First thoughts

Nothing fixed on this ...several ideas though

Chzecheslovakia, 1942 SOE plus partisans assasinate Heidrich , and then have to escape

Yugoslavia, 1943-44 Titos partisans vs Local Germans

Otherwise an invented story to fit players we think are up to it .

Still open ot the options of a German only game with IED providing the OPFOR although the date we've put in for conflicts with one of theirs .

I see that IED are running another E&E at Ceri in April, on dates that I can actually make (16/17 April). I quite fancy going to it as HF, for a laugh, to get some use from my SLR and, to get better knowledge of the site. Anyone else fancy it?

Not for me probably, I really don't think I'm up to this now.

However, we really ought to get a scenario outline knocked together as there is a June game in the public events list now so we ought to tell the punters we have one in July.

Since this site cries out for vehicles it pretty much means it's jerry that has to be mobile. So this would preclude a Jedburgh switcharoo where Germans would be dropped behind enemy lines. I don't think this is a problem, they loved the patrolling/digging/searching/rotas/mine clearing thing so we can build on that.

So, the enemy then. The Brits had their chance at Holt and there are loads of Russian kitted players about now - or do we leave the Russians with just the one game at the end of the year? If so then we could do a partisans/SOE split vs Germans, in which case Guy's Czech idea would work.

So, the enemy then. The Brits had their chance at Holt and there are loads of Russian kitted players about now - or do we leave the Russians with just the one game at the end of the year? If so then we could do a partisans/SOE split vs Germans, in which case Guy's Czech idea would work.

Yes, gives people some choice. Seeing as how we struggled for Brit's at Jedburgh, it may appeal to more players and, there'll be more "loaner" kit available too.

Chatting with David today , it would be nice to swap the sides and let the Germans do sneaky beaky. However Germans have all the vehicles and this is a site that need them .

Maybe a thought of "deep undercover " German squad , not camp based, more as as a tracker unit ? I quite like the idea of a hit Heydrich in Czech but no idea how much mileage there is in it . Then again we've already got the hunt for Hess. Ah decisions decisions...

As for HS .....partisans....red army ...and the odd SOE dropped in Brit kit to provide explosives etc.

We need to think about proper sub unit leadership for the EF as well , I would like to avoid the notion of players left up to their own devices.

Among the "allied" players, Martin (Bedsnherts) and my Bro' are both capable of taking charge and, keeping charge of, small groups. I would also like to be a bit more active myself, rather than sitting in a base all day.

We can't get away with Soviet kit for a Heydrich scenario unfortunately, the Russians were still miles away when SOE bumped him off. A Balkans scenario would work and, justify Germans being able to mount aggressive, large scale operations. Of course, a Heydrich scenario would work if it was civvies and Brit kit .

Since Porta has asked me when our Russian game will be so he can book time off I had to tell him that although we have the site and date fixed as yet the scenario isn't finalised and that we aren't even sure it will be Russian based.

So, moving this on...

As we like a bit of time correctness we can do an Eastern Front game for summers of 41 (Barbarossa), 42 (Case Blue, Battle of Voronezh), 43 (Kursk) and 44 (Operation Bagration) as examples.

We also need to consider that all the big vehicles will be on the German side - maybe the jeeps can be on the Russian side.

And it would be good to find a scenario that involved SS as well as Heer - there seems to be an SS backlash, (AGS and Wladek's games don't have them) so it would be nice to feature SS.

If we can establish some general principles of what we want to achieve we can progress.

I suspect Germans chasing a few SOE's will be a bit samey, no matter what the scenario. Perhaps we could have Russians incumbent, may be in three camps with a German advance party trying to find a route through?

Having bought "The Star" for myself for christmas, I thought what a cracking storyline for an Eastern Front e&e style game! If any of you haven't seen it, it's on youtube, in about 8 parts and well worth a watch. It would be very easy to shoehorn in an SS "tracker" squad, as well as the normal "garrison" duties that they seem to like so much. A russian recce team only needs to be 10 people too, much easier for command and control and, leaves more numbers to play as Germans.

Ah! I still have Diggah's DVD. I'll have a quick skim and refresh my memory of the story!
Looks like it will need a bit of digging to find out where exactly the SS were involved, at first skim it seems to be all Wehrmacht.

The Star (Russian: Звезда, translit. Zvezda) is a 2002 Russian film directed by Nikolai Lebedev, a large modern project of Mosfilm. It is based on a short story of the same name by Emmanuil Kazakevich, about a group of Soviet scouts working behind enemy lines during Operation Bagration in World War II.
Aleksei Kravchenko won a government award for his role in this film.

Plot
A team of Soviet scouts is sent behind enemy lines to find the location of the German armor forces. The Soviets wait until night, and open up with an artillery barrage. As the guns fire, the team advances. The team successfully slips behind enemy lines. Many dramatic scenes follow. In one, a German soldier is captured and interrogated. In another, the team calls an airstrike on German positions, causing great damage and casualties. One man even kills a German soldier with his pistol during the air attack. This tract of scenes finds the main characters successfully finding the location of the German armor. They are eventually cornered in a barn, with Germans attacking on all sides. During the battle, the team leader sends a radio message, telling the location of enemy armor. The team is eventually overrun and wiped out.

