Tuomo
Keeper of the Funk
Dave Ramsey and I played FT271, The Lock of Colmar. I picked it because I like the designer's (Lionel Colin's) scenario J183 A Real Barn Burner (as well as his upcoming HASL for Le Franc Tireur!), I saw it being played on the server a bunch for the vAlbany tournament in December, and I really like the OBs and board layout:
To win, the combined American-Free-French forces must capture 4 of the 6 VC Things, which are all five of the multihex buildings on board 71 plus a Stone Rubble hex in 81W5. They have 5.5 turns to do so. They've got a weak infantry force that starts on the west side of board 71, but bring on six Free French 458s and a rump American platoon on the east board edge on turn 1, supported by five M4A2s. The armor is not much to write home about, EXCEPT they get two -1 Armor Leaders AND two Gyros. OOH AAH. Might be my first serious Gyro scenario EVER. Much rules-scrambling was accomplished beforehand, lemme tell you.
In another first, I think this was also my first time playing on board 81. Whoever designed that board hates all mankind, at least those parts of mankind driving AFVs. Yeesh. Complicating the matter is the Ground Snow, which pretty much means the Allied infantry aren't gonna be sweeping across board 81 any time soon, at least within the 6 Movement Phases they are given here.
It's December 1944, which means a lot of cool things are in the logistics pipeline (3-hex range panzerfausts, WP7 for the US 60mm MTR), but for the moment those are merely pipe dreams.
For their part, the Germans have a very mixed bag of infantry (two 548s, six 467s, and two 436s), backed up by a StuG and a Panther. They also get some Dummies, a Roadblock, two Foxholes, a Fortified Building Location, and can set up one squad-equivalent HIP. They can start the game concealed if in concealment terrain.
Our setups are shown above. Dave wisely created an AFV Dummy, which gave me a good bit of pregame entertainment as I tried to figure out which of the three 5/8" ? stacks was the Dummy. I figured the one in 71O6 had to be the Panther, as it would do a good job holding down that side of the board all by itself, which left the one in M2 as the likely StuG, since there wouldn't be much reason to turn its turret. Turned out, I was wrong, but we'll get to that.
For my part, I initially set up an on-the-bounce lightning armored strike that would take advantage of my enhanced mobility, armor leaders, and Gyros to knock out the German tanks soon after they foolishly dropped Concealment to fire on my weak infantry.
Then I looked closer at my piddly M4A2s and saw that these things had sM5, not sM8, really couldn't move all that fast, and while Gyros and Armor Leaders are wonderful things, they're really only good if they get you side hits on the Panther, which is kinda hard to achieve when you have to spend 8 MP just to get up to where you think the Panther is, and the Panther's PF-totin' friends probably won't be happy to see you.
Ergo, we re-thought things, and we're glad we did. The scenario is set up to reward the Allied player for slowly squeezing the Germans, so that's what I went with. Attack along a broad front, look for opportunities to zoom past the thin German line on the east of town and get to where you can threaten all of the VC buildings. Use the Shermans' WP7 to open things up for the infantry. Don't throw the Shermans away trying to do Fancy Gyro Things that will just get them killed; there's enough German infantry out there to make this a risky proposition if the German player covers his tanks with infantry support.
It's worth it to send a tank with a couple of HS Riders along the north edge to threaten the 81W5 Rubble hex; the Germans probably won't waste a MMG shot on this on turn 1 since it would restrict their CA for the rest of the MPh, leaving your infantry freer to assault the town. On turn 2, the plan would be to fire WP7 at the Rubble and close from there. Sure, the Rubble can be seen from most of the board, so the WP7 could in theory come from tanks that didn't take the long way around board 81, but I wanted the Infantry Riders to get there sooner, and I figured the tank would at least provide some late-game reinforcment to the town, should he survive.
Taking a cue from JR Tracy, I got a little creative with naming my tanks, using a quintet of names from the 1969 Mets: Agee, Harrelson, Seaver, Clendenon, and Swoboda. Agee and Swoboda went up on board 81 where their Armor Leaders might help them gain HD status. Harrelson and Clendenon went along the north and south edges of the town, respectively, hoping their Gyros might let them zoom in for a flank shot against a tank, and Seaver planned to stay true to his baseball form, firing a fastball straight down the middle of board 71.
How did all of these plans work out? Nobody gained HD status, nobody used a Gyro to hit nothin', and Seaver's down-the-middle fastball turned into a changeup curve off to the side, which earned him a brief look at an angry Panther before dying a fiery death. See, the ? stack in 71O4 was Dave's Panther, not a Dummy, so that guess was Really Damn Off. So, yeah.
However, Swoboda found a nice spot on board 81 that had a sneaky LOS to said Panther and scored a side-armor kill on turn 2. Dave's 467/MMG manning the Rubble broke both the men and the MG, nullifying that worry early on. And the "squeeze slowly" plan paid off, leveraged by some effective WP shots when I needed them. With the Allied forces taking few chances on both sides of the town, the Germans couldn't rapidly eliminate the threat on either side and then reinforce the OTHER side, and eventually the end became clear enough for an Allied win.
