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Yup, bit of blue on blue for fun under V3, My Mechanised Lehr vs SS Grenadiers.

My god, all the tactics I tried in the old days just don't work. Trying to pin him was difficult, dug in, GTG Veteran Fearless Infantry, with lots of HMG's and Pak 40's.

The 8" Defensive fire bubble is horrendous even with Smoke etc, pinning isn't as effective as it used to be. Got into that silly mindset of using the PUMA's to gun stuff when I should have been revealing the GTG and at least then I would have been hitting on 5's rather than 6's. I need some Break through guns and to not use Recce for easy killing units like Arty. If I had revealed his GTG, 1/3 of my Attacks would have hit rather than 1/6. This was the game changer.

He even chose not to shoot at me to keep his GTG Status, knowing to assault him would invite Mass HMG death.

Assaulting from my 251's, was good fun and actually was pretty effective for Conf Vets vs Fear Vets. But ultimately I couldn't shift all his platoons off the objectives. Critical Mass and sheer overwhelming firepower is needed, my god those SS are tough.

Nice balancing and on the whole, I think this new version is great, the transport rules, combat attachments and direct fire Mortars are brilliant.

mwnciboo wrote:
Nice balancing and on the whole, I think this new version is great, the transport rules, combat attachments and direct fire Mortars are brilliant.

That's good to hear. I'm really looking forward to trying out 3rd edition in a few months.


What's changed with pinning to make it not as effective? Do regular MG teams or HMGs get more shots even when pinned?

I believe they do. But, as WS forgot to send me my mini rule book in my first order, I have to wait for the back ordered products.

@mwnciboo - Can you confirm.

mwnciboo wrote:
What's changed with pinning to make it not as effective? Do regular MG teams or HMGs get more shots even when pinned?

MG teams go from ROF 3 to 2 when pinned and HMG go from 6 to 3. Will have to dig out my v2 book to see what's changed there.

I believe the shots available while being pinned depends on the current ROF of the unit involved; in V3 HMG's with ROF 6 have a ROF 3 while pinned and LMG's with a ROF 5 have ROF 2 while pinned.

Not sure about standard MG infantry teams though as I have to look that up, but I believe they get ROF 1 while pinned, which is still decent in defensive fire for a whole platoon with HMG support....still I'll have to look that up though.

Third ultra has it, oh and smoke is less effective because you still get to fire Defensive fire due to the 8" bubble. When pinned MG teams can still fire 2, LMG's =2 and HMG's=3 are so spikey that getting 5 hits is a given (I would hate to see an American Airborne with LMG's and Rifle teams "Murderous"). Gun teams get a 3+ if GTG, if they don't fire they keep the GTG status. This is actually a viable tactic with the SS if dug in.

Why reveal yourself and help the Enemy hit you? They cannot close to assault you without having a 2 to 1 Platoon advantage and even then with HMG's combat attached you will likely stop the enemy assault in it's tracks.

My mech assault resulted in lots of Bailed 251's but we had a long debate over the rules (as they bail but have passengers so they are like Tank Escorts) and worked through that if your assault was stopped you withdraw 2" and the Platoon withdrew and lost all of it's Bailed status (Nice for me, and the storm of HMG fire barely scratched the 251's, Armour 0 FTW!)

Yeah, interesting that smoke just now Conceals for LOS now with a 16" max range (within or intervening through the smoke), thus your assaulters will still be targets, albeit at a +1 to hit when making contact.

Guess the most viable tactic would be to assault the flanks where the majority of the enemy gun-teams can't turn to bring their firepower to bear on you....

Still, after reading through the V3 rules for a bit now, having your HMG/LMG teams within 8" of assaulting teams is still a risk, though mitigated by the light penalty of being pinned now.

It seems that a dug-in defender is probably going to take a ratio of a 3:1 force multiplier to effectively remove them lol! Seems somewhat realistic, especially for today's CQB in urban environments yes? lol!

