Russia Besieged

My normally FTF opponent and I started playing Russia Besieged.  He got to choose his poison and went with Russia so I was Germany and her Axis allies.  Neither of us played the game before and it has been a long time since I played Russian Campaign.  I'm certain I made a boatload of tactical errors in regards to the double turn.

The game setup.  Neither of us knows what we are doing.  I guess it is a decent setup...

End of first German movement phase.  

First turn first German combat phase.  Figured out that Blitzing really doesn't do much unless the enemy is down to a couple of steps.  Still need to grok that.

Second German movement phase.

Second German combat phase.  The Russian line is looking mighty thin.  

End of Russian turn 1.  Everyone was in supply and he decided not to do any attacks.  

Turn 2 First German move.  The Star is where an AV occured. 

Results of first combat phase.  Russian line is smashed in.  One of two units stuck in the mountains is eliminated.

End of second German movement.

Second German combat phase rips a hole in the river line defense near Riga and the southern front is pretty much cleared.

End of Russian turn 2.  No attacks again but the line is now filled out.  There is still an opening in the river near Riga.  The Germans have two or three months of decent weather before the Russian Winter hits.  Almost all of the Russians are outside the range of German air cover now as well.  Going to be a tough slog the next few turns.

As for RB itself.  So far I really like the changes that were made from Russian Campaign.  Not needing to attack across rivers or out of a city is a nice change.  The Blitz attack table I have not figures out yet - will probably do so after 1943...  The scale of the game is good, not too large for me like Dark Valley (good game but my opponent and I would take the rest of our lives to finish it), and Lawrence likes it more than No Retreat's scale (I'm good with NR's scale - can game out the entire war in a sitting or two but there is admittedly some nuance missing at the scale).  We will have to get this one to the "table" again so we can put in the lessons learned from this first game.  We are playing again on Friday - two good things about VASSAL are that you can game after work easier since each player can play at home and there is no problem leaving a game setup.

ASL Action Pack 104: Linkup

Tycho and I continued our ongoing 29Let's Go! Action Pack games with the 4th scenario in the pack.  We are going to play through all of the scenarios in the pack keeping sides the same throughout. 

The scenario at start.  The US has 7 turns to get 10 exit VP off the bottom edge on or adjacent to a road.  There can also not be a German MMC in any building hex in the outlined area AND a 24 CVP cap.

And the first MC of the game creates a berserk conscript...

End of first turn prep.  Things did not go as well as the US wanted them to go.  A conscript is unharmed in the middle building (regular squad with LMG on first floor broke).

Start of US rout phase.  The WPd in 426 manage to break a US squad in the stream adjacent.  The dice are rolling LOW.  US fire at the conscript at the bottom left only pins him.

End of US rout phase.  The German HS (K result from earlier attack) is killed by OBA.  The other squad failed an MC while routing and becomes a HS.

End of German turn 1 prep.  Most of the shots do diddly but the Conscript off to the left DMs a US 666 squad that went adjacent.  Those guys deserve medals.

Start of German Rout phase.  The Zerkers charge and are instantly vaporized by Snakes from the OBA.  I was very bummed.  The two Conscript squads directly in the front line manage to pass every MC they are forced to make but the one in the building is pinned.

The end of US Turn 3 and the game.  The Germans broke an MG and the Conscripts both failed their MCs this turn but holding on for 3 turns totally screwed the US time table.  In four turns they still had to get 10cp off the bottom edge of the board (only personnel, ACs count and at least one leader had to be in the mix) and they had to clear out the remaining Germans so they could not get into the buildings  I had my two guns near the bottom building to allow them to help defend or pull a sleazy building bum rush.  Woohoo!  I won I won I won!  (after 3 shellacking I'll crow a little - and I do mean SHELLACKINGS!)

In two weeks we play scenarios 105 and 106.  The first one is very small and likely to be decided on the first Prep Fire phase.  The second one is a smallish one so it looks like we can get both of them done in a day.