Operation Bagration (Russian: Oперация Багратион, Operatsiya Bagration) was the codename for the Soviet 1944 Belorussian Strategic Offensive Operation during World War II, which cleared German forces from the Belorussian SSR and eastern Poland between 22 June 1944 and 19 August 1944. The Soviet armies directly involved in Operation Bagration were the 1st Baltic Front under Army General Hovhannes Bagramyan, the 1st Belorussian Front commanded by Army General Konstantin Rokossovsky, who was promoted to Marshal on June 29, 1944, the 2nd Belorussian Front commanded by Colonel-General G. F. Zakharov, and the 3rd Belorussian Front commanded by Colonel-General Ivan Chernyakhovsky. This action resulted in the almost complete destruction of the German Army Group Centre and three of its component armies: Fourth Army, Third Panzer Army and Ninth Army. The operation "was the most calamitous defeat of all the German armed forces in World War II". By the end of the operation most of the western Soviet Union had been reconquered and the Red Army had achieved footholds in Romania and Poland.

The objectives of the operation are more complicated. The Red Army practiced the concept of Soviet Deep Operations, Soviet Deep Battle and Maskirovka, (military deception). These Soviet innovations were enabled, in part, by the provision of over 220,000 trucks by the United States to motorize the Soviet infantry. It has been suggested the primary target of the Soviet offensive was bridgehead on the Vistula river in central Poland, and that Operation Bagration was to create a crisis in Belorussia to divert German mobile reserves to the central sectors as a part of Maskirovka, removing them from the Lublin-Brest, Lvov–Sandomierz area where the Soviets intended to undertake the Lvov–Sandomierz Offensive and Lublin–Brest Offensive.] This allowed the Red Army to reach the Vistula river and Warsaw, which in turn put Soviet forces within striking distance of Berlin, conforming to the concept of Soviet deep operations - striking deep into the enemy's strategic depths.

Vitebsk-Orsha Offensive
Mogilev Offensive
Bobruysk Offensive
Minsk Offensive
Polotsk Offensive
Å iauliai Offensive
Vilnius Offensive
Belostock Offensive
Lublin-Brest Offensive
Kaunas Offensive
Osovets Offensive

My Plan is thus

1943 , we'll fictionalise something ot fit

It's Russia

So a Russian regular base with the odd jeep if possible 12-15
A Regular German base with more vehicles 12-15

Some partisans with a mission of their own (6-8)
Some SS living rough trying to track down the partisans 6-8?

Two sides , four missions, two sneaky beaky ( the SS and the partisans fighting their own war ) in amongst a more regular attack defend between the two sides .

Bit of an A2C but with less acting and side swapping .

We have a bridge that can be blown up in the valley , and plenty of other props to attack and defend .

We can fudge it to weight for the Russians a bit with less vehicles otherwise they will whinge .

5 commanders , four units to command, details ot be discussed but keeping it simple .

simples eh ?

I'd much prefer something authentic rather than making something up. Less made up airsoft and more history. It also makes it easier to sell, especially if it is a well known scenario or conversely not well known (as Boryszyn for example) that intrigues the punter. This part of what constitutes an 'CiA' event.

I don't think it makes sense to split the CiA team into four separate groups - experience has shown that we need to support each other to stop games collapsing into chaos, we need to be on the ball at all times. If there is to be a hard core independent element then task those that are interested and let 'em get on with it. As long as they know they are on their own from the outset and they are on an adventure it should be sweet!

good points all ...

I've been looking at suitable battles on which to hang this game.

The film 'The Star' storyline: In the summer of 1944 the Nazi Armies prepare a massive Tank Division named 'Viking" for the offensive on occupied Russian land. The Russian Army's special group of seven snipers named "Zvezda" is sent for a reconnaissance operation behind the enemy lines in the back of the Nazi Tank Division. Two previous Russian groups never came back. The seven Russians know that they are going to an almost certain Death for the sake of Victory.
As it is in Poland this would be in June '44.

However, our game is in July and as we like a bit of syncronicity a perfect action would be the Å iauliai Offensive. This was the operations of the 1st Baltic Front between 5 July and 31 July against the remnants of Third Panzer Army; its main objective was the Lithuanian city of Å iauliai.

The Russians were 43rd, 51st - and crucially for us - 2nd Guards.
Germans were Army Group Centre - 3rd Panzer Army, 4th Army, 2nd Army, IV SS Panzer Corps. (What exactly these consisted of needs a bit more research).

So, the game can follow lines already discussed and cover a couple of days of strategic manoeuvring (we can't do big feck-off battles!) as Russian probe ahead of assaults (as per The Star) and the Germans try to find out what the hell is happening, under pressure to hold the lines (needing to control roads, crossroads, vantage points, hunt out enemy recce patrols).

The Russian for Šiauliai is Shyaulyai, so working titles 'The Push for Shyaulyai', 'Shyaulyai Offensive', or maybe 'Шяуляйская наступательная'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%A0iauliai_Offensive

June 1944 - IV SS Panzer Corps:

Pretty much Totenkopf and Wiking. Commander was SS-Obergruppenführer Herbert Otto Gille.

**edit**

Bingo! Thought I had a book on it, and I do: "To the Bitter End: the final battles of Army Groups North Ukraine, A & Centre - Eastern Front, 1944-1945"

Tell you what, for a game title "To The Bitter End" has a good ring to it.

Perhaps: "Shyaulyai: The Bitter End"

gets my vote

And it's ripe for jokes like:

"I'm not going to let those Russian get hold of MY bitter end...."

To be more accurate, 'the bitter end' is from the German perspective so "Schaulen: The Bitter End" would be better (and easier to pronounce!).

..........as long as people don't think it refers to CiA