Eric and I decided to get in a little weekend
Flames of War. We rolled up Fighting Withdrawal, so Eric's tanks got to attach my Infantry.
I wanted to continue our theme of lighter terrain with more open site lines, but Eric moved around and added terrain until there was basically a giant wall down the center. In the picture above, take out the forest along the water and move the forest above the road back and turn it ninety degrees. I thought that looked more like the Battlefront tables. I think with the giant line of blocking terrain in the middle of the board, this AAR is not very valuable in getting WWPD more familiar with lighted styled boards.
Lesson Learned: Set up the terrain, and don't let anyone touch it. =)
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| Jon's List |
I wanted to make good on my promise to try out three Core Combat Platoons, so I went with those instead of another mobile unit - Marders, anyone? Also, this was a chance for me to put two units on the board that I painted a long time ago, but never played:
Panzer IV/70s and
Wespe. I could not pack in a ton of AT, but the IV/70 is pretty good for that type of stuff.
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| Eric's List |
Eric ran a ton of Confident Trained Soviet tanks. The T34/85s were pretty scary.
SETUP
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| This is the object I cannot remove. The stream (skill check) blocks one side, and nice cover is on the other. |
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| The Village |
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| Eric puts his Stuarts down on the far right. These will be a problem for the IV/70s, as they have a SA 3. |
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| T34 horde on the left. |
I put an infantry platoon on each objective and put the Wespe in the middle with cover. I allocated the AAA to cover the Wespe, as I figured they would not be moving much. I held the IV/70s in Ambush.
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| Central T34 horde. That's a lot of armor for me to deal with. |
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| Infantry set up inside and outside the train station. |
TURN ONE
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| Eric's Recce infiltrates and gives me the first turn. |
Apparently, I am really good at rolling a six to get the first turn. I don't know all the rules, but apparently I need to roll a six and get the first turn on Eric. I had this opportunity once before on Eric, and did it. Nothing like a repeat of history.
I reveal the IV/70s in Ambush. When I have a Side Armor of 3, I don't like Stuarts. I blame Luke.
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| IV/70s smoke the Stuarts and the survivors run. |
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| Wespe battery takes out two T34s. |
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| I shoot the Recce and Eric disengages. |
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| The Soviet Air Force seeks revenge! Eric got these damn planes just about every turn. |
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| Eric sneaks a unit of T34s up my left flank. |
TURN TWO
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| Now that the Stuarts are gone, I need to get some AT assets to the middle. I bog a IV/70. |
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| I kill and bail a T34. |
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| The horde advances on my left flank. |
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| D'oh! I got a little exposed there due to missed Stormtrooper. |
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| Eric bails a Wespe..... |
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| ....and the Soviet Air Force takes out a IV/70! |
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| Wespes stays Bailed -- dammit! |
TURN THREE
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| Stealthy T34s still move up my left flank. Fine with me, they are not shooting anything. |
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| The situation: I am not looking bad here, but that horde in the middle is a little scary. |
TURN FOUR....AND ON
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| Moving out to counter the center horde. |
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| Eric rushed in to push for the center objective. |
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| Guys in the houses distract the flanking T34s. Yay! |
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| Gah! They got 7 tanks pushing the objective. |
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| Ok, time for the IV/70s to solve this situation.... |
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| IV/70s kill one and bail one. I also run infantry over to help keep the objective hot. I pulled the AAA and the Wespe battery as my withdrawals. |
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| The Soviets assault to drive the Germans off the objective. |
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| I run the CiC over to challenge the objective....just in case. the IV/70s light up the T34s. Looking grim for the Soviets. |
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| Infantry rushed from the village in case they are needed to push the center objective. |
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| A final assault with two Fausts looks like the final blow. |
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| Another round of shooting and assault leave the center horde dead. |
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| Look! Its the flanking T34s -- they show up just in time to machine gun something. |
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| At this point, we call it. 6-1 for the Germans. I made a TON of Platoon Morale checks. |
Conclusion: Getting the first turn was super lucky for the Germans. The game was pretty close anyway. I was able to kill off an entire platoon in one go. I was thinking that the Stuarts were scarier than they are -- I am accustomed to Luke's US Stuarts -- but I am still glad I took them out when I did. I was happy with my deployment, though Eric was able to skillfully avoid my AAA assets, they did force him to take targets that were less than optimal.
I am not sure what Eric was doing with the 'Lost Company" of T34s that just wandered around on my left flank -- I think they could have been used much better. They did tie down one Infantry platoon, but that was not a good trade from a points standpoint.
