Today we finally had what should be our last game of Chain of Command prior to our Arnhem campaign. It was to be a fun, fast game where both Lucius and I could test out forces that were a bit different to us. This will be a quick and dirty AAR so I can get back to getting terrain ready!
FORCES
Lucius fielded his newly painted Paras. My FJs pretended to be generic infantry, with only 1 Senior Leader and 1 MG42 per section instead of 2. This was to give us an idea of how these forces handle for Arnhem.
For support Lucius rolled a measly 6, giving me 12 points (3 plus the difference in our force rating of 9).
Lucius took an engineer team, a pre-game barrage, and flamethrower team.
I took 2 minefields, a senior leader, a forward observer for an 8cm mortar battery, and a trippd mounted MG42. I’ll be calling the MG42 the Sustained Fire MG (SFMG) to differentiate between the tripod mounted gun with 10 dice from the section weapon with 8. I had enough points for a Tiger II, but sadly decided against it. It just didn’t feel right and would be putting all of my eggs in 1 basket. Not to spoil things but I kinda wish I had.
TERRAIN
A simple setup on the outskirts of town. Lucius was to take the German HQ, the building on the top left and I was to stop him. The German baseline is the left of the picture, the British entering on the right.
THE GAME
The British force morale started at 11, and the Germans started at paltry 8.
The patrol phase was uneventful, with JOPs being placed in reasonable areas. The German JOP near the house is to represent the JOP in the building itself.
1st turn
(Dice rolls are prefaced with B for British and G for German)
As the JOPs had been placed, I put down my minefield. Sadly, this hadn’t surprised Lucius.
B 665543
1 Section deploys towards the German HQ with the Pl Sgt staying back by the JOP. Lucius figured that I’d have problems deploying and wanted to put pressure on me. It worked.
B 653332
2 Section comes on, 1 Section moves towards the HQ at the double.
G44431
Lucius’ pregame barrage begins to take its toll. 1 squad fails to deploy to the HQ. I was hoping to hold this flank with it. The SFMG was supposed to hold my right flank having such good visibility, but it also can’t make it. The Pl 2IC shows up in the HQ as I’m not giving up without a fight, though admittedly this isn’t much of one.
B664311
Another double phase for the Paras. 1 Section doubles forward, moving 15″ in one phase! These paras move quickly! 2 Section activates on a 4 and moves forward on my right.l (thanks to the paras having excellent junior leaders). The 2″ mortar and a sniper come on.
B655421
1 Section crosses the fence and smoke is dropped by the house. 2 section is pushing up again.
G66531
My 1st squad finally makes it to the HQ, with the MG team deploying to the top floor and the large rifle team with the JL joining the feldwebel on the main floor. My SFMG again fails to deploy. This barrage is killing me!
G55441
The SFMG finally deploys and fires at 2 Section by the farm outbuilding but only manages to inflict 2 shock. Elites are really difficult to hit, even in the open.
On the other flank I had the MG in the upper window open fire at 1 Section, adding a bit of shock and then my Pl 2IC lead the rest of the section and the attached JL out with the cry of “Hangranaten!” The melee was devastating. The sergeant from 1 Section stumbled back wounded, the entire section wiped out. On my end, the Pl 2IC and the Obergefreiter were both wounded.
British force morale dropped 3 points to 8, while mine went down 2 to 6. Not a bad trade off, especially considering how hard it is to hit these elite types. My force morale can’t stand too much more damaging before I lose my activation dice but I was fairly happy with that phase. So happy, in fact, that I didn’t take any pictures!
B643211
The Para sniper shoots at the wounded Pl 2IC but thankfully doesn’t drop him. Undeterred, 3 Section deploys and opens fire at the my remaining Obergefreiter and Pl 2IC, killing the Obergefreiter. My force morale drops to 4 and I lose an activation die.
On the other flank, 2 Section fires at the SFMG, killing 1 of the 5 crew.
G6321
I finally bring my forward observer on, but I move him too close to the SFMG. I try to bring on my 2nd and 3rd squad but they can’t get through the barrage! This is really getting me caught short.
B664443
Having 6 dice means the chances of getting double phases is higher and Lucius gets another one.
3 Section once again fires at my wounded 2IC who is desperately hiding behind the bodies outside the HQ. He is wounded, again, and my force morale drops to 2. I lose the JOP in my HQ.
2 Section opens fire at the SFMG and only manages to inflict 1 shock so the 2″ mortar drops smoke in front of the gun. Drat.
B644321
Lucius has both 2 and 3 Sections fire, but neither accomplishes anything, so he drops smoke in front of my forward observer.
G644
I deploy my Platoon Commander (Pl Comd). While this would make it harder to bring on the rest of my platoon, the turn hasn’t ended yet(!) so I can’t be penalized any more than I am already. The Pl Comd moves the SFMG and has the FOO shuffle and contact the battery for a fire mission.
2nd Turn
B666551
Naturally. After I bring my Pl Comd on and move my SFMG out of cover the turn ends and the smoke lifts. As it does his sniper misses again.
B643321
3 Section finally takes out my Pl 2IC and my force morale drops to 0 and my remaining troops on the board figure they’ve had enough and run.
Aftermath
The Para’s lost 9 in the fight, I lost 1 JL, 6 soldiers and 2 support (Pl 2IC and 1 from the SFMG). The difference in force morale though changes that substantially.
The para’s would have 1 miss the next game and then all return to duty.
The German platoon would have 3 permanently lost, 2 missing the next battle and 1 return immediately.
Overall, if this has been part of a campaign game, I would’ve not minded the loss of a section if I had managed a trade off with Para casualties, but the difference in force morale negated that. Playing an entire game under a barrage was unlucky and difficult but I think that I did reasonably enough.
Lessons Identified
Paras are far more vulnerable in hand to hand combat than in the open. Throwing handgrenades and charging in will be used again, I’m sure.
The Paras are hard to hit and so can move in the open with fewer cares, so I will also need to really watch how fast they close my defensive positions.
We did come up with 2 questions that I’ll be putting up on the forum, but will also put here for those who wish to answer them on the blog:
- When a FOO deploys, can they call for fire immediately? A section or team can fire immediately, so if a FOO can see their aim point, can they contact the battery on their deploying phase or do they need to wait?
- In the rules (and errata), it says that minefields can be deployed anywhere. That means that Lucius could’ve deployed minefields in my defensive position or around the road. That doesn’t seem quite right. If it is right, it also begs the question – if the road on which vehicles deploy is blocked, can they simply deploy further down the friendly side of the table?
I found that different filters in my photos actually make the terrain mat not look brown, but I need to watch for washout. The black and white photos sometimes look good, but the miniatures really sometimes need to be in colour, especially Lucius’ ones as he’s done such a lovely job on them. I’m sure we’ll experiment with them more later. I’m going to try to put a slideshow of who moved where and did what to whom for our next game. If there are any tips out there for this, please let me know!
Overall we had a good fun game that was over in under 2 hours. The next bit of time will be getting the last of our support options and terrain ready, and then I think we’ll kick off the campaign next week. I’ll be putting up an overview this weekend.