Mission 16 Airlanding, MSR 5

Steed

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The MSR gives you 40 BPV to purchase reinforcements and the limitations of 15.1 restricting purchases to Infantry MMC only are NA for all purchases. OK understand that.

My question is, can you purchase SWs by themselves? From chapter H, SWs are based upon the year and the number of squad equivalents, so I believe the answer is no. But I'm hoping I missed something somewhere.

Being German the gliders can't carry 5/8" counters ( which leads to another question ), so Ordnance and Vehicles are out. That just leaves OBA ( not enough points ), Infantry ( but can't buy enough MMCs to gain any SWs but can gain another leader which is important in SASL ) and/or adding to our SAN.

Now the other question - In chapter H, the German Ordnance Notes, under 18. 10.5cm LG 42 it states "Recoilless guns could be either dropped by parachute or landed with their SdKfz 2 Kettenlcrad towing vehicles in a glider." So if German gliders can't carry 5/8" counters, how can you land the recoilless rifles in a glider?
 

Eagle4ty

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I just use Ch H for SW allocation.

Depending on the date of the scenario a RR may not be available (Thanks Cpt Obvious) but If it were available and able to be received I would allow it to either be dropped by parachute (though there doesn't seem to be rule to cover its dm state) or provide a glider for its entry (as well as the kettenkrads because Ch H is a later chapter and therefore its notes would supersede anything in Ch E-sometimes you just have make something up as you go based upon historical usage). My guess (SWAG) is that either the 75mm or the 105mm would be treated as a 5PP SW if dm similar to the 81mm Mtr as a SW in its dm state.

[EDIT] Looking into this a bit further it seems as if both the 7.5cm & 10.5cm could be broken down into 5 pieces and dropped by parachute or could be dropped fully assembled on a special airdropped crate. At 300+ lbs to possibly 850+ lbs respectively (plus ammo rounds of 30-50 pounds a piece depending upon the weapon system & type of rounds), a 5PP dm SW counter would be generous as the GrW 34 81mm Mortar had a weight of around 140 lbs with each round weighing about 8 lbs a piece but then again a crew counter can represent an indeterminate number of personnel (take the average crew size of an 88mm AA gun compared to a 37mm ATG for example) so perhaps it could be represented as a 5PP dm SW as well.
 
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Steed

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I just use Ch H for SW allocation.

Depending on the date of the scenario a RR may not be available (Thanks Cpt Obvious) but If it were available and able to be received I would allow it to either be dropped by parachute (though there doesn't seem to be rule to cover its dm state) or provide a glider for its entry (as well as the kettenkrads because Ch H is a later chapter and therefore its notes would supersede anything in Ch E-sometimes you just have make something up as you go based upon historical usage). My guess (SWAG) is that either the 75mm or the 105mm would be treated as a 5PP SW if dm similar to the 81mm Mtr as a SW in its dm state.

[EDIT] Looking into this a bit further it seems as if both the 7.5cm & 10.5cm could be broken down into 5 pieces and dropped by parachute or could be dropped fully assembled on a special airdropped crate. At 300+ lbs to possibly 850+ lbs respectively (plus ammo rounds of 30-50 pounds a piece depending upon the weapon system & type of rounds), a 5PP dm SW counter would be generous as the GrW 34 81mm Mortar had a weight of around 140 lbs with each round weighing about 8 lbs a piece but then again a crew counter can represent an indeterminate number of personnel (take the average crew size of an 88mm AA gun compared to a 37mm ATG for example) so perhaps it could be represented as a 5PP dm SW as well.

As far as the SWs go that was my intention but I was hoping I was missing something in the SASL rules.

I had forgotten about the 81mm Mtr. Since it's a 1/2" counter when dm we should be able to purchase those and land them in the gliders, right?

As far as the RRs go, when I was searching the pdfs for "glider" ( in VASL the Germans have a 19pp glider and I was looking more info on it ) the section came up. After reading it, I started thinking on how it was done. What you say makes sense.

Thank you.
Walt
 

Eagle4ty

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As far as the SWs go that was my intention but I was hoping I was missing something in the SASL rules.

I had forgotten about the 81mm Mtr. Since it's a 1/2" counter when dm we should be able to purchase those and land them in the gliders, right?

As far as the RRs go, when I was searching the pdfs for "glider" ( in VASL the Germans have a 19pp glider and I was looking more info on it ) the section came up. After reading it, I started thinking on how it was done. What you say makes sense.

