ASL11 "Defiance on Hill 30"

von Marwitz

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ASL11 "Defiance on Hill 30"

Situation End of German turn 1:

View attachment 46667


Seems to be one of the classics and is well fit as a teaching scenario for infantry and the introductionary MTR (one on each side). ROAR has it very balanced with close to 200 playings for each side. I played this as the German.

Basically, the US has to hold the village on board 4. The Germans either need to take some buildings OR take at least one and exceed the US in VP (some of which may be granted if the US reinforcements arrive late). The Germans have 12 squads lead by 3 leaders and are equipped with a decent numbers of MMG and LMG along with one small MTR. Nothing fancy here. The at start force of the us is 4 paratrooper squads (one of which may HIP), 2 leaders without modifier, an MMG, 2 BAZ, and a 60mm MTR along with a dozen "?" counters and 2 Foxholes. US reinforcements will be arriving during turn 4, 5, or 6 (of a total of 9 turns) depending on a dr. These are significant consisting of 5 paratrooper squads, a MMG(dm), 4 BAZ and a 9-1.

Usually, the action should play out roughly as follows: The small US defending force tries to mess up the German apporaches across rather open terrain with the MMG and MTR perched on the hills. The Germans will try to close quickly to take advantage of their superior numbers. They probably will try to crush as much of the US at start force and grab the victory buildings before the US reinforcements show up on the scene. If the Germans are quick, they might manage to establish some sort of defensive perimeter in time. When the US reinforcements arrive, it will be the Germans on the defence. They have to hold on to their buildings and watch out not to be hit by the numerous BAZ and high firepower of the US. At start much depends on the performance of the US MMG and MTR. Heaven forbid if the manage a ROF tear which could harm and slow the German significantly. Heaven forbid if they don't perform well, or worse - break.

In my game, the Germans lost some significant 4HS on their approach to the central lvl 1 building and cover behind it as well as to the patch of woods that is connected to the village woods by a grainfield. I tried to avoid the MTR and MMG as much as possible. It took some time to close and then to bring the German firepower to bear at superior range. The US played quite agressively in part, trying to slow me even before getting close to the village woods with some success.

Eventually, the Germans had established themselves in decent cover moving quickly when the US MTR malfed. The Germans then moved quite agressively, clearing most dummies and taking out/capturing half of the US at start OoB and breaking another quarter. A Germans HS managed to storm the US MTR position with the broken weapon and destroyed it. The US MMG position was stormed as well and the MMG captured intact. All buildings were secured as the US cursed its luck with their reinforcements not arriving before turn 6 (which did grant him 6 extra VP, though).

Now the Germans had to brace themselves against the onslaught of 7 US paratrooper squads. These could be more or less held off albeit at some cost. During the last US turn (US moving last), things got a little tighter than expected as the US managed to kill 2 Germans squads and one of the paratrooper squads managed to survive no less than five -2 attacks to stand ADJACENT to one of the victory buildings held only by one German squad. Doing the math, the Germans volunarily broke that squad and a HS both threatened by CC and yielding one of the buildings to the US because that way it was not able to top the German VP tally. This brought the German win with 4 out of 5 buildings secured and a VP Tally of 19 German to 18 US.

Situation end of APh US turn 9:

View attachment 46668


Interesting scenario that I recommend to play.


von Marwitz
 

Uriah Jones

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Nice review of a classic scenario. It is a great learning scenario, well maybe a second scenario as it incorporates the hill LOS issues as well as light mortars.

The only downside is that it is slightly repetitive. The Americans don't seen to have any real choice but to place the mtr and mmg on the hills in foxholes. In response the Germans plant their mmg's with a leader in the building in 3O6/P6 to clear the Americans from the hill. Much depends on their success in so doing. All in all, the American counterattack is the best part. Both sides get to play both the attacker and defender in this scenario, and often coming down to the final CC. If the first 3-4 turns weren't quite so repetitive I'd have this as one of my favorites. Still it is a very good scenario.

Thanks for the write up.
 

Toby G.

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The first ASL scenario I played FTF with a guy I met on this Forum in the Introduce Yourself Sticky. All these years later and I still go to his house most Tuesdays for some ASL. Someday we'll have to pull this out for "Old Time Sake". What an awesome journey!!!
 

