Platoon Forward

Villiage Sweep of Dung Heip part II

2012-01-18T15:08:00.000-08:00

Lt McSwain leading the rejuvinated 2nd squad

against the enemy

Lt McSwain defeated teh VC in front of the hill and planted the hog there to cover the villiage for the rest of the battle. He then left Sgt Lawrence in charge and beat feet back to the LZ.

Meanwhile, Capt Jaroze had stemmed the panic in 3rd squad and had them defending just in front of the LZ.

Meeting of the minds

At the LZ teh two officers discussed the situation. Jaroze called the other two platoons in to surround the village but it was still up to McSwain to enter it. It was decided to send SSgt Davis around the hill to the left to enter the village from that direction and to take out the bunker.

SSgt Davis moving around the left.

The VC in the jungle has just "unmasked"

and is about to fire. It was their mistake

as 1st squad handled them easily

Meanwhile, Charlie had seen the americans strip the LZ and move behind the hill. That left only 2 MGs and a depleted squad at the LZ...

VC squad moving up through my brand new rice paddy

As SSgt Davis entering an empty bunker the MMG opened up on the LZ and mortars burst on the LZ as well. Sgt Lawrence layed down supressive fire on the mortar as two squads of VC charged the LZ!

Leadership matters-- Capt Jaroze makes a difference

3rd squad was shaken as Sgt Coulten took a round in the stomach. Capt Jaroze was everywhere. He rallied 3rd squad and directed fire for the hogs. The VC managed to get within 20 yards of the american lines but fell back with heavy casulaties.

With that the survivors slipped away into the surrounding paddies.

1st squad looking for remaining enemy

Great game and the platoon did find rice and some small arms. 2nd squad's morale has improved to +1 (6). Their half squad is back from BS duty at battalion. Capt Jaroze has added the 3rd MG for the next mission as well. In addition he was unimpressed with Sgt Coulton so when Sgt Coulton is ready for duty (the wound it not bad enough to go home) he will not be coming back to the platoon!. Sgt Douglas is the new squad leader for 3rd squad. Although he is Gr I no one knows that so their morale returns to normal.

Though the battle was fun it was not what I was looking for in my village sweep scenario for Middle of NoWhere. This was more of a set piece battle; not asymetrical. I have adjusted the scenario's enemy forces so they have fewer on board at the start and will have a higher chance of snipers next time. I want to capture the flavor of searching a village, not fighting to get into one. Still, for those of you that want to play this battle the VC had the following all on board at start:

3 squads (1 AK 47 2 mixed) 2 Gr II leaders 1 Gr I leader 2 Nl morale squads 1 -1 morale

1 LT Gr II

1 MMG in bunker

1 60mm MTR

1 booby trap, 1 rice cache, 1 arms cache

Enjoy

Joe

Villiage Sweep of Dung Heip

2012-01-18T14:07:00.000-08:00

Played a Middle of NoWhere scenario last weekend. Used my 1st Cav platoon and got to use my FOW US and NVA dice I got for Christmas!! (Told you before I am a dice junkie) This is my ninth battle with these guys. They are a solid platoon with SSgt Davis their true leader and the LT a good guy. #rd squad is weak as is Sgt Colton but no one can really figure that out yet. Their original platoon leader was kicked upstairs to become the company commander. Blogger still killing me with pictures so this is part I

Capt Jaroz brought the LT and SSgt Davis in. We have hot intel that their is an arms cache in a small village not far from here. I want your platoon to crank up and search the village before this leaks out. Can you leave in an hour?Middle of NoWhere scenario last weekend. Used my 1st Cav platoon and got to use my FOW US and NVA dice I got for Christmas!! (Told you before I am a dice junkie) This is my ninth battle with these guys. They are a solid platoon with SSgt Davis as the backbone and the LT a good guy. 3rd squad is weak as is Sgt Colton but no one can really figure that out yet. Their original platoon leader was kicked upstairs to become the company commander. Blogger still killing me with pictures so this is part I

Capt Jaroz brought the LT and SSgt Davis in. We have hot intel that their is an arms cache in a small village not far from here. I want your platoon to crank up and search the village before this leaks out. Can you leave in an hour?

Characters

Lt McSwain Optomistic/movies Gr II

SSgt Davis Meek/ Wealth Gr III Brilliant Leader 1st SQ morale +1
Sgt Lawrence Gambler/ greed Gr II 2nd Sq 1/2 squad absent
Sgt Colton Cunning/Family Gr I 3rd sq -1 morale
Capt Jaroze Cheery/ movies Gr IV Brilliant Leader Company CO
1/2 of second squad absent because it was pulled by battalion (LtCol Patterson dislikes the platoon) Capt Jaroz countered this by adding a 3rd MG for this mission so every squad will have one. He has also decided he would like to ride along on this one.
1 Huey gunship for support. Nor artillery or Air Strikes authorised
The plan was to land at a LZ near the village. Had to search 3 buildings and the rice paddy.

LZ is top left of photo
WHAT IS YOUR PLAN LT???
Lt McSwain decided to have 3rd squad approach the village through the rice paddy. 2nd squad, since it was reduced, would take a hog and occupy the hill to the left of the LZ and provide covering fire. 1st squad would be held in reserve.

Sgt Lawrence runs into a VC squad in front of the hill
and becomes pinned down

2nd squad ran into VC and was pinned down immediatly. 3rd squad also ran into rifle fire from the rice paddies and promptly became pinned. Lt McSwain went to rally 2nd squad and Capt Jaroz saw that Sgt Coulton was incapable of rallying 3rd squad. When a MMG opened up on 3rd squad from a bunker off to the left the squad broke and ran for the LZ leaving 3 men down.

Now on to part 2

Joe

Punative Raid part III

2012-01-12T14:26:00.000-08:00

The last installment! Please start by reading installment I posted 2 days ago.

We left off with Voss on the left having beat off the Welsh calvary. The Hirdmen in the center gave way under the direction of a gold helmeted warrior named Carnif. Krog is in the back with several Bondi who are reorganizing after putting to the spear some Javilin throwers.

The 2 surviving hirdmen look across the field

at Carnif

Voss starts to plunder the barrles. The hirdmen failed their morale so Krog sends them to the rear. With the Teulu fatigued he gathers his bondi and charges the Gold helmeted warrior!

While Krog matches Carnif blow for blow his

Bondi are no match for the Teulu.

They fall and Krog retreats alone

Carnif, smelling victory, follows!

Krog- outnumber 6 -1 falls after dispatching 3 but it takes

2 rounds of combat.

During the second round the Hirdman move up but are far away.

Voss, seeing Krog in trouble, drop the barrels but the variable movement

goes against Krog and the Bondi are late! (tense die roll that was!)

Voss shows up moments after Krog falls. His enraged troops

Dispatch the Teulu but loose all but Voss in the process.

Voss triumphs over Carnif!

He rushes over to Krog and finds him still breathing

(Hey, it is my story!)

Relieved he does a very Ahistorical thing

He leaves the still breathing Carnif in the field

Lifts his sword towards the village and

lets out a blood curdeling viking yell.

Then the Hirmen carry Krog back to the beach

Great game and the system seems to be working well. Have yet to test battle boards for the Normans or the Saxons. If this works hhope to pen an article for WI.

For those interested in trying the scenario here are the Welsh forces:

Carnif Gr II leader AC 4 start on board

10 Teulu AC 4 enter turn 4

10 Priodaur AC 4 start on board

8 Priodaur calvary AC 4 enter turn 4

12 Javalins Bonnedigs AC 3 start on board

3 SAGA dice until turn 4 then 5 SAGA dice.

Enjoy This weekend it is back to the jungles of Vietnam and the Middle of NoWhere!

Joe

Punative Raid part II

2012-01-12T13:45:00.000-08:00

This time I could only get blogger to load 3 pictures I think. Also I forgot to mention that if you want to read about Krog's son go to Oct 2011 and read about Olveg.

Last time we talked the Hird men had just clashed with the Welsh Priodaur infantry. They easily beat all 10 off losing only 2 Vikings. Before they could make anymore headway towards the great hall...

Fierce Welsh lead by a tremendous fighter in a gold helmet

These men were Teulu lead by the Welsh chief. The hirdmen, without Krog went down, losing 6 men though the Welsh lost many.

Meanwhile towards the barrels...

Calvary stike at Voss' Bandi

Voss manages to beat off the attack loses only 1 man!!

The cavary attack near center
The hirdmen just lost at the house
Krog back with the bandi far right

Now part III

Enjoy

Joe

Punitive raid on a Welsh villiage Part I

2012-01-10T14:55:00.000-08:00

Have been experimenting with SAGA. It is a fast and bloody game system. I reviewed the system earlier and my opinion still stands. It is an excellent game that has simple mechanics. It has some period flavor of the dark ages. I will also re state it is much harder to make a good game with simple mechanics than it is with complicated mechanics.
I am attempting to inject more period flavor as I do more reading of the dark ages. I have tones down teh battle boards, added variable movement (love this and great for solitaire gamers) and a simple leadership system and morale. It seems to be working.    Here is a battle report. It is broken into several parts because Blogger's new system of uploading photos doesn't work as well as the old and I can't seem to load more than 5 photos at a time!
Note my figure scale is 2 men per figure.

Krog intended to punish those Welsh. His youngest son had wandered off near their lands looking for Bacon and they had ambushed him and killed him. NOW THEY WOULD PAY!
His forces include
KROG       Grade II warlord
10 Hirdmen AC 5
16 Bondi AC 4     Voss   Gr I LT

5 SAGA dice

Mission      Burn main building    and steal 2 barrels ( I don't have any livestock painted) and bring back to the beach

Map

Beach far center of board

Main Hall is near left

Krog, what is your plan?!?!?!

Krog decided he would lead with 2 groups of 8 Bondi each followed by his Hirdmen. His trusted LT woudl anchor his left with the Bondi. Voss would screen his left and go for the barrels. The right bondi would make for the village with the hirdmen following.

Bondi ambushed with javilins right off the beach!

The vikings roared but the snow was deep and they were slow to move up the steep hill. (variable movement killed them here as they moved agonizingly slow.) Krog finally had to get them moving personally to chase the welsh offthe slope. He then detached 6 to go after them!

Voss chased some more skirmishers away off to the left. With a gap now present Krog was aware that time favored the welsh who could call on more villagers to oppose the landing. With his bondi in disarray, he sent his hirdmen into the town to burn the great hall.

Hirdmen enter the town

Skirmishers from the hill pay the ultimate price!!

As the hirdmen move towards the great hall priodaur infantry leap to the attack!

Stay tuned for part 2!!!!!!

Enjoy

Joe

Happy New Year!!

2012-01-08T06:57:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year!   Hope you had a great holiday season.
Have been sick most of the holiday so few games to report.   My parents came over and my son was back from university so it was still a great time. Gaming gifts I recieved some vietnam terrain and some norman figures for my dark age gaming.
Thought I would take a look forward at all the projects I am working on.   A few of these should see print this year!
Squadron Forward     No introduction needed for this.   Rich started on the draft last week. I need to finish up the mission tables and medals. Should be out by end of Feb. Really excited about this.

