20mm WW2 West Front 1944 battle with 9 year old (3rd one)

Introduction

The 9 year old that I have played a few games of 20mm WWII asked for a game over the school holidays while he was staying over for the day.  How could I say no?  The weather was going to be great so I thought why not play outside where the light will be perfect.  If we are to play outside, I could use the entire table tennis table when I usually use half of it.  My first game on a full table tennis table in nearly 10 years.  I was amazed on the quality of the photos I took compared to the ones normally taken inside and at night – amazing what a lot of natural light can do!

The rules are the same I used for the last two games against him - a slightly modified version of my own rules that uses more dice rather than die modifiers, see here.

Deployment

I did not choose a scenario but wanted to use some Brits so chose September 1944.  It was to be an engagement scenario as there was not that much time.  Next time I will get into more of an attacker/defender battle. While setting out the table I realised I do not have enough terrain for a 9’x5’.  Neither the amount of roads I want, and definitely not enough trees!  My mantra has always been “you can never have enough trees” and I proved it with this setup.

A composite view of the entire 9'x5' table, Brits enter from the bottom

The objectives across the centre.

The objectives were to hold the crossroads and the T intersection in the centre, the church of the British right, and the road corner on the British left.

The British left. The Germans focussed on the centre and this flank

The British right, the British gave a good showing on this side. 

Troops

I selected what felt about right, and not too much so the table did not feel cramped.  For instance, there was only 4 tanks on each side.  I think it worked quite well not having so many troops, it allowed for some manoeuvre.  

Germans

4 PanzerIVJ

3 12 figure units (incules 3 MMGs), in 9 half tracks

1 75mm AT gun + half track tow

1 Kubel Wagon

1 Motorcycle

British

I have always wanted to use a full contingent of Carriers – I have been collecting them over the years.

13 Carriers (carrier platoon) with 3xLMGs (2 crew), 3x2" mortars (2 crew) and 18 riflemen

1 truck platoon (1 MMG, 8 riflemen, 3 trucks)  

1 Firefly

3 Shermans

The Game

The centre, where the objectives were, was where a lot of the action was.  I have split the report into Centre, left and right as it is easier to follow.

The Centre

The German forces enter down the centre road.

The British response along a wide front.

Due to some good cards, the Germans get to the centre first and begin to setup for defence.

A little further to the British centre right, the Germans have managed to get a foothold.  They have occupied all of the building on their side of the village.  The British have not got to a building yet. 

Two carrier sections race up in the centre to get to the village before the Germans occupy all of it.

The British, due to some good activations, make in to the village.  The infantry behind the buildings are in them,  You can just see the PanzerIVs at the rear of the photo.  Note the line of sight to the Sherman - the Sherman is KO'd next turn! The infantry fared better, and managed to inflict a lot of damage across the roads into the German occupied houses.

The British left

The Germans, keeping the initiative going, get to the objective on the British left and take over the objective with good backup forces.

A carrier platoon moves into the wood opposite.

The view from the German side (the carriers have been removed as I tend to remove trucks etc once they have unloaded.  The British have a Sherman, the Germans have no armour on this side. They do have an Anti-tank gun on this flank, but not in a position to fire at the Sherman.  The Sherman did rout a few Germans, but then they stayed out of sight and the Sherman was just a minor deterrent from then on.

The first thing to note is the lack of British infantry in the foreground woods.  All gone.  Two activations of fire by the Germans took their tool and they were drastically reduced and then routed.  But the Germans are substantially reduced as well.  The Germans also reallocated a PanzerIV to help on this flank.  This is important as the British have one last unit that is coming around the far left (off to the left of this picture.

And here is the flanking British infantry running through the woods to the Germans. 

And here is the PanzerIV overruning the last of the British on the left flank.  The Germans hold the objective, but only with about 1/2 the units they started with on this flank..

The British right

The British send the trucks to occupy the hill with the church.  They took a few turns to get there, but the Germans had been lax and not sent anything on this flank.  The church hill overlooks the village so it is a good spot for the British.

The Sherman is gone.  The British successfully advance across the hill, heading towards the woods in the centre of the picture.

The Germans move some units in the woods for defense, but there are more British than Germans.  It proves to be deadly for both sides.

End Game

The British are hanging on in the woods, and the Germans are getting the worst of it.  The sherman manages to damage a PanzerIV.

The german infantry in the village has just about gone so a small unit moves up under the cover of a PanzerIV.  But unluckily into the range of the Sherman Firefly that has hung back all game.  First shot - gone!

The Firefly

Another PanzerIV falls.  The Germans infantry ran away from the village.  The Germans have lost a fair few of their units, fail an force morale check and retreat to fight again another day. 

