The Russian units (four infantry regiments) are in good shape (rare for Russian units in WW1), and are pretty strong compared to their German counterparts. They are being reinforced, as the battle opens up, by two mounted Cossack battalions. The Russian infantry regiments have some attached MGs, but no artillery.
The German regiments (four, again) are tired and have dampened morale. What the Germans do have, is two field gun battalions mixed in with their infantry units, as well as MGs attached to the regiments.
The objectives of the Russian division are to secure safe passage out of the area surrounding the town, and escape the encirclement, preferably by the north or east road.
The German objectives are to either render the Russian division ineffective, or to contain it within the area.
The time of the year is February, and while there is (surprisingly) not a lot of snow on the ground, a warm week has rendered the farm fields to the east of the town (between the cross roads and the forest line) to be soft and extremely muddy.
I have written some home brew rules (modified from my Russian Civil War rules), that I call "End of Empires". They are a basic "I go/you go" type rule system, rolling dice per stand to inflict casualties, and 2d6 vs a target number for morale. The tactical decision in the game is when a unit takes casualties from fire, it can ignore a certain number per firefight, and choose to give up ground instead. That is a costly decision for both sides, so I hope this is a good fight. I have tried out the rules using blocks and dice at home, but you never know what Wargamers will try. I will try to take lots of photos while refereeing, and post them here as a follow up article.
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