Yesterday, I wrote:
>BTW, I have seen a playtest version of this scenario and the only difference I >can detect between this and the published version is that they added to the VC >that the Germans win if they control the building on the near side of the >river by turn three. It would seem this has been added to force the Russians >to defend both sides of the river. Hmmm.
Keep this statement in mind during my AAR.
hristopher Spell (JSPELL@merc.rx.uga.edu) was in town and we decided to take a hack at this one. I completely enjoyed my game(s) with Christopher - if you get a chance play him.
I had the Russians was ordered to prevent a German Crossing of the river. It was also imperative that we hold building P8 for 6 minutes (three turns) to delay the Germans on both banks of the river.
I knew what had to be done. I ordered one of my platoons (4 squads) to defend P8 to the last man and the last bullet. They understood. They were willing to die in P8 if that's what it took to win this engagement (Boy, I have one heck of a good motivator - my guys are always willing to try anything I say!).
The rest of my force setup "behind" the river. Let the awesome German firepower cross the river before they begin to toast marshmellows with those FT. (By the way, the Germans are really awesome in this one. Lots of FT / DC / MGs, 5 tanks - including 3 Panthers, etc, etc.) I dug in adjacent to the road and hid my ATG on each side of the road to get flank shots. The road block is placed to block the bridge exit. I put my OBA observer on the hill where he has good LOS to most of the battle area. The HMG was on the hill nearby. I was ready. That was good, because we could hear the sound of panzers approaching.
Turn One: 0800 to 0802:
The German hordes swarm onto the board. All of my troops hunker down beneath their concealment counters. No defensive fire except for the OBA. My observer gets radio contact and battery access. On top of that, the SP is placed accurately! Amazing! (I cannot roll higher than 4, and Christopher can't roll less than 9 - the dice smile upon me and all is right with the world.)
In the second half of turn one, Radio Contact - no problem. I place an artillary barrage near the bridge over the stream. This slows down about 60% of the German force as they manuver around it. (no effect on the panther that is caught in it.)
Turn Two: 0802 to 0804:
The Germans Advance, moving adjacent to my OBA FFE. On my left flank, Germans advance to bring P8 into LOS. All squads in P8 are in good order, I move one squad to an adjacent building to interdict Germans on my left as they cross open ground to get to P8. The German fire is almost completely without effect, my return fire (a 4 IFT +2) has no effect on his 10-2, but both 468 squad that are with him roll eleven on their MC and break.
In the second half of the turn, I convert the FFE to harrassing fire, catching several of his stacks of infantry that used to be "adjacent" to the OBA. Things are looking so good, I begin to think about the possibility of withdrawing my "last man - last bullet" platoon to my side of the river. They just have to hold for two more minutes....
Turn Three: 0804 to 0806:
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." Turns one an two were the best... The dice are cruel.
In trying to piece together what happened, as near as we can tell, the "last man - last bullet" platoon all jumped to the windows and made rude jestures toward the German lines. The Germans fired and broke EVERYONE in the building. There were additional casualties, and by the time Prep Fire was over, only two broken conscripts manned the defenses of building P8.
Naturally, the Germans start to swarm the building. My HMG on the hill opens up and stops two of his squads cold. A MMG and a T-34 on my side of the river join in and stop another group. One of the Germans Panthers tries to move thro the harrassing fire and I roll snake eyes for a critical hit! That Panther is toast. But, in the end, there are just too many Germans. A squad or two get adjacent to the building and advancing fire sees all remaining Russians in P8 die. Germans advance and control the building. I am stunned. In one player turn my entire platoon has been creamed. I had thought that 4 squads would be enough to hold him at bay - after all, he has to enter from off board, cross all that space, Kill all my squads, and occupy the building. Never happen, right? Even worse, in this game my OBA has blocked 60% of the attacking force from getting anywhere near the P8 building. He's taken the building and used less than half his fire power!
In my player turn, I look at my setup and realize I have maybe ONE squad that can sprint across the bridge and advance into the building. Of course, I have to KILL all the Germans to gain control - and of course, I'll have to survive (in Good Order!) a pile of defensive fire as I sprint - but it might happen! I make plans for a desparate attempt to retake control of P8. I will call OBA down on P8 and run across the bridge and into the building. The OBA will have to KILL at least one of the squads in the building and my squad will have to CC the other. If all goes VERY well, I'll control the building again.
Observer! Adjust the FFE onto P8!
Yes Sir!
Observer! Where is that OBA! Its still falling on the other side of the stream!
Sir! I must report a terrible accident! The radio was sitting beside a railway track in the shadow of a box car when a large gust of wind came up and blew the box cars over onto the radio. Of course, the radio is damaged beyond any hope of repair. The dice, that have been so good to me for the first two turns now roll 12 on radio contact.
Game ends with the local political officer shooting the commander.
Sam Belcher
AAR fans, Listers, I've lost my only ftf partner to Portland, (you reading this Les?), but thank goodness for computers. After a nail-biting, Hung-won finish in *Wintergewitter*, Tom Hung, (Hi, Tom!), and I met in VASL again and played a slug-fest known as *Crossing the Gniloi Tikitsch*, (1996 Annual, A98). I like the feel of this scenario because it has a sizable river with a short bridge, add to that a large village on the south side of the river, (board 22), and rural terrain on the north side, (board 40), add to that 3 Panthers and 2 Pz IVH versus 2 T34 M43s and 2 45LL AT guns, add to that a largely elite force of German infantry with a lot of toys versus an also largely elite force of Ivans with 100mm OBA....a key roadblock....foxholes....dummies....a German mechanized platoon reinforcing...what fun!