Verdict
The rules are holding up just fine.  And I won.  Against a nine year old I know, but I lost the first two games I played against him!  He is now ten since I played this in July and we have penciled in Christmas to play again.

WW2 20mm West Front Goodwood mini-Campaign Game 7

Introduction
I have setup a 1/2 a table tennis to play a 7 game mini-campaign set over 2 days at the opening of Operation Goodwood. This is the last game, game 7.  Game 1 and some more background, see this blog post.

Scenario 6 - Assault on Chateau St Pierre D'Oursin
Elements of the 12th SS Panzer are defending the Chateau Pierre D'Oursin.  The Irish Guards need to clear Chateau of forces to protect their divisions left flank.

Overview of the battlefield.  The British on the left have to cross the large open fiend to the woods on the right.

Troops
Germans
1 Veteran Panzer Grenadier HQ
3 Veteran Panzer Grenadier squads (each 6 figures + MMG)
1 JangpanzerIV/L48

Reinforcements:
1 Veteran Panzer Grenadier HQ + Sdkfz 250/10
3 Veteran Panzer Grenadier squads (each 6 figures + MMG +Sdkfz 251/1)

British
1 Squadron
    2 Shermans
    1 Firefly
2 Infantry units
   1 Infantry command (5 figures)
   3 Infantry squads (each 10 figures)
   1 PIAT team in Bren carrier
1 Bren Carrier with HMG team.
1 FAC in Sherman tank
2 Daimler Armoured Car

Overview of the British troops.

Scenario changes
Game is supposed to be on a 6'x6' but I am playing on a 4.5'x5'.  No changes to accommodate this.

The campaign so far - Germans have won three (blue) and the British 3 (orange).

Deployment
The British setup behind the hedge.  The Germans are spread out along the tree line with a central vantage point for the JadgpanzerIV.

Where the units are at deployment

Game
A open field to cross.  Slow and steady it is. The Shermans have been advancing with the infantry following behind them in shelter.

The British tentatively advance.  the infantry hid behind the advancing tanks and the Daimlers are out in front. 

The Daimlers advance and manage to spot some units.  The Panzerfausts (I allowed 2 as per the scenario) all missed.

A Daimler makes it to the woods and spots some infantry.  Panzerfausts all miss and they are 

But return fire from Sherman HE manages to pin the squad. In the rules, a recce unit may contact the closest unit and tell them where a spotted unit is.  In this case the Shermans were closest and fired at the Germans in the woods.

The Other Daimler spots some infantry behind the hedge in front of the chateau.

The other Daimler spots units in front of the Chateau.

Time to call in the aircraft, Success and 6d6 of bomb damage sees them reduced heavily.  Some other Britsih infantry are advancing, further back than the tanks, and also the sole MMG dismounts but within range of the woods.

While an earlier image than previous, the units are still steadily advancing and the dismounted MMG and carrier can be seen at the back left.  

The Germans begin to fire back with the MMGs and pin some advancing infantry. The Germans in the woods are routed eventually by quite a bit of HE fire from the Shermans.

The Chateau and the objective for the British.  MMG fire from here was lethal but aircraft bombing and strafing managed to clear out any troops in it.

The building is bombed a few more times until the aircraft missions ran out.  it did cause the MMG to go, and also the HQ unit in the building.  And one of the units hiding behind the hedge in fron tof the chateau.

The Jagdpanzer decides to open up now and manages to KO a Sherman.  It was easily spotted but the Sherman return fire is ineffectual.

Jadgpanzer in the woods. I only have the L70 model, and it is standing in for the L48 version.

Still slow going - the British are getting closer to the wood line and chateau.  Half the tanks gone, the infantry that is advancing is half gone.  But there is another load of infantry ready to take advantage of the situation as soon as a foothold can be made.

Mid game - lots of losses for the advancing units, but the Germans are reduced quite a bit as well.  The British still have a lot of troops in reserve behind the hedge on the left.

And then I bring on the German reinforcements.  In fact, I only bring on half of them as I have an idea what is going to happen.  I bring on three MMGs rather than 3 MMG and associated infantry (15 figures in all).

The MMGs are brought in on the German right and advance, without being seen,to the edge of the wood.

The MMGs setup on the edge of the wood near the road and are not spotted.  They open up.  4 dice each, 5+ required to hit the closest units.  10 hits from 12 dice!  2 units are gone.  End of turn. First card for activation on the new turn is German.  The three MMGs fire again on the next unit.  12 dice but now need a 6+ as it is long range.  5 hits!  Another unit gone.  The Jagdpanzer then takes out a second Sherman and the last remaining Sherman decides it has had enough (failed morale test).

At the end.  While the British have a lot of infantry left behind the hedge, they have nothing else.  and the Germans command the field with the MMGs.

