For Harold Andrews

We here at GR/D want to send our best wishes to longtime Europa supporter and friend, Harold Andrews, who has recently been ill. Harold has our heartfelt thanks for his considerable efforts on behalf of the Europa community, and our prayers for a full recovery.

Flavio Carrillo

I just received my copy of issue #23, and read it with great pleasure (particularly my own article, my first one published!) However, what's this "Operation Gorza" referred to on the cover? I couldn't find it anywhere in the magazine.

The rules court "Case of the Rostov Attack" in particular caught my attention. It is unfortunate that sometimes we Europa gamers lose the friendly, social dimension of gaming in the competitive scramble for victory.

We've all lost our cool playing this game at one time or another, but let's not forget the first objective of the game is to have fun, not to humiliate our opponents. With this in mind, I possess little sympathy for the Axis player in the disputed game, who seems quite willing to exploit his inexperienced opponent's mistakes (I mean, how could he have otherwise overrun his way into Moscow?), but refuses to take his lumps when he makes mistakes that, as the more experienced player, he shouldn't be making.

In addition, the Axis player's claims that "he wouldn't make such a foolish, low odds attack" seem quite disingenuous given some of the other attacks he'd made that turn. My reading of the circumstances is that the German player, flushed with success, simply lost his head and threw caution in the wind, to the point where he dismissed the Soviet player's friendly warnings. That's ok, but he shouldn't try to change the outcome of his extreme boldness. Let him call off the attack--if he's willing to allow the Soviet player to redeploy his central front so that Moscow is turned back over to the Soviets.

I'd like to comment regarding the victory point schedule provided for "Operation Groza". As it currently stands, between two players of equal ability, the Soviet player will almost always achieve a major or decisive victory.

I agree with Victor Hauser's comments that the situation at the end of the playtest between Jason and me would be a disaster in real-life terms for the Axis, but as a philosophical matter, I believe that VP schedules should be designed to rate victory in competitive terms, not historical ones. It is for this reason that I stated in my article that the game's outcome was either a stalemate or a marginal Soviet victory: the average Groza game will likely result in an outcome similar to that we reached.

Only in games where either the German or the Soviet player does better than either of us should it be considered a victory for one side or the other. I also question the whole "Operation Groza" premise as being extremely unlikely for most of the reasons mentioned by various people in issue #23, as well as other reasons too lengthy to list here. However, all such considerations aside, the scenario is a lot of fun to play!

Finally, congratulations to the magazine's staff for putting out a product that improves with every issue, especially with the many new scenarios appearing. Keep up the good work!

Gee Flavio, thanks for pointing out the misspelling on the cover to those (very) few people who might not already have noticed it!

I must agree with you that the Germans are probably up against an impossible situation in the "Operation Groza" scenario. As I read the outcome of the playtest game between you and Jason, the Germans would have ended up with about 7 VPs and the Soviets 2 VPs. This yields a net of 5 VPs for a strong Soviet Major Victory. However, is this really unreasonable? If the only major Soviet city captured by the Germans in 1941 is Lwow, it's hard to rank that result as less than a major Soviet victory.

By the way, the number of VPs awarded for capturing the various Soviet major cities was based on the size of the cities (full hex vs partial hex) and whether they were located within the 1939 USSR, or the area acquired by the USSR from 1939 to 1941. Thus Kiev rates higher than Minsk, and Minsk accrues more points than Riga- the relative difficulty of capturing a given city was not considered. The preceding aside, it would be worthwhile to establish PLA YER victory conditions for "Operation Groza", and the tables at the bottom of page 43 represent my best stab at accomplishing this.

Per these tables, Jason would have scored approximately 28 VPs to your 8, for a net of 20 VPs, or a bare Soviet marginal victory. This would seem to match your assessment quite well. -RG

Trey Nelson

The situation regarding Finland is almost more of a political than a military problem, and any rules concerning German intervention in the main Finnish theater need to reflect this reality. Political rules for this theater need to address the following topics:

I. Finland's ability to operate beyond the 1939 borders needs to be limited.

II. The amount and type of German aid to Finland needs to be limited.

III. There needs to be very strict limits on the casualty level the Finnish Army can sustain before negotiating with the Soviets.

