Luke makes Eric feel dirty...or..US Infantry vs German Panzers in Breakthrough

By Eric Lauterbach and Luke Melia

This was another test of tournament lists for the Huzzah event.  Luke's Arty-party vs my Panzer-bums.  To switch it up Luke suggested that we switch lists I play his he plays mine. I agreed and my slippery plunge into the dark side began.

Luke's list was the US 80th Infantry Division out of Citizen soldiers, with two Infantry platoons, 5 Shermans, M10s, recon scouts, two batteries of 105, and one battery of 155s. The force is confident trained BUT the artillery shoot like veterans.

My list is the 111th Panzer brigade out of Bloody guts and glory affectionately know as the Panzer Bums for their reluctant trained goodness. It contained 14 Panzer IVj, 6 Stugs, 2 Whirlelwind, two Aufkl Panzergrens in halftracks.

The mission we played was breakthrough so as the US player it was going to all be about protecting the Arty-Party from a fast attack wave German tanks aka the "bum rush" maneuver. Neither one of us were really adept at the other guys army and couple of times the words"Your doing it wrong" were mentioned to the opposing player and explained why. With that we kicked off.

The board

With a Division's worth of Artillery on the table I was trying to hide the guns as far away as I could behind a screen of infantry. Which was the best tactical solution for the game.  

This looks incredibly stupid and is why I hate Corp Artillery on the table.  With this we cross the line from a WWII game to a just shooting and tanks game that happens to look like WWII. 

Infantry screen

Objectives

The German deployment 

Luke had 3 stugs, 2 Whirlbelwind, and Panzergrens off table in flank march.

These yanks gotta hold, I have the CO near to help them.

The far left platoon has to move.

Luke attacks turn one and kills two with shooting. It's a ton of shots coming at you. He then goes straight into the assault.

Oops! Goofy infantry fails to counter attack and reluctant tanks drive them back. Luke assaults with a second platoon and kills couple infantry but the Yanks get two Panzer IVs and they fail morale and pull back.

US turn one: Time to drop the M10s, our one mobile US unit.

These guys have to dig in again.

The US infantry platoon is pretty beat up and near platoon morale check.

Luke's StuGs and Infantry go the other way around the hill.

Time to call in Artillery.

The M10s and Artillery do a real number on the German tanks.  "Black Cheetos" rain down.

Luke goes for the infantry and M10s hard again, and forces the US infantry platoon to make a morale check.

The US infantry platoon passes the morale check with only a bazooka and a few stands left.

The Germans also kill one of the M10s.

These guys machine gun the crap out of the US Recon platoon almost breaking it.

On the Second US turn the Shermans show up.

M10s finish off the German CO and last Panzer IV here.

Shermans come in on the flank of StuGs.

At this point three platoons of Panzer IV are dead.

And the CO is dead.

So the game ended.

Sauron's Black Cheetos.

Well I don't think either one of us was really into the other guys jam. Luke's Arty-party has some great mobile units which makes it a lot more deadly than the usual "Sit, Fart, Roll Artillery" (FoW motto of the US 80th Infantry). In the end I felt dirty but at least I can say with a little bit of pride I did not use the devastating bombardment template.  

Tarzan now sit in the "Shame Tree"