Another game of Battlegroup Blitzkrieg... this time an attempt by a light German force to quickly secure the town before the French could adequately organise their defence.
We used the Urban Assault scenario from the 'Fall of the Reich' supplement for this with 350 point armies. I made a crucial error in my planning. I ignored old Johnny Frost's advice after the battle of Arnhem and blew almost a third of my army points of getting a battery of mortars in support and upgrading my platoon
HQ to have a radio. In open ground, it would have been an excellent choice. In the close confines of a town, with the enemy sheltering in buildings and poor lines of sight, they were a very silly choice. I brought a knife to a gun fight in essence...
This flaw would cost me the game, helped by my utterly dreadful luck, and my mate Cyril performing a perfect defence, even with only half his army on the table. I think being French helped him to channel a bit of luck. While my Germans seemed to he hiding behind walls of Swiss cheese, his were behind bunkers! His intial defence rested on two
MGs, carefully positioned to cover all approaches to the town centre, supported by several infantry teams covering them, with a sniper and an aT gun making up the rest. With much of his force in reserve and waiting to rush to help, I needed to move hard and fast to dislodge the initial defence and gain a foothold I could dig into to await the inevitable, and likely piecemeal, French counterattack. I got very lucky and all but one of my units started on table, the Panzer IV remaining in reserve until the infantry had at least got things covered. Finally my ace up my sleeve was my Recce Foot Patrol who using the Infiltration special rule began behind the French defence line of houses.
From then on it went downhill very fast, from turn 1 really...I tried to push forward and ran into French units on Ambush who poured fire into my men. Despite so heroic actions by my men, by the end of Turn 2 my commander was looking at nearly half the platoon as casualties already. Then the Panzer IV arrived and my men roared in anticipation of victory as it clanked up the road. There was a loud crack from the little 25mm
AT gun on ambush, followed by it rolling double six to penetrate the frontal armour. The Panzer IV burnt very nicely.
And that was how it went on really. A total massacre despite my best efforts and utterly awful dice rolling. The Frenchie was on fire though and when the French reinforcements began to arrive my army morale finally collapsed and we retired to the nearest Field Hospital to get Uncle Richtofen and his Stukas on the phone.
So lesson for tonight... dont under estimate the French in defence and make sure you have plenty of men for fighting in an urban area. Obvious really...
Battlegroup Blitzkrieg is due out at Salute in April, but can be pre-ordered from The Plastic Soldier Company and get some freebies and chance to win cool prizes into the bargain!
http://www.theplasticsoldiercompany.co.uk/
