I’m enjoying meandering slowly through the game. Not too many counters. Not too much to ‘crank on’. This allow me the time to consider the choices and options present and roll, re roll for items to see how different choices impact game play.
113th Bde element 1/30 moves adjacent to CCA/4’s A37 Company which has 2 steps.
This is a stopping action and the German tanks must attempt waive the STOP, by conducting a fire action. They elect to fire at the real AV unit roll and roll a net 9. [7v7 FP+AR]. This puts a step loss and 3 hex retreat on the Shermans in that hex. [EDIT This forces the Motorized infantry to also retreat.]
Underneath that unit is a mechanized infantry company the B.53 company. So what to do? – [EDIt lets look at wheat the options are assuming the first fire had not taken place, since I buggered up this simple task! ]
The Germans could fire again and be finished.
Call a barrage and Fire then be finished.
Or close assault [ combat ].
Another idea might have been to bring up the stugs and have them fire at the Armour first and push them out, then use them as a supporting element for an assault on the hex with 1/30? The Stug unit is just one step and if we do not roll well on the first fire mission…Yikes. We would lose a unit. It would fire at a -2 minimum given the delta in Firepower and AR ratings. Feels a lot riskier.
I could just do a regular combat on the combat table. Which would pan out to be on a die roll of 9 A1, D:Situational and Traffic. Yikes also, that would use up our barrage for +2, but -1 for TEC, and minus 1 for AR delta/differences. Poop.
A shock attack would not be much better, with the same roll. +1 for barrage but net -1 for village. Same result. There is however another way.
Another choice:
1/30 takes its second and final shot and this time fires at B/53 on the barrage table as it’s a non-AV unit, it misses and is now Finished. Now the Stug 2133 advances. It fires and hits on the barrage table with a 4, this drops one step. Then calls in a barrage of arty missing then takes a final barrage [Fire action] shot and it hits putting a second final hit on the enemy unit eliminating it.
This then allows the motorized infantry to advance. The earn a soft jump on the HQ underneath [roll for this]. That soft jump moves HQ back to stack with the displaced armour from earlier. The Supply train goes ‘Ghost’. With the Objective marker in the village hex we can move in and plan our next activation if we get it!
Games such as this and the more fiddly Death Ride Kursk, or TCS, OCS and Under an Iron Sky which have these ‘multi-choice’ options of how and what to do and in what order fascinate me. It is often a TASK to get ones head around systems, and order of operations. But part of having flexibility in a game system such as the ones mentioned above is the dual challenge of learning what choices you have and when to use the right one for the task at hand. Excellent!
All units stacked together in a hex must retreat together. That’s why it’s not always a good idea to stack in infantry unit with a weaker type armor unit, a Retreat on the Engagement table will force the whole stack back.
Could you have stopped the Panthers (I/30) 2 hexes away in order to take advantage of their longer range? The Shermans would not have been able to shoot back.
hmm good question! Does anyone know!? I think you are right.
2.0 rules. Section 5.2a, 4th paragraph.
My copy came in the mail yesterday. Just for completion purposes A company of Shermans, in addition to the step loss and retreat would be flipped to its movement side.
Might be too early to ask, but is your preliminary sense that the individual mechanics of fire and movement you describe here provide a good sense of both the battlefield dynamics in 1944 there and depict the overall event itself fairly accurately?
Hard to say. You know we were not there. I suspect that it pulls us towards proper doctrine. That it emulates a lot of things in a somewhat abstract manner that will give you pause to think about ‘what is really’ going on. This is as unique a system as you will find. Its very, very clean and streamlined. but it does use some odd terminology, and swap those terms around. Which adds…I dunno a bit of dissonance for me. But Im not the brightest chap.