Thursday, April 23, 2015

BA Germans vs US Paras- Breakout

Last night Nigel, Kent and Dale popped round for a game of Bolt Action. I've been trying to get Dale involved for a good 18 months now as he is/was one of our FoW stalwarts. Dale joined Kent and Nigel and I commanded the Italian Front Germans.

I'd made a few tweaks to my German sit, hopefully to give it a bit more omph:

Reg 1st Lieutenant+NCO
8x Reg infantry (SMG, LMG)
7x Vet Infantry (SMG, 2x LMGs)
7x Vet infantry (5x SMGs)
8x Pioneers (5x sMGS, flamethrower)
1x Reg 120mm mortar and spotter
1x 233 heavy AC
1x Pioneer hanomag with panzerbusche
1x hanomag 251/1c
1x Stuh


Kent had also finally got round to updating his list, taking most of his supports as regular to get a couple of squads of tough fighters. He had approximately:

Vet 1st Lieutenant + NCO
1x medic
11x Vet tough fighting paras (BAR, anti-tank grenades)
11x Vet tough fighing paras (BAR, anti tank grenades)
11x Vet Paras (3 SMGs, LMG)
1x Reg 81mm mortar and observer
1x Vet bazooka team
1x 57mm AT gun
1x M8 Greyhound AC
1x75mm Sherman

We enjoyed the Breakout mission last time so played it again. As with the last game we introduced a break test once a force was had lsot half its starting units. The test is taken at the rating of the highest ranking officer with the following penalties:
-1 per two units destroyed
-1 if officer killed

This has the result of stopping games dragging on and adds another element of tension to the game later on, it worked really, really well,

Turn 1, the Sherman arrives to support the American advance.

 And for the Germans the Stuh advances.

End of term 1 we charged the 251/c loaded with the SMG armed panzer grenadiers and platoon commander. The greyhound then appeared and blew the 251 and lieutenant to smithereens.

The infantry squad leaps out of the blazing vehicle and hits the dirt.

The regular grenadiers advance to the ruined farm.

A view through the woods.

Turn 2. The 251 armed with the panzerpusche advances and fires on the Sherman...

And knocks it out!

The 233 advances in the centre.

A hit from the 57mm AT gun in the far distance fails to penerate the Stuh.

Infantry andvance down a narrow lane. In the distance the 251 has just survived a round of assaults from the paras.

Paras charge the pioneers and massacre them.

The other two German sections fal back to defend the wall backyard.

Lots of crazy assaults occcurred and both sides took casualties.

The Americans came out on top, just.

And another assault goes in. This one was epic. It started with 13 US dice vs 7 German.

Two rounds of tied resuts (2-2 then 1-1) but finally the Germans prevailed.

The 233 also advanced to get involved.

The regular panzer grenadiers form a skirmish line, and destroy the 57mm gun with small arms fire!


Then in the last turn charge the last squad of paras- but are cut down.

And so it ends.

Result: 8-6 to Kent with neither side in the enemy deployment zone. A cracker of a game. The break test rules worked well. Nigel and I managed to keep the game alive for 3 turns by rolling 6 or less on two dice to keep our force in the game.

The 120mm mortar was underwhelming, falling to the new unit curse- being destroyed in turn 2 by the American mortar scoring a direct hit. However, the pak 38 managed to kill 4 teams by good use of the ambush rules. Nigel and I made use of our armoured mobility with the half tracks to try to keep the Americans off balance and to a degre, at least after our first rash charge, it worked. The assaults were, as usual, brutal in turn 4 and 5 but it was a very close game.

A thoroughly enjoyably night of dice rolling and chilling out, even if it does bring my losing streak to 8 games!

Craig

4 comments:

  1. Thats a lovely looking game, sorry that you lost again :(

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  2. Great looking troops, vehicles and terrain. One of my favorite rule sets too!

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  3. Great battle report! Thanks for taking the time to share!

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  4. Cheers guys, was a fun game. I don't mind losing in BA, rolling dice and having a laugh is our main purpose, so we tend to throw assaults in etc and throw caution to the wind whenever possible. Apparently fortune favours the brave, but my dice rolling doesn't!

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