Tom took the Germans. His plan was to get the Panthers on the bridge in the (approximate) middle of the two mapboards, while killing any Russians in sight and setting a DC on the roadblock to clear it, (and I did place the roadblock at the north end of the bridge). Then he would drive the Panthers off the north edge to satisfy the Exit VP requirement of 16 EVP. Capturing the Russian-held building of P8 near the south end of the bridge was not a major part of his plan, even though controlling it by the end of Turn 3 would mean an automatic German victory. If opportunity presented itself, then that was another matter.
With the Russians, I wanted to make sure he couldn't sweep into building P8 for the quick win, while banking on my tanks and AT guns and Arty Observer to hammer the Germans at least enough to make it difficult to control a continuous road network to his exit hex, (required), but I didn't think my Russian force would be able to force the Germans to/over the 43 CVP limit, for the automatic Russian win. One of the AT guns and both tanks were on the north side, (the tanks and the arty observer on Hill 520), but I only had 3 squads of infantry on the north side -- having used-up most of the infantry, (and all the dummy counters), to hold P8 and to cover the approaches from both sides. If he had made it across the bridge like he planned, I have no doubt he would have made short work of what was over there, while mopping-up on the south side of the river..
Perhaps the opening move set the tone, as the quickly-accessed OBA landed on part of the force going straight up the middle and wiped-out a HS while sending others reeling, but it didn't seem like much at the time, (considering how much was about to threaten the tranquility of my nice little bridge.) Turn 2 was when things started getting wild, as the Ruskis lost 3 HS, (I think most of that due to disturbingly efficient tanks), and the Germans lost a 8-0 and 3.5 squad-equiv's, the largest chunk of which was caught in OG by mmg (22X7/Lev2) firing at 15-hex range across the board, (probably a first for me, to tear something up that well with a mere 2fp at such a distance.). A KfZ1 was hit with mmg fire, boom! Brewed! A Panther had been Klanged by a T34, Panther went into shock, went into UK status, revived, and then.....got two Crit Hts in a row! Boom! Brews up a T34 on Hill 520, retained rate, Boom! Wipes out my 9-1 C.O. and 1.5 squad-equiv's of elite infantry in objective P8. (Guess that tank crew didn't like being shocked like that.) My weak side, my left, was quickly getting crunched, but there wasn't much out there anyway. With that double-Crit performance, (I seem to be inspiring one fantastic _enemy_ tank crew per scenario, lately), it looked to me like the path to the P8 victory was wide open, and that Tom would go barreling in there full-speed with his tanks, putting the freeze on my remaining two 628's, (still concealed, albeit), and why, oh why, didn't I put something upstairs in there to be able to help overcome this VBM freeze stuff? I was kicking myself. A hmg458 in 22R1 by the river's edge was there to help, and a lmg458 in OG in 22S7 tied-up a lot of OVRing attention later on, but it all seemed pretty weak to me, at the time.
But Tom's tanks were scattered and/or preoccupied. A Panther still back in 22P3 helped knock-out the squad with my arty observer, and the observer himself broke, but by then it was Russian Turn 3 and his FFE was coming down. A second Panther was up front & center, but remained stationary and shooting at infantry, and the third was out toward the German right, firing from river's edge at the AT gun across the river. A IV-H on the east flank was involved early with freezing a ATR squad, (it got halved and sent reeling by an infantry/DC assault), but when it had come out of the bypass it was acquired by the aforementioned AT gun across the river (at 40G5) and was knocked out, crew and all. Another IV-H went rolling, OVR style, over my squad entrenched in 22O8 OG, (I had thought the VBM stuff on the P8 complex itself was about to begin), but that one got acquired by a slice of LOS possessed by my remaining T34 still in its At Start spot on Hill 520, at 40I6...exit another IV-H. The Russian OBA came alive again and caught the [formerly shocked, now extremely dangerous] Panther on the small bridge 22R7, (No Effect), and two squad-loaded HTs behind it, stunning one HT and ex-PLO-ding the other. And then, much to my amazement, instead of sending all his reinforcements up the center or the virtually all cleared-out German right, two HTs came up the Y-road on the German left, one of them, (the 75mm, or SPW 251/9), parking right next to my other, still HIP 45 AT gun, having evidently been drawn-in by the ATR squad and/or dummies behind it. The AT gun knocked'r out, and the AT squad elim'd the other nearby HT -- crew, squad, and all--with an AFPh hit, in Russian player turn 3.
As the wreck blazes roiled and smoked, I counted up the points, (not all of which I tried writing down, here)...could it be?.....I counted again... I double-checked ASLRB....I checked in the armory.....46 CVPs! Russian win! So what I did not expect to happen had happened, before we began the 4th Game Turn. Tom was seemingly unconcerned about the sudden loss, said that he rated it a Highly Recommend, (as did I), and commented that he would have put more Russians, and both AT guns, on the north side of the river -- the guns perhaps in 40V4, (which I had done, but decided to switch it to 22AA8, where it smited the SPW 251/9), and 40K7/Hill Lev2, (where I had my A.O. entrenched with a 447).
I got lucky when the two HTs went up the Y-road. Might not happen again. I would pull my stuff in closer to P8 and put a squad or two upstairs, probably two. This scenario has been at the top of the ROAR list for balance, though, so who knows what th' hell would happen, next time?
--Paul