After reading the Mounted Assault rules, i think in your situation, if you had two passengers per halftrack, then they are treated as tank escorts. Since you didn't have any half-tracks destroyed by defensive fire, the rule doesn't mention anything about that. However, i think in the V3 book, they cover this, so I think you guys got it right.....you bail 2" away from the enemy and the assault stops. However, the rule does mention, since they are Open-Topped Tanks teams in regards to assaulting, they still fall back when hit 5 or more times in defensive fire....so, yeah, I think you guys did well with the interpretation.

@Third ultra, I agree with everything you wrote. .

Peter is a damn good player and won a tournament recently, he's a really pro.

Yeah we debated for 10mins over a cup of Coffee and eventually interpreted it that way with the bailed 251's. He said it was a risky move, I pointed out that I needed to get him off the objective so doing nothing with my Mech Infantry was not an option, My Panzerwerfers were okay and Mortars we damn near useless against them (due to needing 6's) and though they did achieve a few stands killed and pinned them.

The funny thing was because my Troops survived the HMG's blasting my 251's next turn (Pak 40's all missed, a miracle). They then got out, and formed up (my 2iC was in there) My Panzershrecks shot up the PaK 40's, and with the MG's, SMG Team's and 251's behind I put up a storm of Fire before the assault and Nothing, too many FP checks needing 6's. LOL

My Flakpanzer 38(t) platoon was actually really good against Dug in infantry mainly due to the high ROF and a decent FP.

So in summary, pinning veteran Fearless, Dug in infantry you will still take horrendous levels of fire. Try and hit them in the Flank or Block LOS to minimize fire, oh and don't forget Gun teams can fire over friendly untis (damn it).

mwnciboo wrote:Third ultra has it, oh and smoke is less effective because you still get to fire Defensive fire due to the 8" bubble. When pinned MG teams can still fire 2, LMG's =2 and HMG's=3 are so spikey that getting 5 hits is a given (I would hate to see an American Airborne with LMG's and Rifle teams "Murderous"). Gun teams get a 3+ if GTG, if they don't fire they keep the GTG status. This is actually a viable tactic with the SS if dug in.

Why reveal yourself and help the Enemy hit you? They cannot close to assault you without having a 2 to 1 Platoon advantage and even then with HMG's combat attached you will likely stop the enemy assault in it's tracks.

My mech assault resulted in lots of Bailed 251's but we had a long debate over the rules (as they bail but have passengers so they are like Tank Escorts) and worked through that if your assault was stopped you withdraw 2" and the Platoon withdrew and lost all of it's Bailed status (Nice for me, and the storm of HMG fire barely scratched the 251's, Armour 0 FTW!)

So pinned defending MGs are better and I get defensive fire through smoke?

I think V3 will be fun for my MW Bersaglieri...

The funny thing was because my Troops survived the HMG's blasting my 251's next turn (Pak 40's all missed, a miracle). They then got out, and formed up (my 2iC was in there) My Panzershrecks shot up the PaK 40's, and with the MG's, SMG Team's and 251's behind I put up a storm of Fire before the assault and Nothing, too many FP checks needing 6's. LOL

My Flakpanzer 38(t) platoon was actually really good against Dug in infantry mainly due to the high ROF and a decent FP.

So in summary, pinning veteran Fearless, Dug in infantry you will still take horrendous levels of fire. Try and hit them in the Flank or Block LOS to minimize fire, oh and don't forget Gun teams can fire over friendly untis (damn it).

LOL! yeah, missing a bunch of FP checks (even if 6's) really takes the wind out your sails when hammering F/V infantry.

And, I agree; with the ability of gun-teams to fire over infantry in defensive fire just adds more pain lol!

So pinned defending MGs are better and I get defensive fire through smoke?

I think V3 will be fun for my MW Bersaglieri...

My Bersags are really looking forward to it; heck, for MW NA, an AS42 Fuscilieri Battalion would do well under these circumstances and since they're cheaper, you could add more support to the list lol!