Matrix Games (www.matrixgames.com) is pleased to announce that the Conflict of Heroes’ series will soon add a new title! Based directly on the original boardgame, Conflict of Heroes: Storms of Steel will be released on the 20th of November 2013 thanks to Western Civilization Software (www.west-civ.com).
The game relives the moments of Operation Citadel, when the German Army tried to overcome the Soviet forces in its major offensive on the Eastern Front in 1943. The clash of the full might of the two warring powers culminated in the largest tank battle in history, outside Prokhorovka, where 900 Soviet tanks charged 600 German panzers to neutralize the German long range advantage. The result cost Germany the strategic initiative and helped turn the war in favor of the Allies.
Conflict of Heroes: Storms of Steel puts you in command of the fast-paced and fiery firefights of the Battle of Kursk and allows you to make the tactical choices and experience the challenges of this massive and decisive battle. It adds fifteen new firefights, new terrain types, over fifty new units like New AT Guns, Marders, Panzers, troop transports, Panthers, Tigers, T-70’s, Grenadier Squads, and much more along with new rules for fighters and sniper units.
Conflict of Heroes: Storms of Steel is a stand-alone game and DOESN’T REQUIRE ownership of Conflict of Heroes: Awakening the Bear. It will also work as an expansion if you already own Conflict of Heroes: Awakening the Bear.
About Conflict of Heroes: Storms of Steel
Conflict of Heroes: Storms of Steel is a stand-alone expansion to the critically acclaimed tactical computer wargame Conflict of Heroes: Awakening the Bear, the official adaptation of the award-winning board game from Academy Games. Storms of Steel brings an impressive new campaign to Conflict of Heroes set in the Battle of Kursk created in part by legendary wargame designer John Hill. Storms of Steel adds rules for airplanes, snipers, and over fifty new units.
Operation Citadel was to be the major German offensive on the Eastern Front in 1943. It chose the most obvious target: the bulge in the front line around the city of Kursk. Germany badly needed a quick success for several reasons: shorten the frontline, free up forces against the inevitable invasion of Western Europe, and to keep her fledging allies in the camp.
Hitler gambled all resources on this battle, and his insistence on having the newest tank models, the Panther and the Tiger, on the battlefield in force delayed the offensive.
Such big preparations against an obvious target did not go unnoticed by the Soviets. While the Germans massed tanks, airplanes, and artillery, the Red Army built impressive fortifications, and was very well prepared when the Panzers finally started rolling on the 5th of July.
North of the salient, the German 9th Army under Colonel-General Model encountered resistance and conditions more similar to trench warfare than the Blitzkrieg they got used to. Although characterized by intense and desperate fighting, the northern attack never got too far.
The Southern attack saw much more success initially, as General Hoth’s 4th Panzer Army broke through the first line of defences, and with the II SS Panzer Corps leading the charge, putting the best of the German forces against battle-hardened veteran units of the Red Army, the fate of the battle hung in the balance.
The clash of the full might of the two warring powers culminated in the largest tank battle in history, outside Prokhorovka, where 900 Soviet tanks charged 600 German panzers to neutralize the German long fire advantage.
Eventually, with the failure of the northern arm of the attack, and with the Allied landing in Sicily making Hitler relocate forces from the offensive to Italy, the Germans failed their objectives, and bled their panzer armies dry against the well-prepared and determined Soviet resistance. Stalingrad ensured that the Germans would not prevail in the East; Kursk ensured the German defeat.
Conflict of Heroes: Storms of Steel puts you in command at the fast-paced and fiery firefights of the Battle of Kursk and to experience first-hand the challenges of this massive and decisive battle.