Barbarossa Fast, Jun-Dec41 (2020)

FREE print-and-play VERY fast and family&friends simple/introductory point-to-point game of the Nazi German invasion of Soviet Russia, plays in 40-50 minutes. Designed as a solitaire game, but as good if not better with live Russian player. Large, 3 (army group) player team 3-piece map table size or small single player(s) 11x17/A3 map (and smaller pieces) "travel" size - with single-sided pieces, VERY easy to assemble. The base map is the *actual* OberKommando Heeres (OKH) campaign planning map (albeit the 1943-44 edition with corrections made) in the public domain on Ft. Leavenworth's Command and General Staff School's Combined Arms Research Library's Digital Library for anyone to see/use. 7 monthly turns. 6+2 German armies, 10+1 panzerkorps, and the 3 Luftflotten. No peripheral Finnish or Rumanian fronts/forces (so Odessa is left out). Similar to my more detailed wargame Robot Barbarossa: From the 48 Strong and Weak Russian units, 3 groups - Strong, Medium/"Historical," and Weak - are pre-sorted and only 2 of these unknown groups are selected and mixed. At end of game, compensation victory points are adjusted up or down for the arrays having been found to be Weak or Strong. OR you can use the un-presorted free Bell Curve selection which usually (as with bell curves) comes out to the average/"historical" but can instead go to extreme extremes! 2 "Siberians" arrive later, and risk arriving sooner than December if Moscow is too threatened too soon. Has hidden Russian individual and overall strengths with just Strong (1-factor) and Weak units - no armor vs. infantry combat arms differentiation. Ground combat is (for simplicity and playing speed) DICE-LESS - the unknown units factor giving unpredictability, strategically as well as tactically. —description from the designer