Cassino FJ vs Urdany- Road Block

My FJ (1750 pts)

• HQ + 2x stumelwerfers
• 1x shrek
• 2x full platoons
• 4x marders
• 3x stugs
• 2x Luftwaffe 88s (RT)

• 1x panzer II turret
• 1x HMG nest
• 3x pak 40 nests
• 1x Flak 38 nest
• 2x gun pits
• 3x trenches

Dave's Urdany
HQ + 2x 45mm guns
2x full platoons
Pioneers (11-12 teams)
5x scouts (FV)
5x T34 flame tanks
3x ISU 122

Dave has been working on his Urdany over the past six months and they look fantastic!




Yes, that guy can't hold his vodka and is throwing up!


The Game
We set up a fairly terrain heavy (table with few long LoS) then rolled between Dust Up, Witches Cauldron and Roadblock as all will be at Conquest- we got Road Block which is in many ways my worst possible defensive mission as it means I had to attack- given the LoS we had my pak nests and 88s were going to be next to useless :)

I deployed my bunkers, 88s and Fj and ambushed with my marders. I made a small KG to get an 8th platoon for deployment.

The marder ambush: 8 shots, 6 hits, 2 dead, 3 bailed! Luckily the survivors broke and ran!

The urdany marching along the road in the other sector of the table.


Turn 1: More urdany (with 45mm guns attached) arrive on my flank and immediately attack. I got lucky as the flamethrower missed with all 4 dice and thee to 45mm guns missed too!
Memo to self: watch out for this in future- I deployed too close to the table edge and so was assualted in turn 1.


Still I had 1 marder bailed and another destroyed by a pioneer in assualt and so the two survivors broke off and retreated.


The urdany then settled in to prevent me approaching the objective- I had 2x pak 40s and an HMG nest with no decent LoS so this side of the table was pretty much irrelevant for the rest of the game- Dave was happy to prevent me doing anything silly (like racing marders round to try to grab the objective) and I had enough firepower to dissuade him from going forward after my guns.

On the other flank my FJ advance into an orchard. My single attached stummelwefer fired and killed 2x scouts (I thought they were urdany) then the next turn it ranged in on and hit 6 pioneer teams that had come on from reserve and 5 failed their saves!


My stugs also arrived and managed to kill the scouts then as my FJ set about organising themselves in the orchard for an assualt they heard a cry of Urrah from the far side of the orchard and the Urdany company charged out to meet them!





The battle in the orchard lasted about 4 rounds. in the end I was left with a company commander as the only team left of the platoon that had entered the woods- luckily though the stummelwerfer survived and retreated off the board (sole survivor) to deny a VP- that mortar well and truly earned its keep!


The final round of the assualt- I am running out of troops but the Urdany are just above 1/2 strength!


The next turn I threw my 2nd platoon forward- I had a distinct feeling I would need even more infantry. The assualt killed the two closest teams.


The rest of the Urdany company counter assaulted.


Once it was all over I was left with 5 teams and Dave's company broke- leaving him with the ISUs and 5-6 pioneers to contest the objective which lies near those dice barely visible behind the ruin.


The next turn the stugs managed to kill a team forcing a company morale test- which Dave failed, he then attached the CO and he failed to stop the rot. This left Dave with 2 platoons from 5 and no Battalion commander! Game to the FJ.


My infantry about to launch a do or die assault- but it wasn't needed


I failed to get any shots of the stugs or ISUs- they deployed as far part as possible and played cat and mouse- as did the marders. The stugs assisted in getting rid of the pioneers though.

Outcome
6-1 to the FJ- much to my surprise. The assaults in the orchard were nasty and really decided the game- I wasn't expecitng the inital charge and it caught me off guard. Dave kept feeding teams in and bleeding my army and I was at the point of being unable to continue.

