heavy toll.  The
German dice were hot to say the least.

Italian Semoventes in German service advance.  US TDs fail
to stop them.

With the objective contested, Panzers assault.  Copious bazookas
miss or are saved against.  We are driven back.

My TDs are eliminated by stationary fire.

And so I conceded the game with no reasonable hope in sight.  Hard fought we got to use lots of new stuff.  We also met another new player in the area, Roy.  Very experienced player also with Soviets.  We look forward to lots of Eastern Front games in the future.