Battle for the Minsk Suburbs

Using 4th Edition Flames of War our vaccinated group assembled for our first big city fight. Each side had 150 points for two players with the Soviets fielding a Sapper-Engineer company and a Hero Rifle company, both with supports. They were opposed by an SS Reconnaissance company and a regular Panzer-Grenadier company. Because of the points we set up a 4x6' table, liberally covered by blasted buildings and rubble in the streets, as shown by the craters. Both sides chose "Attack" so a dice-off gave the first move to the Soviets.  The jumping off positions are shown below.

 

The circled area shows the objective for the Germans.

The circled spot holds the objective of the Germans. 

I don't recall exactly what the mission was, but both sides had delayed reserved and picking those was a real problem with reduced points.  The Soviet infantry was all on foot while the SS company had a cloud of halftracks.

Turn 1 Soviet move, infantry failing to enter the building.

Turn 1 German rush

SU-100s face down gun halftracks and Grilles.

German view, turn 2 of a rapidly congesting area.

The Grilles are eliminated and the halftracks bailed out.

The Sapper-Engineers took out the halftracks by using smoke pots to mask the German HMGs in the building across the road.  They are a fearsome company on the attack, with options for flamethrowers, mortars, captured panzerfausts and smoke pots.  The only downside is the limited range of their weapons and are hit on 3+ on a d6.

Turn three and the Soviets get reserves.  The ruling was
one dice throw but each player would get something.
More Sapper-Engineers and IS-2s

The smoke from the pots remains through the
German half of the turn.

The "brutal" guns in the IS-2s begins to whittle down
the German HMGS holding things up.

The Soviet objective is well protected and now the
fight for the German begins in earnest.

Turn 4 and the Germans get a mess of StuGs.  There
used to be six mortars there.

SU-100s move to counter the StuGs as a see-saw 
fight in the building intensifies.

With their gun support eliminated the HMGs and
HQ element face a fearsome fate.

Flamethrowers and SMGs take out the panzer-grenadiers
contesting the objective.  A final German attempt fails in
the proverbial hail of bullets.  The naval infantry holds!

Another view of the table on the last turn.

Recognizing they can't get to the objective in time
the StuGs focus on trying to break the Soviet formation.

Some early luck from Soviet shooting coupled with some bad German saves gave the advantage to the Russians and them getting reserves right away when the Germans didn't largely decided things.  The special rules for a city fight were an interesting twist from our normal games.  I look forward to more games.