Shoot Out @ Dead Man’s Corner, Chain of Command 1944

 An excellent little Chain of Command scenario, from Wargames Vault, with the Germans defending Dead Man’s Corner in Normandy, against an assault by US Paras.

Steve’s unusual pushing of a German Jump-Off point, well forward, into the orchard to the South-East of Dead Man’s Corner junction, turned out to be an unexpected stroke of genius! As the main para force pushed through the orchard, two ambushes launched from this Jump-Off Point, significantly disrupted the US paratroop advance. When the paras did finally reach the hedge line overlooking the house that Dead Man’s corner, the disorganisation caused by these ambushes resulted in the paras coming off worst from the long range fire-fight with the German MG teams occupying the House at Dead Man’s corner. While the US paras finally did manage to dislodge the German MG teams from the house, their own losses were too high, to allow them to press forward.

Even a more half hearted US flanking move, way around to the South-West, was thwarted by a single German Jump-Off Point, plonked right out on the West flank. In the end the paras simply had to pull back and await armour re-enforcements bigger than an M5 Stuart!  

Holding Out @ Neuville-au-Plain - Chain of Command

 Another excellent little Chain of Command 1944 scenario, purchased off Wargames Vault. This time with the US Paras are defending against a German counter-attack on Neuville-au-Plain.

The Germans opted for 5 infantry sections and opened with a bold, rapid deployment from the Southern table edge, into the field to the East of the church. These 3 German sections rapidly rushed forward to the hedge line overlooking the church, but then quickly got bogged down in a fire-fight with paras in the church and behind the wall to the front of the church. A rush assault by the Germans around the rear of the church then ran into a US ambush, with paras seemingly hiding behind gravestones! A vicious hand-to-hand fight developed, resulting the Germans being thrown back.

Hah, thought Lieutenant Altrik, at least that is all 3 US paratroop sections now accounted for and so he launched a flanking move around to the German right, through the open woodland, with the last two German sections. However, the paras had opted for a 4^th Infantry section as part of their Support Option, which deployed into the garden of the house overlooking the wood. Some pretty devastating fire from these paras quickly stalled the German flanking move. Realising that this attack was now just eating men, who could not be replaced, the Germans withdrew.  

Kampfgruppe Von Luck - Scenario 1

The much vaunted 21st Panzer Division tank crews slept, while their infantry took crawling through the cornfields, trying to work out where the Allies were!

After crawling a few hundred yards, Blue section was surprised, first by a vicious ambush by a British bren gun team, then by two infantry sections, one behind the hedgerow and one further back in the cornfield. Blue section sustained heavy losses, but rallied enough to return fire. After directing Green & Yellow sections to fire at the Northernmost Allied section, Lt. Altrich ran forward to stabilise the situation with Blue section. Pausing only briefly to yell, “It’s all your fault” at Sgt Bouue, Lt. Altrich screamed at the poor quivering FAO, to laydown a mortar barrage, which the FAO prompted did, but sadly on his own position!!

Lt Altrich rolled his eyes skyward and yelled again, at the FAO, to get him to roll the barrage forward.
The combined fire of Green & Red sections was too much, even for the stalwart paras and the Allied right flank section was soon streaming to the rear.

Meanwhile with the Allied left flank pinned under the barrage, the Allied commander called for a rather disorderly retirement from the field.

Phil

Chain of Command: A Bridge Too Far: Lost Ark: 5th Nov 2022

 

Our first experiment with running a Big Chain of Command game, at the Lost Ark shop in Stevenage. This enabled up to set-up an 8’x6’ table, pitting a US paratrooper platoon, a British Tank Platoon & a British Infantry platoon against two German infantry platoons (with support).

The British tank platoon would enter via the road in the South East corner and needed to exit at least one AFV, over the bridge, on the eastern edge of the table, while keeping the Germans at least 12” from the road. The US paratroopers started on the bridge, while the German entry point was on the track at the centre of the Northern table edge. If the Germans could prevent this, while at the same time gaining 2 Chain of Command dice, they would win (time running out!).

The patrol phase went well for the US & German contingents. The US managed to get a Jump Off Point (JOP) behind the house just to the East of the bridge & in the woods overlooking the road, SE of the bridge. The Germans managed to get a JOP right down the bordered field, adjacent to the road, as well as JOPs near the farm and behind the fields overlooking the bridge.

The British infantry only managed to get their JOPs, one up into the field overlooking the farmhouse & the other in the woods just South of the road.

Turn 1 saw the British tanks roar onto the table, while a British infantry section deployed into the fields, just to the North of the road, to cover their advance. The US paras modestly only deploying an LMG and sniper, into the house.

The Germans responded aggressively, by deploying a section behind the low walls to the South of the farmhouse, while simultaneously deploying the FAO, with an LMG team, in the bordered field, right down next to the road.

The US paras then revealed an entrenched section, in the woods, to the SE of the bridge. These opened up with murderous long range fire on the FAO & supporting LMG team, eventually resulting the loss of both the FAO & LMG team.

On the East of the table, the German section was suffering from fire from the Brits in the field, but also the US sniper, in the house near the bridge. However, the German platoon leader deployed here and started to restore some order. So much so, that casualties in the British infantry caused them to deploy a further section here.

But the continued focus of the British infantry on the farm area, was leaving their tanks exposed. Panzershrek teams were sneaking down and ambushing the tanks on the road. One was soon burning, while another had somehow survived two ambushes!

