V23 Tiger at Bay- or SS vs. SSF

Mike205

Senior Member
Joined
Jul 7, 2017
Messages
150
Reaction score
301
Country
llUnited States
F*cking finally! I’ve had my eye on this scenario for quite a while now. After printing out the scenario card at work months ago I rushed home to discover that I was missing board 63. Poking around online I had trouble finding a copy of WO 2011 for sale and thought I was fortunate to find one listed on Ebay. For a pretty reasonable price too. However, once the package arrived I tore into the envelope to discover that the vendor had mislabeled the SKU# and that I was staring at a copy of WO 2010, which I already own. Weeks passed as I coordinated with the seller and EBay regarding a refund. In the meantime I was fortunately able to find another seller, this time from the UK, from who I purchased another copy on Geek Market.

As soon as it arrived I convinced Doug to postpone our scheduled playing of Sangshak Redemption for Tiger at Bay. Hey, where else in ASL are you going to be able to pit SS against late war U.S. Marine counters?

In this scenario set in May 1944 during the Cisterna offensive, a small group of Italians and Germans are defending a vital road junction on Route 7, Via Appia, against a crack company of the Special Service Force. They are tasked with keeping it open so that surviving members of the German 10th Army can escape the net being formed by the U.S. VI Corps. The defenders are a mixed force consisting of three separate groups which set up on board 40: a X-MAS unit (3x5-4-8s, 9-2 leader, 2 Italian lmgs, Italian mmg, psk), a platoon of German grenadiers (3x4-6-7s, 8-0, 2 lmgs, 50 mm mtr, psk), and elements of SS “Vendetta” (3x4-6-8s, 9-1, 2 lmgs, mmg, psk) backed up by a Tiger tank commanded by a 9-2 AL. Per SSR, the Italians can use German SW without penalty and also generate PF. Oh, and the Vendetta are Fanatic. Victory locations are the 63 P8, R9, Q9 intersection and building. Grain are vineyards and orchards are olive groves. It’s also raining. Yay.

By the way, have you ever seen a more menacing call for friendship?
8725

The Special Service Force consist of 10x 6-6-8 squads, a 9-1 and 2x 8-1 leaders, 2 Marine lmgs (representing the 1941 Johnson lmg), mmg, dismantled 60 mm mtr, 2 44 bazookas, a FT, and a DC supported by a platoon of M4A1s, a M10 TD, and M8 Greyhound. By SSR four squads can enter as Riders, and SSF personnel are considered Stealthy, have underlined morale, don’t cower, and can use captured SW without use penalties applying. However the B# becomes an X#. SSF units also have their choice of American of British nationality characteristics and the player can use whichever are most beneficial in a given encounter. The SSF must enter within five or less hexes of the southern edge of board 4.
8727

Doug was understanding and kindly took the Italians/Germans for this one since I was so psyched about playing the SSF. His plan was to set up a tank killer 5-4-8 squad to keep things honest on the western edge of board 40 in the 40 H8 woods with an eye on moving into the board 63 hedgerow west of the intersection. Another 5-4-8 and 2 lmgs in H9 was ready to provide security to the panzerjaeger. The final 5-4-8, mmg, and the 9-2 leader were poised in M10 to quickly head towards the 63 V7 building to set up a forward position. They would give me lots of problems all game. A super stack of SS fanatics in 40 P9 was ready to slide into the R9 building and dominate the crossroads, and the Landser stack was placed in the board 40 woods east of the intersection, with the goal of sweeping behind the R6 & R7 buildings to tie in with the SS at the intersection. The Tiger set up on the eastern road with the plan of getting onto board 63 hill in order to prevent my armor from maneuvering too freely. Doug had the good idea to keep his sole tank back from the action and make the best use of the 88L and AL to kill things from a distance. Thus, the main defense would fall along the VL intersection, with a smaller blocking force further up the road and two squads to harass the U.S. left flank and distract.

Although this game was a little bit longer (7 turns) vs. the ones we usually play, I felt time was still of the essence and sent my M4s, and Riders, supported by the M10, northward along the board 4 road with the goal of dismounting a small force in turn 2 behind the church facing the crossroads. Although I couldn’t take control of the intersection immediately I could start to challenge the Axis forces as soon as they began to set up around its northern edge. The tanks would then form a base of fire and hopefully start knocking them out of their stone buildings before my remaining infantry (CXing) finally reached the fighting. The M8 maneuvered into positon in 63 Y4 to get LOS on the road. Top of turn 1 the rain increased but otherwise all was quiet as the SSF moved on their objective.

