AWI dust up

Sundays game saw my Dad and I turn our attention to a AWI Blackpowder game with myself taking command of the British force. The game was back and forth and saw the both of us holding the advantage at various points of the game.

We Ramdomly rolled to see what raiting  our generals and brigade leaders would be with a mixed bag of results.

The first of the action saw my British line infantry engage in a fire fight with the American continental troops across the centre fields pushing the American forces back and shaking a couple of brigades with a very effective first volley fire from all my units.

The American continentals of the second division take a defensive position on the hill as reinforcements arrive to support th shaken units in the fields.

The Rebel militia defending the farm buildings, with a few Indian in support.

 

British line infantry break in the centre under deadly fire from the Continental toops which have arrived from reserve.

Things start to go from bad to worse for the British at this stage as my first division is broken in the centre after the two sides got involved in melee. The broken division now started to retreat from he battlefield 

After holding there ground for a couple of turns  the Hanoverian troops close to short range and unleash a deverstsing couple of rounds of shooting, breaking the Militia troops on my left, fleeing the farm compound

More sucess for my British as a second American division breaks after a fierce fire fight with the Britsh guards. In breaking the 2nd AMerican divisions my units had taken heavy casualties and had to hold there ground for a couple of turns rally some points off them.

The British militia reserve try to hold the line together behind he fence line as the broken British troops retreat towards the table edge. A blunder roll by my dad sees a shaken unit of Continentals suddenly find some courage and they storm forward rather recklessly into point blank range where they are duely shot up and broken. At this point he Ameican troops could not get to move due to my dad failing to roll a successful order for a number of turns. This allowed me to somewhat steady my right flank 

The final position , my dads right flank had complely collapsed the right centre had also been broken. However the left flank was still strong and was only opposed by my 3 brigades of militia. 

At this point it was time to call it a day. It was a see saw game which saw after I had taken the initiative  in early stages my dad hit back hard with good success in the centre. If my dad could have passed a few important command rolls he would have broken my entire centre but it wasn't to be. With this restbite i was able to launch a strong attack against my dads right flank/centre which saw my British gain great success in breaking two divisions of Americans. I was starting to hold the upper hand again and with my dad losing 2 divisions to my 1 we decided that the British had forced a minor victory.

It was a very good game, definitely a period I enjoy  fighting.

Somewhere on the fields of Kursk

Russian tanks and cargo head towards the battle raging on the fields of Kursk

German mechanics repairing a Panzer IV ready to meet the on coming Russian hordes

The fields somewhere on the edges of Kursk, I took command of a German armed division to take on my Dad who was in command of a Russian armoured division. We decided to have a tank only battle of 600 points aside to see who would come out on top. The church was the only objective in the middle of the table. Aircraft chits would count as a one to your battle rating and low on ammo chits could be played on tanks (yes this would come back to bite me). As a little gimmick I had made one of my Tiger 1 tanks a panzer ace, if my dad could destroy this tank I would have to pull two chits instead of the usual one as it would have a demoralising effect on the rest of my Panzers.

Starl Starl Starl, The first wave of T34 tanks waste no time in rushing towards the initial German forces firing a few HE pot shots as they advance.

German Panzer III tanks head down the road towards the objective, taking it at the end of he turn.

Strike one to the Russians, my Panzer ace in the Tiger tank becomes the first casualty. My dad was forced to take a morale chit thanks to me taking the objective, my dad draws a low on ammo chit which we are allowing to be played on tanks tonight. The said chit is placed on my tiger ace and on the roll of 6 the tiger ace was completely out of ammo so decided to quit the battle field in search of more!! My two chits later saw 9 points wiped off my battle rating, I was getting a bad feeling about how this game was going to be heading!

               ( han's we seem to be out of ammo, best call it a day )

As the tiger ace leaves the field a second tiger enters the game in support of the Stug III platoon 

The second wave of Russian tanks enters the left flank in the form of  3 SU-76 tank hunters and some T-70 light tanks.

The Panzer III tank defending the objective 

A T34 advances to tne cover of the walled field and makes light work of the Panzer III but suffers the same fate as a second panzer III returns fire and moves into securing he objective again.

The Stug III platoon becomes involved in a long range fire fight over a few turns with 5 T34's, after a few rounds of firing and pinning one another a StuG manages to destroy a T34 before it suffers a direct hit and is destroyed. One of the other remaining StuGs has to fall back to the memo truck to be re supplied . 

The Panzer III in the back of the picture fails a morale test while pinned after suffering a glancing hit from the T70 and the crew abandon it and a second Panzer III erupts into flames from a direct SU-76 shot. The command Panzer III does manage to destroy the T70 in return fire in the lol owing turn.

 

A T34 is flanked by a Stug who some how fails to spot his target (must be because of all the smoke from the burning German tanks). The T34 returns fire pinning to Stug.

Some return fire over a few moves sees a t34 and the Panzer III command tank knocked out and a SU-76 destroy a tiger with a roll of eleven on the armour penetration roll, my Germans were all but broke by this stage.