The US paras decided it was time to help out. They threatened an advance toward the German JOP in the South, while deploying a rifle team & bazooka, in the North, to try to flank the German positions. The advance of the rifle team in the North was rapidly checked by the deployment of first a Stug IIIG, which opened fire on the house, while an infantry section deployed across the advance line of the US paras, forcing them to deploy smoke & retire.

Further South, to counter the threat to their Southern-most JOP, the Germans deployed a Section into the bordered field next to the road. However, this rapidly started to lose the long range firefight with the entrenched US paras in the wood. Soon these were broken & running.

Seeing that the British infantry appeared too distracted to cover his tanks, the British Tank platoon leader decided to press on with his two remaining tanks. However, time was running out. The Germans were rolling more 5s and soon had further Chain of Command dice, enabling them to launch further ambushes on the exposed British armour, but also end the game.

A classic case on not maintaining focus on the objective, but all agreed it was a great venue & we would be returning.  

Operation Martlet - Table 4 – Striking at St Nicholas

As expected the British pushed deployment points into the orchard area, as well in a flanking position in the cornfields on the Southern table edge. The Germans pressed to get their deployment points into St Nicholas Farm, as well as covering the road.

The British initially deployed their Forward Artillery Observer, with a supporting infantry section, in a flanking position on the Southern table edge. They then deployed two infantry sections into the orchard area, which started working Eastward, supported by a Sherman, just south of the road.

This forced the Germans to deploy an infantry section into the Western edge of St Nicholas farmyard, but after dropping a couple of spotting rounds, the British FAO called a 3” mortar barrage down on the farm. The Germans then revealed a dug-in Mk IV, just South of the road, which immediately hit the Sherman, forcing it to withdraw in shock.

The two British infantry sections were now approaching the farm, through the orchards, so the FAO drew the barrage back toward the South-East, obscuring the Mk IV, clearing the Panzer Grenadier position.

The British Blue section, supported by the recovered Sherman, laid down fire on the Panzer Grenadiers in the farm, while Yellow section eased around the left side of the farm. However, Yellow section quickly discovered another section of Panzer Grenadiers, dig-in at the North-West corner of the farm. The four MG42s of the Germans started to inflict losses on the British infantry, which their return fire just could not counter. To prevent further losses, the British FAO walked the barrage back over the farm area.

Lifting the barrage from the Mk IV allowed the Germans to reveal an IG.18 gun, entrenched next to the Mk IV. Both of these proceeded to engage the infantry section on the Southern table edge, in the hope of neutralising the FAO. Sadly for the Germans, there appeared to be significant quality issues with their HE shells, because although the combined fire of two 75mm guns, was just not inflicting damage fast enough, because the mortar barrage on the farm was starting to inflict intolerable losses on the Panzer Grenadiers in the farm area.

Eventually the German Commander decided that these losses could no longer be sustained and called for withdrawal. However, even this withdrawal did not go well for the Germans, with the platoon leader and two section leaders being captured and only one member of Red section managing to sneak out from under the barrage!!

Operation Martlet in the Digital Age

Having tried out Command and Colours using Tabletop Simulator we thought we would be a bit more adventurous and try a game of Chain of Command, having found the setup for the Too Fat Lardies Operation Martlet pint sized campaign on Steam.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2080803354

The British objective was to get at least one team to exit the right hand side of the table.
The patrol phase took longer than was usual for a physical game due to a bit of difficulty in measuring distances and the markers sometimes wouldn’t sit on top of terrain. However, we persevered and the British managed to get jump off points advanced along the bottom edge of the table with a solitary point in the cornfield near the road.

The British were hoping that they could use their jump off points at the bottom edge of the table as their main point of advance and deployed accordingly. The Germans had other ideas and deployed a section into the orchard which the British shot up, wiping out a team. The Germans sent in reinforcements, thus preventing the British from advancing.

The Germans also deployed a section into the farmhouse. It was easier to line the figures up outside the building otherwise it would have been difficult to know what was inside. Also sometimes the figure placing misbehaved and we ended up with “figure stacking”.

With a Mexican stand-off at the bottom of the table the British switched their line of advance to the cornfield with their last section. This section came under fire from the Panzer IV but managed to continue their advance...

And find cover behind the building.

To provide support to the Panzer the Germans moved an MG42 team up to the hedge next to the crossroads, but immediately came under Bren fire, wiping them out. Things were now looking very sticky for the Germans, especially as the Panzer failed to activate while the British continued their advance to the table edge, thus completing their objective.

Interesting game with a few minor issues with moving figures but by the end we were getting the hang of the system.

82nd Aiborne try to hold off the Germans

The Germans looked on at the causeway and wondered whether it was a good idea to flood the fields as it now made it difficult for them to push the invaders back into the sea. The Germans deployed two sections and as they got a double phase started to run towards the cover of the woods.

Unfortunately the second section didn’t get into cover and the Americans deployed a section of airborne behind a hedge.

With the Americans getting a double phase it wasn’t looking good for the Germans left out in the open and soon there was a field full of casualties. “Well there goes the plan” muttered the German commander. With only two sections left things were going to be very difficult for the Germans, so they deployed the Somua to hose down the hedge line. Unfortunately this caused few casualties.

The Americans responded by sneaking a bazooka team into the ditch beside the causeway...

and managed to hit the Somua with their first shot. However it did little damage but did force the Germans to deploy their last section into the ditch.

The Germans opened fire and managed to hit everything in the ditch but the bazooka team. The Americans now had a target to shoot at and so they did, causing significant casualties and soon the German section was down to half strength. Meanwhile the German section that had been hiding in the woods pushed forward to the edge...

but immediately drew the attention of the American second section.

This was not a firefight that they were going to win and with the Germans running out of troops and force morale plummeting, the game was called.