Rodgers' ASLOK AAR

Michael R

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Game 1
J14 ON THE HOSS’ SIDE versus Jim Mackay. Jim is a local player and sort of new, but been playing regularly for three years. He chose this scenario from a list that I published online before ASLOK. He wanted the Japanese so he could work on the caves and complexes rules. My Americans did a lot of close up shooting into caves that were set up in the VC hexes. Jim kept replacing the cave losses with units from the complex. He also sent out some to do CC against the adjacent Americans, so the Americans took casualties too. The Japanese MMG and HMG were on the other peak to cover the VC hexes, but their shooting was mostly ineffective. We had a lot of rule book diving. I used my Climb counters for the first time ever, because I wanted to climb to place DC on the caves from above. Eventually, he Americans were in the VC hexes in numbers too great for the Japanese to remove.


Game 2
BFP21 KWAJALEIN CRUSH versus Bill Hayward.
I finally got in a match with Bill. We diced for sides, which gave the defending Japanese to me. I planned a mostly rear area defence with a couple of HIP traps and two hidden THH. Bill’s American ground forward at a decent, but not reckless pace. One HIP THH was able to eliminate a FT tank in CC. Later, when a Sherman moved into a HIP MMC hex, it was able to generate a THH and eliminate the Sherman. That might be a record number of THH kills in one game for me. Twice during the game, I skulked units into hexes that I thought were safe, but were not. Bill made me pay both times. Both snipers were active. Two American leaders died. Both Japanese guns were pinned by sniper attacks at one point. Around turn four, the Americans were taking buildings; things were looking bleak when both my MMG broke, as well as the 75. I told myself I would concede after the Rally phase if nothing repaired. I rolled three ones to repair all three weapons. The following Prep fire, however, accomplished nothing, so could not save the bad situation I was in. I conceded soon after.


Game 3
RPT86 NO QUARTER REQUESTED with Pierce Mason of Georgia
I had the Japanese attacker in this 1945 Philippines scenario against Partisans. Pierce chose this scenario from a list that I published online before ASLOK. I was able to banzai early into the stone buildings with some smoke cover. Later CC cost me a squad and leader and cost Pierce a squad, MMG and hero. There was one other Philippine squad with a leader and LMG in that area, but it got in trouble while skulking and had to leave. My turn one reinforcements came in near the huts area, but out of LOS. I led with a HS and Pierce revealed his HIP squad, shot the HS, and made him berserk. The berserker then tied up that squad, and the rest of my reinforcements followed and surrounded the former HIP squad, which died for FTR. My turn two reinforcements ran down a road for the middle board, except for one HS that secured an outlying building. They supplied a DC hero that helped take out the squad that had left the stone buildings. The leader that had been with that dead squad had broken, rallied, and then killed a Japanese squad in HTH CC initiated by the Japanese. Pierce’s 9-2 was in the hut village with the MMG and a few squads and a lot of dummies. These troops gave ground slowly to my troops moving cautiously towards it from the south. Pierce brought his turn two reinforcements near the village huts, but moved slowly to maintain concealment. The 9-2 and majority of squads went to the nearby hill, where the Japanese were able to overwhelm them with the help of a DC hero. Pierce’s southern reinforcements tried to enter the village huts, but were unsuccessful.