The final nail in the coffin saw my final Tiger tank hit and pinned and then roll a morale of one, again leading Germany's finest Panzer crews to abandon there Tiger and LEG IT!!!!

Well that was me comprehensively beaten, my break point of 41 was passed with the chit drawn for the running tiger crew, I had lost a full squad of Tiger 1's, two of whom abandoned their tanks as the T34 shells bounced off the Tigers armour. I had suffered some terrible luck during the game finding it hard to roll high enough to penetrate the Russian armour and the less said about my morale throwing the better, I also had picked high chits at an alarming rate but to be fair to my dad he kept my fire power limited due to consistently pinning my tanks forcing me to take morale chits to un pin my units as his tanks advanced, especially neutralising my a tigers deadly 88mm guns.

 In the end it was a big and glorious victory for the red army.

The victorious Russian armour heads down the road as German Panzers burn all around them, victory was had today but plenty more Panzers still lay ahead...

Competed Fall of the Reich Platoons

Here is my newly completed Fall of the Reich (FOTR) German infantry platoons, x 1 Volksstrum platoon with heavy weapon supports and a Auxilary platoon.

The Auxillary platoon I pictured as a right rag tag unit if any troop type the Germans could muster armed with anything they could put their hands to. To represent this I have used a number of various troop types ranging from Lufftwaffee piolets  Kriegsmarine, SS troops, Grenadiers in different theatre uniforms, troops armed with Russian sub machine guns and mixed them together, the command team are field police with a dog. The figures are Peter pig for the most part but I think some maybe command decision as I dipped my hand into my dads spares box to help complete the platoon.

I feel the unit captures the state of the German army available come 1945 .

My Volksstrum platoon are Peter pig figures and look really good with their civilian clothes mixed with bits of uniforms. The unit has a mixture of panzerfausts and rifles with the odd sub machine gun mixed in and and LMG teams. The heavy support comes in the shape of a MG38 tripod and a 80mm mortar.

How long this unit remains in its positions when they get on the table and start to come under fire top only time will tell!

Next up for the Germans FOTR army list will be. Massive Jagdtiger, Battlefront minitures are releasing a lovely box set for the tank which includes a Jagdtiger and dismounted crew and ammo loading teams which I'm sure il will find a home for in this army list.

Macedonian v Indians

My Macedonians were given a run out on Sunday evening against their old foe my Dads Indian army. With my latest additions we could field a game of a 1000 points aside, way to much for an evening game but what the hell we decided to do it anyway!

I slightly changed my divisions around, mixing my companion cavalry with my medium and light cavalry  

My dad fielded his Indian Elephants in units with skirmishes supporting them for the first time

Indian light/medium cavalry and chariots in support of  the Indian infantry

The following photo is how my right wing cavalry division spent all the game bar the last move. After blundering their command roll on the first turn, the light cavalry and horse archers turned tail and retreated two moves never to return into play, the rest of the cavalry failed every command roll until the final turn

 

As much as I tried I couldn't quite get the right command throws to push my attack in the centre in a disciplined order and became somewhat bogged down with limited success.  My dad faired little better  struggling to get good command scores, I was starting to think buying us the new warlord games Roman numeral dice for our ancient games was certainly not bringing us much luck :) 

My left wing cavalry faired much better and after my light cavalry and archers softened up Indian mercenary Hopilites my Companion cavalry crashed home and broke the division swiftly 

Indian war elephants somewhat reluctantly head towards the massed ranks of Macedonian pikes, not that I would blame them

My first division of elite Macedonian Phalanxes battle against the Indian foot troops gradually pushing them back and putting that division on the brink of collapse, however I suffered to and lost my Hypastists through arrow fire, one casualty, morale throw of double one = Hypastists break pppssstt 

so much for been elite! Also one of my Phalanxes had become spent  in the melee phase meaning my division was starting to waver slightly.

Skirmishing in the woods.

With my right flank cavalry clearly not interested in taking part in the battle my phalanxes are flanked by the Indian left wing.

 

After becoming flanked and disordered by a lot of arrow fire their was little I could to do but brace myself for the impact of the Indian elephants which duly came and smashed my phalanxes  one after the other shattering my infantry division. Ouch

That turned out to be the last move, both my dad and I had lost one division each so all ended in a draw. As I mentioned earlier the game was to big to play to a finish in a couple of hours gaming time so next time we will scale it down abit, also those new warlord dice might be getting put on EBay if they keep behaving in the manner they did in this game for both sides  :-) 

Fall of the Reich, End of the Rat race

                                                "Right boys this way to Berlin"

With my new American armoured Platoon finished and with the recent arrival of Fall of the Riech mdf morale chits I ordered we played a scenario out the Fall of the Rich book called The end of the rat race. The objective of the game is for the attacker to destroy the German Rear guard. The defender has set up a road block in the middle of the table on the road. A destroyed vehicle is placed on the road to represent the ambush been sprung onto the attackers Vanguard. my force was to arrive in column which enters from the table edge, I managed to start with 6 units on the road, D6 reinforcements will enter The game at the start of each turn, the Germans defenders entered D6 at the start of turn 3. The game was played at approximately 600 points patoon level, my Dad played the Germans and choose (from memory) a Volksstrum Grenadier platoon with HMG and Pak 40, Senior HQ, Ammo supply truck, Platoon Panzer IV H, Tiger I, HMG Nest, a minefield, two Target points, off table 105mm Artillery support and a forward observer and also for good measure a 88mm A/A gun. My dad started with 5 units on the table in ambush fire. 