Thank you.
Walt
I really don't see a problem (rule wise at they stand now) for the 81mm Mtr in a dm state. As alluded to earlier, I really don't see a problem with the Rcls Rifles (along with a Kettenkrad) either as long as the dates of usage are met as the MAVN and research seems to support their use in such a manner.
 

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I don't have any answers for you, but I'd love it if you posted your impressions of this mission when you're done. This one and the two beach missions (landing/defense) are the only 'standard' missions I haven't played yet.
 

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So far ( Turn 4 ) it's gone too smoothly. One of the boards was pretty open and we had no problems landing (no crashes, almost all gliders landed on their intended hex, no Enemy activations ). This is our first attempt at gliders so we may have made a mistake or two, but I think the fact of the wide open board and not as many S? on that board helped. So far we've taken 1 of 6 VPOs, another two should fall within a turn or 2. I think it'll be close but we've taken out 2 x T-34 M41 ( both immoblized and one has a Malf MA and it's crew abandoned it ) and there's 3rd under recall which Frank is thinking of trying to take in CC. With the 3 VPOs, the points for the 2 tanks, and if we don't lose any more units, we might pull off another victory. If we need to we might have enough time to take one of the other VPOs.

The only bad thing about this mission is the Friendly REs. We've rolled 1 so far and it was AT guns first and then Flank Attack - both of which you can't take so you have to keep rolling, finally getting a Sniper attack.
 

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I don't have any answers for you, but I'd love it if you posted your impressions of this mission when you're done. This one and the two beach missions (landing/defense) are the only 'standard' missions I haven't played yet.

We finished Sunday night. We won by 1 point. We ended up taking 3 of 5 VPOs ( I was mistaken in my comment above - bad memory ) and were trying for the 4th one when the game ended. We needed another 2 (wishful thinking) to 4 turns I think to take it. The VPOs for both sides evened out so it came down to CVP and we had them by 1 point - luckily the Soviets received a Tank RE and even more luckily we were able to take one out in CC and another one immobilized itself - the crew failed its roll and vacated the vehicle and we promptly broke it (the crew), they surrendered and we captured the abandoned tank. Otherwise they had us on the CVP - they had a good sniper (6) and I couldn't stop rolling 6's. We had MANY prisoners but unfortunately they don't count in this mission.

We made a couple of mistakes. In the last turn we realized there was a building on a level 2 hill which did have a LOS to where my gliders landed. It would have been a long range activation which means a HMG - which would have made getting to my first VPO more difficult and time consuming. A long shot but if you roll often enough you get those snake eyes.

I split the landing up into 2 areas. The idea being, 1) Don't put all your eggs in one basket, 2) We could surround the first VPO and hopefully take it quicker and the "surrounding" force would be in great position to take the 2nd VPO. ( The VPOs were pretty much in a straight line North to South on the Western Board ). Number 2 didn't work out that way as Frank was in charge of that force. He played more aggressively and went after VPOs 2 and 3. This worked out in the long run as the Tank RE came in by VPO 3 and his troops were in a good position to take them on - otherwise I think they would have run us over. If I had to do it again I think I would not split up the company unless the terrain forced me to. We took a lot of losses from failure to rout.

( So you understand what I mean by "we", an old friend, Frank, and I are playing SASL - running a company through the entire war. He's in command of one half, I the other. Each has the final say in what their "section" does but we bounce ideas off each other so we're not working against each other. In the process we're getting a better understanding of the rules, tactics, and having fun )

It was our first time playing this mission, first attempt a gliders, first vehicle OVR, and a few more CC vs Vehicles ( overall not too many so far ) so I'm sure we made more mistakes we're not aware of and we'll find out as we continue to play on.

Overall the Mission was fun. If it wasn't for the tanks though I don't think it would have been as much fun. I think you have to move fast to capture the VPOs as soon as possible and as many as you can. At the same time though you have to watch the activations - it's very easy to get surrounded and have no way to rout. It's a tough one. Your REs are limited, their's not so much. I would play this one again - and will some day.
 

Barking Monkey

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Thanks for the recap and mission assessment. 1 VP win - you can't ask for tighter than that. In my experience it's often tempting but (due to the command and control rules) usually a mistake to break your company up - it's especially dangerous when the ENEMY has a high SAN. You can sometimes get away with it with the companies that have 3 leaders but almost never with those that include only 2.

Don't know how much you've played, but I've found the ENEMY loves overrunning with their AFVs, so you'll probably get comfortable with those rules before too many more games. They also aren't shy about moving their AFV right up beside you so you get a lot of CC/vehicle opportunities as well as machine gun tank kills.

The getting surrounded danger sounds a lot like 'Besieged' - probably my favorite 'defensive' mission. An encouraging sign.
 
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