Game 4
AP63 THE NUTCRACKER with Seamus Hoskins from Pittsburgh, PA
I had the Russian attacker in this interesting December 1941 scenario. I chose to have my Russians obtain the VC of all building hexes on one map; the one on the Russian right. I had fun skiing down the slopes towards the Germans. Each squad went closer and closer until one of the German stacks finally shot. I was able to claim my first building on the first turn, with only one broken squad. I sent the on-board tanks to the Russian right towing an MMG to discourage the Germans from entering there. The reinforcing tanks went up the middle. The BT-7A tanks positioned to shoot at a central German MMG in the factory. The German 37mm ATG was able to shoot at the lead tank of my BT-5 platoon and killed it. My troops amoeba moved into the town. The German reinforcements came in far away from the Russians and Seamus forgot about the Russian MMG on the level 2 mountain. I got lucky on the two flat shot and a stack of three German squads and a leader broke. My infantry found a 150 ART piece that I later smoked so the infantry could take it out. From there they also attacked the 37, but only after it had shot up some infantry. The central German MMG fell to a BT-7A so my Russians got into that building and obtained the MMG. I lost a second BT-5 tank to the other HIP 150 ART gun when the tank tried to get behind the Germans for some DM work. Soon after, the Russians had all the required buildings. The German reinforcement tanks came in far away and moved to shoot at the Russians from a safe distance. Seamus realized he was running out of time, so started trying to move his infantry closer to the Russians, but they were getting shot up. Finally, his tanks move adjacent and into the factory building where my Russians were. We had a big struggle there that consumed all of our attention. Control switched twice. The game came down to needing to kill the German tank in the factory. It took three tries from three tanks to finally do it. Extreme winter played almost no part, only taking out a German light mortar.

Game 5
SP15 TOBACCO FACTORY with Michael Koch from Germany
Michael chose this scenario from a list that I published online before ASLOK. He had the Americans with the balance; ROAR shows the scenario favouring the Germans. I put the 75 ATG and one 81 MTR on the left, pointing to the middle. I put the 50 ATG on the right, in a grain field, pointing across the line of the American advance, and also pointing at the Germans defences, because the 50 would need a side or rear shot against the Shermans. The other 81 MTR was near it, as well as an LMG team in a foxhole. My best leader was with the HMG in the obvious level two position. I put two 251 halftracks in the center area with some troops and abandoned them early to have the LMG less vulnerable. I had the SMG HT out of sight on the hill with the victory hexes. It unloaded the inherent HS with the AAMG converted to a HMG and later moved to interdict American infantry movement. The other 251 HT was on the German extreme right with plans to move into the American rear. Michael sent most of the American troops through the woods to the American left of the board 11 hill. He also sent two Shermans up the American right. There was also a small stack on the far American left, which I later figured out was the OBA observer with an escort. Michael put two HS on Shermans for scouting duties and they led the pack.


Since it was obvious that my left side assets would not see any other targets, I had them fire at the two Shermans on the American right. Despite being in motion, the 75 destroyed one Sherman and the 81 immobilized the other; the abandoning crew died a little later for reasons that I forget. Michael put only one Sherman on the central board 11 hill mass. I revealed the right 81 MTR to smoke it. This, and other defensive movements that I made attracted the other four Shermans to the area around my 50 ATG. One was literally parked adjacent to it with its frontal armour showing and outside the gun covered arc. When Michael started moving Shermans past the gun, I decided to not shoot until after all his movement, unless one moved into my bore sighted hex. The tank adjacent to the gun moved first; I let it go to harass my infantry a few hexes distant. I let a second and third Sherman move by the gun to similar positions. The fourth Sherman moved into my bore sighted hex, so I fired the gun. It destroyed that Sherman and kept rate. In the following DFPh, the gun destroyed a second Sherman with a rear shot. American advancing fire broke the crew, however, so that was the end of their heroics. The American observer had brought a SR down on my level 2 HMG. I moved down to level 1, where the observer could not see it, but the HMG could still cover some approaches. Meanwhile on the German left, I sent a squad and leader to help push the 75 ATG to where the action was. I then did the most pushing of a gun that I had ever done in a game. In one turn, they spent 6 MF to move three hexes and in the next turn they spent 8 MF to move four hexes. They ended behind a wall pointing at the side of a Sherman tank. When they arrived there, they had to take a 16 down 1 shot. The crew broke, but the leader and squad were okay. In the following turn, the squad recovered the gun and immobilized the Sherman. On the German right, I also had a lucky success. The solitary 251 HT headed for the American observer stack and entered their hex in bypass, hoping for a melee. In the following CC, I rolled a 2 to eliminate the observer! My turn three reinforcing Pz 4 tanks had taken positions to defend the victory area. Having no more OBA and only one or two Shermans after four turns, Michael decided to concede. By the way, the above details are not in exact chronological order.


