Just started the sixth scenario of the Market Garden series with Patch tonight, with me as the Brits.
It's fairly interesting. The Brits have to exit 8 VP off the GG end of board 22 in 9 turns. The distance isn't that great, and the British have a good amount of firepower, and are well equiped with multiple MMGs, LMGs, PIATs, and a mortar. But the stream on the board is flooded, except for the two edge hexes (which are merely deep), which limits the crossing options to four hexes, two of which are adjacent to each other.
The Germans only have six squads, two leaders and two LMGs. However, three of those squads are elite, and both leaders are 9-1s.
Oh, yeah, and they have a Panther.
Patch set up with the Pather guarding the NE (right) bridge and ford by himself, one leader, two squads and LMG on Level 2 of the one Multi-Story building in his setup area, and the rest near the other (closer) bridge.
I took a while to do my setup. I just wasn't at all sure as to how I wanted to handle this.
The eventual plan was fairly conservative. Even with only two areas to cover, he doesn't have enough for a great defense in depth. I figured to move out into the center area and engage the troops guarding the nearer bridge. I'd also send a unit across the W10 ford. It's slow, but it makes sure I will get someone across. I planned on pushing a PIAT as far as I could towards the other bridge to keep him honest. That didn't work out so well. DFF broke a LMG squad with the 8-1, and and Final Fire broke the PIAT squad in R1 (he retained rate).
Sadly, I only thought of it after I was moving, but it would have been interesting to run a squad from Y6 to the R7 bridge, and advance to Q8. Thanks to all the buildings and the range, it's easier to do than it looks. They'd be in some trouble, but it would force some hard decisions from Patch.
Situation, British Turn 1, end of MPh.
I rallied the LMG squad with the leader during rally. Since Patch couldn't get at the other squad, that left me in a very good position for the next turn.
Patch preped the squads in N7 at my squad in the Orchard near the bridge and rolled poorly. The LMG fired twice at S5, but couldn't get an effect. H4h2 fired at S5, with a -1 (no cover...) and got a 2MC. Thankfully, both squads passed.
For movement, he pulled in the O10 flank, and shifted the Panther one hex so it could cover the R7 bridge.
My MTR managed three shots (ROF 2...) but couldn't get anything at 2FP, even with the -1 Air Burst TEM. However, R6 got a 1MC on them, breaking the leader and pinning both squads.
This left Patch with quite a problem, and had to think about it quite a while. He ended up routing the leader next door and leaving the squads in place. He'd been tempted to self-break them to get them away from the MTR, but the furthest available rout target was M6. If he was going to rout, he wanted to go further.
This leaves me with a decision. I had been planning on using the MTR to put Smoke on the bridge, since I assumed the ACQ would be useless anyway. Now I need to decide if I want to try to kill the two squads, not great odds, but the best that MTR is ever likely to see....
Situation, German Turn 1, end of MPh.
Last edited by Rindis; 20 Oct 09 at 13:33.
My turn 2 got off to a wonderful start with Patch's 9-1 failing to rally... and my squad in U1 reducing to a HS with a '12' rally DR.
I decided to prep the MTR at N7. No hit, no rate, and if I had gone for the Smoke, none of that either. The MMG and 9-2 in W8 fired on H4h2, to no effect.
And that sort of set the tone for the turn. I was hoping to force the bridge with some luck, determination, and smoke. Never did get any smoke. Nor luck. After that, determination was a bit lacking.
First, R6 tried for it. Failing they AMed away, and a squad from U7 moved up, and broke/ELR before they had a chance (done by email, roll failed anyway). A second squad came up, survived the residual, but also failed smoke. I decided to put out a sacrificial HS on the bridge, but they broke (and ELRed) to the residual in S7. Then I moved a squad out of S3, which promptly broke from fire from H4h2.
In DFPh, Patch got a K/2 against Q6, which broke the remaining HS. The Panther switched targets and got a K/3 against the pinned HS in M1.
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Ah, the battle for the road to Arnhem continues in A37, Dreil Team. I am Germans once again (4th time out in the baby blues), and for a change this scenario is a little more even at 53-69 Pro-German in ROAR. I offered Rindis the balance, but he declined.
Set-up
Boy o boy. Long odds in infantry, but I do have the tank which (if I keep it BU this time) is likely to survive and inflict some damage. It's essentially impenetrable frontally to Rindis' PIATs, so I need to pay attention to those flank shots in this urban terrain.
Rindis is heavily set for a crossing at R7, but switching focus isn't that hard and there's an annoying platoon or two that looks determined to make a try for K1/K2.
