Prague Summer 2

A few of us recently discussed some ideas about games featuring competing friendly forces. Could we represent rival brigades from the same army racing to reach a strategically valuable objective against relatively weak opposition? 

The classic historical example of this, albeit on a larger scale, would be Zhukov and Konev's respective Fronts racing to be the first to take Berlin in 1945.

The fictional Prague Summer 1948 setting seemed like a good fit for such a game. My plan is to recruit a total of between four and eight players. I hope to arrange a TacWWII game in such a way that the respective command teams can plan their operations in advance.

Two Soviet Divisional Forward Detachments will be tasked with reaching the fictional Czechoslovak city of Stary Boleslav. The Order of Suvorov First Class will be awarded to the first Soviet commander to reach the city.

One Detachment will have to fight its way along tables 1, 2 and 3, the other along tables A, B and C. Each Forward Detachment will be controlled by a Soviet player or by a team of two players if demand for places is high. 

The Czechoslovak players will defend the two routes to Stary Boleslav but they will be limited as to their deployment; political and logistic factors meaning they they must begin with a main force battalion on each of the tables 1, 2, 3, A, B, and C. Again we could have two individual Czechoslovak players or a team of two on each route.

Both sides will have fixed starting forces and the option to purchase additional supports. The Czechoslovak players will be able to co-operate as to how they share out the available supports whereas the Soviet players will be competing to get the best supports from a limited set of resources.

Combat engineers - a possible Soviet support

In addition, I want to make some allowance for political events in the period between the abortive February coup and the July invasion. I'll be asking the Czechoslovak players to roll three six-sided dice some time before the game. They'll be asked to allocate one die result to each of three categories of political effort: 

• Czechoslovak Intelligence
• Purging the Communists
• Seeking Help from the Western Allies

Before allocating the scores they won't know the full effect of this; merely that lower numbers are bad and higher numbers good. The effects of these die rolls (using the umpire's secret table) will influence starting factors such as troops' training, morale, and deployment.

Another thing I'd like to try out, given the chance for the command teams to plan in advance, is an approach to artillery support that more accurately models Soviet doctrine.

I propose to restrict indirect Soviet artillery fire to locations plotted before the game. The Soviet players will be allowed to nominate a limited number of targets and the fire missions to be fire at them. 

The fire missions may be scheduled (e.g "Three 120mm mortar batteries are to fire HE at location B, starts on turn 3 and lasts for two turns") or planned to be called in by a battalion HQ unit that can see the target location (e.g "Perform Fire Mission 6 with immediate effect"). The details of Fire Mission 6 (target, guns firing, ammunition type, and duration) will have been specified before the game.

The number of pre-plotted target points allowed to each Soviet Forward Detachment will be limited. They will be restricted to tables 1 and A unless the relevant Soviet command team purchases the option of pre-battle tactical recon missions from the Air Force. This will mean that the Soviet commands will increasingly need to rely on their Heavy SU Regiments to provide direct fire support as the attack progresses.

If any of you will be within striking distance of Sheffield in Spring of 2024 I'd be delighted to have you as players.