There's quite a bit of propaganda on both sides at this point. But some is to boost moral and some is to save face/manipulate the masses.
As soon as Russia attempted to set off a durty bomb in the form of a nuclear power plant (still may according to some reports of black mail and such) I realized how insane Putin is and how far he's willing to stretch the narrative to save face but still force an "accidental" nuke. What do snipers and the "Ghost of Kyiv" matter now?