Essentially three crossing points to cover with 6 squads and the kitty -- W10, R7, and K1/K2. I'm looking at sneaky LOS between the buildings to try and interdict Rindis' movement, as there's no way I can duel in a stand up fight. The Panther goes in H1, covering the K1/K2 crossing and the approach road. The tank is enough for me there so I load more squads to the east. Two 467 squads, an LMG, and a precious 9-1 go upstairs in H4. I'm looking for long shots, which will be difficult due to the increasing blind hexes with range, but if you look closely there's a lot of sneakiness to be found. I'm hoping Rindis will realize this too late. Rindis is leader-poor (3 for 14 squads), and I'm hoping to nail one and make things a little worse. To the east, I have four squads. I stack two 468s and an LMG with the remaining 9-1 in N7, and I plunk a 467 in O9 and the 468 in O10. Not the best placement, but I'm looking to remain off the front line on turn 1 so a MMG and 9-2 doesn't nail me. This way I can get concealment on set-up and advance up front turn 1. N7 can cover Q8, providing some protection for a turn 1 rush.
UK Turn 1
Rindis moves cautiously, using a lot of bypass which is becoming his trademark. A long shot with the H4h2 LMG breaks a squad in X2, and I broke a second squad in R1 with ROF. Rindis shoves heavily for R7, but things are going slowly, with no rush apparent until turn 2 at the earliest. Two broken squads ain't bad.
German Turn 1
Rindis rallies one squad (dang), and in Prep I see the opportunity to break another one. 8FP(-1) from N7 to R7 gets a NE result, and H4h2 gets around the back side of the hedge in S5 for a 2MC, also to NE. So not a good start.
In movement I move both O9 to O8, and the Panther to H2 to cover R7, as well as the K1/K2 crossing. True, I can't see K2 from there, and the BMG is unusable, but I can hit the exit points and I expect a turn to redeploy if needed. Anyway, I need the extra firepower on the bridge and I expect the R7 area to get hot next turn. I area fire against the bridge with the Panther for the acquisition bonus.
Boy, was I right about that. Rindis gets his own sneaky shot with his mortar that I never saw against N7 and breaks the leader and pins both squads. This is trouble. I can't stay, as the Mortar can nail me in Prep, yet I have no good rout path that can't be hit next turn if I voluntarily break. No choice, so I keep them put but rout the leader to N8. I advance the concealed 468 into N8 to cover Q8, and with much hand-wringing, I keep the concealed 467 in place in O9. I could move him up front to P8, but there's a MMG and 9-2 (I deduce) in W8, and another MMG in U7, making any up front position risky, and I'm at risk of losing two 468s in the N7 woods. I need to play conservative, and keep units intact. I may only have that 467 left at the end of the next turn.
UK Turn 2
My 9-1 fails to rally (no shock there), but Rindis loses a HS when he rolls a '12' on his U1 self rally attempt. Nice to see, but damn, half squads can be annoying.
Rindis leads with his mortar and rolls a '10', missing and losing his rate. BIG save for me there. W8 reveals a MMG and the 9-2 with a Prep against h4h2, but to no effect. On to movement.
Rindis makes the attempt to smoke the bridge for a crossing. R6 tries, fails, and creeps along the orchard instead to flank. U7 moves up, but is broken and ELRs before be can try. There's 1FP residual in S7 now, but Rindis braves it and moves in another squad, but fails in his smoke attempt. A little desperate to stir things up, Rindis throws a HS at the crossing, but falls to the residual. A squad moves into S3, a tempting target, and H4h2 opens up, breaking him. To the west Rindis moves two squads towards K1. I pin a squad in M1 with H4h2, and the Panther switches targets from the bridge to M1 and gets a K/3 result, breaking the remaining HS. Rebuffed! The best Rindis can do in retaliation is get my 9-1 under DM again, and he retreats to L9.
I think a push for a turn 2 crossing was perhaps a turn early. 9 turns is a long time, and I think Rindis maybe should have moved into the orchards and gotten some fire in the P8 building backfield. That would leave a lot of FP against my defenders to hold against a turn 3 crossing, and the mortar would be available to place ordnance smoke for better coverage. As it is he can try for a turn 2 crossing, but he doesn't have the FP up front to discourage my defense. Still, he does have 7 turns left to go. I have to be careful not to let units get flanked and cut off, or I'll be trying to redeploy my front lines under fire, which would be fatal to me.
German turn 2 starts off fine enough, I rally two squads and Patch's 9-1 refuses to rally. Of course, he's now where I'll never get him under DM again. The bad news is that two good rolls during prep reduces the squad on the bridge and breaks it, and breaks the MTR squad. My fire produces a 1MC on N7, which he passes, but it reminds him that it's a tough place to rout out of.
Situation, end of German Turn 2 MPh.