So the British now have no tanks, no aircraft, one MMG and lots of open ground to traverse - taking about 4-5 turns.  The Germans have 3 MMGs, in cover, that can reach the entire table.  The British retreat.

Verdict
Another open ground battle went as expected. I believe I played the British the best I could do, but it is hard to attack over an open field against hidden forces.  But I did enjoy trying it out.  I believe I will not be trying out open field battles like this again!  It also likely has something to do with playing the scenario based for one set of rules and using another.

This is the last battle in the campaign and the table has been put away.  I started work on some company level rules and realised I am not entirely happy with Advancing Battalions as a ruleset.  They are good, but not great (and I wrote them!).  Playtesting them in these 7 battles has been useful.  I think infantry to hit is too easy and am changing the base to hit from 4+ to 5+.  Also, I would go back to the original way I did morale and add back in suppression.  So while the rules as there were for these rules were a leap forward in mechanisms, I have toned it back a little to what I am more comfortable with.  I have updated the rules (but are untested) and they will be the final version for a while until I get back into battalion sized battles. 

Campaign result

The rulebook has a method to calculate who won the campaign based on a weighted score for winning battles and cross referencing each sides' totals on a small table:

Centre Battles
Game 1 - German win
Game 3 - British win
Game 6 - German win
2- 1 German victory gives 1 campaign point to the Germans
Right Flank Battles
Game 2 - German win
Game 7 - German win
2-0 German victory gives 1 campaign point to the Germans
Left Flank Battles
Game 4 - British win
Game 5 - British win
2-0 British victory gives 1 campaign point to the British

Final result
Cross referencing this on the table gives a narrow German victory.

Final word
With the table away, I am back to 2'x2' table battles for foreseeable future.

WW2 20mm West Front Goodwood mini-Campaign Game 6

Introduction
I have setup a 1/2 a table tennis to play a 7 game mini-campaign set over 2 days at the opening of Operation Goodwood. This is game 6.  Game 1 and some more background, see this blog post.

Scenario 6 - Assault on Frenouville
Grenadier Guards need to clear the reinforced town of Frenouville to clear the road through it to Vimont.

Overview of the table at deployment - Brits on the left, Germans on the right.

The story so far - Germans have won two (blue), British have won three (red)

Troops
Germans
2 Veteran Panzer Grenadier units
     1 Veteran Panzer Grenadier HQ
     3 Veteran Panzer Grenadier squads (each 6 figures + MMG)
1 FAO in Kubelwagon
Dedicated Artillery - 2 x 105mm
3 PanzerIVH

Reinforcements:
3 JangpanzerIV

+ surviving Tiger IIs from Scenario 2. I did not add the Tigers as the board would be too crowded.

British
2 Squadron
    2 Shermans
    1 Firefly
2 M10 Achilles
1 Motorised Infantry unit
   1 Infantry command in M5 half-track
   3 Infantry squads in M5 half-tracks (each 9 figures)
   3 PIATs
1 Infantry unit
   1 Infantry command (5 figures)
   3 Infantry squads (each 10 figures)
   1 PIAT team in Bren carrier
1 FAO in sherman HQ
1 FAC in Dingo Armoured Car
Dedicated Artillery - 3 x 25pdrs

+ surviving Cromwells from game 5. I did not add the Cromwells as I did not add the Tigers for the Germans.

Scenario changes
Game is supposed to be on a 8'x6' but I am playing on a 4.5'x5'.  No changes to accommodate this, it will just be cramped!

Deployment
Not a lot of room for deployment here.  The British split into two broad groups - one unit of Shermans and the motorised infantry to take on the centre objective; the other to advance up the right flank for the objective there.

The Germans setup to attack through the centre and the left with some infantry holding the objective on their right.

Deployment. Four objectives marked with an X - wheatfield corner, centre house, house on bottom left and hedge at top right.

Early Game

Turn 1 was an advance on both sides.  Turn 2 sees the British get a card first and decide to run a halftrack down the road and unload infantry into the objective building.  Another card and they run another halftrack and unload behind the building.

Two units of infantry charge up the road and take the centre objective.  It ended badly.

Bit of a gutsy move and may not pay off (spoiler: it didn't), but infantry is harder to dislodge from hard cover and the building is an objective.  Germans then machine gun the building with vehicle MMG fire and cause them to retreat to the orchard and are pinned.  Germans infantry advance into the building and also the other objective building on their left flank.

Some of the German units in the woods.  If they didn't move, they did not get spotted and acted as great reserve during the game.

The British units that advanced to the centre building objective was a big mistake - the other unit behind it is later also pinned and pulls back into the orchard.  Over the next few turns they take artillery and vehicle MMG and other infantry fire and are reduced from 20 original figures down to about 8.  But they pass all their morale checks and stay in the orchard.