1. War Aims

Finland's war aims were restricted by two primary considerations:

. A small, highly nationalist minority of the Finnish electorate favored an aggressive war to expand the borders established at the time of Finnish independence after World War One. This group wanted to annex all of Karelia, up to the White Sea. Their war aims were never supported by the political leadership of the country, nor by the majority of the populace.

Finland relied heavily on diplomatic support from Sweden (of which Finland had been a province up to the Napoleonic wars), Britain, and America, the latter two countries being allies of Finland's enemy, the Soviet Union. A limited war to recover territory lost in the Winter War would allow the Finns to retain a measure of sympathy and support from the democracies. An all-out war would sacrifice this support, which was necessary to allow Finland the ability to remain independent of Nazi control.

Suggested rules:

The current "stop-line' rules more than adequately reflect these political restraints on complete Finnish military freedom.

II. German Aid

The limits on German aid reflect the following facts:

The Finns, especially the aristocratic Field Marshal Mannerheim, were suspicious of German intentions towards them and remained wary of allowing too strong a German military presence in their country (later German actions in Romania and Hungary would justify this caution). They put restrictions on the type and amount of aid they would accept from their ally, which included such items as munitions and economic aid (the Germans shipped in substantial amounts of wheat, locomotives, etc. to boost the Finnish economy and free Finnish men to serve in their army).

Suggested rules:

The RE limit on German units in southern Finland is a good start towards reflecting the above reality. However, the type as well as the amount of assistance should be more completely defined to more strictly limit German ground combat forces in the theater.

Further, the level of German aid should probably be tied to a series of "trigger lines", mainly on the Karelian Isthmus and the southern approaches to Helsinki.

These rules would reflect the fact that the Finns welcomed German assistance in the Finnish war against the Soviets, but considered themselves cobelligerents rather than full allies of the Germans, and remained almost as wary of the Nazis as they did of the Communists.

III. Armistice

Finnish surrender rules should be adjusted to reflect the following realities:

Finland went to war only to recover her lost territory (from the Winter War), and gambled that Germany would defeat the Soviets swiftly, thus enabling the Finns to achieve their goals with a minimum of sacrifice. Having suffered serious losses in the Winter War, Finland could not afford a bloodbath and restricted her participation accordingly.

For instance, the Germans put great pressure on Mannerheim to attack Belomorsk, to cross the Svir and link up with Army Group North, and to attack Leningrad after that link- up failed. General Erfurth, the German military attache to Finnish GHQ, was constantly frustrated by Mannerheim's refusal to follow OKW's directions, conducting instead his own independent strategy.

Mannerheim's overriding concern was the casualties his army could afford to take. Early in the war he was forced to de-mobilize two divisions because the strain of a full-war footing was too great for his small nation's economy. A bloody fight to the last man would have had catastrophic consequences on Finland's population.

Therefore, Finland could remain in the war only up to a certain military and political pressure point-which would be passed long before the army was physically bled white. It was at this point that Finland hoped to draw upon diplomatic support from the Western democracies.

Suggested rules:

To reflect Finland's limited war- making ability, Finland should negotiate after suffering a certain level of casualties. To keep it simple, I suggest that if there are ever three or more Finnish divisions in the replacement pool at the start of any player turn, the Finns will make peace.

To reflect political realities, I suggest that the Soviets be limited to a "stop line" in southern Finland analogous to the Finnish one. This stop line would consist of the 1941 border. Further, and more importantly, I strongly believe that Helsinki should not be considered a victory-point city. I believe that this one suggestion, more than any other, will go farthest towards limiting the fighting in southern Finland to more historical levels. Instead, substitute Danzig (since it was forgotten in FitE/SE) for Helsinki, thereby resulting in no net change in final victory-point calculations.

Some gamers may complain that the above rules make it too easy for the Soviet Union to force Finland's surrender. In fact, the Soviets could probably have forced Finland out of the war long before they did. Memories of the Winter War and Western diplomatic support may have helped keep Stalin from acting before he did in 1944. But there has long been suspicion that he acted as he did in order to allow Leningrad to suffer accordingly, so as to break the independence of the Party and people there to his programs.

However, the real point is that Finland gambled on an easy German victory. She could not and did not suffer a total war of annihilation, such as all-too-often befalls her in FitE/SE. She would, and did, surrender long before her army was decimated, and the rules simply need to reflect those historical realities and results.