Middle of NoWhere   The asymetrical warfare expansion to Platoon Forward.   Should add about 6 scenarios and tweak the tables to cover anti partisan operations in WW II and Vietnam. 3 of the scenarios are done and playtested. Need to work on the other 3 and playtest the table tweaks some more. Hopefully out end of year if I can get Rich to publish it (Haven;t shown it to him yet)

Bling the Hun   My variant for Bag the Hun.   Includes how I attempt to differenciate all the different models of aircraft and tone down the "one plane gets to move 3 times a turn" bit. Includes an updated damage table and takes into account cockpit armor/ self sealing fuel tanks, rates of climb and dives, turns and how hard it is to land!   Basically "Lazy TW&T" for BTH 2". 80% done.    Will shoot for the summer special; if not the christmas special

Release the Hounds My coastal action naval rules. TW&T meets MBTs. 85% done but it needs something to be finished; not sure what it is yet. They are a decent set but they don't always give you the "wow" factor so I would not release them yet to the public. It is the damage model.   I am finding it hard for it to work easily for both MBTs and CLs without any record keeping. The rest of it works great including the personalities.    Don't know if this will be a full set of rules or a special.   Depends how long they are.

Flotilla Forward Platoon Forward for Naval actions.    Still on the drawing board

SAGA variant Have added variable movement, minor morale,leaders and tone down the battle boards.    Playtesting now. 50% done.    Hope to have an article in WI before the end of the year.

Warband Forward Platoon Forward for Dark Ages   Still on the drawing board.    Need a clean set of Dark Age rules where people live first!    Rich if working on a set so we will see...

Bombers Forward Expansion to Squadron Forward.   Adds Bomber squadrons and missions to Squadron Forward.   Still on the drawing board.

That is all the stuff in my mind at the moment. Finished a SAGA game today which I will post this week.
Any comments on the above are welcome. I really appreciate your support!
Thanks and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Joe

For want of a nail The death of a Marine Aviator

2011-12-15T13:43:00.000-08:00

Have been busy with Squadron Forward and with painting my Welsh. Several weeks ago was a guest at the Honorable Artillary Company in London for a formal dinner. The English do fomal military dinners well and most of the US traditions actually date from the English. The Honorable Artillary Company was formed before the ECW and have a very nice museum. They are also an active regiment.

The Hall where we entered

I wonder if these folks are gamers?

A fabulous time with a string quartet, horn and bagpipes. All my other pictures have folks in uniform but it was a grand time and I would like to thank the British officers for sponsoring the event.

Corsairs arrived in Guadicanal early 1943. My Jolly Rogers are a Corsair squadron in the 'canal. They have flown 2 missions and not faired particularly well. This is where squadron reputation comes into play. They have 4 kills against 2 losses. Not terrible but they are flying Corsairs against Zeros and Vals. Squadron Reputation helps level the playing field.   That kill ratio would be great for my Greek 18 Mira flying PZL 24s but for the Corsairs it is average.

Capt Sanford was leading a patrol of 4 planes up the slot this morning. The squadron was light on experience so he was taking his XO and 2 of the more experience 2LTs. If he and the XO bought it 1LT Cohen could step in as he already had 2 kills.

Capt Sanford     Pleaseant/ wealth        Veteran
1LT   Johnny Lightning    Naive/ alcohol
2LT Sam Jones    Lazy/ Position
2LT   Rick Brown   Coarse/ Hedonism

During the flight up the slot LT Jones noted his manifold was not working properly. He radioed in to lead and after a brief discussion it was decided that the engine was running smoothly enough that he would not abort. Capt Sanford really did not want to be down to 3 Corsairs facing an unknown enemy. It was just manifold pressure and it did not seem like it would impact any battle.

I am sure you have all heard the story of a horse that has a loose horseshoe and it is not fixed for want of a nail. No one thinks it is too important; afterall, it is just a horseshoe on a horse. Well eventually the horse is placed in a critical position, either moving supplies or carrying a king, and slips and falls off a bridge due to failure of the horseshoe. Thus ends the kingdome or the battle.   Thus the phrase, " For want of a nail..." Keep this story in mind as we think of this simple manifold on the Corsair engine. Afterall, it is just the manifold and the engine is still working...

While on patroll the flight gets information that there are Vals coming down the slot and they are vectored towards an intercept!

Capt Sanford moves in from 5 o clock

Since Capt Sanford gets good position on the Vals he decides to have each element go after a trio and deal with the escort as they appear. The american aim is poor however with 1 Val damaged and 1 Val going down to the Captain's 6 brownings. Lt Jones is able to keep up so far. The 3 Zero escort, caught in front of the Vals whips around and come after the Yankees.

Zero tailing Lt Brown

A Zero quickly slips behind Lt Brown and before anyone knows it his corasir is spinning towards the Pacific. A good chute is seen...

Squadron Forward has a random event called a "Gut Check". It is a morale check for an individual pilot. It is modified by many things to include leadership, character and plane status. Guess who had to take a Gut Check? Lt Sam Jones. Guess who missed passing by 1? Guess what modifier I gave to a corsair with a bad manifold? Now most men in combat won't run away, they don't want to leave their buddies in a lurch. They just don't want to expose themselves to much danger. Thus Lt Jones moved to the edge of battle and was hesitant to mix it up. This caused two things: Capt Sanford lost his wingman and the Jolly Rogers lost a Corsair in the thick of the fight.

As Jones circled the battle a Val approached him. He lined up a deflection shot and it went spinning into the ocean!

Towards the end of the battle Capt Sanford was in trouble. He had a zero on his tail and took hits to his gas tank and was leaking fuel. Lt Jones came over to assist but was no longer in formation and still was watching his own six more than Sanfords. Another Zero joined the fray

two on two

Leaking fuel and no wingman, Capt Sanford was in trouble. The inevitable happened.

For want of a nail...

The fuel ignited and a large explosion ripped the sky. The death of a marine aviator.

The loss of two corsairs for 2 vals and 1 damaged was a clear loss for the Jolly Rogers. They lost another cool point and their reputation is down by one. No one notice Lt Jones' actions in the heat of battle, particularly when he came home with a kill. Lt Brown was rescued and will miss one mission.

The Group commander decided the Lts are too junior to lead a squadron moving in the wrong direction so pulled strings and brought in an old flying buddy of his known throught the Corps, Scottie McBride. Scottie is an idealist when sober and tough as nails. He is currently a Captain but has been many ranks due to both his idealism and his alcoholsim. He has 3 kills in Wildcats ( I so badly wanted to roll up an ace but all I got was a veteran!), has the leadership trait and ironman trait. We will see if he can pull the squadron up out of its dive. Should be a blast to find out!

For those of you that want to play the battle the forces rolled for the Japanese were:

9 Vals 3 Zeros 1 Vet, 1 Avg and 1 rookie.

Zeros start in front of Vals 1 altitude up

Corsairs start at the Vals 5 o clock half the max spotting distance away acording to your rules. The Japanese Vals are spotted. The Zeros are not. The americans are not. American altitude is player's choice.

Enjoy and Merry Christmas

Joe

Blue tails over Frankfurt

2011-11-28T13:54:00.001-08:00

Have been working on the mission tables for Squadron Forward. Unlike Platoon Forward, almost each model of airplane will have it's own table and this will vary by year and theater. For example, a ME 109 in 1940 would have a differnt mission profile than in 1945!
Rich and I are going to start working in earnest on Squadron Forward after the Christmas Special. I hope to have the finished product end of January or Feburary. Like Platoon Forward, Squadron Forward is the way I play my games so hopefully you will enjoy it!

I visited The Eagle pub in Cambridge last week. It is an authetic WW II pub used by the RAF and 8th AF pilots. The food was good and reasonably priced and they have an aviation room.

Stray person in front of Eagle pub

So despite my finishing up my vikings this weekend, I played a battle with my P-51 blue tails. This is thiee 4th battle and they are a hard luck squadron with a poor reputaiton. They were bounced by FW 190s and lost their CO on the first mission. On their third mission they missed the rendevouz with the bombers!
I roll up a mission and get escort strategic bombers.

Capt Anderson looked at the thread going all the way to Frankfurt. This was a long mission for the bombers in March of 1944. He was to lead a 6 ship and pick up the bombers on the way back from the target. Maj Franklin, the CO, drilled into his head not to his the rendevouz! The other squadrons were still laughing. The weather was clear today which should make it easier.
Pilots
Runway Anderson   Naive    Government
2lt   Pierce McKennon    Mecurical     Family

1Lt Pudge Storch     Coarse    Government        Veteran 1 kill
2LT Chance Blake    Cocky   Hedonism

2LT John Turlock Cunning Government    1 kill
2LT Pete Thornell Shy wealth            1 kill

On the outbound leg Chance had trouble with his oxygen so aborted; down to 5 planes. [ In real life most pilots didn't realize problems with their oxygen and just dropped out of the sky. SF is not that realistic! We want you to have a chance with your pilots.] Runway breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the bomber stream heave into view right where it was suppose to be. Rendevouz on time!

Blue tails with their charges

An interesting thing happened in rolling up the enemy fighters. I got bomber destroyers 6 ME 110s armed with rockets, and fighter cover, 3 ME 109Gs. The germans had obviously been watching because they attacked the bombers directly opposite the blue tails. [this sequence is all handled by the rules] Outmanuvered again!!

Germans start their attack.

Pudge is to the right

Runway kept his element above to tackle the ME 109s and sent the other 3 down to tackle the ME 110s. All the german fighters fired rockets before the blue tails could react. Fortunatley they all missed. Runways' wingman has a reputation for getting "lost" during the action but stuck to his side this battle. They were able to damage 2 of the ME 109s and quickly drive them away.

The melee continues

Next Runway did a split S and got behind a ME 110 with his new 6 gun P-51. As bullets streamed into the german he began to burn.

Runway using all 6 guns

As the german dove away he exploded. Runway had his first kill! Next he heard a call for help. Pudge was in a bind. His wing was about to fall off so he had no manuverability and he had a ME 109 on his tail.

Pudge in trouble

Decreased manuverability denoted by the brown pipecleaner

on the stand

Tailing status denoted by the pipecleaner between the two planes

[Pudge did not have a wingman this battle as Blake aborted. I let him go solo as he was the only veteran pilot in the group. I have a warm spot for him because he was the first pilot in the squadron to score a kill. I really wanted him to score this battle and become the leading scorer again. Nervewracking this game is...]

Runway raced over to Pudge and drove the german off his tail!

Meanwhile, the ME 110s had downed 1 B-17 and damaged 1 other. Turlock and Thornell had lined up on a pair of ME 110s when the back gunner damaged Turlocks engine.

2Lt Turlock's chance at a kill thwarted by a well placed bullet

2Lt Thornell followed the other ME 110 down scoring hits but became concerned that he was going to become sandwiched between the two 110s and gave up the chase. [amazing when you become attached to these guys how you act]

The rest of the mission over the contenent was uneventful. Over England it was raining...

The three undamaged fighters set down without a problem. 2Lt Turlock nursed his plane home, skidded off the runway but was otherwise fine. [There are tables for all of this as well] Capt Anderson had trouble keeping trim and altitude with his aircraft but made it safely to the field. The slick runway did not help. He crashed midfield trying to land. He was pulled out alive and Doc Thompson said he will fly again. [We always knew he was a tough, if naive, SOB.] The plane is a write off.

Great game! It was a victory for the blue tails because if you are outnumbered at least 3:2 you can lose 1 bomber and still claim victory. We scored 1 kill as well and ended up gaining 1 cool point which puts us just under average.

Post game     Capt Anderson became a veteran pilot [ AKOT handles this]. His naive ways in the hospital have won over Doc Thompson whose obnoxious style gave a -1 modifier to all previous rolls.   We are up to neutral with the Doc now 2Lt Turlock did not become a veteran pilot but he did get promoted to 1Lt largely due to the wing commander liking him. Lastly 2LT Gray has joined the squadron. He is a pessimistic young man who believes in the great crusade [government] and he is a rookie pilot.

Really enjoyed the battle and how Squadron Forward is shaping up. The characters and stories are great. But I really like not having to figure out the mission I am going to fly each time.  Who should I fight? How many? Should this be an escort or a strafing mission? I just decide I am going to use my blue tails and the system takes care of the rest. I hope you guys like it. As stated, it is how I play my games.