Game 6
DB107 STOSSGRUPPE SCHLICTER with Jeff DeYoung from Michigan
Jeff and I chose this one from my “to play” binder to have something short. I think we diced for sides. He had the defending Norwegians. This scenario requires some thought by the defender of where to put the roadblock that the German must eliminate. Logic says to put it on the wooded board, but it is legal to put it on the more open board and then try to fool the German to waste his time looking for the roadblock on the wooded board. Jeff chose to put the roadblock on the wooded board, as far away as possible from the turn 1 Germans. Not only do the Germans need to eliminate the roadblock, they also need to exit units from where they entered for VP, or eliminate/capture Norwegians for VP. This scenario also features reinforcements for both sides that enter from interesting areas; such as Norwegian reinforcements entering from the German exit area. Jeff’s troops were able to delay the at-start Germans enough that I could not capitalize on the broken Norwegian units, so they rallied and made it difficult for my sapper reinforcements to approach the roadblock. After three turns of play, I felt I could no longer win this game.


Game 7
74 BLOODY RED BEACH with Brian Martuzas
I had this on my play list and saw online that Brian wanted to do it at ASLOK, so we connected and scheduled it. I needed several hours to digest rules G11, G12, G13 and G14 and then plan the Japanese defence before ASLOK. Despite this, we gacked a couple of important rules during the run-in of the amphibians that probably contributed to the American casualties rising faster than they should have. My plan was to shoot a lot starting on turn two and try to force the Americans to hit the CVP cap. After four turns, the Americans were at 70 CVP. Brian decided to concede at that point; an asterisk win to be sure.


Game 8
BFP90 EARLY MORNING ACTION with Jim Burris of Saint Louis Missourri.
Jim Burris is the force behind the Saint Louis tournament, and was also the force behind the new CBI publication from the Saint Louis ASL club. I had the Russian defenders in this CoS scenario that we chose from my “to play” binder. I gave this game away by making two mistakes. I left out of my OB by accident two 127 crews that could have manned light mortars from a distance and I set up my ATG where a German HS could find it on the first turn. After three turns, Most of the town had fallen to the Germans and I had not a whole lot of troops left, so I conceded.


Game 9
ESG120 DOOM PLATOONS with Jim Risher from the Cleveland area.
First mini tournament game (Mother Russia). We played this small scenario where a low grade German force must prevent an average grade Russian force from exiting the board and also have someone Good Order on board at the end of the game. We both bid for the Russians; I received the Germans with the balance. Both sides start off-board and head for each other. My dice were warm at the beginning and Jim’s were cool, then they switched around. Things looked bleak at the end of turn 3 when I was down to one Good Order unit, but an excellent turn four rally phase kept me in the game. On Russian turn 4, my remaining troops were on the exit edge as the Russian tried to exit. My hoped-for fire lane came to naught when I rolled a twelve and Jim exited enough for the immediate win.


Game 10
FRF80 BREAKING BAD with Mark Watson from Toronto.
Mark really wanted to play something from the new Friendly Fire pack. I had heard of this one, which uses some BFP vehicles that I had with me, so I suggested this one. I had the attacking Axis Minors (Dutch, surprisingly). The Dutch need to take a lot of buildings from the Japanese and then manage to hold six against a later counter attack. I used the Dutch APC to make a flanking attack and the AA truck to support the main attack. The only detail that I remember is that Mark tried to attack with some at-start Japanese. We both took losses on the CC, but I received a hole in his defence that I could exploit. The flanking attack did nothing more than tie up a squad and MMG. After three turns, the Dutch were well established in the village, right up to the church and were getting into position to interdict the Japanese reinforcements. Mark decided to concede at this point because of too many losses.


