Europa XIII, The Urals, is proceeding steadily towards a first quarter 1989 release. Since the article that appeared in TEN 4, the scope of the project has become more refined and I have completed nearly all of the research. For inquiring minds, a status report (dated November 13, 1988) on each of the game's major components is provided below:

Maps: The drafts of maps 28, 29, 30, and 31 were sent to John Astell in October for review. Following his review, the four maps were sent to Winston Hamilton for production. There have not been any significant changes to the maps since TEN 4 because this portion of the project was nearly complete at the time of the last article. I have uncovered some additional material that will affect some of the terrain on maps 28 and 29. 1 will also be tweaking the roads and rail lines on map 29. This will cause the port rules to be somewhat more complex. We are thinking about addressing the remaining portions of the Caspian in a future module or play-aid kit. More on that idea to follow at a later time.

Rules: The first draft of the rules is now complete. I am presently doing a major edit to ensure total compatibility with the Scorched Earth rulebook. We will not be republishing the entire rulebook. Rules that have been changed or added will be written in their entirety. Clarifications to existing rules will also be listed. Players will then be asked to note in their Scorched Earth rulebook where the changes occur and refer to The Urals rulebook for the actual change. The rules themselves are a combination of additions based on the new map coverage and changes to the old rules where I felt a problem existed. John Astell is the final arbitrator on any rule changes or additions, but some of the problem areas I am now addressing include: Soviet armor/artillery replacement pool restrictions, range restrictions for Axis air drops similar to those applied to the Soviets, the definition of the end of the first winter for purposes of Soviet winterized unit replacement, and changes to port size based on historical embark/disembark capacities. The main additions to the rules will be found in the factory/ capital transfer rules, the reinforcement/ replacement rules, and rules for supply/movement of small units (less than 1 RE) along roads. The off-map military district movement procedure is quite elaborate and will provide players with insight into both the geographic enormity of the Soviet Union as well as the types of units that were raised in each region. I eventually hope to see this portion of the game expanded in a future module (with counters) to include all Soviet forces raised during the war. The draft rules will be forwarded to the review team assembled for this project following my final rules scrub and the development of the designer's notes.

Soviet Order of Battle: Unlike the rules, the Soviet order of battle will be completely revised and reprinted. All errata will be incorporated and the Eastern Military District forces will arrive in individual off-map military district holding boxes. In most cases, these units will go into reserve and be released at a later time. Many of the 46 rifle divisions were originally raised at 3-6 strengths. They received additional training prior to their commitment and will be converted off map. At the present time, I do not anticipate providing for early commitment rules for reserve units unless Axis forces enter the military district prior to their release. In the case of some of the on-map districts, this becomes a relevant issue. Charles Sharp came through with some fine research on the off-map military district forces which was recently forwarded to me. I just finished a scrub of his OB and have forwarded a list of units for his confirmation whose order of appearance differs from Scorched Earth. The OB appears to be nearly ready at this time. There will be no major surprises, but my Axis opponents in the postal Scorched Earth game I am now playing should take note that the arrival of the 69 Mech XX (8-6-8) now occurs in the Moskva MD and not in an off-map MD. As commander of the Soviet 1st Tank Army in the Moskva sector, I sure would like to have this bruiser on Aug I 41 instead of Aug II 41 due to the fascists' violation of the sanctity of the Moskva MD! I guess it will have to wait until my next game of Scorched Earth! There will be some other small surprises to the Soviet OB as well, but nothing major. Consider this version of the Soviet OB to be an update, with detailed information or~ all units arriving from off-map military districts. By the way, the infantry replacement rules have been rewritten to account for the individual off- map military districts. Infantry replacement in the off-map districts is no longer lumped into one total.

Charts: Expect 10+ charts in tire module. I have completed preliminary work on these. They are not expected to require a great deal of time tc finish. Most of them are updates to existing charts appearing in Scorchea Earth or the play- aid kits previous!%, published by GR/D. Two new charts will be provided. One will cover offmap military district movement and provide for holding boxes to place units appearing in these districts. The other new chart will be an off-map rail distance chart for the east and west map edges. The rules on off-map rail movement will no longer be abstracted.

Miscellaneous: Expect to receive 50% reductions of each map similar to those provided in the playaid kits. We have downgraded the scope of the "scenario" due to the lack of reliable information. We might be providing information and possibly rules to cover potential Axis commando operations against the industrial regions in the Urals. I won't know the final scope of this effort until the module gets closer to publication.

In summation, expect the module to be packaged in official Europa box art in March 1989!

Before leaving, I would like to extend a note of thanks to the following people: Charles Sharp, for plugging some gaping holes in my Soviet OB; A. E. Goodwin, for providing answers to several sticky issues covering similar problems in both The Urals and The Soviet Far East modules; John Astell, for guiding me away from "weird Europa" and providing the master's touch in maintaining overall continuity with previous titles in the series; and finally to Winston Hamilton, for giving me the opportunity to develop a project that I have asked for since Unentschieden was published in 1974! Again, many thanks.