Here's a crappy map I drew of the initial moves:
8728

Axis turn 2, Doug’s troops began swarming towards the intersection and would gain most of their target hexes, with the exception of the grenadiers. The Tiger also rolled into position on the hill and took a shot at one of my M4s in order to gain acquisition. My M8 plunked away at the troops in V7 to no effect.


Turn 2 was a little tough for the SSF. For starters, the Greyhound kept firing on the V7 house and generated a sniper that BU’ed the crew in the M10. All game, the M8 continued to be a thorn in my side, generating sniper rolls left and right.
8731

I was also worried about the Tiger and rightfully so. Start of American turn 2, it smoked the M4 and killed its riders.
8732

Everyone else bailed out and started moving towards the church and R row buildings while the remaining tanks started maneuvering into blind hexes. One M4 also rolled into Z3 to disgorge an mmg squad that later advanced into the Z3 building to apply additional pressure to their opponents in V7. My main force was still chugging its way up the road calling out cadence as they went. All those runs back in Helena, Montana were paying off.
8733

For their part the Axis settled into their buildings and steeled themselves for the fight to come.

The clash did indeed come in turn 3, as, despite one squad breaking and another one pinning thanks to the sniper rolls generated by the M8s high, but ineffective ROF, the first group of SSF surged forward and got into the R row building line, trading shots with the Landsers. Despite the FT HS breaking, this small but hardy group managed to break most of the German line and later killed another squad in CC. reading up on this unit’s history, they had been trained in advanced hand to hand fighting techniques such as groin grabs. Ouch.

My main force finally reached the fighting but most of these squads would later be dragged into what ultimately amounted to an exchange of shots with the V7 house or fighting off the X-MAS squads that crept down the western board edge and killed an M4. Fortunately the Tiger malf’d its MA and rolled off the hill to provide MG support to the grenadiers getting their butts kicked and their groins grabbed in the R row buildings. It died after being swarmed by the M10 and Sherman in turn 4 after being recalled for its gun, which X’ed in the turn 4 RpH.

Top of Axis turn 4 heavy rain arrived to further hinder SSF efforts to clear Axis units out with FP. Shooting at morale 8 or 9 troops in stone buildings, they had to form enormous fire groups, but few of these were really successful and generated a few Axis snipers of their own. Both the M10 and last remaining M4 went down to PSK and PF attacks.
8734

By turn 6, the fighting had stabilized in the west. Several squads had managed to break the harassing X-MAS units but in the center they were still slugging it out with the 9-2 leader and his mmg team in V7. Repeated attempts to clean the fanatics in R9 building out with firepower never amounted to anything and any units placed in buildings across the street were subjected to withering return fire that broke several squads. Understandably, the remaining squads were content to hunker down in their captured buildings in T6, S6, R6, & R7 and passed the time slapping their unit’s calling card on the foreheads of dead fascists.
8735

Having lost an 8-1 leader to a sniper, the 9-1 was forced to fall back to a rally point in the 63 woods and couldn’t help influence the fighting. Rinse and repeat until turn 7, when I threw the kitchen sink at the R9 fanatics only to fail in my efforts to get them in CC. Enough groin grabbing already. The V7 units finally broke and ran but by then it was too late to shift my forces east towards the crossroads and the Axis won.

This was a unique and challenging scenario that made me look forward to digging into LFT 14 and playing more scenarios from the Italian campaign. In retrospect I committed an obvious but grave error in ASL and wound up letting irrelevant units hang me up. A perfect example of this was the V7 house- at one point I’d devoted the M8, four squads, 2 lmgs, and an mmg to suppressing it, to no avail, when I should have committed them elsewhere. For some weird reason I became obsessed with it, probably because those guys stoically endured everything I threw at them. I just couldn’t seem to let it go.

8736

I also forgot to push the SSF hard enough. I should have tried getting more units across the road and overwhelm the fanatics in R9. Even though I was super excited to pit Marine counters against the SS, ultimately I was gun shy about force preservation. I’d definitely like to try this one again sometime.
 

Attachments

Top