Last weekend, Joe and I completed Campaign Day 1 at the end of turn 5. We both agreed that the end of game die that looked like a 6 was really a 1, thus ending the game after the fifth turn. :)

The final score had Joe controlling 18 stone locations, which was 3 more than was required to win the scenario. Along the way, Joe managed to rack up 21 casualty victory points (CVP). The defending Russians did manage to get 28 CVP, so at least we made the Germans pay in blood for their gains.

Since this is one scenario in a campaign game whose purpose is to control terrain, the resulting demarcation lines are important.

On the North flank, the Russians held off the Germans and kept them north of the northern most road. On the west flank, however, the German army was able to take control of many of the stone buildings west of the railway embankment and north of Arbatovskaya street. Only the multi-hex building B17 is contested. The Germans were also able to take over two stone buildings east of the railway embankment (F5 and F11.

Basically, the Russian western flank is weak and but the North held out. Earlier I mentioned that I had made two mistakes, well now that the first scenario is over, I can relate them.

1. 1.When I purchased fortifications, I spent all my points to fortify certain buildings (L5 and N5 were fortified for multiple stories) but I didn’t buy any trenches. The result was that I was unable to redeploy forces from the northern flank to reinforce the western flank quickly.
   

2. 2.The second was the placement of my two AT guns. I put them both in wooden buildings on hex row W. I gambled that the German tanks would come across the open ground on the northern flank. Joe rightly brought them down Tramvanaya Street. They were behind both railway embankments and, since embankments are LOS obstacles, out of my LOS!
   

3. 
   

Given all that, Joe did very well and got very far. I’m definitely on my back foot and need to come out swinging in the next campaign day. My forces are weaker than I’d like to defend such a wide front, so I’m considering making a Night attack to either reclaim some stone locations or collapse the northern pocket. It depends on what I can purchase and how many CG days I might have to regroup.

More info as I have it. We should start the next RB session in about three weeks.