Fireball Forward: Darkness Before the Dawn continues

We continued the Fireball Forward game on Tabletop Simulator and managed to finish up one and a half turns (turn 2 and half of turn 3).  All pictures are from the end of the game session.

Overview of the action.   The smoke markers are killed tanks.  

A close up view of the end of session carnage.  The US used an initiative chit to do a double activation of their M10s.  They go lucky and killed a Panther and the rest of the Panther platoon failed Morale Checks caused by the loss of the one.  So the US is in great shape right now, though a lot will rest on who wins initiative next turn though the US has the shifting initiative chit next turn.

From the other end of the table.  The other M10 platoon took out another Panther.  Off to the left is a dead M10 from turn 1.

Battle Above the Clouds: Mclemore's Cove conclusion

Finished up the Mclemore's Cove scenario today.  This is a four day scenario using the basic rules so a fairly large scenario for a basic game.  The Campaign scenarios in the series can go up to over a hundred days, although a lot of that would be marching to battle I don't see how anyone has that much time.

The situation as we start today's session. We left off partway through the second day of battle.  Rosecrans, Bragg Thomas are facing off in the middle of the map.  Union forces are moving up the right flank and the CSA threat to Chatanooga has been beaten back.

In the first activation the union forces near Chatanooga finish off a CSA cavalry unit that was in a bad position where it could not retreat.

With a bit more maneuver the second day of the battle comes to an end.

Thomas wakes up early and leads the first attack of the third day of battle.

Polk is pushed away from the VP spaces in the Cove area.

Thomas moved to parry Bragg's forces at the other pass, surely Rosecrans could hold against Buckner - well maybe not...

Grant needs to send this bum on home.

Bragg had his forces in position but Thomas strikes first pushing Hill away.  This buys Thomas and Rosecrans more time.

Before Bragg can act Union Cavalry take Lafayette - an important town for VP purposes.  The cavalry are quickly sent packing but CSA troops in the area are thin on the ground.  The ones that were here are fighting with Thomas at the moment.

Bragg finally has forces in position and makes his assault on Thomas.

Thomas fights Bragg to a standstill and all the forces in the area are exhausted.  There will be no more fighting in this area today.  In the meantime US troops move in on Lafayette.  They are one mile outside of town when the game is called.  The CSA are losing badly on points by this time.  Despite taking 20VP in VP spaces they are down 22 points due to casualties, 2 points due to VP hexes lost so far and soon to be down 16 more due to other VP spaces.  With the distances they would have to cover to take those spaces back it is not possible with exhausted troops.

The situation near Chattanooga.  The VP space there is defended by a single strong enemy unit that is about to be flanked.  

The entire map at the end of the game.

Next up is Russia Besieged by Compass Games.  I hope it is a worthy successor to Russian Campaign.  All of the modifications I noted reading through the rules sound good.

ASL Action Pack 103: That Damn Bridge (smoke...)

Today's torture was Action Pack 103: That Damn Bridge.  Tycho and I are continuing my self flagellation romp through the 29 Let's Go Action Pack with my continuing as the Hapless Germans and his continuing as the Americans.  This one has a ROAR of 13/13 which make this shellacking harder to stomach.

The Americans have 7 turns to capture the two buildings circled.  The Setup silliness is by SSR.

The results of the first run prep fire.  5 smoke with every mortar getting rate to boot.  In regular fire one and a half squads in a trench would KIA or MC off the map, an HMG and leader in a trench and in Smoke would also be forced to take an MC and not only fail but the lead roll boxcars to go from an 8-1 to a 7-0 and another LDR and MMG in a stone building would also break but at least not ELR.

German Defensive fire had a couple minor successes but the 81mm MTR (all that was left of the hill defense) would do squad to the 2MMG stack it was shooting at (well, it got a pin result).  Other fire had NE on an 8-1 led stack in the open too.  The Dare Death group ran up to my smoked in squad with LMG.  I tried a FPF shot and rolled an 8 of course.  And up on the the hill at the bottom right I tried an intensive fire shot with the HMG and broke it.

