AAR - One More Try - Stonne 1940 3

Major Issues

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Covid-19 Tip Of The Day – If you hold your wine glass with both hands, it will keep you from touching your face!
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I have been spending my time at home with members of the military. Specifically, Captain Morgan and Colonel Sanders.

Out here on the perimeter, there are no stars. Out here, we is Stonned. Immaculate.

Bonus point if you get the reference.

Keeping with our France 1940 theme, Walt and I headed for the Gardens of Stonne. Old CH scenario, One More Try from their Stonne 1940 HASL. Like some other CH products, this scenario was rereleased, with some significant changes. We played v. 2. Changes from v. 1 were: Stuka support went from 1-3 to 3. A bunch of wrecks and foxholes start already on board. The VC and the rest of the OB were the same.

A buncha Germans, mostly 447s, are defending the rubble of Stonne. They have 5 MTRs, 3 37L AT guns, 105mm OBA with an aerial observer, and Stuka support.

The Garcons en Bleu have a buncha squads, many of which are Green, and 11 tanks. Eleven. Five are Char Bs. Ouch.

I prepared a defense. Walt prepared by singing Edith Piaf songs.

The board is kewl, but there are lots of different hill levels, some of which are close to the same color. It wasn’t too much of a problem, but we did have to pay attention.

Couple interesting SSRs:

Hills are Terraced, so you can only see to the next lower level if you are adjacent. But you can still see to the lower level hexes beyond that. I like this rule, and wish that more scenarios had something like this.

All buildings are Barney Rubble, but the rubble is limited to the building outline, so you can still bypass. This also means that no building is rally terrain.

MMCs suffer from Tank Fear, which means that anytime a tank moves adjacent, or vice-versa, the MMC must take a 1PTC, limit one check per player turn. With 11 French tanks, and no German tanks, this benefits the French.

I’m not so sure that it is Tank Fear, or if the Germans are busy laughing because the French painted targets on their tanks.

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VC are that the French must control 15 rubble hexes.

On the heights on the NE corner of the board, I had all the mortars. All the AT guns were piled adjacent in the center of the board. Without having much chance of killing French tanks, they were positioned to take shots at 6 hexes or less. I wuz hoping for additional penetration vs. the H39(L)s. (I am always hoping for additional penetration. Always.), and Deliberate Immobilization vs. the B1s. There are three rubbled buildings on the SE section of the board. I stuck a 447 in each, not with much expectations for them, as they would be pretty well doomed when broken, but I didn’t want to concede what was left of the buildings without a fight.

French come in on the SW corner of the board. About half the infantry on each edge, the H39s on the south edge, the Chars on the west edge.

F1, one of my Doomed 447s shoots at a HS scout, and kills him. Another one of the Doomed 447s takes a 4 flat shot at a squad, and gets a K/1, and the surviving HS ELRs. Two H39s drive into these hexes via bypass, but stay in Motion.

My 50mm mortars start plinking away. All get multiple ROFs – I think two got 7 or 8 shots off. More French breakage and ELRage.

On the west edge, I only have one LMG squad with a LOS to the far side of the hill. He gets a K/2. In front of the hill, a squad and a half are in foxholes. They break and ELR a HS with a light mortar.

Walt can’t get any infantry into the hexes I’m in. A Doomed 447 immobilizes one H39, who then breaks his CMG.

G1, the radio breaks in the observation plane – obviously the work of Flemish sympathizers. Heavy Sigh. My light mortars start really pouring on the fire, again with 7 or 8 shots each. The other French mortar HS breaks and ELRs.

In DFF, my flanking LMG squad gets broken and reduced. In CC, one Doomed 447 immobilizes another H39. This H39 then breaks his CMG.

F2, a French sniper breaks the Doomed 467, but he is not in Melee, and can rout away. My forward line by the west edge is a squad and a half in foxholes. The 237 goes Berserk! Some Char Bs and infantry get onto the western hill. Walt gets two squads into CC with a Doomed 447. I roll snakes to kill a 458, and create a 8-1, but both my squad and the new 8-1 die in the return grenade volley. The 8-1 hadn't even gotten his stripes sewn on yet.

G2, Walt fixes the CMG on one immobilized H39, but then breaks the MA on another mobile H39. I break one 50 MTR, but the other mortars are still raining down Kardboard Karnage. I got three CHs with light mortars during the game – two of them back to back this turn. The Berserk 237, mistaking themselves for Anti-Tank Hunter Heroes, charges a Char B1 bis with a pointed stick, and gets mangled for it. The 447 in the foxhole next to them gets KIAed by fire from two HMGs directed by a 9-2. Ouch. He keeps rate, and kills a 37L AT crew. Double ouch.