Babyear

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Thank you Von Marwitz! You have motivated me enough to talk a fellow player into doing this scenario. I have never played before; so I stopped reading your AAR after first paragraphs. I am playing U.S. and would like to see how I fare compared to the play in your game.

Using this scenario as a way to get back into the game. I have played folks that knew rules so much better than me. But without me looking up what is correct / incorrect I feel I never get a handle on what goes into rules. Playing versus someone at my current experience I believe is d great way to relearn rules. And ASL11 is one of many to use to keep learning.

Thanks again!
 

Stumpy82

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Bringing up an old thread here, but I just played this classic scenario as my first one from Yanks and I loved it. Initially I thought it looked quite unbalanced given how many forces the Germans have, but that turned out not to be the case. Instead it proved to be a real nail-biting finish with my US troops proving hard to “dig out” from the crossroads farm. The reinforcements came in on Turn 5, but before then it had been an intense battle with the Germans given repeated bloody noses as they pushed forwards. This was after my mortar broke on its very first shot too!

I’d recommend this one to anyone in the early stages of their ASL journey as the hills are a great way to introduce the LOS rules; the Americans will almost certainly move some units up there to try and shoot at the Germans as they advance, so you’ll get plenty of practice with blind hexes, etc.
 

ScottRomanowski

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You're right about the hill LOS. I set the MMG and MTR in foxholes on level 2. It teaches that sometimes not shooting and leaving full FP of the MMG and MTR for later targets is more effective than firing at the units that move early in the MPh. It also teaches about bluffing with the twelve American ? counters. You sometimes have to pretend real units are dummies to make the bluffing work.
 

Eagle4ty

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Playing that again right now after MANY years of not having visited those Paratrooper scenarios. Actually, having a blast though my Paras must have lost all their weapons on the drop.
 

Stumpy82

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Playing that again right now after MANY years of not having visited those Paratrooper scenarios. Actually, having a blast though my Paras must have lost all their weapons on the drop.
I’m coming to it all fresh for the first time - my copy comes from this year’s reprint of Yanks. I’m working my way through the scenarios and I can see why Paratrooper was such a good introduction to the ASL system - controversially, perhaps even better than Beyond Valor!
 

Stumpy82

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You're right about the hill LOS. I set the MMG and MTR in foxholes on level 2. It teaches that sometimes not shooting and leaving full FP of the MMG and MTR for later targets is more effective than firing at the units that move early in the MPh. It also teaches about bluffing with the twelve American ? counters. You sometimes have to pretend real units are dummies to make the bluffing work.
I agree. It was my first time using Dummy Stacks. It also introduces players very simply to HIP with just one unit, although I’ve done that before in a PTO scenario. If memory serves I think you’ve got enough for 2 dummy stacks if you want to pretend they’ve got the SWs, 3 if not.
It really is such a cracking design - those initial US units take quite a pounding, then the battle swings back the other way where the Germans know those American reinforcements are going to show up. It’s a really interesting balance of needing to push aggressively and take ground before they show up, but weighing that against potential losses as the Germans won’t receive any backup of their own. I also noticed a lot of ELR and breaking happening in the German ranks with this one too.
 

bendizoid

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I’m coming to it all fresh for the first time - my copy comes from this year’s reprint of Yanks. I’m working my way through the scenarios and I can see why Paratrooper was such a good introduction to the ASL system - controversially, perhaps even better than Beyond Valor!
If I recall correctly all the scenarios in Paratrooper are pro American. Might consider giving the Germans the balance in all of them or letting the more experienced player take the Germans.
 

Stumpy82

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If I recall correctly all the scenarios in Paratrooper are pro American. Might consider giving the Germans the balance in all of them or letting the more experienced player take the Germans.
Maybe, but I believe everything was rebalanced and reworked for Yanks; at least, most of the scenarios say they have been updated from the originals. I certainly haven’t experienced any imbalance so far.
 

Eagle4ty

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Maybe, but I believe everything was rebalanced and reworked for Yanks; at least, most of the scenarios say they have been updated from the originals. I certainly haven’t experienced any imbalance so far.
Yes, I don't believe there's a single scenario from the original Paratrooper or Yanks that wasn't updated in Yanks 2, some of them quite dramatically.
 
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