The table at set up

My American armoured force, Platoon of Infantry + M3 Half Tracks, HMG team, Forward HQ and Jeep and communication team, Reece team Jeep, 4 x M4 Shermans, Jumbo Sherman and a Greyhound armoured car and of table 81mm mortars. I also had a timed air strike set for turn 6 and a timed 105mm barrage for turn 4.

The head of my column enter the table, the Reece teams led the way followed by two Shermans and 2 M3 Halftracks and mounted Infantry squads.

A dug in 88 mm on the hill for a clear view readies itself on ambush to open fire onto the American armoured column.

As my Americans spread out off the road one the Shermans became a early victim to the Panzer IV in the field near the road block, the morale chit was a high one which added to the two I had to take for the Germans holding both objectives at the start of the game put my BR up to 11 already. A round of 105mm artillery also finds its mark and pins the is mounted infantry and Halftrack .

The Panzer IV after knocking out a Sherman becomes involved in a long distance fire fight with two other Shermans.

American infantry are given the order to dismount and run for the cover of the hedges across the field towards the German 88.

The HMG team takes position on the top floor of the building to give covering fire, I put it on ambush fire but over the next few turns I forgot about it! The recce Jeep team dismount and find a position in the building giving them a full view of the battlefield to call in the off table mortars.

My dismounted infantry ran through the ploughed field to get In bazooka range of the Panzer IV with the support of a Sherman. The troops had ran straight into a pre targeted register point (PTRP) and 105mm shells rained in killing a couple of infantry men and pinned the Sherman. The Panzer IV then fired and hit the Sherman, although it didn't penetrate the armour I was forced to take a morale test which resulted in a 1, my tank crew had decided that enough was enough and abandoned the vehicle and ran!

A much needed sight was the Thunderbolt dropping its bombs onto the German infantry in the wood, who suffered a direct hit and were destroyed meaning two morale chits to the Germans BR. The Panzer IV which had entered from reserve was lucky to be out of the blast radius.

With half my armour on fire the infantry teams closed to bazooka range, a side shot onto the panzer IV hit and blew it up, the second Panzer in support also suffered the same fate shortly after from the Sherman Leader tank. My other infantry squad took the roadblock objective back from the Germans.

 

After crossing two mine markers which proved to be dummy minefields I forgot about the third and final minefield marker next to the road beside the field. Obviously this was the main minefield, and I rather rashly sent my Jumbo tank top speed down the road after both the Panzers had been knocked out to take the German road block position. My dad some what surprised by my move informed me i had just past through the minefield, Sure enough I rolled badly and set the minefield off and blew my Jumbo to bits, not the greatest debut! I managed to pull a aircraft chit but it didn't turn up in my next turn.

My dad revealed a second PTRP in the second field down the road and a shell direct hit my Sherman making short work of its armour and destroying it. My infantry squad in the ruined house near the roadblock are forced to flee due to heavy casualties from MG38 and rifle fire becoming pinned while under 50%

On my right flank my remaining infantry squads dismount and enter into the woods waiting on reserve move for the pre programmed 105mm strike to come down on the wood opposite them where the HMG nest was housed.

Boom...a couple of direct hits destroys he HMG nest and the American infantry quickly take the position using their reserve move in the following German turn.

Seeing the danger to their flank the German Grenadiers take position behind the fields hedges with a LMG in support. The Pak 40 which had been quite over the last few turns was waiting on ambush keeping my one remaining Sherman hiding behind the wood.

after Knocking out the Panzer IV the infantry squad turns its attention to the 88mm and after pinning it with area fire for a couple of turns with area fire they open up with direct fire killing all the crew despite the fact they were dug in.

The Tiger 1 enters from reserve and perches itsself on the hill near the Forward observer team covering the wood in case the remaining Sherman command tank made a dash for it

 A Panzer IV moved down to the wood and opened up with MG fire on my infantry squad who had over run the HMG nest destroying them after they failed their morale test. I pulled a 5 for the  morale chit! I targeted the Tiger with mortar fire but my co ordinations were well off the mark and missed wildly.

The final turn,what was left of my infantry platoon were now in a position were they could not advance without coming into mg fire and my sole surviving Sherman was stuck behind the wood with a Tiger waiting for it to appear into view. My Dad also just consolidated his remaining troops and with time almost up we decided to call it a day. With no out right winner A quick tot up of the points saw the Germans take a tactical victory by a couple of points 26 to 24. The last chit I pulled had lost me a tactical victory and my Dad had managed to pull low chits all game and avoided all those nasty out of fuel markers and low on ammo chits etc which would make life even harder for the German defence. 

This day though the Germans had just about done enough to hold the American advance up for a little while longer.