In my first game of the Euro League of this years tournament I played against Björn Lorenzen AP143 Late for Chow.
My brave Germans of Fallschirmjäger-Regiment 7 had to break through the infiltrated Pathfinders of the 8th Infantry Division around Kerogas, an area with a lot of bocage terrain. Normally a blessing for the defending Axis troops but now they had to assault and advance themselves through this well defendable bocage terrain.
I chose to make the assault on the east side of the battlefield as there was a little less bocage compared to the west side. Also there were less Pathfinders on this side who covered the first 150 meters of open ground which I had to cross. I deployed a machine gun team and an half-squad together with a good leader in the center axe to defend my left flank of my assault.
My Fallschirmjägers initial assault went very well. I crossed the open ground without losses and could infiltrate his first defensive line into the hedgerows along the road. My machine gun team in the center deployed into a good position to defend my flank.
I wanted to keep the momentum in my attack and rushed my troops forward, but the Pathfinders well positioned machine nest laid down a very effective fire lane which stopped my assault.
As they had exposed themselves my rearguard troops protecting my assault team could return fire and broke the machine gun crew. My sniper did his part of the job too and wiped out a complete squad!
This opened up my path of advance and my assault regained momentum.
In the mean time the Americans on the left flank redeployed but the terrain slowed down this effort.
The Pathfinders machine gun team on the west side of the battlefield got into a firefight with my machine gun team in the center but they lost the fight and without leader they would be out of action for the rest of the battle.
This freed up my left flank defenders and they too could advance over the center axe of the battlefield.
Around that time the Americans received reinforcements which deployed into a defensive line to cover the open ground my troops had to cross in their final stage of the assault.
These reinforcements together with some Pathfinders slowed down the assault once again but my left flank defenders came to the rescue and broke a squad and my main assault gave some good return fire which made a gap in the Americans defensive line.
I pushed forward and could reach the last woods on my path of advance. His machine gun team had recovered but could not chase my assault group because the open ground in my back was covered by my rearguard light machine gun team. So they chased down my left flank machine gun team and with success; they broke my 9-1 leader and pinned a squad!
This was a set back because they too were in a good position to cross the battlefield to earn the needed VP’s.
But Lady Luck would be on the German side in the final stage of the battle! I sent a half-squad into a risky close combat to tie up a full squad. But this half squad would prove to become the heroes of the battle!
Not only did they killed the squad which made the path of advance for my main group a little less dangerous but their brave action even created a 8-1 leader, valuable VP’s which could exit the map too now!
I pressed the attack with my main assault team and managed to exit 6 VP’s of troops off the map, together with the 3 VP’s of my CC-heroes I gathered 9 VP’s which won me the game.
Thanks a lot Björn for this very exciting game, you played very well, but I rolled a 1,1
at exactly the right time at exactly the right place! Without this you would have won this game, no doubt about that!