Joe

A Short War; Egypt 1940

2011-11-02T15:53:00.000-07:00

Actually did get to play Platoon Forward last weekend while I continue to paint more Vikings for SAGA. Started a brand new platoon--british 1940 in Egypt.

SLT Nelson stood on the rampart trying to peer through the perfectly laid Italian smoke screen.   What the Major had feared had happened. "The Italian army was on the move and we have damn little to stop them! Leftenant, take your platoon to this station here and delay them while we set up a defensive postion 6 miles back. See if they have any fight in them. You will have a 2 pdr with you and I will try to scrounge an armored car or two."

Characters

SLT Richard Nelson    Sensible/ arts         Gr II
Sgt Johnny Smith   Optomistic/Position     Gr I   1st section
Cpl Egg Southcote Conformist/wealth     Gr II      2nd section
Cpl Joey Crocket   fanatic/hedonsim       Gr I       3rd section

2 in mtr          2 pdr gun 1 FO with 25pdr gun off board

Looking towards the british lines

Nelson deployed the ATG on his far right [ left in the photo above], 2nd section in the station with Egg down below and himself above with the bren team. 2 in Mtr and FO on the road. Sgt Smith in the center building ready to reinforce either way. 3rd section was split. The bren team was dug in at the turn of the road and Joey took 4 men and a ATR and hid in the building hoping to ambush some armor and then skeedadle back to the lines.

A perfect smoke screen was laid in front of the central buildings as the Italians probed forward.

Italian AC comes within 20 yards of Cpl Crocket's position!!!

The AT rifleman's shot rang true and the armored car was knocked out. The accompanying infantry started peppering the building as Joey started whis withdraw. One man went down as they made it back to their bren team.
The Italians were not able to make much headway and SLT Nelson was feeling confident, particularly when a british AC showed up and began to rake the Italian infantry with 303 shot. [Cool random reinforcement!]

Then an Italian tank and 2 infnatry squads showed up on the right flank. The 2pdr quickly dispatched the tank and his bren team was keeping the Italians at bay when suddenly an officer rose in front of them and they seemed to rise in unison and charge through the bullets towards the station!

AC retreats after MG breaks!!!!

Italians charge the Station!!

Italians reach the station and take the ATG!

1st section is too late to reinforce

The Italinas drive 1st section away and enter the station proper leaving SLT Nelson trapped on the roof with his bren team. In the courtyard desperate fighting breaks out as Egg fights to get back to the stairs.

Italians pour into the courtyard

Egg is repulsed. As this is occuring, a green flare is sighted from the east. That is the signal for the platoon to pull out of their postions and board transport. Their job is done.

Sgt Smith takes charge. He orders Cpl Crocket's section out as they are down to 50% effectives. He and Egg have one more go at the the station but the Italians have moved up a MMG and it is no use. Fearing encirclement he pulls out the rest of the platoon.

SLT Nelson defends the roof but it is just a matter of time. He has 3 men with him against 18 Italians downstairs. His force takes two down but then he loses one. With honor intact; he surrenders thus ending a very short war.

The Station under new ownership!

Great game! I played the delaying action and it looked like an easy win for the british because I could not drawn the Italian LT's command card. [ he was leading the flank attack. He started out a Gr III leader but a random event upgraded him to a Gr IV outstanding leader] Once I started drawning his card the Italians caught fire and never looked back.

Post game 3rd section has had a drop in morale and we will be getting a new SLT.

For those of you that want to play the scenario the Italians initially had

2 squads, 1 MMG and an AC with 1 Gr II leader and 1 GR I leader. They also get 2 pre game stonks from a 75mm gun that can be used for smoke. They also can have 3 fire missions during the game.

According to the scenario rules a flank attack will occur. This consisted of 1 tank plus 2 squads with 1 gr III leader, 1 Gr II leader and 1 gr I leader. I modified the scenario for the desert by adding 2 "C"s to the mix.

Enjoy

Joe

Something Completely Different-- Olveg the Bacon Lover

2011-10-26T14:54:00.000-07:00

Since moving to England I have become interesested in the Viking Invasion of Great Britain. I actually stepped out of my comfort zone ( WW II ) and purchased some Dark Age figures. I wanted some skirmish rules. I finally settled on SAGA from Gripping Beast as they seemed to have character even if they seemed a bit gamey for my ususal taste. [ I am completely historical non gimicy type of gamer. Doesn't have to be complicated but I don't like rules to force my actions. I am also big on Command and Control. Hence my affinity for TFL products but even here I slightly modify all their rule sets; usually streamlining. ]

I finally had enough figures for a very small skirmish which I played twice. So I thought I would report the story and give you my impressions of the rules. I apologize to my WW II readers who only want that. I hope to get a desert platoon Forward battle in this weekend. STOP READING NOW.

Olveg loved bacon. He particularly loved Welsh bacon. He had his friends had been going over to the neighboring farms and stealing pigs for several weeks now. It was easier than raising them yourself. He and four of his friends decided to go and grab some today. What he didn't realize that was that the Welsh farmers did not appreciate it and decided it had to stop.

Characters

Vikings
Olveg and 4 friends        Vikings      Hirdmen    (AC 4)

Welsh Farmers 8 split into 2 groups Priodaur armed with javilins and swords    (AC 3)

SAGA had 3 classes of warriors that are elite, good and peasants. Their fighting abilities and armor are tied to their classes. Those of you with the game can see I uncoupled the armor from their classes. As a soliaire gamer I don't have to worry about points but it does have a points system.  As written, elites appear very, very good and peasants appear to be used to wear down your opponent. It appears this is easily modified however.

Olveg preparing to cross the river and teach

these cowardly Welsh a lession!

Activation is done by rolling SAGA dice as players take their turn in sequence.   These are special dice that you do not need at all. The game is easily played without them. [That said as a dice junkie I will probably buy some as I think it will add period flavor. Afterall, you could also play the game without miniatures!] You earn dice and then roll them. You then allocate dice to activate units and to use nation specific abilities. For example if you roll well the vikings can add 1 to their armor class against missle attacks. Some of these are neat but some appear gamey to my tastes. As an example, the vikings may also eliminate 3 of their warriors and gain 3 attack die per figure. It is apparant that dice management is an important aspect of play. Since the dice are not hidden from the other player this is not a big hinderence to the solitaire player. I suspect the battle boards that are used with the dice are finely tuned to give an even game. Since I am a solitaire player that is not a high priority for me and I will be modifying the battle boards to downplay the gamey factors.

Olveg appraoched the ford and roared at the four Welshmen to stand down.   He was met by a rain of javilins! The first time 3 of his compatriots were cut down!! The second time one of his friends was taken by surprise as javelins also appeared from his left and entered his side.

Combat in SAGA is elegantly simple.   You roll against the armor class with a D6. Your opponent gets a saving D6. If he fails your warrior is down for the count.   Except for the danish axe and cross bow there is not weapon differenciation. If I knew more about dark age combat this would bother me. Right now it does not.

With his friend bleeding from his side, Olveg charged across the ford prepared to make the farmers pay!

Iron rang against iron, wood and bone. Two Welshmen payed the ultimate price but one Viking went to his maker. These men did not fight like farmers and Olveg was suspecting a set up. The 2 warriors scampered towards the rocks.

Olveg hesitated. He had 3 men against an unknown number of Welsh in the rocks. But his friend was dead, this was a test game and he wanted bacon!

After any unit melees it gains Fatigue. If a unit moves more than once it gains fatgue. Fatgue decreases a units effectiveness if an opponenet wants to use it. Alternatively, it can be accumulated and when it reaches a certainly level the unit becomes exhausted. I believe this is a subtle mechanic that I have not fully explored yet but I love the concept. There is no morale per say in SAGA. I thought I would want it but in a heroic game such as this the jury is still out.

Olveg ambushed amoung the rocks!!

Olveg attacked the Welsh but they threw ambush with their SAGA dice. A bit gamey but here it worked with the storyline. He could have not attacked but then the game would have ended, where is the fun in that!

As Olveg followed the Welsh fighters into the rocks they were jumped from above!!! 6 against 3. Now they were fighting for their very lives. His friends were cut down but not before they each took one of the tough Welsh with them. Olveg escaped the rocks and made it back to the river for the final showdown.

Bring it you pansies!!!

The epic battle swayed back and forth but the welsh fighters proved too tough for our bacon loving hero and he was cut down!

All in all a fun time that took 20 minutes each time. The game is desgined to be played with at least 4 groups per side. Anyone with the game that wants to play this sceanario I gave each side 3 SAGA dice. The Vikings can only cross the river directly in front of the Welsh. It would be interesting to try it with 6 vikings or to give them chainmail and see how they fair. (They weren't expecting a fight so didn't bring it)

In summary I think Mr Buchel and Gripping Beast have a great skirmish game on there hands. It is harder to make a game simple than to make it complicated. The dice mechanic is different and works. I will modify it to suit my needs. I will add variable movement, simple spotting and simple comand and control rules as well. For the solitaire gamer I think this game will work. It is not particularly solitiare friendly but it is not particularly difficult either. This game would do well with the Platoon Forward treatment. I think a solitaire friendly scenario generator and campaign game is very do able. Chris and I have talked about it and I will add this after Squadron Forward and Middle of NoWhere. Warband Forward anyone??

Enjoy

Joe

Ambuscade on Highway 2 1967

2011-09-29T14:36:00.000-07:00

Finally got some items unpacked and had some time to play a game. Read an excellent article in WI 286 entitled, "The Hard Ride" By Joe Trevithick and Piers Brand. It is about US convoy operations in Vietnam. What better way to test my ambush scenario from "Middle of NoWhere"? Please note I do not have all my terrain unpacked and do not have all my trucks unpacked. So excuse the german trucks and american halftracks! They are all trucks for this scenario. Using my US squad. We last saw them assaulting LZ Hotel which was posted in August 2010. (was it that long ago?)

SSgt Davis did not like it one bit. He was a soldier not a baby sitter. Guarding a convoy was like being a target. Still orders were orders and the LT said this stuff was important. Davis put Sgt Colton's squad up front in teh first 2 trucks. Colton and his squad weren't very good so if casualties had to be taken it might as well be them. Davis would follow up the rear with the 113.

Characters

    SSgt Davis   1st sq    Gr III Meek/Wealth   Dynamic leader
    Sgt Colton    3rd sq   Gr I    cunning/family
    1st sq +1 morale -2 men 1 MG attached   3rd squad -1 morale 1 MG attached
    1 jeep with 30cal    1 m113    5 trucks with 2 men each

Convoy rolling down Highway 2

As they slowed to take a bend in the road near Xuan Loc the silence was shattered and the lead trucked rolled over on fire. SSgt Davis got his men dismounted and started taking rifle fire from nearby trees across the road just as the second truck in line exploded.

NVA manned RR quickly finds 2 targets!

1st squad stumbles out of the trucks.

Luckly only losing 2

Sgt Colton tried to rally the squad but they started taking automatic weapons fire from the jungleline. He ordered the dazed men back to the buildings to rally. Meanwhile the jeep, and other trucks kept moving forward out of the kill zone.

Unusual for Colton, he rallies half the squad

and the MG.

The M113 found the range to the recoiless rifle and started a steady stream of fire that slowed the blasts from the jungle. SSgt Davis suppressed the rifle fire facing him and took his squad into the woods to investigate. Sgt Colton sent his half squad and MG team towards the jungle to supress the automatic fire there.

Most of 1st squad slugging it out

The jeep and 2 trucks made it off the table. 1 truck took LMG fire from the jungle and was knocked out. With 3 trucks destroyed and the rest out of the kill zone the VC/NVA broke contact and left the americans in control of the field and very frustrated.