Still, things are generally going My Way.


https://youtu.be/elWO5Mk6wbk

(Warning – Not Safe For Anyone!)

Walt breaks his repaired CMG again in CC. It’s tough being Walt.

F3 – I fix the Observation Plane radio, though it took some fancy wing walking. Those years spent barnstorming are finally paying off!

“Look!!! Up in the sky!!! It’s a bird!!! It’s a plane!!!”

Actually, three planes. The Stukas come in!!!

Mostly a moving turn for Walt. One platoon of two Char Bs rolls a 12 on their start roll, then rolls doubles on random selection to both run out of gas. Two other Char Bs drive into bypass into rubble hexes on the hill. One hex has a HIP AT gun in it. Who turns, misses, keeps rate, and gets about six shots off until it kills the Char B.

Another Char B moves next to one of my MMG positions, which puts him adjacent to the last HIP 37L AT, who start plinking at the side.

My mortars, running out of targets, start popping away and eliminating broken HSs.

Stukas wait until DFF. They all make their sighting task checks. The first has a stack of 2-1/2 squads in open ground in his sights, but rolls a 12 with his MGs. He then drops his bomb, which hits, but rolls an 11 on the effects roll. Still, all three French units fail their 1MC. These were the squads that had an opportunity to get into CC on the top of the hill this turn.

Continuing to pick on easy targets in open ground, the second Stuka Ks a squad with his Giant Bomb, but the HS survives Pinned. The third breaks a squad with his MGs, so I decide to hold off dropping the Giant Bomb until a future turn.

Walt waves the white flag, something that the French practice regularly. He is down 7-1/2 GO squads, out of the original 24. Of 11 tanks, one French tank croaked, four are immobilized, one has a malfed MA, and one is about to get a whole buncha little shells hitting it at 1 hex range. I had lost a crew and 3-1/2 squad equivalents, and had two SEs broken. So I still have 10-1/2 GO squads, two light mortars, two heavy mortars, two AT guns, and three MMGs up and shootin’ like fools.

Walt had control of three rubble hexes, and was going into CC against the Doomed 447 to try to get one more. Still, the CC was 1:1, so it was no guarantee, and he wuz still a long way from 15.

Hard to grok this one from our playing. Despite some bad rolls and no snipers for the Germans, generally, my rolls were really, REALLY good, and a lot of Walt’s MCs resulted in ELRing. I don’t think any MMCs rallied for either side during the game. Walt did use the Tank Fear rule to help his advance, but his infantry were generally unable to keep up enough to really take advantage by jumping pinned squads. The other thing that hurts the French, besides people who serve red wine with fish, is that so many of their squads are Green and have 3 MFs unless with a leader. There are a lot of slopes and barbed wire fences on board, so moving fast was not happening. Also, if a Green squad advances into rubble, it has to go CX unless with a leader. This would screw up CCs for the French.

I wanted to take out the infantry, and not really worry about the tanks. Having half the tanks useless in 2-1/2 turns was a combination of good luck on my part, and bad luck on Walt’s.

Armored Assault would have helped Walt, especially crossing barbed wire fences. Sending the tanks in first and making my squads pin had its merits, but couldn’t stop the mortars that were far, far away.

I think that this version would make for a better game than v. 1, as the wrecks and foxholes help the French, though Walt never got anyone into those hexes. The wrecks did create some hindrances for my shots. Still, my gut feeling is that this is pro-German. I would play it with no OBA. I finally got a SR down during F3, but it was way, way off target and landed 6 hexes away.

Still, even Walt said it was a fun game. And it is a kewl map, except for some of the colors.

ROAR does not differentiate between the two versions, so there is no way of knowing how many listed games were the second version.

Pic from F3 below. Walt conceded before the rout phase, and there were two CCs that would have been resolved.

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“Forget the night. Play with us with your counters of azure.”

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dlazov

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Nearmiss, beat me to it. I was just going to say Jim Morrison...
 

Major Issues

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Three thumbs up to both of you!!!

We did make some mistakes during the game, none of which affected the outcome:

I malfed the AT gun after the crew was Ked. It should have still been okay, since only a KIA can affect a SW. Not that it mattered...

I didn't bring my Monster Rule Book with me, so I forgot that Barbed Wire Fences are a potential Bog on a 12 for the tanks. Given the outcome, and how unlikely it was to have come up, not an issue.

Though, with Walt's luck, he probably would have rolled 12 three times...

If you are dropping your Giant Bomb from your Stuka (lucky you!!!), you have to predesignate the attack, so I would have had to drop 150mm of Awesome Exploding Death on Walt's poor broken squad as part of my third attack, even though I didn't really need to. 'Cause that's just the way we Nazis roll...
 
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