End of German turn 1.  By this point I was completely disgusted.  A big juicy stack with 2 81mm mortars firing at it doing squat - well one of the MTRs did malf...

American turn 2 just before the Advance Phase. Defensive fire was not that strong and the failure to rally sealed the fate of the wounded 8-1 leader and squad with him.

Just after a second snake eyes in a few rolls.  The first was when the US attacked in CC.  The second was a 16 flat shot.

Like I wrote earlier my PMC was shot at this point.  Even the squad that whacked by a Sniper self rallied the first chance he got...  

Next up is AP 104.  For 2.5 turns the Germans have to defend with just 2 leaders, at least then they get another leader to last the next few turns.  I'm dice shy at this point though and the idea of not having a leader nearby to rally makes me itchy at best - then again this pathetic leader couldn't rally in time anyway...

Battle Above the Clouds: McLemore's Cove

First time playing a scenario from the Western Theater of the Civil War using the GCACW (Great Campaigns of the American Civil War) system.  McLemore's Cove from the Battle Above the Clouds game.  This scenario covers the opening battle that threw the Union in to Chattanooga with the CSA besieging them.

The setup.  Everything circled in red is a possible Victory space.  Those to the right are if the USA controls them and those in the left and middle if the CSA controls them.  The game runs for four days of battle but many of the units can not activate on the first turn.

The first attack is by the CSA against the USA.  I just noticed but there is the Cove right there.  The USA forces manage to hold through this assault!

Negley's boys give's Hill's boys a lesson!

The CSA wins the next activation (or two) and attacks Negley again!

Round two went to the CSA and Negley is routed off the field.

A little more marching and the first day of the battle concludes.  Lines shows some of the marching done on the first day.

The second day sees a lot more fighting.  First up some Cavalry surrounds and then Cheathem assaults Van Cleve outside of Chattanooga.  Not a good start for the boys in blue.

USA mounted infantry make up for the loss by assaulting CSA cavalry and routing them.

Then a major fights occurs with A demoralized Negley holding off a large attack by Bragg.  USA reinforcements will seal off this trouble spot for later activations (the fatigue 2 unit at the bottom marched to join Negley).

The USA get a couple of activations and put Cheathem and his Cavalry in a bad spot.  The Cavalry win the activation and attack but are beaten by the US blocking force.

The USA attack the cavalry on their next activation and wipe them off the map.

The next USA activation after that sees the USA attack and rout Cheathem.

This battle leaves Chattanooga in a pretty good spot but the battle near the Cove is still in the balance.

The Situation when we finished playing for the day.  Most of the maneuver is shown above but there is also a large USA force coming up from the bottom of the map.  In addition further US forces are coming from the left side of the map but have not started moving yet.

Basically a day and a half done in a few hours of game time.  Next game day is the 30th when I expect we will be finishing this one up.  I really like the game system but with some reservations.  Luck is far too prevalent in regards to activations and Flank Attacks.  The bonus for a flank attack is huge and most of the time the ability to get one is nothing more than luck.  Maybe my opponent and I just are not grokking something though.  Regardless the game has a great narrative flow and the system allows us to play out Civil War campaigns at a campaign level instead of strategic or tactical.

Fireball Forward on Tabletop Simulator. Darkness before the Dawn

Played Fireball Forward on Tabletop Simulator.  We finished up the first turn of the scenario and will be continuing on two weeks from now.  Overall it flowed very smoothly - much better then I thought.  The only real problem is making sure voice communication works beforehand!  (TTS itself as well of course).

The table at the end of turn 1.  The Germans entered the road on the right.  They have more forces to enter next turn.  To win they have to get more VC then the US by taking the buildings at the bottom and/or getting tanks off the top or bottom road exit.

A closeup of the German entry area.