Short, vicious, frustrating fight. Hard for the ambushee to win which is why this scenario was not included in Platoon Forward. But for a suplement on asymetrical warfare this is bread and butter. 3 trucks I would have considered a minor loss except the US caused NO casualties. Yep, in spite of copious ammunition expended the NVA walked away scot free. No blood trails today.

After the battle morale of the 2 squads did not change. The battalion commander (who does not like the platoon) has pulled 5 men for special guard duty. The company commander Lt Jaroze ( who use to be the platoon commander) will ofset this by giving the platoon an extra MG team on their next mission.

For those of you interested in playing the NVA forces rolled up where

1 75mm RR

1 NVA sq with gr I hesitant leader 1half squad VC squad semi auto armed -1 morale with gr I leader

1 VC LMG team with Gr II leader

It was fun to finally play a game again Now to unpack some more stuff!

Enjoy

Joe

Groupe de Chasse part Trois

2011-09-21T13:51:00.000-07:00

I finally have my computer after nearly 4 months!!!!!!! Am busy unpacking boxes. Before they arrived I sent off the first draft of Squadron Forward to Rich. He won't look at it for at least 2 weeks as he is up to his elbows in IABSM 3 but at least it is done.

Wanted to do a new ambush scenario for vietnam but there wasn't enough time or space yet so instead ran a third mission with my trusty french Hawks. Also I now can include some pictures to keep your attention.

Col Renard called Lt Leroy into HQ. "Lt, a reconnasense plane spotted german trucks near Saarbrucken moving supplies to the front lines. If you hurry we can give the Boche a nasty surprise. Remember, your mission is to take out the trucks."

Lt Leroy hurried back to the Escadrille and discussed the mission quickly with Lt Martin his right hand. they only had 6 planes operational. Leroy would lead the main strafer patrolle while Martin led the secondary. They would leave Cpl Chef Grasse behind as the new guy. A quick brief and they were off!

The 2 patrolles on their way to Saarbrucken

Lt Martin's Hawk (Heroic and Ros- not great model but painted up
pretty well I thought)

Shortly before the German border Lt Leroy sensed 3 ME 110s headed their way at their 5 o clock. Lt Leroy decided he would continue on and Martin should try to delay the Me 110s for several turns and then join him.

3 on 3

(the ME 110 on the left has an experimental camo scheme)

As Martin's Patrolle tangled with the Germans the new SLt (that had cheated at the academy) Caron missed his half loop and became separated. After several minutes Martin called to break off and head for Germany and Caron was lagging. Then Caron preceeded to try to line up shots at the ME 110s. Martin snapped off a direct order to move out as he wheeled his hawk back west to get his wayward charge. Caron duly broke off and headed east. Sgt Lisle continued east as well. As SLT Caron straightened his hawk out a ME 110 came up and blasted him from the sky. He managed to get out of the stricken fighter over no mans land as Martin saw a good chute.

Suddenly Lt Martin found himslef alone with 3 ME 110 fighters. While his hawk was more manuverable, the germans had a definite speed advantage.

The hunter becomes the hunted

Lt Martin called Sgt Lisle back for help but his plane caught several blasts of fire from the germans as he twisted and turned. His gas tank was punctured and his radio knocked out but he managed to escape west. He swore he would ask for censure of SLt Caron when he got back to base.

Lt Martin's adventure had allowed Lt Leroy's troupe to arrive over Saarbruken unscathed. They found their targets and went to work.

Lt Leroy's strafing attack. At this speed the trucks look like little

cardboard counters!

In 2 passes they damaged 3 trucks and Cpl Chef Prideux destroyed 2 while pinning infantry and AA. [Used my Brag the Hun rules]. SLt Brun's plane was hit by ground fire but took minimal damage.

The 5 Hawks made it safely back to base. I chalked it up as a minor victory for the French as they took out all 5 trucks, their primary mission, but did lose a plane.

Post mission Lt Leroy was finally promoted to Capitain, sealing his position as CO. While he has not upgraded to veteran pilot yet he has developed an uncanny sense as to where the enemy is. This would be called "radar like" if we knew what radar was! [eagle eye]. Lt Martin fumed about SLT Caron and waited for his return. After 3 days he began to worry and made several calls to front line units. A week later word was recieved through the Croix Rouge that SLt Caron was a POW with the Germans. Lt Martin was racked with guilt and lost his cheery disposition. Capt Leroy told him to forget about, Caron had it coming after what he did but Martin still felt responsible. The Flight Surgeon has grounded Lt Martin for 2 missions to work through this. [ Event rolled that grounded Martin for 2 missions; way cool!] A replacement pilot has also show up: Slt Challe a classmate of Caron's from the academy Pragmatic/religion and green.

We are down to 5 planes plus one in depot and 6 pilots plus Martin. Worse we have no veterans and our reputation is still average.

Great game as strafing for the Hawks is unusual to roll up. The system is a blast as the interactions affect the tabletop which is what I am after. If the squadron can hold it together for 1-2 more battles I think their experience will start to rise and then it should get easier.

Enjoy!

Joe

Groupe de Chasse part deux!

2011-08-30T19:00:00.000-07:00

Still no pictures but thought I would let you know how the second mission went. I won't be as specific as how Squadron Forward generated this stuff because you get the idea. If you have any questions though please ask.
It had started snowing so the morning mission had been scrubbed. Word came down for another patrol [ I still like patrols!] at noon. Lt Leroy decided on a maximum effort which meant all 6 pilots and 6 of his 7 planes. Shortly after takeoff Cpl Chef Prideux's plane had engine trouble and he had to abort. 5 planes left. Lt Martin took the Vic and Lt Leroy had SLt Brun as his wingman.
Over German lines they spotted 5 ME110s moving briskly towards France. {Like Platoon Forward the # of enemy fighters is adjusted slightly based on your number to give a balanced game. Purists don't need to make the adjustment but it isn't any fun to send 2 hawks up against 6 ME 109s!. Like PF, it can happen but it should be rare except on the russian front.} Once again the Frenchmen had the advantage and once again they moved to the 6 o'clock position before aryan eyes spotted them. While the ME 110s were not manuverable, the Hawk's light armament had a difficult time with the robust german planes. SLT DePaul was lost in an expolsion to a fuel tank hit. Sgt Lisle evend the score however. Lts Martin, Leroy and Brun all damaged fighters and Leroy claimed one that was denigned. Unbeknownst to the Chasses the ME 110s were on a mission to strafe some artillery positions and this mission was aborted. Thus it was a victory for the French.!

Post mission everyone celebrated Lisle's victory while mourning yet another KIA. Two new pilots showed up:
SLt Caron Corrupt/ revenge Green Military
(Caron graduated from the french military academy where his honor was questioned but a violation was never proven. He has vowed revenge on those responsible. He is a novice pilot)
Cpl Chef Grasse Agressive/position Green
(Grasse is a novice and realizes it. His goal is to become an Ace.)
In addition a new plane has showed up but this is somewhat offset by the fact that the plane that aborted the mission today needs major maintanence and will be off line for the next 2 missions.

Still having a blast. Hope to have the first draft done within 2 weeks. For those of you interested the 5 hawks set up in the ME110s six at 50% visual range. The german pilots generated were: 2 Veterans/ 2 Average and 1 green.

Enjoy and thanks for the support

Joe

Groupe de Chasse in the Phoney War

2011-08-27T14:25:00.000-07:00

If you read my post from yesterday you were introduced to my French Hawk squadron and a bit of Squadron Forward. Well I played a mission today and even though I can't post pictures I thought I would tell you about it as a way to explain a bit more about Squadron Forward.

First you roll up your mission. Unlike Platoon Forward each theater, year and often plane has its own table. After all, a ME 109 squadron in 1939 rarely had an intercept mission; in 1945 that is all it had! My Hawks roll up a patrol; excellent mission as anything can happen! So I decided to send out 2 Vics of 3 aircraft each. We will leave the DO and the kid at home. Take off will be at dawn (of course) and we will patrol the border and then return in time for a big breakfest!

The winter weather is scattered clouds. [ You roll for weather] While patrolling the border we discover the enemy has moved in flak around Saarbrucken and it comes uncomfortably close!
[There is a chance for a pre battle event. I rolled flak. Luckly no one was hit.] After 40 minutes we head for home dejected at this phoney war. But wait, in the distance, 4 shapes that turn into fighters and they do not see us! [ we rolled to see what we encounter {fighters} and then what type based on theater and year { ME 109Es}. Then you roll for where the encounter takes place. You then roll for the number which is modified by how many fighters you have to give a somewhat even battle { 4 }. After that you roll for who has the advantage and by how much. { we started at their 6 at just under maximum visible range}. This speeds up play considerably and takes care of the manuvering before battle. Now you are ready to set up the planes on the table and use whatever rules you like! { I use BTH 2} ]

Capt Durand manages a bounce on the German leader but his foe is an ace and shakes him off. A rookie german pilot is quickly cut off from the pack. Sgt Gravois sets upon him but can't get in a mortal blow. The german ace rides to the rescue and knocks Sgt Gravois out of the sky. There is no parachute. Capt Durand gets a kill and then latches on to the German aces' tail. He forgets the lessions he learned about target fixation as another german comes up behind him and shoots him down before he can fire. Alas, again there is no parachute. [ there are tables for bailing out, emergency landings and crash landing back at the field] At this point the Germans race back across the border.

All four remaining planes land a bit stunned by the ferocious encounter. Later that evening both bodies are recovered. Col Renard names Lt Leroy as the new CO of the squadron despite his lack of administrative prowess. [ For those of you familiar with AKOT it handled these matters.] He is not promoted but SLt Martin is and named the new DO. [ AKOT again] We get no new airplanes or pilots [ there are tables for this] and our scheduled event is to introduce SLT DeLarue as a NPC. He is the maintanence officer and is pessimistic but is an accomplished violin player [ the arts] He is neutral towards the squadron but can influence how fast aircraft are fixed. Hopefully Lt Leroy will have Lt Martin and not himself interface with SLt Larue!

For those of you who want to see if you can do better, have 6 hawks against 4 ME 109Es. The Es are driven by 1 ace, 1 veteran, 1 average and 1 green. They start in the schwarm formation. The Hawks start in 2 Vics, same altitude at the max visibility at the germans 6. They see the German's but the German's don't see them. It is not a true bounce yet as they still have to manuver closer and the germans have time to see them, particularly the ace and veteran.

Hopefully this has given you some insight as to what Squadron Forward is and is not. In additon, you get a scenario!