I still like the scenario very much (of course I would), but I think the Germans could use the balance, which adds a FlaK38 AA Gun and crew. THAT would really spice things up. Thanks to Dave for the game; I'm sure his defense would have defeated the initial Allied on-the-bounce lightning strike plan, but thankfully calmer heads prevailed.
To win, the combined American-Free-French forces must capture 4 of the 6 VC Things, which are all five of the multihex buildings on board 71 plus a Stone Rubble hex in 81W5. They have 5.5 turns to do so. They've got a weak infantry force that starts on the west side of board 71, but bring on six Free French 458s and a rump American platoon on the east board edge on turn 1, supported by five M4A2s. The armor is not much to write home about, EXCEPT they get two -1 Armor Leaders AND two Gyros. OOH AAH. Might be my first serious Gyro scenario EVER. Much rules-scrambling was accomplished beforehand, lemme tell you.
In another first, I think this was also my first time playing on board 81. Whoever designed that board hates all mankind, at least those parts of mankind driving AFVs. Yeesh. Complicating the matter is the Ground Snow, which pretty much means the Allied infantry aren't gonna be sweeping across board 81 any time soon, at least within the 6 Movement Phases they are given here.
It's December 1944, which means a lot of cool things are in the logistics pipeline (3-hex range panzerfausts, WP7 for the US 60mm MTR), but for the moment those are merely pipe dreams.
For their part, the Germans have a very mixed bag of infantry (two 548s, six 467s, and two 436s), backed up by a StuG and a Panther. They also get some Dummies, a Roadblock, two Foxholes, a Fortified Building Location, and can set up one squad-equivalent HIP. They can start the game concealed if in concealment terrain.
Our setups are shown above. Dave wisely created an AFV Dummy, which gave me a good bit of pregame entertainment as I tried to figure out which of the three 5/8" ? stacks was the Dummy. I figured the one in 71O6 had to be the Panther, as it would do a good job holding down that side of the board all by itself, which left the one in M2 as the likely StuG, since there wouldn't be much reason to turn its turret. Turned out, I was wrong, but we'll get to that.
For my part, I initially set up an on-the-bounce lightning armored strike that would take advantage of my enhanced mobility, armor leaders, and Gyros to knock out the German tanks soon after they foolishly dropped Concealment to fire on my weak infantry.
Then I looked closer at my piddly M4A2s and saw that these things had sM5, not sM8, really couldn't move all that fast, and while Gyros and Armor Leaders are wonderful things, they're really only good if they get you side hits on the Panther, which is kinda hard to achieve when you have to spend 8 MP just to get up to where you think the Panther is, and the Panther's PF-totin' friends probably won't be happy to see you.
Ergo, we re-thought things, and we're glad we did. The scenario is set up to reward the Allied player for slowly squeezing the Germans, so that's what I went with. Attack along a broad front, look for opportunities to zoom past the thin German line on the east of town and get to where you can threaten all of the VC buildings. Use the Shermans' WP7 to open things up for the infantry. Don't throw the Shermans away trying to do Fancy Gyro Things that will just get them killed; there's enough German infantry out there to make this a risky proposition if the German player covers his tanks with infantry support.
It's worth it to send a tank with a couple of HS Riders along the north edge to threaten the 81W5 Rubble hex; the Germans probably won't waste a MMG shot on this on turn 1 since it would restrict their CA for the rest of the MPh, leaving your infantry freer to assault the town. On turn 2, the plan would be to fire WP7 at the Rubble and close from there. Sure, the Rubble can be seen from most of the board, so the WP7 could in theory come from tanks that didn't take the long way around board 81, but I wanted the Infantry Riders to get there sooner, and I figured the tank would at least provide some late-game reinforcment to the town, should he survive.
Taking a cue from JR Tracy, I got a little creative with naming my tanks, using a quintet of names from the 1969 Mets: Agee, Harrelson, Seaver, Clendenon, and Swoboda. Agee and Swoboda went up on board 81 where their Armor Leaders might help them gain HD status. Harrelson and Clendenon went along the north and south edges of the town, respectively, hoping their Gyros might let them zoom in for a flank shot against a tank, and Seaver planned to stay true to his baseball form, firing a fastball straight down the middle of board 71.
How did all of these plans work out? Nobody gained HD status, nobody used a Gyro to hit nothin', and Seaver's down-the-middle fastball turned into a changeup curve off to the side, which earned him a brief look at an angry Panther before dying a fiery death. See, the ? stack in 71O4 was Dave's Panther, not a Dummy, so that guess was Really Damn Off. So, yeah.
However, Swoboda found a nice spot on board 81 that had a sneaky LOS to said Panther and scored a side-armor kill on turn 2. Dave's 467/MMG manning the Rubble broke both the men and the MG, nullifying that worry early on. And the "squeeze slowly" plan paid off, leveraged by some effective WP shots when I needed them. With the Allied forces taking few chances on both sides of the town, the Germans couldn't rapidly eliminate the threat on either side and then reinforce the OTHER side, and eventually the end became clear enough for an Allied win.
I still like the scenario very much (of course I would), but I think the Germans could use the balance, which adds a FlaK38 AA Gun and crew. THAT would really spice things up. Thanks to Dave for the game; I'm sure his defense would have defeated the initial Allied on-the-bounce lightning strike plan, but thankfully calmer heads prevailed.