From: Daniel Thorpe Subject: CAMPAIGN TO STALINGRAD (Rhino Games) Someone asked yesterday for a review of CAMPAIGN TO STALINGRAD, Mark Simonitch's mini-monster on the German 1942 offensive into southern Russia. I don't have a whole lot of play experience with it, but did own a copy until recently, and can fill you in… As with all Rhino games, the components are handsome and well printed, including: a 2" deep bookcase box, 1 and 1/2 maps (32" x 33" play area), 800 counters, 24 page rule book, and over a dozen chart and table cards of varying sizes. Map and counters eschew the modern schools of painterly verisimilitude and Photoshop overindulgence, but are clean and good looking in a traditional way (what SPI would be doing now, were it still going under the original crew). The rules are among the best I've come across - very readable and with all game concepts explained clearly and remarkably concisely. The lack of excess verbiage (think of it as the opposite of a Command Mag rules book) really cuts the workload when you're learning the game. And it manages to fit Designer's Notes and three scenarios (opening German offensive, Soviet Stalingrad counter-offensive, and Campaign Game) into the 24 handsomely arranged pages without squeezing down the font size! The good rules and the basic IGO HUGO game system initially fool you into thinking ROAD will be an easy game to pick up, but Simonitch is out to create a true simulation and layers a lot of detailed sub-systems onto a traditional turn sequence. Some of these are utterly brilliant: ZOCs are very slippery, except in the hex between two units, where a "ZOC Bond" is formed. Major cities have off map displays which divide each of their hexes into half a dozen sectors - all of which have to be taken before the hex is yours. The game is thus able to recreate both sweeping offensives and grinding city battles with the same combat system. All this good work was undone for me, however, by a degree of user-hostility, and some dubious design decisions that became apparent upon closer examination. User hostility first: the level of detail in every sub-system (and the number of exceptions and fiddly factors to remember) eventually became a bit too much, especially as things like armour capabilities are not marked on the counters and have to be remembered for each unit type. The game also uses multiple counters for units with more than two steps (flip the counter for the first loss; substitute the next counter down for the second loss). If you must have more than two steps per unit I much prefer the use of generic loss chits, especially in a game with as many units as this one. As it is, you must track all those counters very closely lest two 29 Pz Divs appear on the map. Again, counters that are reduced variants of full-strength units have no special marking to distinguish them. And, as for the dubious design decisions, the obvious one is that the map does not stretch down to the Caucausus [sic]. Simonitch defended this in print, saying that he picked an appropriate scale for division sized units and including the Caucausus at that scale would have meant a very large map, most of which would never be fought over. The result, however, is yet another elaborate sub-system to govern the placement and combat of units in off-map boxes representing the region. Simonitch also thinks traditional operational games give breakthroughs to players too easily. In ROAD you work for your blitzkriegs as each turn is only three days, and there is no mech movement or traditional overrun mechanic (you can nullify enemy ZOCs during movement and get exploitation effects from combat). Due to the time/distance scale foot unit movement factors are also very low (3 MPs, and it costs an MP to enter an enemy ZOC!), again showing what Simonitch believes their true capabilities to be. All this may make for a good simulation, but it makes for a damn slow game (and, for the Campaign scenario, a damn long one). Eventually, I decided it was all a bit much for me, and sold my copy. If you like big games with lots of detail, there is no doubt that this is a quality product (if a flawed one) from a good company. And, there isn't much competition. Remarkably, despite the squawks of all those who think the hobby is awash in east front games, SPI's old DRIVE ON STALINGRAD is the only other title of similar scope. Though much faster playing and more fun than ROAD, it is also badly flawed and now quite obsolete. If you do decide to go for it, ensure you get the errata, as they fine tune and clarify the original rules a lot. It is eerily reminiscent of DRIVE ON STALINGRAD that much of the errata is devoted to weakening the Soviets (depriving their rifle divisions of their third step, among other things) in an effort to correct play balance problems revealed by repeat play. Hope this helps; sorry for the long post. Daniel