AAR the Finnish ASL tournament Sissukoni XXI August 23-24-25 2019.

asloser

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Here is an AAR of the games I played during the Finnish ASL tournament Sissukoni XXI August 23-24-25 2019.

Round 1 Friday evening: DB111 Flanking Hatten vs. Lars Gregorson

In this one I was the attacking German. It was nice to play Lars whom I had never played before.

He had three concealed tanks on board so one had to be a dummy. There was one concealed tank in the front. I made a guess that it must be a dummy since it was there all alone - hence I advanced confidently with my panzer IVs. To my surprise this was the Sherman with 76L gun and the armor leader. I lost two panzers right away but on the other hand I managed to position the rest to challenge the tank. The Sherman was dispatched on turn 2 prep and I charged forward along the German right board edge. I ran into the HIP Sherman in the woods along my way, dispatched it and the third, which was on the level 2 woods moved to hinder my exit. I was able to run off enough Germans around the single tank and won the game comfortably. Key to the Victory was the US setup which allowed me to pick out the US tanks one by one.

1-0

Round 2 Saturday Morning: RPT144 Got Me a Tank vs. Andeas Carlsson

I had played Andreas before long time ago on Copenhagen in the 2008 tournament. I had no recollection who won our game back then because of some confusing circumstances but he informed me that he was the winner back then so I was in for a revenge.

Anders set the US in a good way and did not allow me to make a direct push with my entering force. On the other hand he had a 10-2 led .50 cal equipped kill stack in the middle of the board with two BAZ 50 toting squads close by- in other words something I could nor challenge. The 10-2 kill stack started to rip trough my at start force in the victory area and it looked pretty bad as some of my reinforcements were tied up far away from the victory area.

However I had the at start T-34/85 behind the wall in the middle of the victory area and it was making things difficult for him. So midway through the game he decided to advance the two BAZ 50 squads he had there out in the open 2-3 hexes from the T-34 behind the wall. I fired the CMG of the tank, I fired the gun, and intensive fired the gun. The result of this was that both BAZ squads were broken and next was my MPh! I charged his 10-2 stack with two T-34s and surrounded it- he tried maneuvering away during his turn but I blasted them point blank and the 10-2 and both squads in the kill stack broke. Suddenly his whole center had collapsed and with only a couple of MMCs left unbroken and one usable BAZ 50 he conceded as all of my tanks were still intact and there was precious little he could have done about them or my reinforcements. Risky use of the BAZ squads turned the game my way.

2-0

Round 3 Saturday afternoon: FT232 Heart of Darkness vs. Antti Westerlund

Next up was this somewhat unusual offering off the latest Le Franc Tireur magazine. I was playing Antti Westerlund who is one of my oldest ASL buddies, we just celebrated our 20 years of ASL games together in last May.

I was the attacking South African. Early into the game I encountered some headwinds with Marmon Herrington ACs – one broke the MA MGs on the first shot I fired and rolled 6 on the first repair attempt, another was killed on a snake eyes TK roll from a MG and was left burning. On the other had I bagged several prisoners and massacred them and managed to get in a comfortable lead in the VP despite the tank being dead. Then I realized Massacre means also declaring no quarter and taking prisoners became more difficult. I managed to capture some more and the game culminated on the last Italian movement phase where Antti had to run off couple of squads trough my thin defense line close to the board edge. He just made it and the Italian won at the last possible APh as the last needed squad exited.

If I had two ACs instead of only one left for the endgame I would most probably stopped the exit. Also the decision massacre the prisoners right away was not a good one as I might have capture couple of additional Italian squads easily.
2-1

Round 4 Saturday evening: FT152 Avanti! Against Teemu Lukkari


Next I was facing my brother Teemu Lukkari in an older LFT offering. As you might have already guessed Teemu is the longest suffering ASL buddy I have. This time I was the Italian attacker who gets some help from their German brothers in arms against Russian defenders.