Game 11
STL2 NOTHING VENTURED with Wei-Kwong Wong of Toronto.
I had the Japanese defenders by dice. This scenario requires the Japanese to hold a bunch of buildings against a Commonwealth attack that can come from three directions. My defence gave up one outlying building from the start, but I defended the rest be occupancy or by cover. This scenario has a neat SSR regarding a Commonwealth 9-2 leader. While he is healthy, the Commonwealth troops (a lot are green) are fanatic; if he dies, they lose that and their ELR drops to zero. We had a slug fest for three turns, which included a long CC for one two hex building near the board edge and near woods. The Japanese managed to win that CC. During that time, Commonwealth troops moved closer to a few buildings and Wei kept the 9-2 in the background, but directing an MMG. In Commonwealth turn four, the 9-2 was finally attackable without any hindrances. A Japanese MMG went on a rate tear that caused CR to the leader and he died. This, combined with other losses and the time of evening, led Wei to graciously concede so we could both get sleep for tomorrow’s mini tournaments.


Game 12
DB120 START FALL GLEIB with Derek Pulhamus, from somewhere in the United States
This game was part of the Tin Can mini tournament. I think I bid for the Germans; that is the side I had. The main things that I remember from this scenario are having my Pz 2 tanks work their sD6 “on demand” four times out of four attempts, and not being able to push my troops forward fast enough. Around turn four I changed the axis of my attack, which then made some progress, but the Belgian tanks gained the opportunity to do some overruns. Other fire also broke my lead troops on turn five, so I decided to concede because there was not enough turns to rally and regroup for another attack.


Game 13
A74 VALHALLA BOUND with Jim Fardette of Maryland.
I suggested this large classic scenario from my “to play” binder and Jim was game despite being a part-time ASL player (i.e., he plays lots of other games and attends WBC). I bid German and he bid Russian. At the beginning of this scenario, the German player can really feel the desperation of small resources versus the Russian hoards, because the Panthers do not enter until turn two. Even then, it is five Panther D tanks against fourteen Russian tanks. The Russians entered with a lot of riders. I think there were units on both entry boards. During the MPh, a HIP German HS took out by PF one tank with riders. The HS died soon after. Two Panthers moved in front of the hill mass on the German side. A third Panther, with the 10-2 AL, stayed on level one. Two other Panthers moved on the German left to take up positions partially behind a wall. As the Russian tanks moved closer, the Panthers started to get a few kills. Jim reacted by hiding his tanks, unloading them, and re-grouping for swarm tactics. During the re-grouping, a German HS with PSK had a shot at a Russian tank, but missed. The falling snow changed to heavy falling snow, so the German advantages were less. One Russian tank took out a Panther on a non-stopped BFF shot. Just as the Russians were about to swarm the Panthers (some of which had pulled back a bit), the falling snow stopped. The Russians killed another Panther (with the AL), but in the next German fire phase, the remaining Panthers killed four Russian tanks. This led Jim to concede because his VC choice was to exit 42 VP. We had played five of the eight turns. I can’t remember using the Panther D tanks before. Their start-up roll has three negative possibilities: burn, immobilize or stall. My AL was stuck in one that immobilized.


Game 14
SP249 NON-STOP GURKHAS with Hennie Van Der Salm
This game was part of the Bushido mini tournament. This may have been my first time playing with rice paddies. I made one mistake with my British defence. I had two units in the rice paddies that were enclosed by hedges. I should have had a third, because Hennie had two tanks to tie up those two units so his infantry could move through that rice paddy unmolested. Besides being an excellent player, Hennie had hot dice and I had cold dice. He had a mortar crew that was well supplied with smoke and WP, while my mortar team rolled 11, 11, 11 and 9 before going down. After Japanese turn 3, I conceded because I did not have enough troops left to win.


