Sunday, November 20, 2016

Flames of War - Eastern Front

We called for a get-together at Adventure Games in Oshkosh a week ago.  The idea was 1500 L-W points.  Some RSVPed and I brought a couple of extra forces just in case.  As it turned out we had two Soviet and two German players plus myself who had brought German and British.  The simplest solution to the odd number was to change from two one-on-one games where we switched opponents to one big game on an 8x6' table.  So each Soviet bumped themselves up to 2000 points and I cut some out of my Germans.  We had a Panzer IV company, Falschirmjager company, and my Aufklarungs against two Soviet tank companies with supports.

The mission rolled was a Meeting Engagement.  Since it featured Delayed Reserves I had two people roll dice roll for reserves starting turn 3 instead of one.  I wanted to make sure everything got into action.  It also had Scattered Reserves which strangely enough had things show up in their owners sector almost all the time.

The table tops didn't match and the connector was unpainted,
but it still works.  
 Our Mk. IV group started on the left, my recon in the middle, and the paras on the right.  The Soviets went (from our perspective) center and right.

Each side aggressively advanced their left against the opposing right.

Our left advances, initially unopposed.

And stops and shoots till we neutralize the Soviet AT guns.
The Soviet infantry in the center didn't have any intrinsic AT capability, so direct fire and bombardment from 15cm guns made short work of the excellent Soviet 57mm ATGs leaving them vulnerable to the approaching panzers.

On our right the Soviets learn assaulting Fearless-Veterans with
Panzerfausts is a thankless task.
When the T-34s assaulted the defensive fire from the integral Panzerfausts stopped the assault and bailed several tanks.  With a firepower of 5+ they aren't going to kill many, but left the company ripe for a killer Falschirmjager assault in our half of the turn.

When my reserves arrived I raced up the middle, assaulting Soviet
infantry.  I didn't even need the Pumas and 250/9s.  The Luchs did
the job.

Another group of (proxy) T-34/85 roll on but are slowed, then stopped.

With the field littered with burning T-34s and us within striking distance of an objective it seemed time to quit.  Both sides had airpower but accomplished little with it except sometimes intercepting opposing air.

All in all a pleasant, low-key game with one new player (thanks Alex), one out of practice player (cheers Kyle) and our usual more or less proficient regulars (Bob, Todd and myself).  Coming up in a week, the annual "Tanksgiving" game that will please any heavy metal enthusiast.

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