Luck was with me over all- the flamethrower & 2 45mm guns all missing the marders and failing 5 out of 6 infantry saves being the moments where the dice really abandoned Dave. The 2+ morale was handy, paks and 88s less so on the table but they did manage to keep the ISUs at bay so they had minimal impact. The fortifications allowed me to throw all my infantry towards one objective and so we had similar numbers, without the fortifications I doubt I would have been able to do it. The attached stummelwerfer really earned his keep!

The assaullts in the orchaard were epic- betwen us we llsot 30+ teams fiighting for tht one peice of real estate. Im not sure if counter attacking into the orchard was the right tactic for Dave but he almost pulled it off and left me all but incapable of going forward.

A good fun game on a worse case scenario table for my force and so I am happy with the way it performed and it will definitely be my Conquest army with no further changes. As I had hoped although reasonably defensive with the fortifications it has enough support and mobility to go forward to take objectives too- although in this case I broke Dave's force just before my final assualt was to go in.

Looking forward to a rematch at Conquest Dave- and love the army, an outstanding effort!

The first few FJ stands using the Cassino rubble themed bases- i.e. , permafilla, cat litter and sand.






I'm off to Christchurch today to give Dave a game vs his Urdany tonight- we'll see how the Cassino FJ perform.

82nd Airborne Recon + FJ Fortifications

82nd Airborne Armoured Recon (from Hell's Highway)

I decided to add US flags to the first platoon for easy recognition.






Fallschrimjager Fortifications are finished

Gun Pits




Pak 40 Nests


Trenches




Panzer II turret, pak nest and flak nests






Now to paint a FJ force to match the basing :)

Craig

Last night I made some stone walls.


And a couple of stonewalled fields


Ideas for vineyards.
These are some scouring pads that I converted into hedges for my NW Europe terrain but I think they could also work for vineyards. By having them free standing means that I can simply move them out of the way when needing to move infantry or gun teams.




The Cassino table taking shape.


The pen denotes half way.

There is a low hill and cornfield in the attackers deployment zone to offer some concealment/ protection for the attackers artillery (if any)

As you can see the attacker has several potential avenues of attack. They can:
1) advance up the far left road using the orchard as cover
2) advance infantry up the centre through the shellholes
3) advance to the right of the main road using the cornfield and then stone walled fields as cover.
4) advance up the far right flank, using vineyards as cover and onto the hill, potentially outflanking the town- however the hill will be very difficult going so won't be an easy option for armour.

At this stage all the buildings on on the defenders half (assuming a defender uses there brain!). I may swap the location of the shellholes/rubble and vineyard yet to offer more cover in the centre and possibly add a second area of orchards.

However, there is plenty of LoS blocking terrain that prevents the defender having wide open fields of fire- the hill being the obvious exception, but the attacker should be able to advance on the hill protected from LoS.

I'm sure it will need some fine tuning but this is the general idea.

A reverse angle shot from the defenders end of the table. I think I'll make a slightly smaller hill and move the entire village across to get some buildings on the far right (in the shot below) side of the road.

Cassino Table Update

Here is the terrain so far.

Today I experimented with a new way to make the rubble/buildings- each building can lift out of the rubble area to make transport/packing easier. All the buildings are JR miniatures.














The CassinoTable WIP
Thew table will be used for a No Retreat.
I want the monastery to dominate the city but also be placed so that it will be a focal point of any games- or potentially so.












Still a lot to be done- another road and more ruins/ rubble for the vacant left section, some walls and hedges, shellholes and smaller rubble piles.

Ideally there will be three main avenues of approach, all somewhat protected so that infantry have a decent crack at the defences- or armour too for that matter.

Craig

Lasalle

Kent and I managed another game of Lasalle last night. An entertaining draw. My Cuiriassiers arrived early and smashed though a French line battalion only to bounced repeatedly from the battalion behind it after they formed square. Meanwhile on the other flank Kent's Cuiriassiers smashed two of my grenadier battalions although my canon wreaked havoc on one regiment of french Cavalry. In the end it was draw. We used less terrain this time and felt that it worked better.








Just a few pictues of the game rather than a blow by blow account.