Darkest Crusade, a free Print & Play game designed and released by Lou Coatney, is an introductory war board game that covers the German war against Russia starting in June of 1941 and continuing as long as May of 1943, with shorter 1-year and 2-year scenarios included for those who prefer a shorter game.
This article briefly describes two 1-year scenarios played by me, controlling the German Army, and Sebastian M. commanding the Soviet forces, at Oslo's Ares Game Club.
In the first game, I had a strong start, but Sebastian quickly proved to be a pro-active - if thoughtful - Russian, frequently counterattacking. I had 2 2-factor PzKps in Minsk, and in August, he brought up mechanized corps and eliminated them(!).
However, I had my armies and most of my strength then adjacent to his attackers and most of his strength defending Moscow, between Tula and Smolensk and E7 (Velikiye Luki?) and then launched a prepared, Blitzkrieg attack which annihilated ALL of them, in September. We ran out of time, and Moscow essentially lay open, so it looked like I would have won. We didn't finish the game so we'll never know, but...
In the second game, Sebastian had TERRIBLE ground attack die rolls at the start of the game. On the other hand, they were good enough to slow my advance, and in the air, the Red Air Force was hitting hard, against the odds. Unlike the first game, he was trading space for time, where he had the space, and he was building powerful concentrations of units in Smolensk (again) and Kiev, to the point I could not safely attempt to surround them to annihilate them. It took a prepared 2-round attack and then the operational move and attack to take Kiev.
In the north I was confronting Leningrad and I pushed my 3-factor 4th Army, a 2-factor PzKps, and an Infantry Corp past Smolensk into F7 (Vitebsk?). He then attacked those units with all the 2-1 MechK, 1-factor MechK, and 1-factor Armies he could - plus 2 Katyusha units - AND GOT 8 HITS OUT OF 9 DICE! - from a nominal 50% hit probability - ELIMINATING 4th ARMY AND FRIENDS!
Just as disastrously, I had my best (8th) FliegerKorps in a forward position defended only by a PzKps, and he eliminated the pzkps - ergo 8 FliegerKorps, *permanently* from the game!
Next turn was September, and I concentrated whatever I had in front of Leningrad, and hit it along with 2 FliegerKorps. The Baltic Sea Fleet joined in the defense from Kronshtat, and after the 2 battle rounds, he had only a Disrupted MechK left - one hit short of eliminating it and taking Leningrad! As badly as things had gone for me and as well as he played, I then conceded the game.
I later realized that I could have activated the Finns and probably indeed taken Leningrad. :-(
Anyway, Sebastian really likes the game and wants to try the Germans next week. He also thinks that air units - as simple as their rules are - are a major factor in the game.