Naturelich Games

German troops approaching Moscow

Time for another Memoir '44 scenario. We continued our way through the Eastern Expansion pack and decided for scenario #39: Gates of Moscow. Here is the official description:

In October, the German High Command launched the final offensive of 1941 - Operation Typhoon. The initial German success on the Eastern Front had put them deep into the Soviet Union on all fronts, but the advance slowed before they could reach the key cities of Mother Russia. The Soviets used their large population to continuously produce more military forces. Although poorly equipped and inexpertly led, the Soviet soldiers were deployed in a last desperate line of defense to keep the German army from reaching Moscow.

Mozhaisk, the last major town on the direct road to Moscow was captured but the German advanced stalled. The exhausted army had no additional reserves for the final push on into Moscow.

Naturelich took the German troops while Shelak played the defending Russian forces. Plenty of troops were involved in this fight (see image above). So far, this has been the largest Memoir '44 scenario we have played. As a little refresher, we had to go through the Eastern Expansion rules again. Just to be sure...

The battle started as always: the Germans lost their artillery pretty early in the game, giving the Russians a long-distance advantage. Actually, this seems to be a common pattern in me playing Memoir '44 - the artillery units are always the first to be killed. Oh, wait a minute, maybe that's just Shelak's strategy? Now, that I think of it, it actually makes sense :D

The battle was very close. While the Germans were able to drive off the Russian forces from the hills of Vyazma they suffered heavy casualties in the process. They had to slow down their advancement considerably, exchanging the wounded with fresh troops. The Russians lost troops in the woods of Bryansk and Rhzev was undefended as well. The Allied troops had suffered heavy casualties due to the Germans advantage in armor fire power. This made it easy to take out the remaining troops. In the end, it was a close 7 to 5 victory for the Axis forces.

Probe, Dig-In, MOve Out?!