As Reported
The Chir river · December 1942

As Reported

Command from reports, not from the truth.

A 1942 situation map of the Chir: a quiet printed map with rivers, woods and towns, German units in blue, a hold line in black ink and a Soviet attack arrow in red Illustration
In development

December 1942. Sixth Army is encircled at Stalingrad. On the Chir, a thin German line stands in front of the airfields that keep it alive, and a Soviet tank army is coming for them.

You are not on the battlefield. You are in a headquarters a hundred kilometres away, with a map, a telephone that is always late, and reports you cannot check.

You never move a piece

You command the way a staff did: with orders and reports. Draw the order on the map and send it. A courier takes it to the corps, two to five hours away. Everything on your map is someone's report, with a source and an age, fading as it gets older. Some of it is wrong.

D+1 07:58 · XXXXVIII. Pz.K. is carrying out your order to hold the line (sent D+0 05:12). reported by XXXXVIII. Pz.K. · observed D+1 07:40

Your commanders can say no

Each commander has a temperament of his own. One understates his losses, another sees enemies behind every ridge. Order an attack into a position he thinks too strong, and he refuses, with his reason. Insist, and he goes, under protest.

D+0 09:31 · XXXXVIII. Pz.K. will not carry out your order to attack (sent D+0 04:03): the position is too strong. Send the order again to insist. reported by XXXXVIII. Pz.K. · observed D+0 07:01

Five days, each one begins at dawn

A battle is five days of war in an evening. Every day starts with the morning report: what changed overnight, the state of your command, the orders still out, the weather. Pause to plan the next day, or let the clock run.

Morning report · D+2 · 8.12.42
  • Surovikino bridge held through the night.
  • 336. Inf.Div. steady, ammunition adequate, 4 h ago.
  • Two orders on their way.
  • Ground frozen. Two sorties at Morozovsk.

Your own eyes, from the air

Your reconnaissance flies from real airfields, as far as their range allows. It sees what your corps does not report: columns, movement, a bridge going up. It cannot see whether a division is fresh or broken. When the air and the ground disagree, you decide which to believe. Fog grounds the aircraft, and an airfield can be lost.

D+1 13:05 · Air reconnaissance near Surovikino: armour column moving west; bridging at the Chir. flown from Morozovsk · observed D+1 09:10

Then you see the truth

When the battle is over, the reckoning shows the moments you were wrong: what you saw when you sent an order, and what was really there. And who told you the truth.

What you saw at D+1 14:20 · one enemy division near Surovikino. What was there · two divisions and a tank corps you had not been told of

Ways to play

Alone

Take any staff. AI commanders hold the rest, on both sides, each with his own character.

Together

Every staff can be a player, on both sides, all sharing one clock. On the Chir that is four staffs; bigger battles bring more. There is no chat: you talk through orders and reports, or across the room.

The German staff's map: own units in blue, the enemy in redIllustration
Play the German side, and your map is a German staff map: your forces blue, the enemy red.
The Soviet staff's map of the same ground: own units in red, the enemy in blueIllustration
Play the Soviet side, and it is a Red Army map of the same ground: your forces red, the enemy blue.

The game shows no Nazi symbols and no uniforms. It is about staff work: what you know, when you learned it, and who told you.

As Reported In development

play.asreported.se · for invited testers