I set up so that the Elite Italians were to make a strong push on the right for the two victory buildings on the back and I sent the 347 squads to capture the one in forward left.

I was able to capture the two back buildings quickly and also suppressed the Russian reinforcements. The two Russian BA-20 armored cars appeared but my German reinforcement were able to dispatch but of them quickly with ATR and MG fire.

Meanwhile my attack though the grain was less spectacular and I was just able to slog my way through to the victory building for some late turn CC. I ended up having a couple of prisoner guards in the CC and this almost cost me the game since one of the guards was killed and this took the game into the last possible CC. I needed a 7 or less at the last possible CC roll to win and just made it.
I was too strong with my attack on the back buildings and that almost costed me the game as the grainfield force was too weak I also lost the only leader there to a sniper.

3-1

Saturday evening pickup game: FE16 Where the Bullet Meets the Bone against Mikko Lukkari

Since I had finished my game early and my cousin Mikko was not playing on Round 4 we played a quick game of FE16. Again I was attacking for 4th scenario during the same day.

This time I did not do a good job of it. I lost one of the tankettes on turn1 to the 20L ATR. The other spent rest of the game failing the non-platoon movement TCs which are not easy as the Partisan crews are inexperienced. I pushed hard to the village but did not get a break, and even though I managed several MG TK attempts against the funny Italian Armored cars I did not kill any. Mikko shot my partisans to pieces and I quit mid scenario as I did not have realistic chances to take any buildings or score CVPs.

I’d say at least one Italian AC has to go down for CVP for the Partisan to be successful, but that is easier said than done.

3-2 overall, 3-1 in the tournament.

Round 5 Sunday morning:
FrF80 Breaking Bad against Magnus Rimvall

On the last round I got the chance to play the professional ASL tournament attendee Magnus Rimvall of Sweden. We chose this FrF PTO offering and I sat down to command the Dutch who had disguised themselves as Axis Minors and got to drive interesting BFP AFVs.

Magnus set up pretty forward and had the prisoners with guards far back. I divided my attacking force to two, the AFVs supported by three squads, MMG and leader approached from board 38 and rest of the force came on board 67.

I was able to pick up the dispersed Japanese one by one and by turn 4 I had most of the Japanese eliminated and also I had the control of majority of the building locations. Magnus could not see how his reinforcement would change the issue and conceded. Pity, I would have liked to see an yellow Marmon-Herrington on map.

4-1 in the tournament, overall 4-2

Sunday Lunchtime pickup game: SP270
A Small Stack and a Schnapps against Timo Kärnä

Since my last game was over early I took the oppoturnity to play quick game with TD Timo Kärnä. We chose this small scenario from the latest Schwerpunkt, and for the first time for the whole weekend I was defending.

My plan was to pull couple of squads, MGs and the PSK I took from the halftrack to the victory building with the 37L halftrack guarding the flank. I had a screen of couple of squads and halfsquads hoping to dealy his infantry and getting ina few PF shots against the Russian armor. The JagdPanzers were guarding the flanks, in buildings and HD position behind walls.

Timo made a conservative opening move and my withdrawal went better that expected. I managed to hit one T-34/85 with a PF shot and JPz IVs in buildings traded shots with IS-2ms with German getting hits but no kills and Russian failing to hit altogether. By Turn 3 Timo got into position to assault the victory building but I had already made myself comfortable there and the attack went nowhere. In my opinion this one requires very aggressive Russian opening move to get the German out of balance. And as it is an SP scenario this should not come as a surprise to anyone.


4-1 in the tournament overall 5-2 and a second place. I was very happy how I played in this tournament, after a slower patch of 6-7 years I started to play more actively in May of 2018 and now after 15 months of intensive play I feel I have got my game back close to the level I was back in 2009-2010 timeframe when I was at my best as an ASL player. It was the fourth or fifth time I came up second at Sissukoni with one win on 2009. I must have the record number of runner up finishes in this tournament.
 

Gordon

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Must be a focus for the ASL-midichlorians.
 
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