ASL: The Steelworks 2 - Hunt the Hun

 Got in a game of ASL.  Tycho was busy with an online tourney so we kept it small.   The Steelworks Scenario 2.  A fight for a small industrial area in France.  With mist and stone buildings this is a tough one when the Germans start with four squad equivalents onboard and the UK has 10 SE coming on turn one.  The Germans roll for a further three squads starting on turn 2 but...

The setup.  The UK wins if there are no Good Order Germans in the buildings inside the red lined area at the end of the game.

First turn coming on for the brits.  The only units that were broken were either moving in non-building terrain or the one stepped into mines.  The +1 for mist up to 6 hexes (and going up every 6 from there) along with stone buildings makes defensive fire (or offensive) somewhat meaningless.

I left a guy in the road to try and get a kill, hoping he would only be possibly DM in response if things went badly.  Nope, multiple shots killed him outright.  The UK troops stream on and CC my other units after 1 hex shots at them in buildings (8+4) does nothing.  To be fair Advancing fire did nothing as well but self breaking and routing was not an option or there would be no one left to hold the line at all.

Germans get reinforcements as early as possible on turn 2.  They run up the road on the left.  Blast the units in the building adjacent and move in for CC.  Still did not manage to kill everyone even with an ambush so they jump out the hex to see if they can shoot them with firepower and move back in.  They did manage to break everyone but also get pinned by return fire so can not jump back in later.  I conceded on that note.

Maybe using snap shots is a better idea.  A 4+1 shot being better then an 8+4.  Hard to find good snap shot angles but worth keeping in mind for next time.  OK - won't be a next time for this one, too many better scenarios to play at least once first.

Fireball Forward; Find the English! (and boy were they found...)

 Played a round of Fireball Forward with John at Dragon's Lair.  My Brits got stomped!  The Brits had arty but rolled a 3 (second to worst result) and a 4 (third worst result) for each attempt - having no effect on the Germans.  The German arty rolled an 11 and a 12 and an 11.  The best and then 2 second best results, leaving the majority of my armor broken from failed morale checks or destroyed from two failed morale checks.  The only breaks the Brits got were the German 50mm guns all breaking and the 88mm gun being destroyed before it could shoot.

End of turn 1.  A couple of Honeys have already been taken out at long range by fast moving Panzer IIH tanks.

End of turn 2 and things are only getting worse for the Brits.

ASL, Lone Canuck, The Steelwork, Knock Them Down! (Game Day 3, End of Game)

 My Germans through in the towel.  I did not play well but I also don't think this one is balanced.  Even though my opponent managed to malf half his vehicle MA I still was unable to take out a single one of them and the manpower losses were highly lopsided as well.  The problem is the amount of map to cover and the Germans only getting two leaders at the start of the game.  A forward defense to buy time means the Allies can mass and destroy one group and with only a single leader for each side of the map...

The other option is a defense further back but with the Massive amount of smoke the Allies can create that is also iffy.  So damned if you do and damned if you don't.  Reinforcement rolls for the Germans may make all the difference.  On turn 4 I got none of them (5 chances rolling a 1 or less).  On Turn 5 only 1 group (the arty, with a 2 in 6 chance for each).  On Turn 6 I only managed two groups out of the four remaining (with a 4 in 6 chance for each).  By this time my frontline was down to a single leader and about 3 Squad Equivalents.  If either of the infantry reinforcement groups had gotten there earlier it may have made a load of difference (each one had a leader for one thing).

ASL, Lone Canuck, The Steelwork, Knock Them Down! (game day 2)

 Finished up a turn and a half.  Big game.  Germans are hard pressed.

ASL, Lone Canuck, The Steelwork, Knock Them Down!

 Started the big scenario from Lone Canuck's The Steelworks scenario pack.  Instead of a campaign game this pack includes a large scenario as the main draw for the pack.  A 12 turn slugfest with a lot of tanks and toys.

The UK have 12 turns to demolish the two smoke stacks shown on the map.  We finished up two complete turns in two hours and stopped for the UK to put some thought into reinforcement placement for turn 3.  German reinforcements (on the left) come in if they roll less then or equal to the reinforcement number starting on turn 4.
So far the UK have rolled a bunch of boxcars disabling the MA on a number of tanks while the Germans managed to Malf (and lose) an 81mm mortar.  The German sniper has also been going gangbusters, activating a whole BUNCH of times (lost track but at least 5 times in two turns).

ASL scenario Quick Six 02: Baron's Counterattack

 Played this one quick today, lots going on so I did not have time to play the second Quick six scenario we had planned.  Quick Six scenarios are small scenarios that play quickly.

The setup.  The Germans have to capture the two buildings with circles around part of them by the end of turn 6.

End of German turn 1 fire phase.  The rolls of 4 in a row.  The US squad in the target hex was reduced to a half squad and the leader with it died of wound check...

End of German Advancing fire on turn 1.  US has not passed a single MC yet.

End of the game on US turn 3 (less then half the turn allotment).  The US couldn't make an MC to save their lives (pretty much literally) except for the HS with the Mortar which gets MVP status.  They took out a German squad in a single fire phase - but otherwise the US was on the backfoot the entire game.  If the opening shots had gone differently the whole thing would have been different - but that is a risk with a small scenario like this.  An interesting scenario I would play again. 

Next up on the play list is Lone Canuk's SteelWorks.  From Tiny to Huge scenarios!

ASL scenario BFP 30: Melee Near the Coast

 The New Years Day game was postponed due to a blown out TV/monitor (went dead on New Years Day, BooHoo!).  So the game that was to be played that day ended up being played today.  Luckily the storm that went overhead from the time the game started till the time it ended did not knock out the internet or power...

The scenario is BFP030: Melee Near the Coast.  So far all the scenarios from Blood and Jungle have been interesting and this one was a nail biter and fun as well.

The situation.  The Japanese have to be in control of 10 buildings at game end.  There are 6 buildings on the left board meaning the Japanese have to also capture and hold 4 more on the right board.  They could go for the single building at the bottom right but I figured that would take too long so did not worry about defending it, except in relation to also keeping the Japanese from swinging around the bottom of the map.

End of Chinese turn 4 and the writing is on the wall.  I don't remember any CC going for the Chinese and there were two instances where a single Japanese squad CCd two Chinese squads and only the Chinese were eliminated.  I should have fallen back more and made the Japanese advance into fire more but too late now (still getting used to facing off against the Japanese and their stripes...).  Four squads and two leaders coming on from the right are all that stand in the way of the Japanese juggernaut pounding my Chinese.  

Add a crew to that - the Chinese crew in the building at the top managed to rally just in time.  They also managed to pin a Japanese squad so the leader and another squad with it had to CC the Chinese crew to take the building (which they do with gusto).  This gave the Chinese reinforcements time to get in position however.  It ends with the CC rolls of the Japanese half of turn 7.  They needed at least one CC to go their way and none of them do.  The pinned squad near the top may have made a difference if it could have gotten into E3 with the leader (I forget the CC roll there - the Japanese leader by himself was 1 to 5 odds) but the pin result kept that from happening.  E5 ended up with both sides being eliminated and F5 with a Japanese crew being eliminated without harming the Chinese squad.  Well, if there is a time for the Chinese to come up the winners in CC the last turn is as good as any.

EDIT - The Japanese rolled a BUNCH of boxcars during the game.  At least four times for morale checks and at least twice for fire attacks with mortars or MGs.