For my rally, I get the HS in U1 back, but that's it. Patch naturally rallies his 9-1, who'll be in a good position soon enough, no doubt. I'm seriously contemplating whether to try a race for the other bridge before he can redeploy his infantry and hope that I can get close enough to the Panther, but decide to keep mounting the pressure on the close bridge. After some consideration, I Opportunity Fire the two squads and MMG in T6, but leave everything else to maneuver.
Things immediately go wrong. I AM the squad in M2 into the street with the idea of crossing the other flank at K1. A 1KIA immediately disabuses me of that notion. R6 tries to smoke the bridge (again), and fails (again) on a '6'. I move in Q6, who does manage to get smoke finally. I then miscount in my head and my next move ends with a squad having to stop short of the bridge. The next group, escorted by a leader, makes it on. Deciding that the action was about to move up, I Dash the 9-2 and MMG across from W6 to U7.
In DFPh, Patch's last shot finally gets a result on the bridge, breaking my leader, and the LLTC Pins the squad in place.
Situation, end of British Turn 3 MPh.
Last edited by Rindis; 22 Nov 09 at 13:42.
This sucks. None of the text formatting buttons or smilies work.
German Turn 2
The 9-1 didn't come back, but I didn't expect him to (looking for that '5' or less under DM). Rindis brings back two squads.
In Prep, the Panther re-aquires the bridge as he fails to hurt the occupying squad, but the big hit comes from H4h2. I roll snakes on a 4(+0) attack on R7, reducing the squad who also breaks, then the LMG takes a long shot against the mortar in U5 with a 1(+0) and rolls a '3', which breaks the manning squad. Nice! The shot does activate RIndis' sniper, who pin the LMG unit in H4h2.
With the removal of the mortar threat, I decide to hold tight in N7 and see what other damage I can do. Little risky, but I've tanked down two units, and I'm feeling a little cocky. Besides, what's the point of ML 8 units if you don't get dangerous with them? They both fire on R6 (8(+0)) but roll an '11', getting better luck with the LMG's 2(+0) vs Q6, which pins the squad there.
In Movement, nothing left to do but skulk N8 to O9.
In Defensive Fire, Rindis combines Q6 and R6 against N7 for an 8(+1) which generates a 1MC. Both pass, but I'm really rethinking my decisions to stay up front now. I'd like to fall back, but I have to keep R7 covered. Turn 3 is too soon to let the bridge fall in British hands.
In Advance, I move N7 to N8 (which has LOS to Q8), the concealed squad in O9 moves up front to P8 (I expect to see him break, but what Prep Fires can't move, and the concealment should help him withstand at least one attack), and I fall back the 468 to N9. I have no idea why. For some reason, it seemed like a good idea.
(Just noted an error in our game. When the broken HS in R7 routed, it should have dragged the acquisition along with it to T6. I'm used to the orchards blocking the LOS from H4h2, and apparently got to thinking it blocked the Panther's LOS, too. This error will continue for the next few turns, and would have had a big impact on the crossing attempts on turns 3 and 4.)
UK Turn 3
Rindis brings back a HS in U1, which I know will cause me trouble. My 9-1 comes back, but without support will not have an impact this turn.
Rindis Opportunity Fires T6, hoping that by Advancing Fire P8 will be exposed. No one else fires, so this turn promised to be bloody.
The U1 HS with PIAT makes the run up to O2 unopposed, as I prefer to keep the remaining H4h2 available for the R7 fight. However, when Rindis makes a two prong attack, moving a squad into L1, I take a shot with a 6(-2) and nail it with a 1KIA. R6 then tries to smoke the bridge, failing on a '6'. Q6 then moves over and gives it a go, and is successful. Rindis CXs a squad from S3 and tries to make the crossing, but forgets he needs 7 MF to make the trip. This is followed by the 8-1 and squad still in S3. I try a shot from H4h2 against T5 with the remaining 467, but miss. I don't fire P8, as the smoke will eliminate any residual, and a 4(+1) isn't as nice as a 4(+0) in Final Fire. Rindis moves the 9-2 and MMG up with a dash, unattractive to P8 due to the smoke in R7, but no one else enters R7.
In Defensive Fire I miss with the Panther, but up the TAQ to -2. However, N8 fires on the bridge and breaks the 8-1, and the 457 Pins with the LLTC. I decide to keep concealment in P8 due to the Opp Fire opposite me.
Advancing Fire brings the anticipated Opportunity Fire from T6 against P8, but to no effect. Fire from U7 and R6 also fails to reveal P8.
In Rout, I elect to maintain concealment and don't interdict the routing 8-1. It's going to get harder to maintain/gain concealment, and it's worth more than a low crawling 8-1.
In Advance the 9-2 moves up to T6, making covering the bridge much more difficult. Other units slowly move up.