Walter Hard

During the couple of years that Second Front has been in playtest I've been surprised not to have read more comments (pro or con) on the overstacking or, as I call it, the "reserve echelon" rule. This is the proposed new rule allowing effectively unlimited stacking in corps counters, with the "reserve echelon" unable to perform any game functions while in reserve (note that they are subject to negative combat results).

This rule seems to me to have more effect on game play than any other proposed SF rule change. I think it is excellent-I haven't stopped smiling since I first read the rule in the playtest kit and I definitely hope it is slated for the production version. I suspect John was persuaded to include this rule because it's the only way to fit the historically present units into the Normandy/Anzio beachheads.

I believe the main benefits, however, will be to dramatically cut counter clutter and introduce intriguing new tactical decisions: Where do I put my "extra" reserve units? What units do I want to have in reserve to hold the hex when the attack force advances after combat? I just wish I could convince my fellow Scorched Earth players to retrofit this rule into that game!

Enzo De Ianni

I write to you on behalf of a group of Italian wargamers. We have been developing plans for an Italian wargame magazine for some time now, and our journal will at last be available, starting in May 1992. Our numerous contacts among players, retailers, and wholesale importers let us hope for the best.

Our interest in the Europa series is years-old (as well as shared by a lot of people in Italy) and we'd be pleased to obtain your authorization to republish the most suitable articles from your previous issues, translated into Italian to be best of our ability. It is unnecessary for me to emphasize the favorable consequences this would have towards the spreading of Europa here in Italy.

We are also very interested in the "Europa Association", whose mysterious Italian section has not yet been founded. We wish to discuss the feasibility of using our developing circuit to found the "Society Europa - Italia".

We are pleased to grant you permission to reprint articles from back issues of the Europa magazine. We hope that they will add to the enjoyment of your readers and to the success of the new magazine.

We are also very hopeful that satisfactory arrangements can be worked out to form an Italian chapter of the Europa Association in the near future. -RG

Niko Mikkanen

Howdy! I am a member of SSP (Suomen Simulaatio Palaajat : Finnish Simulation Gamers).

First of all, I would like to thank you for the great work you are doing on the Europa series. GDW did an enormous job with the first parts of Europa, and GR/D now continues the tradition.

Next I'd like to point out a few "Finnish facts". I don't know about the other causeways in FitE, but Punkaharju (the causeway a couple of hexes NW from Lake Ladoga) is DEFINITELY unbreakable. It consists of series of 'hilltops' peeking out of the lake. The longest bridge between these hills is no more than thirty-four meters long. The hills consist of pure sand with grass and trees on top. Such broken bridges don't present a great obstacle, and the hilltops cannot be 'broken'. Demolished like bridges? Not bloody likely.

Meanwhile, note that the two Finnish battleships Vainimbinen and Ilmarinen were, during the winter, positioned so as to maximize their use of AA in the defense of their harbors. This they are not allowed to do in FitE under the current rules. How about allowing ships to use at least half their AA against air units bombing their harbor (I prefer full use, after all, they aren't far away from the harbor if they are in it ... )?

Finally, about A Winter War. To maximize the accuracy of your information, why not let the real pros help you (I bet we know more about Finland than you do ... ).

Seriously, if we, the Finnish wargamers, could be of any help in any part of publishing a Europa series game, it would make us all immensely proud (and we would brag about it to everybody and their mother), as well as help you over some of the usual problems encountered when researching a game of Europa magnitude.

Thanks guys (and gals), and keep up the good work.

The communication problems inherent in GR/D operations (with design, mapping, development, and production personnel scat- tered all over the USA) have prevented us from utilizing this kind offer, but we hope that before the overall project is completed, our Finnish wargaming friends will have an opportunity to provide input. -RG

Steven R. Eschner

I have just finished reading an excellent new book on the German invasion of Norway, Francois Kersaudy's Norway 1940, promoted as a recent #1 best-seller in Britain. I highly recommend it. It seems that some significant changes will have to be made to Narvik when it is re-issued as a "Collector Series" game, especially with regard to the strengths of certain British brigades, which appear to be far overrated considering their lack of training, equipment, etc.

I wonder if you would consider a scenario for the magazine covering naval operations in the Norwegian campaign. After seeing Supermarina, the abstract naval system in Narvik is not very satisfying. This, plus a state- ofthe-art air system with revised aircraft capabilities and more accurate distance and range information, would really improve an old classic.