Those dratted German Uberpanzers!

[John D Salt]

The scene: A 1500-pt armour vs armour QB, Central Front, June 1944, lightly-wooded rural terrain with moderate hills, everything else set to random except that I picked the Sov forces to play with.

I like to fight pure tank companies from time to time. Having the choice between "Green" or "Conscript" troop quality, I plumped for Green. By mixing '43 and '44 model T-34/85s, I found it possible to buy a 10-tank company for exactly 1500 points -- HQ and 1 platoon riding '44 models, the other two platoons in '43 models.

The first unpleasant surprise was to discover that the situation was an Axis probe, and the weather was fog. Ah well, no matter, adopt, adapt and improve. Looking at the shape of the ground and the location of the VP flags, I decided on a right-flanking counterstroke, hoping to take the enemy in the flank as he drove over the low ground in the centre.

First contact was an odd experience. A solitary Pz III was spotted and enagaged by my right-flank platoon. Troop quality counts; disdaining to shoot back, it drove across the platoon's front at a range of about 200 metres, with apparent unconcern for the 85mm projectiles whistling over and around it from my green gunners. Having driven across the front of the first platoon, it came to grief after several shots from the centre and left-hand platoons finally registered a hit.

By this time HQ and the left-hand platoon were starting to pick up infantry movement at the limit of vision in the central low ground, and started to brass it up. I planned to put left and centre platoon with HQ on the ridge to shoot down into the low ground. The right-hand platoon was sent off on a wide sweep to flush out any lurkers in the top right-hand corner of the map, and then to attack into my planned kill-zone from behind, following Genral Patton's dictum of "Hold 'em by the nose and kick 'em in the pants". Then, I thought, they should probably be sent on a gunnery refresher course.

Unfortunately, the tanks of the Fascist Invader began to emerge from the fog before the flanking force had made it all the way round. The Company Commander's was the first tank to go. Over the next few minutes, a succession of enemy tanks loomed out of the fog and knocked out tank after tank. A Puma stuck its nose out, and after a few shots was knocked out. Before long, four fascist tanks had accounted for all 7 T-34/85s of the left and central platoons and HQ. My return fire was completely ineffective, no hits being scored despite the short range. To add insult to injury, the enemy tanks were identified as "T-34?". Yup, those German Uberpanzers were, apparently, Soviet sverkhtanki, under new ownership.

What could the remaining three tanks of the flanking platoon hope to do against the four fearsome enemy who had already obliterated the rest of their company? I don't know if the Russians have a proverb equivalent to "It's not over 'til you're in the pub", but this platoon apparently believed it. Hunting through the planned kill zone, they destroyed all four of the German T-34s for the loss of one of their own. In fact, the platoon commander (whose gunner had obviously remembered to take the lens-cap off his gunsight some time over the last few minutes) scored all four kills -- a striking example of what I call the "Lucky Alphonse" effect. The two remaining tanks of the platoon then rolled into the rear of the German panzergrenadier force, destroying three half-tracks and a Flammpanzer III before succumbing to some close-range dirty work by German assault pioneers.

The final result was a Soviet surrender and minor defeat. The reason for the apparent passivity of the first tank contacted was that it, too, was a Flammpanzer III, and so incapable of returning the fire it was under. The captured German T-34s were T-34/85 '44 models, all Veteran quality. I think my right-flank platoon redeemed itself for its initial poor shooting; they might have felt somewhat miffed to discover that the Germans had a later model of T-34/85 than they did themselves.

What a great game this is -- even when you get a spanking from the numerically-inferior AI!

All the best,

John.

[ October 28, 2002, 09:40 AM: Message edited by: John D Salt ]

[Nippy]

I don't know if the Russians have a proverb equivalent to "It's not over 'til you're in the pub", but this platoon apparently believed it.

I think the saying is:

"It's not over till the Commasar says it's time to fulfill your patriotic duty."