Rindis is in better shape this turn, now that he has the FP to keep me off the front lines, but I think that he'll still have issues trying to rush the bridge Turn 4. There's a lot of sneaky LOS around N8 and O9, and I don't want to get cut off by the Brits creeping through the orchards. But if I can hold him back one more turn, I think it will be huge. I plan to get off the immediate front, but still look for those oddball LOS which allow me to get the bridge covered yet avoid his Prep.
For German rally, the only activity was me. However, I got the 8-1 and both HS in T6 back.
The Panther shelled the bridge, breaking the squad on a critical hit. Other than that, he mostly skulked, and sent a squad around from H4h2 to G6h2. I was surprised at first when he pulled out of N8, but when he advanced into K8 it was clear: without anyone in W8, he was clear to put a nice Fire Lane through the Q8 bridge exit.
Situation, German turn 3, end of MPh.
In rally, I got the R4 HS back, as well as the freshly routed squad in T6. I'd lost a few people, but other than that was in fine shape. I was still contemplating a fast break to the other bridge, but with the two squads now back in K8, there really wasn't any chance of beating him there, and not worth serious consideration.
My standard R6 smoke R7 opening worked and I moved onto the bridge. Naturally, the Panther hit and broke the squad. The good news was that with BU and bridge, the residual was a mere 2FP. The second squad moved in and attempted smoke and failed. I decided to try to draw the initial 2 -3 attack from K8 with a HS, but they broke on the bridge. This left me with a major problem. Moving any squads in would cause overstacking, which could get deadly fast. On top of the problem of the FL just waiting to be declared when I finally did get into Q8. I made one final stab by moving in another HS, which pinned on the bridge.
At this point I was extremely frustrated, had no workable plan, and was watching the scenario turn into the slog for the bridge crossing that I had been afraid of all along. Patch admitted he didn't have any good thoughts on what I should do.
I finally came up with something: It meant that the bridge crossing had to be scrubbed for another turn, which I doubted I could really afford, but there was no other choice. I shifted the 8-1 and a LMG squad around to the south to put pressure on the area behind the bridge crossing, and moved the 9-2 and a MMG squad into S7, where there was no LOS, and then advanced into S8, countering his 9-1 and stack in K8. The other MMG advanced into T6, holding the center down.
Wish I could have done that a turn earlier. It's a valuable lesson on controlling the approaches when crossing a bridge. Though I'll admit I hadn't really thought of K8 as a possibility.
There was some satisfaction to advancing a squad off the bridge into Q8.
Situation, British turn 4, end of MPh.
For rally, the only thing that happened was my HS recovered the light MTR. Prep was a disaster. On two shots he killed the squad and 8-1 in P5. (k/2 reduced the squad, and broke the remaining HS. 1KIA killed the leader and CRed the HS out of existence.) The good news was that my sniper activated and nailed the squad in G6h2.
In return, I did manage to break the 9-1 in H4h2, but only pinned the squad. Of course, the bad news was that allowed him to rout to join the squad the sniper broke. But it still put the modifier out of action for a turn.
Situation, German turn 4, end of MPh.
Sadly, for my turn, Patch got his guys back, but I didn't. I started with the obvious but dangerous moves. The HS on the far flank advanced into L1, and broke on the shot from H4h2 (which got the real job done; thankfully they survived a sneaky LOS shot from G6 first). The squad across the bridge advanced into P8 and took the shot from adjacent O9 without trouble. I put the HS across into P9. I then surprised Patch by moving up the squad in S10 and smoking the Residual in Q8. He had forgotten the difference between Resid and FLs for 'soft' Hindrances (which is odd, since it came up just the week before). R6 tried to smoke the bridge yet again, but didn't manage any this time.
The Panther naturally hit the bridge when I did go across, but got an '11' for the effects, so the main shot did nothing. Pity, one more and it would have been a Dud. Thanks to poor residual rolls, he Pinned a MMG squad on the bridge, but did no other damage during movement. He did manage to break a squad in P9 during DFPh. My return fire broke O9.
Situation, British turn 5, end of MPh.
Why should AFV BU status have any effect at all on the amount of RFP placed?Originally Posted by Rindis
(he asked innocently)
Sadly, any positive DRM caused by conditions outside the hex will reduce the residual FP left behind, including for TH rolls. See A8.26.Why should AFV BU status have any effect at all on the amount of RFP placed?
(he asked innocently)
[SFX: busily consults the Book Of Armaments...]
"...caused solely by conditions outside the hex (including CX, BU, Stun, leadership modifier ..."
Oh dear. How many years have I been playing this game? I can't recall an opponent or me ever applying a column reduction for any of these, only TEM or a hindrance. Or have I been rolling dice in a coma? Ah, a whiskey-induced coma, that's the ticket...
Please move along. Nothing to see here.
Last edited by GeorgeBates; 10 Nov 09 at 10:45. Reason: punctuation error
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