Enjoy

Joe

Update on Squadron Forward

2011-08-26T21:22:00.000-07:00

The site is not dead. It has just been a combination of not having my home computer yet (no picture posting capability) and very little time for gaming. Hopfully will get my computer within the next 3 weeks.
I have been a staunch WW II gamer for 4 years. But living in England with all the green fields, stone fences and really old houses is like a renassance fair every day. I have actually dipped my toe in the water and ordered a few dark age/early medieval figures. Had a short test run with some beta rules that Chris is working on and it was really fun! Who knows, maybe I will branch out.
But for now work continues on Squadron Forward. The first draft is two thirds complete. I am enjoying this as much as Platoon Forward. It has really personalized my air combat. I reciently painted up some P-36s for my French and rolled up my squadron today. Thought I would take this opportunity to share this with you since you don't need pictures for this part.
For those of you familiar with Platoon Forward, rolling up your squadron is similar except there are more characters. The personality tables have been tweaked a bit, motivation is the same, leadership has been replaced with fighting skill. Officers still roll up where they came from. Squadron Forward also adds the possibility of an additional inherent skill. There are seven of these ranging from crackshot to flying demon.
Since I play my games solitaire and use 1/300 planes I rarely have more than 12 fighters on the table at one time. Hence I only roll up 8 people per squadron. You can use more but I have found the system becomes impersonal after about 12. ( hard to remember more stories than that)
I present my Hawks Groupe de Chasse
Capt Durand cheap/Glutton Vet
(CO experienced, cheap with the budget and praise. NEVER bother him when he is eating)
Lt Leroy Foolhardy/Glutton
(loves to fly and eat/ really doesn't care about paperwork or the squadron)
SLT Martin Cheery/ position Vet
(Upbeat person who volunteers for additional duties hence does much of Leroy's job; the "go to" in the squadron and excellent pilot)
SLT Brun Pessemistic/wealth
(Solid pilot who feels the communists are ruining France)
SLT DePaul cunning/family flying skill
(Quiet person who appears to be always thinking; along with Lisle best pilot in the squadron)
Sgt Gravois Coarse/glutton
(Farm boy who is always hungry)
Sgt Lisle Foolhardy/position flying skill
(Natural born pilot; if he doesn't kill himself will be France's first ace)
Cpl Chef Prideux idealistic/revenge Green
("The Kid" in the squadron, going to rid the world of evil)

The group commander is Col Renard, a WW I ace who is unsuportive and already doesn't like the squadron!

As you can see, flying into combat with these folks should be a lot of fun. I already really like SLT Martin and Sgt Lisle. They are going out on Patrol tomorrow.

Thanks

Joe

Dark Night for Dog Boats AAR

2011-06-26T18:40:00.000-07:00

Greetings! Doing the final moving from the US to the UK. Read Coastl Patrol rules in the Lardie special. They look like a fun quick play set of rules; good show Jim! Thus inspired, I dusted off my Release the Hounds rules and tried my take on the scenario from the book.

Lt Ian Evershiem (RNR) took stock of his boat one last time. Intel had a convoy coming down the coast tonight with a light escort. Hopefully trawlers, maybe barges but not F-lighters. Ian didn't have a good answer to those yet. Draft too shallow for torpedoes, Jerry had added armor and concrete to barges, then added 88s to create a force to be reckoned with .

British forces are 3 Dog boats ( Jolly Jack Tars)
Lt Evershiem
SLt Tompkins
SLt Smith

I did not roll for Jerry to try to play the scenario. I didn't mess with blinds but used initative similar to Squadron Forward.
Jerry
2 Patrol Boats 1 88 each Raeder's men (Avg)
4 Flak Lighters 2 Raeder's men 2 Hitler's men ( green)

Jerry creeping down the coast

Lt Evershiem on the Hunt

Lt Evershiem had his eyes peeled for movement. A half moon hung in the sky and visability was about a mile for barges. Despite the cool night air he was sweating profusely.

Suddenly the air errupted with light and exposions and his boat came under fire from his 11"o clock. KuJ 324's gunners opened up on the Dog Boats as they radioed to the fleet of the danger. As Ian gathered his wits, a fire errupted aft and his boats started taking a pounding from 88mm and 37mm shells coming a mile a way.

Dog 1 in trouble

Ian immediatly doubled back as Smith broke right and Tompkins broke left looking for the merchants. Fortunately the germans did not pursue Ian but went after Smith. Why became apparent 3 minutes later when Smith sighted 2 barges.

Dog 2 trying to find the range

SLT Tompkins had circled far left and was now trying to join the battle. Ian was still in retreat; trying to fight a fire aft before it blew his small craft to kingdom come. SLT Smith gallantly charged the barges hoping they were not Flak lighters.

SLt Smith charges the F lighters

KuJ 324 in pursuit at 15 knots!

They were Flaklighters! Blast! Well the 6 pounders could still do damage. Smith bobbed and weaved his boat on a gun run and managed to damage one of the F-lighters. In return his boat was damaged and flooding. He turned for home. Ian had put out the fire but with a boat 50% damaged it was foolish to go up against Flak lighters. Lt Tompkins meanwhile had lined up KuJ 324 for a torpedo shot. He let go his torpedoes early at a mile and turned his attention to the damaged F-lighter. A gun pass revieled no significant damage to either side. But then a huge explosion (20% chance!) cut through the night.

KuJ324 after the Torpedo hit

She sank in 15 minutes

With that the British withdrew savoring a minor victory!

Fun game! Would like to play it again to see what would happen if Ian's boat is not put out of action on the first turn. Will also change it to 1 Flaklighter and 3 unarmored barges.

Have actually started writing down Squadron Forward.

Talk to you next from the UK

Enjoy!

Joe

Scenario R avaliable

2011-06-12T13:58:00.000-07:00

Scenario R is available in the Too Fat Lardies Summer Special. At the risk of sounding like an advertisement, they really pack alot of stuff into their specials for 5 pounds [ about $7 ]. I always enjoy reading them; even the bits about games and history I don't play ( which is minimal).

In the editing, Rich either forgot or wisely cut out my introductory comments; for the intrepid they are reproduced here:

The Scenarios included in Platoon Forward were aimed at typical situations that a basic platoon would face. That doesn't mean we can't have a little fun. Included in this issue is a meeting engagement that an armored infantry platoon might be faced with. It is ideal for the US and German panzergrenadiers as well as the UK motorized infantry. It also works well with Russian tank riders but you should beef up the defenders a bit by ensuring your first real "B" is a big AT gun or ensure your real "C" are tanks or SP guns. Players should feel free to substitute scenario R into the scneario table wherever they wish. I often put it in in place of recon; not because it makes sense, but because I often do not wish to play recon! [recce for the St Albans group!]
In addition, this is my favorite 2 player game because, like the patrol scenario, it never plays the same way twice, allows both players to manuver and everyone gets to play with at least a couple of vehicles.
I would like to thank those of you who have given me feedback on Platoon Forward. Your support and kindness have been more than I could have imagined. Thank You.

"Fighting Joe" Legan

Flank attack at the factory

2011-06-09T13:30:00.000-07:00

Finally got my soldiers; not all my terrain but you can't have everything. So last weekend had a chance to send my Russian Platoon Forward! This is battle #5 and this is a fun platoon to play. There is tension between the platoon leader and the 1st squad leader. This is not helped by the fact that the company commander seems to favor the squad leader. It is 1943 and the Platoon Leader is a replacement coming into the company. To catch up read about the attack outside of Kursk from last November posted on this site; I'll wait...

Still no camera so I will try to describe the board:

There is a factory in the center with a plaza in front. To the right is a small collection of buildings and on the left is a small church. Behind the factory are some scattered trees. To the left of the factory is a ruined railroad station. This is all on a beautiful Kalestra hexagon board that a least one visitor doesn't like :)

If you read the post from last November you know that a reporter from Pravda is here to do a story on Sgt Shakulo. Of course the CO is not going to let the JrLT mess this up so he is going to to make sure the reporter is not killed.

Characters

JrLt Bessonov Scholarly/plessure Gr II
Sgt Shakulo addicted/ alcohol Gr II
Sgt Chrnnyshov Evil/ knowledge Gr II
Sgt Mikhev conformist/ wealth Gr I

Lt Konerko Fanatic/ Position Gr II Company CO

Sgt Shakulo wished commerade Lennin was here. The Russian army in 1943 was not the classless society Lennin envisioned. These officers were driving him crazy! Oh, they had their place, doing grand strategy and such. They had gotten the platoon onto the flanks of the fascists today. But by and large they got in his way. JrLT Bessonov was a timid old woman. He was afraid of making a decision and was against a man having a drink now and then. Lt Konerko was better. But he was always trying to help him. Shakulo didn't need any help. He just wanted to rid mother russia of the invaders and go home to his family. Now this reporter was here asking hiim all kinds of questions. Lt Konerko seemed nervous.

By the time they got into position, a T-34 and an armored car had joined the platoon. JrLtBessonov's plan was to have Shakulo clear the houses on the right. 2nd squad would stay with the armor in the center and 3rd squad would be in reserve. As soon as the reporter said he was going wtih Shakulo the JLt decided he was leaving the reserve and going with Shakulo too. Shakulo tried to run his squad but the JrLT kept taking over. They cleared the first building easily. They became pinned down by a MG from the factory while advancing towards a second building. Lt Konerko showed up. He Ordered teh Jr LT to go back and rally 3rd squad in the plaza (the tanks had run into an 88 dug in near the church) while he shuffled the reported into the safety of a house. I got my squad moving again and barely missed capturing a MMG in the second house.

By this time 2nd squad and my own were in buildings facing the factory trading fire with its occupants which consisted of about a squad of germans supported by several MGs. We traded fire until Lt Konerko showed up with the reporter. The reporter wanted to see me and my squad "in action". Lt Konerko led our 2 squads in an assault on the factory. He told me he wanted my squad to go in first. Just as we were entering JrLt Bessonov showed up with 3 men from 3rd squad. He ran past me to make sure he entered the building right behind the Lt! Fighting in the factory was moderate until the germans retreated. The reported took my picture in the factory next to a russian flag that he had and left pleased.

Unfortunatly Sgt Mikhev was badly wounded in the attack. I don't think he will be back. JrLt Bessonov has moved Cpl Zuvich up to take over 3rd squad.

Great battle. The fighting in the factory was particularly exciting. We never even saw the company CP in the station. I am sorry I have no pictures for you all. The only other post game event of note is 3rd squad's morale is decreased.

For the scenario:
This is a flank attack (C) so set up the germans facing to the right. The russians recieve a T-34 and armored car at start.
The german forces generated for me were:
1 squad, 2 MMGs 1 88 ATG 1 company command post with 10 men with decreased morale.
1 Gr III leader, 3 Gr II leaders and 1 Gr I leader

Place a reporter figure on the board. It can never be more than 50 yards from Sgt Shakulo and Lt Konerko can never be more than 50 yards from the reporter. If the reporter is killed you can do no better than a draw.

Enjoy

Joe

Malta Spitfires AAR

2011-05-30T09:39:00.001-07:00

In the new house, internet appears to be working. Still no camera but a 3 day weekend. Went to the Duxford Air Museum in the UK; outstanding! Three cool things that differenciate it from most of the air museums in the US. First, it appears most of the planes are in working condition. Second they always tell you where this particular plane came from. Third they have a land warfare hanger that is over the top! They have life size diaoramas of a tank battle in Berlin, a german AT gun in France, british troops at D-Day. There is a shrine to Field Marshal Montgomery which was interesting since you here nothing about him in the states.
After Duxford I had to use Spitfires but I only have my desert ones as Mark from Raiden has been 2 weeks slow on my Battle of Britain package! So... Malta Spitfires round 2. (Same squadron as the last post)

Flt Lt Wilson rather liked running the squadron. He could do things HIS way. He had been at it for 2 days every since Cheese went missing near Sicily. Gp Cpt Eithing told him a CO was inbound from England but wouldn't get here for awhile.
He hadn't spoken to Sgt Randel directly after "Cheese's" last mission but several of the NCOs had. Randel had denigned losing "Cheese" on purpose and was sticking to the story. "Scrum" Patson had refused to fly with him. Wilson had avoided the issue so far by not scheduling Randel. There were plenty of pilots. Today's mission was an intercept. 5 planes were ready to go!
Characters
Flt Lt Jim Wilson Unsupportive/avarice Vet
F/O Jamie Farnsworth Cocky/ Avarice Avg
F/O Bullet Skeel Corrupt/ Position Avg
Green element
Sgt Scrum Patson Cocky/ religion Vet
Sgt Joey Towson Fickle/ enginering Avg

Jim saw the bombers off at his 10 o'clock closer than he wanted due to some clouds. Stukas without fighters! He turned to get behind them; Scrum asked to go over them to get in better position. Jim didn't really care as long as he got a couple of shots.
As all 5 spitfires closed Scrum called out 2 bandits 12 o'clock high! [ great place for a picture if I had a camera] Jim told Scrum to cover the bandits while blue flight took care of the 8 stukas.
As Jim continued to close on the Stukas, bullets hammered into his wing! He looked back and a MC202 was on his tail. [ I have to explain this as it was too cool. A random event had 3 more MC 202s enter right behind blue flight. I got bounced by my own game system!!] Bullet and Jamie screamed they were taking fire. The 2 outside Spits started tight turns while Jim did a snap roll. Bullet took a while to shake his pursuer needing several barral rolls but not before he had taken minor engine damage. Throttled back he could keep the temperature down but any faster and he risked over heating.
Meanwhile Scrum and Joey had tangled with the 2 original MC 202s and saw the furball developing behind the Stukas. Since no one was now calling for help they gave chase to the bombers. Joey downed one in a brilliant flash that left no doubt to its destruction. Scrum's shooting was off as he fired off all his ammo, damaging 2 that aborted. [nother great place for a picture]
The 3 members of blue flight could not break away from 4 of the Italian fighters to chase the bombers. Worse, Bullet's plane had a bad engine and Jim's plane had lost speed as well due to his wing damage. after several minutes the English could not gain an advantage, the bombers were nearing the field and Jim still had 2 out of 3 machines damaged. He told blue flight to break off and Green element to leave once they entered flak range. The British successfully disengaged. Only 4 Stukas bombed the target; 1 nearmissed teh runway, 2 destroyed parked aircraft and one destroyed the operations building.

