This turn is the costliest yet for the Britishers. A short time after I lose an irreplaceable sixty minutes to British Summer Time, the glider riders defending Brinkmann’s Bridge lose an irreplaceable half-dozen men to an assortment of kill kit that includes a 10.5cm howitzer, an MG 42, an MP 40, and a scoped Karabiner 98K.
Want to turn a green lane into a brown lane, tow a MoBAT across a snowy field, or roam the Western Desert trashing Axis airfields? Get a 4×4. Want quick introductions to low-profile PC games with military or transport themes? Read a 3×3. This new potentially recurring column is my attempt to reduce the number of interesting wargames and sims ignored by THC each month. Prior to penning a 3×3 I’ll play three under-exposed underdogs for three hours each. While it would be cavalier to call the reports that result from these brief auditions ‘reviews’, it’s conceivable they might lead…
Today’s co-op brainteaser is the work of my Chief Foxer Setter’s talented understudy. If you think Roman’s word chains are tough, you’ve clearly never attempted one forged by Colonel K.
During this minute of WeGo action a mortar team is decimated, two men fall foul of the same handgun, an anti-tankist uses the F word, and I marvel at CMx2’s glorious unpredictability.
Unlike the formidable Friday foxers, the Monday kind are designed with lone truth sleuths in mind. Roman, my Chief Foxer Setter, assures me the following brainteaser can be solved single-handedly. Crow all you like in the comments section, but please don’t spoil the puzzle for others by sharing solutions or dropping hints.
Erich Woikin is eleven again, sprinting through an orchard with a satchel of scrumped cherries bumping against his sweat-soaked back and a baying hound snapping at his heels. He’s a few strides from the spot in the barbed wire fence where the broken strand makes for easy vaulting when something grabs his satchel straps, pulling him off his feet. “How odd” he thinks to himself as he struggles unsuccessfully to get up “that I should fall on my back yet wind up with so much cherry juice staining my shirt front. How very odd.”
A dusty StuG and a Molotov-scorched Panzer IV are knocking seven bells out of the north wall, there are enemy scouts pressed against the east wall, and behind every rubble pile to the west is a fascist with a firearm. Things look grim, but if Turgunov, my AT rifleman, and Bondarenko, my machine gunner, are on the ball this turn, this battered four-storey Stalingrad apartment block won’t fall into German hands just yet.
Every Friday at 1300 hours, Tally-Ho Corner’s cleverest clogs come together to solve a ‘foxer’ handcrafted by my sadistic chum and colleague, Roman. A complete ‘defoxing’ sometimes takes several days and usually involves the little grey cells of many readers. Don’t be shy. All are welcome to participate.