Game 15
FT138 MEETING UP AT MATAN with Jim Wiseman from Michigan.
After browsing my “to play” binder, we selected this scenario which features a Japanese attack on Chinese fortifications in 1938 on board LFT2. The Japanese need to eliminate or control four of five Chinese pillboxes at game end to win. The LFT2 board is a steep hill, up to level 5, with patches of grain (kunai) and open ground. I concentrated my defence on the Chinese left to take advantage of the woods that would be out of LOS of the Japanese. The Japanese took many losses working their way up the hill. I had placed wire on four of the pillboxes to slow down the Japanese and it worked. After five turns, they had three and were about to take a fourth. The pillbox on the Chinese right, however, was vulnerable to a counterattack that I staged. I was able to take it back to end any hope of a Japanese victory.


Game 16
AP107 BETTER FIELDS OF FIRE with Craig Hornish, maybe from CT
This game was part of the Best New Artist mini tournament, although the scenario was by Ken Dunn. Bret said something about running out of mini tournament names when I asked him about it. I bid American and Craig bid German. When bidding, I had forgotten about the -1 against the Americans for the first two turns. Thankfully, I chose the American group B which has mortars. The 81 gave me one, and only one, WP round to provide cover. Craig set up a good side to side defence and used the shell holes to destroy all the buildings in front of the victory building. My troops pushed forward very slowly for the first two turns, because of the -1 SSR and several broke during the advance. On turn 3, however, the 81 MTR scored a CH against the German MMG in the fort that really opened things up for the Americans. Can you say 30 FP with -4 TEM? The 60 MTRs helped from the American left flank and I was able to move substantial numbers of troops into the fort before the German reinforcements came on board. There was still one German squad in the fort, however. Craig used the bocage to keep concealment on his 9-2 fire group, but once it fired, my 81 opened up on it and broke it up. His other troops also suffered from the 60s and my troops in the fort. Once too many were broken, Craig conceded.


Game 17
AP114 A LION IN THE FIELD with Ray Woloszyn
This was round 2 of the mini. I bid German and Ray bid British, IIRC. Ray deployed squads early and often, which made it harder to focus my assault. I attacked mostly from the German right; I sent only one platoon with a FT up the German left. I had one tank make a bee line for the exit for VC and recon. On turn 3, it crossed the river and found a HIP PIAT that, lucky for me, missed its target. The other PIAT was revealed early by Ray in the level two steeple to deny concealment gain to the Germans. Because of the VP requirements, I was a bit conservative with my other tanks at the beginning. I was unlucky with the two FT. One was hit by a sniper and took a long time to rally. The other had its squad broken on a 4 up 2 shot and also took a long time to rally. Ray’s HS were also doing mischievous HS things to make my life more difficult. I got lucky again when I sent a tank to try cutting off a British retreat path. An ATG revealed to shoot and missed; the tank was able to move out of the CA and hide, but it could not do the job that I wanted. Ray had his OBA observer bring the OBA danger close as harassing fire, which also slowed my advance. Around the fourth turn, a second ATG revealed itself to attack the recently recovered left FT unit and break it again. After four turns, I had pushed the British back behind the central road dividing the village, but Ray had not taken many permanent losses. I had lost one tank and several HS. I felt that I could not achieve the VC at this point, so I conceded.


Game 18
AP93 BEST THINK AGAIN with Chris Chapman of CT.
Chris was waiting for his travel partner, Steve Pleva to finish the final round of Grofaz. Chris suggested this scenario because it is on the NY State ASL Championship play list. He spent most of his ASLOK working through that list; smart guy. I had the German defenders by dice roll. I had two HS pickets and two of my dummies up front; I would not do that it again; they were too easily overcome for no gain. My other defences had the ATG and MMG on the German right. I had LMG in centre and left positions with the assault engineers scattered about because they were my other anti-tank weapon. The Russian attack focussed on the German left to reach the cover of woods early. The Russian tanks were required to move first and they did good work breaking Germans or locking their fire. I was able to break a few Russians as they moved up, but not enough. My engineers failed at one DC tank attack, but were successful at a second one. After two or three turns, there were a lot of broken Germans. My ATG finally had a chance to shoot at a tank; it malfunctioned on its first shot. I conceded.