Post game Sgt Towson was upgraded to Veteran [possible]. Doc Logan, the flight surgeon, is hearing alot of complaints about Flt Lt Wilson and is acting as a great sounding board. The Squadron had to undergo a morale check and he was able to add positively to the die roll. [Don't be alarmed about the term "morale checks'. Think of it here as a cohesivness check and it occures after the flying.] A replacement plane for Cheese shows up and one of the damaged planes is repaired.

Great Game! Really enjoyed it. Squadron Forward is working well and adds a layer to the game which really increases my enjoyment. I have started writing it down and am probably 25% done.

Scenario Interception

5 Spitfires vrs

2 MC202 2 Avg pilots
8 Stukas

3 MC 202s come in as reinfocements turn 3. 1 Vet 1 avg and 1 green Allow them to come in behind Blue flight.

Airfield defense I used 3 dice for heavy AA as per my LAAF AA rules found in 2 specials ago.

Hopefully my land troops will be here wednesday; then maybe I can visit Berlin with Platoon Forward!

Enjoy

Joe

Cheese is Packaged AAR

2011-05-15T11:30:00.001-07:00

Having trouble posting to the blog. Will try in short snippets
Still moving but have played 2 games of Squadron Forward. thought I would post one here as it does a good job explaining some of the interactions and showing the differences/similarities with Platoon Forward. The big drawback is I am without a camera so written word only! Sorry folks
[BTH2 used for the tactical game with my "Brag the Hun" air to ground rules used for the rockets and bombing.]

Malta 1942
"Cheese" came back from group HQ happy. An escort of Beaus to Italy to take out some barges that the intel lads had found hold up in a small port. He would lead the flight as he desperately needed flight experience. He would take Sgt Randell as his wingman. Sgt Randell walked teh line of insolence but there was no doubt he was the best pilot in the squadron. Cheese could not ask for help but hoped to learn from Randell just by watching. F/O Barnes was a steady lad as long as you let him hit the bottle every 3-4 days. He could take up the new pilot, F/O Skeel to check him out. Skeel's nicknam was "Bullet" and he had a gaze that chilled Cheese at first.
Characters
Sdr Ldr Cheese Landry Pessimistic/Hedonism Avg
Sgt Paul Randel Cocky/ Family Vet gifted pilot
F/O Paul Barnes Pragmatic/ Alcohol Vet
F/O Bullet Skeel corrupt/position

Rendevouez over Malta was easy and they headed out. Several miles from Italy the Beaus called out bandits at 8 o clock. " Should have seen them first" thought Cheese. His next mistake was delaying the flights split S (missed his roll ) which put the spitfires out of postion to intercept. During the delayed split S Randel lost the Sdr Ldr. [Difficult for a gifted pilot to do.] fortunatley the bandits turned out to be lightly armed MC 202s which had a hard time with the Beaufighters. they managed to take only 1 down. Sgt Randel, unencumbered with Cheese, shot down one fighter and damaged another. F/O Barnes bagged one MC 202. Sdr Ldr Landry gamely tried to find firing positions without success. towards the end of the battle a MC 202 got off a deflection shot that must have hit his petrol for his plane was seen to catch fire. A good chute was seen and later it was confirmed that Cheese had been packaged and taken as an italian POW.
The 5 Beausfighters ripped up the port sinking 3 barges, damaging 2 others, damaging a VP ship nad destroying one AA emplacement.

Scneario should include the 4 Spitfires, 6 Beaufighters and 5 MC 202s. The Port contains 6 barges, 2 VP ships (AA str 2) and several AA emplacements around the port. I rolled the Italians had 4 average pilots and 1 green. If using my "Everyone wants an Ace" for BTH remember that Avg Italians don't have to roll for hard manuvers.

Post misison squadron reputation went up by one. The squadron feels that Randel intentionally dropped off Cheese's wing to go hunting with dire consequences for Cheese. Randel is persona non grata currently. F/O Barnes was medically disquallified for 4 missions due to an ear ache but Doc Logan managed to cut that down to 2. the squadron still waits for a replacement spitfire and Lt Jim Wilson [ not popular as he is a greedy SOB] will temporarily at least run the squadron.

Great game and hopefully gives you a feel for it. Hopefully will get a chance to play some Platoon Forward next month!

Enjoy

Joe

Easter Update

2011-04-22T18:18:00.001-07:00

Apologize for the lack of updates. Fact is I have been doing little gaming. I have received orders for England and am getting ready to move. Good news is Squadron Forward is basically done. All I have to do now is write it down and begin the painful yet important process of haivng Rich Clark make it a better product. Next should be Middle of NoWhere and I am now starting to toy with Rifles Forward.
Would like to mention 2 games I did get in. The first was with my Italians (Sgt Bustamanti) in Kenya. They were soundly defeated by the British and there were no particularly interesting post game actions. A fun game but not a great battle report.

The Italian Attack.

Busta on the left.

This was as far as they got!

Staying with the desert theme I took 6 Tomahawks up from 111 SQN on a fighter sweep. Fighter Sweep is a great mission. It is similar to "patrol" in that you don't exactly know what will happen when you start.

Characters

Sdr Ldr " Puck" Poole Pessimistic vet 1 kill

F/O Jessie Oldfield jovial born leader

Sgt Ken Harrison foolish

2nd vic Lt Thurlby liberal 1 kill

Flgt Sgt Nick Skinner Generous Vet

Sgt George Turnhill Fanatic

Sdr Ldr "Puck" Poole was leading 2 vics on a fighter sweep when Dandoline came over the wireless. "Bandits 12 angles heading toward comet". Comet was a small convoy that was returning from Tobruk. Looks like they were going to earn there flight pay today! He only hoped he would get a chance to drink it.

He spotted the enemy far off and due to his experience, managed to get behind the stukas. "Must be italians" he thought. As he closed in he told everyone to break the vics and go for a stuka. He and Oldfield managed to do just that before the firing started.

"Puck" and Oldfield execute the bounce!

It was a one sided battle despite the prescence of 3 MC 200 fighters. "Puck" got 1 stuka and damaged another one. Flgt Sgt Skinner picked up both a stuka and an italian fighter. F/O Oldfield managed a hat trick with 2 stukas and a MC 200! Of the 6 Stukas only 1 reached the ships and he missed. Sgt Harrison was wounded during the battle and crashed landed back at base. He and his plane are reparable.

Nick takes out a fighter!

Post battle I tried to get F/O Oldfield promoted but this was denigned. Our reputation has increased and a junior staffer shows up next mission to fly with us! Lastly "Boomer" Balfour has returned form OCS and is now P/O Balfour but he wants the same respect he had when he was a Sgt!

Great battle. The Character system works well and the scenarios are fun and balanced. What I have found is that I really worry about putting some of my guys on a limb now. Unlike Platoon Forward, death is a more likely possibility for these guys, particularly over enemy territory or water. Oldfield is well liked in the squadron [jovial] and I can see everyone celebrating his hat trick. What if the next mission is a straffing mission of an enemy airfield deep in their territory?

Great fun with highs and lows!

Enjoy

Joe

Looking for Rango Yugoslavia 1942

2011-03-28T17:53:00.000-07:00

The only thing predictable about me is the unpredicatability in what I want to play next. This week it was back to Middle of NoWhere. I am painting up some CR-42s and Italian Ju-87 though. I would also like to thank Chris and Laffe for their excellent posts at PlatoonForwardStories. They are both interesting tales and I look forward to hearing more.

Am working on a dawn raid scneario so I thought it was ready for playtesting. Rather than Ethiopia or Vietnam I wanted to see if the system would work for partisan warfare in WW II.

Needed to roll up a platoon. As some of you know I am partial to Italians having lived in Italy for 2 years.

Lt Scapolini Cunning / Avarice Gr II

Sgt Musculin Foolish/ Alcohol Gr II 1st squad

Cpl Zern Pragmatic/ Hedonism Gr I

Sgt Gunesto Unsupportive /Religion Gr I 2nd squad

Cpl Tarentino Cheap / position Gr I

So, how to interpret the men above? As their story unfolds they will develop character but Platoon Forward gives us some basics now. The Lt is obviously a greedy SOB who will steal anyone blind yet he is very clever. He has some leadership ability on the battlefield. I suspect he was transfered to the "Middle of NoWhere" because he was caught with his hand in a cookie jar somewhere back in the world. Sgt Musculin is too trusting and fond of the bottle. When sober he knows tactics and his men will follow him. His ASL, Cpl Zern, is almost the opposite. His pragmatism has him learning tactics from his Sgt and following him on the battle field. Yet in the barracks I wonder if he takes advantage of his NCO's trusting nature?

2nd squad is led by a rigid Catholic who feels all his men will be damned if they don't follow the true faith by the book. He is unsupportive of any deviation and thus unpopular with the men and his platoon leader. His ASL sees what is happening in the squad but will not make waves as he is worried about making the next stripe. If the political climate changes he would gladly help the squad if it would help him...

Anyway, that is how I interpret the above. With a little imagination you can get alot out of 10 words!

The Capitano called the platoon leaders into his office. "Gentlemen, we have them now. We know where the battalion leader "Rango" is hiding. [Rango fought in the SCW] He is in these hills. We will hit them with a hammer and anvil at dawn tomorrow. Lt Scapolini, your platoon will be the hammer. Move fast to capture Rango alive. If you can't drive him south towards our other platoon. You will have an amored car in support. Questions?" Lt Scapolini was not going to drive anyone anywhere. He would capture Rango! With that on his record all past indiscresions would be forgiven and he would be reassigned to Roma. What is your plan LT?

The hills are alive...

Scapolini would send the AC down the road with 1st squad while he went with second squad through the field in a pincer movement hoping to get Rango in the middle. He stressed to his men that speed was critical.

Lt Scapolini [ left] advancing

Some sentries fired but were quickly driven off as both squads approached the hills. Then on the left, 1st squad ran into some dug in partisans with an ATR. One round bounced off the armored car and Sgt Musculin could not believe his eyes. The armored car started backing down the road! He ran over the the AC and questioned the commander's manhood. That did the trick.