Meanwhile, in the second turn the M10 Achilles unit had activated.

The M10s at the bottom and there commanding position on the left flank.  Same there was not much to fire at (except the burning tank at the top right).

Long range fire at a Panzer IV.  1 in 9 chance of destroying it (works out to a 5+ to hit and a subsequent 5+ to KO).  Rolled a 5 followed by a 5.  The other Achilles misses.  This was the only hit by the M10s for the next three turns and the only tank KO's by the British in the entire game.

A closer look at the only German tank destroyed during the game.

The Jadgpanzers came on in turn 2. The Jadgpanzers are in soft cover and they have better armour.  I decide to move them in on the right flank, facing all the British tanks.  The Germans are a bit armour-weak there, especially after losing a PanzerIV.  I did consider bringing on the left flank to  make that very strong but losing the right flank impacts three potential objectives. The Shermans facing them run and hide behind the orchard and start to assist the other flank.

The Shermans hide behind the orchard from the Jagdpanzers.  The infantry from the ruined building are hiding in the orchard, although they rout soon after this picture was taken.

So moving the JadgPanzers here was a mistake as their 75L48s do not have the range to engage much. They begin moving across to the other flank - the German right flank is fairly empty and did not need the bolstering after all.

On the British right flank, the British are advancing, but so are the Germans.

The British right flank looks quite good from the British perspective.  It does not end well here either!.

The British fail to spot the movement in the buildings and keep advancing.

The British advancing toward the building (and objective).  They also rout shortly after this picture from fire from the building.

The Germans open up from 6" away.  10 dice needing a 5+ to hit on each (due to soft cover).  It is not going to be great.  It was really bad - 8 hits on the British unit and they rout.

The Germans that were in the building that fired on the British in the previous picture.  In the picture the infantry are behind the building, but are really in it.  The building do actually have a removable roof, but I have a terrible habit of forgetting there is stuff inside - if I cant see it, it isn't there!

Mid-Game

The mid game opens with the Germans controlling the game.  They have 3 of the 4 objectives, have units in reserve in the woods and are in a comfortable defensive position.  The British are reacting to the Germans, not in a great position and are down a unit and some others units are battered.  The Germans had got inside the British decision cycle and it showed. On the British plus they completely control half the table, but that half has one objective and no terrain.  Hopefully we will see the British gaining a bit of the initiative or it will be over soon.

Germans in the house on their left flank are routed under intense British vehicle MG fire and artillery. A great run on the dice from the Brits.  The two British units pinned in the centre orchard take a lot more hits and both are routed. Another good run on the dice but this time by the Germans - payback for the previous rolls.  These two British units belong to the same four unit infantry battalion. The battalion has lost over 40% of its units (2 of 4) and rolls a battalion morale check.  They fails and pull back off the table.

Note the lack of any infantry in the picture - half of the original British infantry is gone.

It then became a battle of the tanks as the British were not going to expose the British infantry - there is not much of them left (one battalion).  Some Shermans were KO'd and the last Sherman left pulled back (off the board).

Tank graveyard behind to orchard - The one destroyed M10 missed twice and succumbed to the advancing Jagdpanzers that can be seen in the background

One M10 was pinned and one destroyed by the Jadgpanzer IVs that advanced down the left flank.

A shot of the Jagdpanzers advancing up the empty flank.  They are the L70 version but the scenario calls for the shorter L48 version, which is what I used them as.

There was an British aircraft attack on one of the building that caused 5 casualties but the remaining German veteran infantry just shrugged it off (passed all 5 morale checks from each casualty!).

The British finally get to the objective building, and more in support behind them.  unluckily, the force morale check is not passed at this point and the British pull back.

At this point I realised that the British forces had 3 of their 6 units out of commission.  I rolled for force morale and they decide to pull back (a 4+ required to pass but failed).

A view at the end game.  The British are really hemmed into one corner of the board.  The Germans (played by me) did an excellent job of forcing the British player (played by me) to react to what they did.

Verdict
Well, that did not go as expected but was enjoyable nevertheless.  And my rules seem to be working as I expect them to.  The table was very crowded and there seemed there was always multiple targets to choose from for any unit firing (this went for both sides).

I can pin the British loss down to my stupid move of advancing to capture the objective with the British infantry.  They were quickly kicked out, and soon disappeared.  I should have played the more careful, slower game and used the tanks to more of an advantage to assist with moving fowards (wow, combined arms, who would have thought).  But I can be an impulsive player as times, especially when solo playing.

The British had it hard anyway - the German were able to store a lot of reserves back in the woods for possible counter attacks.  I think even if I had played it better, the Germans would have managed, barring unlucky dice rolling,  to kick the British out of any gains.

Onwards to the last game - a quite open table.