The Russian Campaign

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The Russian Campaign is a strategic board wargame of the Eastern Front during World War II, during the period 1941-45. The unit scale is German Corps and Russian Armies. The game was designed by John Edwards, and was first published by Jedko Games in 1975. The Avalon Hill game company bought the rights and published it in 1976. The second and third editions released by Avalon Hill in 1977. The 4th edition was later published by the L2 Design Group of Toronto in 2003.

The game came in a color-printed cardboard box, with a fold-out, cardboard-backed game board (22" × 28"); Order of Battle cards giving the unit deployments for the German and Russian players; a sheet of 225 chits; a set of rules, and a six-sided die.

The system features a double-impulse movement system that simulates the German armored blitzkrieg into Russia, with mass breakthroughs and encirclements. The rules cover unit production with Russian factories, air strikes, partisans, rail movement, and weather rules. There are also several smaller scenarios detailing key periods during the campaign.

This game was the 1976 winner of the Charles S. Roberts award for "Best Strategic Game". It is considered by many experienced wargame players to be a classic wargame, and has been widely played both in-person and via mail.

[edit] Components

The game map covers the portion of the western Soviet Union and the eastern European countries where the military campaign took place. It is overlaid by a hexgrid to standardize movement, and each hex was about 55 km across. Each turn of the game covered two months of the campaign, beginning with the German invasion on June 22nd, 1941.

The terrain types represented on the map included mountains, woods. swamp, rivers, and the Black and Baltic sea coasts. Significant cities are shown, divided into major and minor cities. There are also national boundaries, Russian military district boundaries, and the start lines for the different scenarios.

The die-cut cardboard counters were colored according to nationality, with yellow for Russia, field gray for German, and light olive for German allies (Hungary, Romania, Italy and Finland.) The German SS units were printed in black and the Russian Guard corps in a lighter yellow.

Each of the counters is printed game-specific information. This gives the unit type, size, designation, combat factor, setup information and a movement factor. German allies were also printed with a letter indicating the nationality. The unit type is indicated by a standard symbol, and the available types are Armor, Cavalry, Infantry, Mountain, Paratroop, and Panzer Grenadier (mechanized infantry). There were also markers for Russian partisans and worker formations, and for German Luftwaffe (air force) troops.

The unit size of a counter detemined how many can be stacked together within a single hex. Up to three of a player's corps, or two armies (or a corps and an army) can be stacked together at the end of a turn. Each of these unit counters has a zone of control, consisting of the six hexes surrounding its current location. As the units are moved about the map during game play, they must cease movement for the turn when they enter a zone of control of one of their opponent's units.

[edit] Game play

A game of The Russian Campaign is normally played between two players, with one playing the side of Germany and its allies, and the other playing the side of Russia. The game is then played in a series of turns, with the German player performing a sequence of actions followed by the Russian player repeating the same sequence. After the German player has rolled to determine the weather, the game sequence proceeded as follows:

Move your units
- Position air units
- check for reinforcements, withdrawals, &c.
- Railroad movement
Attack enemy units
Move your units not in enemy zone of control
Attack enemy units
- Check if your units are out of supply

The Russian player then repeats the same sequence.

Units are moved across the map by spending one or more of their movement allowance to advance from hex to adjacent hex. If a hex contained significant terrain, such as mountains, then movement ceased upon entry. Movement was limited under certain weather conditions. For example, muddy conditions limited first movement to 2 hexes for all units and prevented second movement. Only certain formations could perform second movement (e.g. German armor) and the movement allowance was limited for all units.

If a unit ends its movement in a zone of control of the opponent's units, then those units must be attacked. (Not necessarily by every one of the player's units in the opponent's zone of control.) Each attacks is performed separately by adding up the combat factors of the player's attacking units, then dividing by the combat factor of the opponent's units being attacked. This is then rounded down to a simple ratio, such as 2-to-1, 1-to-3, or 5-to-1. Higher odds improved the odds for a successful attack. (Typically you'd want odds of 3-to-1 or more to have better than 50% chance of success.) Terrain features generally favored the defender by doubling their combat factor.

The results of an attack are determined by rolling a six-sided die and then finding the result on the Combat results table. The results ranged from the attacking units being eliminated up to the surrender of the defending units. Between these extremes there are a range of intermediate results, including retreat by the attacker or defender; an exchange of losses, or a combination of unit losses and a retreat.

Supply plays an important role during the game. Combat units need to be able to trace a line of supply to a friendly city or rail line. Units out of supply have their combat rating halved. The first and second winter in Russia is particularly difficult for the German side as supply is severely hindered during that period.

The game contains a number of special rules to reflect the special conditions on the Eastern Front. These include the German air supremacy early in the war, Russian winter airdrops of paratroopers, the efforts of partisans, replacements, and a schedule of reinforcements.