Sgt Musculin and the armored car

Rebels on the left flank

2 LMGs and the AC laid down fire while Sgt Musculin worked his way around the flank of the hill. Meanwhile, Lt Scapolini had run into a bunker with a MMG. This cost him 5 men and Sgt Gunesto WIA. "No time for a bunker." He ordered smoke and bypassed the bunker looking for Rango.

Lt Scapolini bypassing the bunker looking for Rango

Sgt Gunesto is far right waiting for a friend to help him

Sgt Musculin finally makes it onto the left most hill.

Sgt Musciln clears the hill

Lt Scapolini finds a truck in the woods

Could it be that Rango rides in style?

The itialian LMGs fire into the woods and momentarily supress the partisans. Before Lt Scapolini can get down into the valley they have rallied and the truck drives off southward. He sees Roma farther away than ever. It doesn't matter that his platoon has scattered the partisans and they retreat in poor order or his platoon has sustained only 7 casualties. Rango was so close! Or was he?

The Capitano tells Lt Scapolini he is quite pleased with his platoon's performance. Turns out Rango was not there having been delayed in route. There had been a large food cache however that was captured thanks in part to Scapolini's platoon!

[ I would have used a wagon instead of a truck if I had one. Time to buy something else I think.]

Enjoy

Joe

The Colonel was furious! A FAAR AAR

2011-03-21T17:50:00.000-07:00

Capt Selei felt good walking back from HQ. His SQ was one of the best in the Fortele Aeriene Regale Romana (FARR) with a reputation of 3. LtCol Ulsei, his group commander, had just told him that they were picked to escort the FARRs brand new HS 129s on their first combat mission. He felt a flight should be able to do it as enemy activity ahd not been heavy. He would give Lt Anca, his DO, the honors since he himself had just come off a mission early this morning. Lt Anca was not particulary liked as he was a braggart, but he could back it up as he was a good pilot and had already downed a P-39 in 3 weeks of combat.
Characters
Lt Anca Cocky/religous Mustang Veteran Flight lead
Adj Stag Encioiu Pragmatic Green wingman
SubLt Marulus Pessimistic/ The Arts gifted flyer Veteran Element lead
Adj Stag Manoliu Agressive Lucky Average wingman

HS129s on loan to Romania because

the Germans were afraid they would

be used against Hungary

The weather was clear as the 4 ME 109Gs took off without incident. Shortly after climbout Adj Stg Manoliu radioed Lt Anca that his oxygen wasn't working. As combat rarely occured above 12K feet here in the east the Lt was tempted to keep Adj Stag Manoliu with the flight but flinally decided to send him home.

When the depleted flight got to the rendevious site there were no HS 129s!!!!! He loitered for severla minutes then proceeded along the mission course. Then he heard that the HS 129s were being attacked and his heart sank. How had he missed them?! He opened throttles and raced to the scene.

It wasn't pretty. 6 HS 129s against 5 P-39s and 2 LA -5FNs. 1 bomber had fallen and one had turned around, its pilot seriously wounded. The 3 Romanians charged in!

Lt Anca takes one down!

During the dogfight Lt Marulis managed to take 2 russian fighters down and a HS 129 claimed one as well.

A P-39 ace strikes back!

Lt Anca also damaged one fighter but half of the 6 HS 129s were not present for the attack run on the russian armor. To add insult to injury one of the armored bombers was shot down by flak leaving 2 to drop bombs and strafe.

One russinan tank blows up. From this angle only my beautifully

painted miniatures look like cardboard counters!

All bombs missed and the strafing was less impressive than I hoped. 1 tank damaged and 1 destroyed.

While Capt Selei was disappointed in the loss of the HS 129s he was happy that 3 ME 109s took on 7 USSR fighters and destroyed 3 and damaged 1 without loss. The SQ rep did drop by 1. Adj Stag Encioiu developed a sinus infection and will miss 3 missions. [He has flown 2 missions and it takes at least 4 before you can roll to loose your green status.]
LtCol Ulsei was furious!! He comes from a military family and does not like Lt Anca anyway. He brushed aside the fighter victories and stated that the mission was to protect the brand new HS 129s and to destroy the russian tanks. "Captain, you should have gone on the mission and not left it to a prior enlisted man. You have a good squadron. A leader must lead and pick good leaders like Florescu to lead as well." [ Lt Florescu comes from a military family as well. His dad served with LtCol Ulsei's dad in the great war. Lt Florescu also happens to be the leading scorer in the sq with 3 so it is not a bad suggestion. ]
So Capt do you replace your Director of Operations? Will that mollify your group commander?

Great battle. In retrospect I should have sent 6 fighers on the mission but I don't think it would have helped. We missed the join up [ 10% chance] no matter how many planes we had.
Hopefully this gives you a flavor of Squadron Forward.
For the Air to Ground I used my Brag the Hun rules found in the summer 10 Lardie special. Like all my stuff these are not ruleset specific. Use your to hit sequence and these will tell you about the damage.

Enjoy

Joe

YOUR blog is launched!

2011-03-15T17:26:00.000-07:00

Hey, we don't have to listen to Joe's

boring stories now!

I have just launched Platoon Forward Stories. A mirror blog where YOU can publish your AARs and feats of derring do. It is found here http://platoonforwardstories.blogspot.com I hope you enjoy and frequent it. I also hope you still stop by here now and then!

Enjoy

Joe

Greek border village attack

2011-03-07T18:23:00.000-08:00

Apologize for the break between updates. Have been ill. First, there appears enough interest that I will be starting a mirror blog where YOU can post your stories, ideas and links about Platoon Forward. This is a natural evolution of publishing the product. Helping you guys enjoy your games. I would love to hear your feats of derring do as well as the occasional failure. Who doesn't love a good story?

Second, playtesting Squadron Forward continues on with good results. I have decided to add theater/year specific encouter tables for the scenarios. It is not that much more work as I need them when I play anyway. Will just have to make them more inclusive and formal.

One of the reasons Platoon Forward works for me as a campaign vehicle is that it is flexible enough that I can stick with it. I am not forced to play a scenario I don't want to just because it is next in line. An example is today's AAR.
I felt like a break from Squadron Forward and an idea hit me. "Why not use that cool Russian Church in a scenario?" Sounds good; what platoon to use? Haven't used the Greeks in a while? That sounds like fun; I could have it winter of 1940/41 with the Greeks on the offensive. A big attack? A patrol? I don't know. Why not roll up the scenario? That sounds good. Die rattles-- Platoon Attack; good I can make that work. Won't roll up the ojbective because it is going to be that cool Russian Church... [ Hey, it works for me! This is how 80% of my battles get generated]

This is my 7th scenario with my Greeks. As you play longer with the platoons they do develop personalities and subplots. This platoon has struggled with poor performance and the battalion XO has sniped at their efforts from time to time.

Lt Sposito shook the snow off his boots then entered the room. The Company Commander seemed genuienly happy to see him. " Sposito, tommorrow we go on the attack!" You will attack the small village to our front at dawn tommorrow to test the preparedness of our foes.

Characters
Lt Sposito Pleasant/ family Gr II
Sgt Hellik Addicted/ alcohol Gr I 1 st squad hesitant commander
Sgt Pitsikas Course / Glutton Gr II 2nd squad
Sgt Basakidas Generous/ alcohol Gr III 3rd squad
1 MMG 1 81 MTR off board 3 stonks
1st and 2nd squad have decreased morale and all three squads have 1 less person due to previous losses

Looking towards the village

from greek lines

What is your plan Lt ?

Cool Russian Church with A and B blind

With visability limited to 100 yards Sposito decided to creep up on the normally slack Italians. His best squad was 3rd squad and they would lead off on the right flank. He would use 2nd squad to demonstrate against the church in the center and he would bring 1st squad up personally behind 3rd squad to add weight to the right. The MMG would be postioned on a hill on the right just off picture to cover the attack. The compound on the right would be hit with mortars once firing started.

The Italians were more vigilant than Sposito had hoped and 2nd and 3rd squad soon were pinned down by automatic weapons fire from both the church and the farm complex on the right. "Where was the artillery promised?" [ poor card draws] Lt Sposito realized if he did nothing the atatck woudl fail and battalion would somehow blame him. He sent 1st around to the right and moved up to rally 3rd squad.

Attack on the farm

3rd sq center/ 1st on right

Lt Sposito in the Kelpi

1st squad reached the wall and traded shots with the Italians. Sposito knew with 1st squad's poor morale and Sgt Hellik's lack of leadership abilities they would not last long going toe to toe even with Italians. Then suddenly a roar overhead!!

Better lucky than good!!

Mortar shells landed right in the midst of the Italians! This broke them and Sgt Hellik was able to sweep over the wall. [ the artillery was targeted for the adjacent building and scattered!] He then moved quickly into the building and just missed capturing a MMG.

As the Italians retreated to the barn Lt Sposito and 3rd squad moved up to the farm. However, the Italian Lt was not idle. He had gathered forces and advanced to the farm as well.

Sgt Basakidas at the farm

Italians massing along the far wall

After a fierce fight the Greeks prevailed and the Italians retreated to the Church.

Italian Lt rallies the men at the church

Lt Sposito thought the battle was won but when he had his squads advance towards the church he found the Italians still had plenty of punch. As he debated what to do next, he saw the Italians slowly evacuating the church towards the far end of town! [ for those of you familiar with my esprit rules the Italians had reached their limit. ] Sgt Hellik, ever the hothead, wanted to charge immediately but Lt Sposito overrulled him fearing they could still lose the battle. They kept up fire until the last Italian had left. Lt Sposito realized at that moment this would not be an easy war for the Greeks to win.

Post battle 1st squad's moral improved to normal and Sgt Hellik lost his hesitant status. While the company commander accepted Lt Sposito's actions the battalion XO, must have spread rumors because when Lt Sposito met the battlion S-4 they did not hit it off.

The enemy forces generated where heavy:

2 squads, 1 HMG, 1 LMG 1 Lt Mtr 2 Gr II leaders and 1 Gr I leader Italian esprit level 14. Greeks have the same esprit level if using my tactical esprit rules.

Special rules visability starts at 100yards and improves by 20 yards every other turn.

1st Italian unit generated is alert. Every other Italian unit generated the 1st turn has a 50% chance of being alert. 2nd turn this increased to 75%. 3rd turn all units are alert.

Enjoy!

Joe

Kicking Mules in the Med Squadron Forward

2011-02-19T17:51:00.000-08:00

Hope everyone is doing well. I have had the flu. I thought of starting another blog page so we could all share our Platoon Forward stories but not everyone could post on it. You will have to forgive me; I am not computer savvy. I think it is a great idea but don't know how to execute it.

Being sick allowed me to read "An Ace of the Eighth" by Bud Fortier. Very good book and got me fired up for Squadron Forward. So... sorry guys but I finished up the charts for Squadron Forward and wrote up the rest of the scenarios. Dice tested the charts and they work. Have come up with a neat way to figure out A/C postioning without needing blinds. All that is left is playtesting the scenarios, and then the part I hate-- writing it out. It has many similarities to Platoon Forward and still containts 3 parts but the focus is more on the individual. This feels right to me as air combat involved fewer people and, while leadership is important, it was more a test of skill.

So, as a preview, here is a test play of the CAP scenario using my P-38 "kicking mule" squadron.

Capt "Zap" McGrudger made yet another right turn. They had been circling the western part of the fleet for hours. His flight was protecting ships offloading supplies onto the island of Sicily. The squadron was inexperienced and Maj Bunker had given him 3 2Lts to give them seasoning. 1Lt Lewis had been pissed. He had been bucking to be an element leader since they arrived in Tunisia. Bunker let him lead occasionally, but honestly, no one in the squadron liked Lewis, he was a spoiled brat. Daddy was a bigwig in Detroit and he let everyone know it. It was too bad because he was a decent pilot. 2LT Carls was the element leader today. Though a 2LT Carls was the best pilot in the the squadron. He instictively knew how to fly. If he lived long enough to learn how to fight he would be an ace.

