Counterattack on the Moselle

[michammer]

Not a proper AAR, as I forgot to record my turns. This was a scenario I picked to play against SoccerDJ. I was Axis, DJ was Allied.

An enjoyable scenario that is difficult for the Axis to win against a competent opponent - and, unfortunately for me, my opponent was very competent. Reports on the blitz show that this game ahd been reported 7 times with 7 Major Allied Wins.

I decided to push my strongest force straight up the middle, with my Recce Coy going left, supported by a Stug pltn, a PzGr Coy going right, supported by another Stug Pltn. This left the central prong of 3 PzGr Coys supported by my 3rd Stug Pltn, a PzIV pltn, and a Panther Pltn.

The left hand prong ran into a defended position on about turn 3 and spent the next dozen turns trying to force a way through before I gave up and started to pull back to protect my undefended artillery park.

The right hand prong made good headway and met no resistance. However, I advanced them too far and they played little part in the battle.

The central prong easily - looking back, too easily - pushed the enemy out of the first objective hex; the only objective I was to take.

The majority of the game was spent with me trying to push forward, but my opponent's skilful fighting withdrawal, coupled with his overwhelming artillery support, prevented me from making any real progress.

If you want a good challenge, play this scenario as Axis.

 

[SoccerDJ]

well first let me thank Andrew for a great game, it was a good game to get back to CS with as I've been absent from playing for a while.
I also want to agree with Andrew that this scenario seems very hard for the Axis side as the Allies keep recieving artillery throughout the scenario and if plotted correctly can slow and in some cases even stop an enemy advance. What follows if my basic strategy and take on the scenario.

At the beginning of the game most of my units were fixed so it was a waiting game until Andrew started attacking and some of my units were released. I soon realized that there was no way I was going to hold my forward objective and figure that giving it up would be small price to pay if I could just slow down the enemy troops and not take very heavy losses. Thankfully my flanks never came under any horrible pressure so I could devot my troops and more importantly my artillery to stopping his main advance up the middle. So after the 3rd or 4th turn I began to slowly withdraw my troops from the forward objective and establish a defensive line at the base of the hill and along the tree line. All the while I made sure my units that were fixed were digging in and makeing IPs in case Andrew broke through. I tried to withdraw my troops as slow as possible and tried to infilict as much damage as possible to the enemy. While I did take some losses as I withdrew I was able to slow down and cause enough damage to Andrews troops that his assult stalled a number of times. However, once again I must mention how my artillery saved the day and help on more then one occasion in bringing his assult to a standstill. I must admit however that in the later turns of the game Andrew suprised me by appearing on my right flank seemingly out of nowwhere, it came as a suprise to me as I thought that if the flanking attack would come earlier and when it didnt I figured it wouldnt come at all and I wrongly assumed that he would just attack my left flank since thats where he struck first. I was able to stall this flanking attack but no before takeing losses as the scenario ended.

I had an enjoyable expericne playing this game but will admit that it does favor the allied side so keep that in mind if you decide to play this scenario. Again thanks to Andrew for a great game.

DJ