Game 19
J46 STRONGPOINT 11 with Matt Zajac from Texas
We chose this scenario from a list that Matt had. The list contained ROAR scenarios having more than 100 playings and play balance near 50%. Since I needed to eat lunch with my wife, Matt took the defending Dutch. He had an hour to construct an excellent, mostly reverse slope style, defence. The swamp and marsh hexes channelled the Japanese attack and Matt took advantage of that. I perhaps should have banzai’d some of his defenders early on, because I ended up running out of time. Losing the best Japanese leader, breaking an LMG, and breaking both MMG on their first shot, did not help either. We kept playing a while past necessary, but there was no way to take the last level 2 hex with the time remaining because of the Dutch occupied trench and pillbox fortifications.


So I finished nine days of ASL with a 10 and 9 record, which is pretty close to my historical record of playing this game. Bret and Bill did another excellent job of running this event.





 

Jeff Sewall

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Game 1
J14 ON THE HOSS’ SIDE versus Jim Mackay. Jim is a local player and sort of new, but been playing regularly for three years. He chose this scenario from a list that I published online before ASLOK. He wanted the Japanese so he could work on the caves and complexes rules. My Americans did a lot of close up shooting into caves that were set up in the VC hexes. Jim kept replacing the cave losses with units from the complex. He also sent out some to do CC against the adjacent Americans, so the Americans took casualties too. The Japanese MMG and HMG were on the other peak to cover the VC hexes, but their shooting was mostly ineffective. We had a lot of rule book diving. I used my Climb counters for the first time ever, because I wanted to climb to place DC on the caves from above. Eventually, he Americans were in the VC hexes in numbers too great for the Japanese to remove.
So you're saying that Jim experienced the "agony of defeat" here? :laugh:

Enjoyed the AAR -- sounds like you got in a bunch of good games.
 

PabloGS

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Game 1

Game 6
DB107 STOSSGRUPPE SCHLICTER with Jeff DeYoung from Michigan
Jeff and I chose this one from my “to play” binder to have something short. I think we diced for sides. He had the defending Norwegians. This scenario requires some thought by the defender of where to put the roadblock that the German must eliminate. Logic says to put it on the wooded board, but it is legal to put it on the more open board and then try to fool the German to waste his time looking for the roadblock on the wooded board. Jeff chose to put the roadblock on the wooded board, as far away as possible from the turn 1 Germans. Not only do the Germans need to eliminate the roadblock, they also need to exit units from where they entered for VP, or eliminate/capture Norwegians for VP. This scenario also features reinforcements for both sides that enter from interesting areas; such as Norwegian reinforcements entering from the German exit area. Jeff’s troops were able to delay the at-start Germans enough that I could not capitalize on the broken Norwegian units, so they rallied and made it difficult for my sapper reinforcements to approach the roadblock. After three turns of play, I felt I could no longer win this game.




Hum, I would argue that a clarification is in order so as to make the roadblock placed in the road?

I recall playing this scenario in the ASL League. Very interesting stuff.
 

jrv

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Hum, I would argue that a clarification is in order so as to make the roadblock placed in the road?

I recall playing this scenario in the ASL League. Very interesting stuff.
I'm not clear on the situation here: I believe by rule roadblocks need to be placed on a road hexside. Otherwise I would just use them for wall. Are you saying it needed to be clarified to put it on a specific road?

JR
 

Michael R

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Hum, I would argue that a clarification is in order so as to make the roadblock placed in the road?

I recall playing this scenario in the ASL League. Very interesting stuff.
There is a road on the non-woods board on which the Norwegian could place the roadblock. It takes only one German HS on that board to discover it on turn 1 because of long LOS.
 

chapman

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Michael,
Thanks for a fun game Sunday morning, it was a nice close to a great week. Glad we got a look at AP93 for Albany, will see you there!

Chris
 
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