Needle flight

Capt Zap McGruder Foolhardy Wealth Average pilot

2Lt Glenn Schlick Cheap Wealth Average (lucky)

2Lt Chuck Carls Cheery Government Gifted pilot

2Lt Bill Wright Coarse Wealth Average Mustang

"Needle 1 this is thimble. Bogeys due west heading east at angles 7. " Zap turned his flight due west and dropped down to 10K feet.

The bad guys. 4 on the right with bombs

green base is rookie/ grey is veteran/ blue is ace

Zap spotted 7 FW 190s and was trying to move his flight behind them when he was spotted while at there 9 o'clock. 3 190s turned toward him and 4 barrelled towards the ships. He told Carls to tie up the 3 and he would go for the bombers.

Zap's Charge!

A melee ensued but the 2 kicking mule wingman stayed with their leaders. Zap pulled up behind a bomb laden FW 190 and let her rip!

Zap Lets her Rip!

Multiple hits strike the German plane and it spins out of control.

The hunter become the hunted!

Suddenly cannon shells tear into Zaps plane. He banks left and screams for Schlick to come to his aid. 2Lt Schlick, while lucky, is just an average pilot and moves to slow to save Zap. He has to hit the silk as his Lightening disintegrates around him. Fortunaltly a US DD sees him and he is not in the drink long.

2Lt Carls causes 1 bomber to eject his bomb but the Lightenings have no other successes on this day.

Meanwhile 2 FWs with bombs and 1 without race for the ships.

The FWs attack!

AA fire is ineffective as is the strafing attack against the american destroyer. However, the 2 expreienced german pilots find a merchant ship stopped and both their 500lb bombs hit. One enters the engine room doing severe damage and the ship itself sustains 50% damage.

SS Lard Island after the attack

Post mission Zap is returned quickly to the squadron. His claim for a FW 190 is denigned. Turnes out the german aircraft recovered at 2K feet and went home! The squadron only damaged 2 for the loss of 1 plane and a merchant ship badly damaged. The kicking mules rep goes down by 1. In addition one of the P-38s will be out for 2 missions needing major maintanence.

Great fun! Think you guys will really like this. I sure do!

Enjoy the scenario (when playing the US gets 2 DDs and 1 large merchant. The merchant is stopped as it is unloading.)

Joe

One of our planes is missing

2011-02-07T18:03:00.001-08:00

I have not gotten a lot of questions on how to play Platoon Forward. That is a tribute to Rich Clark's editing skills. I am also hearing unanimously positive comments. Thank you. That also means I can turn to blogging about my next project while still teaching how to play Platoon Forward.
I have turned my attention to finishing up my expansion pack for asymetrical warfare entitled "Middle of NoWhere". This is an expansion to Platoon Forward focusing on partisan ( or freedom fighting) actions from the 1920s through Vietnam. While Platoon Forward can certainly be used to game these actions as is[ training excercise April 2010], this expansion changes the blinds tables, tweaks some encouter tables and add a bunch of new scenarios. One of the new types of missions is "rescue". A subset of "rescue" is a downed aircraft or helicopter. I swiped this title from a scenario by Max Maxwell in a TFL special. It was a cool scneario and title! I will only use the title in the pack if he says it's ok but for the blog I thought it fine. Hope you don't mind Max!

Today's platoon is my favorite. They started it all. This is my 8th battle. [ Please see Dawn Raid and training excercise found in April 2010} Sgt Bustamanti was just upgraded to Gr III and was moved to the second squad because morale there has dropped. In addition Cpl Fan has joined the platoon to replace Cpl Riccelo who was KIA last battle.

Sgt Bustamanti hurried into Capt Butro's office wondering where the fire was. Lt Chanti spoke first. "Buffo, One of our planes is missing. It was on a pacification patrol was struck by rifle fire and couldn't make it back to base. It crashed 15 minutes ago about 11 kilometers from here. I can't send Sgt Polti. Take your squad and find the pilot before the Wahlas do. For God's sake hurry!

Characters
Sgt Bustamanti confident/ family Gr III SL
Cpl Fan Conformist/avarice Gr I
Italian squad here made up of 10 man rifle section (assualt) and 9 man LMG section (support)
1truck and 1 saharina with 1 MMG and 20mm autocannon

No I don't have a cool model of a crashed plane!

That is it in the white smoke

Buffo enters from top left

Buffo sees the plume of smoke past the mosque

The Italians enter the board as all
the locals stay indoors

Several blinds start on the board but turn out to be shadows. The jeep stops at the treeline watching the mosque and the crashsite. Buffo jumps out of the truck yelling for the pilot. Hearing no answer he sends Cpl Fan left with the LMGs and he takes the assualt section right to go searching.

Cpl Fan finds our aviator!

Cpl Fan finds the aviator. Just then the jeep starts to fire at a MG in some brush. Cpl Fan sends the flyboy back to talk with Buffo and takes his men forward through the trees to flank the MG.

Unfortunatley...

Cpl Fan runs into some rebels trying to
flank the Italians

In ferocious close quarters the casualties are even so Fan pulls back with 2 KIA and 2 WIA. Buffo dispatches 5 men back to the truck with the pilot and takes 5 to the LMGs. They lay down fire on the rebels which drives them back. Fire opens up from the mosque but the autocannon silences this quickly. As Buffo moves up his 10 Italians for an assualt, the rebels, with all there forces shaken and no pilot in their possesion, decided to leave the field.

Our Hero!

I love this scenario! It has such a wide range of possibilities. Buffo was lucky that the rebel forces on board were not real therefore he found the pilot first with no bad guys around. He also found the pilot on the first try. In game event showed Cpl Fan ticked off Buffo so he must of been mad at Fan's inexperience of moving into the ambush. There is now friction between the two. My freeform event was to raise the morale of the LMG section to normal. Given how they performed I thought it unlikely and missed the roll. First fixed event was replacements with a +1 for winning this scenario, +1 becasue LtCol Aquino likes the platoon and -2 for heavy casulaties for 0 modifier. I rolled a 4 so no change. Second was player character effect. Character was Cpl Petracela and was a morale check of his LMG section. Petracela is cultured so no modifier there. A quick roll and morale of the squad goes up! Turns out they like his solid leadership.

Rebel forces

2 squads without LMGs 1 gr III leader 1 Gr I leader

1 MMG gr I leader

Enter near board edge turn 1

Enjoy

Joe

Thank you and Patrol AAR

2011-02-01T18:42:00.000-08:00

First thank you for the response to Platoon Forward! I was hoping to sell 100 copies eventually so I wouldn't feel guilty about Rich publishing it. It has sold over 150 in the first week! More important, people seem to be enjoying it. That makes me happy. This will also allow me to give our local food shelter a nice check. Thank you for that too.
I thought I would go over a patrol type example a little in depth since now you guys really know what I am talking about. Here goes. We are going to use my british squad in Italy. The guys from the Couterattack at Orveto and the Monestary at Taromina. If you want to go back and read those go ahead I'll wait! As always this is an actual battle with these guys (7th to be exact.)

"Balls" had not laid into "Red" after the counterattack at Orvetto like Red had figured. The whole company had been beaten up prety bad. 1st section had not been reconstituted. After the front had stabablized the company rested for a whole day before Red was called to the command post. "Lt, I want to see what Jerry is up too. I would like you to take your platoon on a combat patrol to these hills and have a look around. Take everyone including your mortar as I don't want casualties and it will give your chaps a boost of morale." Red thought a better boost for morale would be another day of rest but thought better than to question the major.

Characters

Lt Red Talbot Fickle/ Government Gr III
Sgt Theo Barns Cocky/Hedonism Gr II 2nd section
Cpl Scottie McNabb Addicted/ Alcohol Gr I 3rd section

We are using the Patrol scenario. I have no set item I want to place on the board so we will roll it up cold. As we are on the east coast of Sicily we will us the heavy terrain chart and fill the board in. Once I have the major features I add some brush, rocks and a wall around one of my buildings. The final board is shown below looking south to north.

What is your plan Red?

Red decides to move up the right side of the board go between the 2 hills. Have his mortar move up onto the center hill and leave Sgt Barns in the center watching the road and building. This will leave Cpl McNabb to check out the forest on the right side. That done, McNab will come back to the buildings. After all is checked out they will withdraw through the swamp on the left.

With my plan set we have to see where we will encounter the enemy. I love this part about the patrol scenario; you just never know but it is often close range! Opposed die rolls give me a 2 turn jump. I move 3 hexes a turn so get my forces to the hills. One blind enters at 3 which in this case is the road on the top left and one blind enters at 4 which is behind the right most building. I tend to have my patrols in an arrow head formation so I initially use 1 marker and this marker is whchever part of the formation is closest to me. I can easily see folks coming down the road so I roll and this is the dummy. Nuts! That means the guys behind the building are real. I deploy 4 A 2+2 and 2 B 1 +1 markers behind the building. I do not deploy a C though I earn one. My ratonale is this; on a patrol coming through this type of ground in Sicily the germans probably would not have a vehicle. Had the blind coming down the road been real I would have deployed a C blind because that would make sense to me. This is what I mean when I say Platoon Forward is the 90% solution 90% of the time. I just added my 10%. If a C blind there makes sense to you by all means use it. So the german has 1 A and B break right, 2 As head into the building and 1 A and 1 B break left into the woods.

The initial encounter

Cpl McNabb caught in the open

The british can't spot a blessed thing. So Cpl McNabb starts to carry out the brilliant plan to search the woods. At this point several german blinds are set and have good shots at 3rd section in the open. I start to roll on the blinds table using the patrol side. Make sure you add or subtract 1 based on if your last rolls for that catagory was a unit or not. (This helps get a balanced game normally.) The germans get 1 squad plus a platoon leader plus a MMG.

The british patrol is rudely interupted by MG fire from the nearest building. Cpl McNab's section is pinned down and the bren team loses 2 men. Red orders supressive fire and yells for them to come back. { The german's right flanking manuver vanishes into thin air when 2 unlucky die rolls revel 2 more blinds to be fake} When McNab is back he orders that section to shift left thereby screening out the MMG. He has the 2in mortar put down smoke and yells "Platoon Forward" as both sections race towards the house.

Platoon Forward!

The attack suceeds though 4 men go down including Sgt Barns who is seriously wounded. The germans pull back.

Fun and quick battle. The british had a heroic event card which they used to help there hand to hand. This was Pvt John Andrews who is mentioned in dispatches. The Germans forces generated were a little light but the MMG packed a punch. I always love patrols. They are quick and unpredictable.

For my freeform event I chose to see if Pvt Andrews was mentioned in dispatches I felt this was very likely and easily made the roll. For my next event I got character noticed. I don't play with platoon Sgts so that left me with the 3 above. Random roll revelled Red. He knows the following characters, his 2 squad leaders, the men, Company Co " Balls Foster -1, Co Sgt Maj, Sgt McGregore who commands a MMG (cut out at orveto) -2, Cpt Hamlin Forward Observer +1. A random die roll shows that Cpl McNab had an encounter with Lt Talbot. There is no history between the 2 so no modifier. A "2" results in a negative encounter. Turns out the day after the patrol McNab tied one on. Red is ticked so there will be a -1 between them now. However, Red can't fire McNab for 2 reasons. First, he just lost Sgt Barns and second the company Sgt Major McCarthy (a fellow Scot) is a relative of McNab. My second event is Manpower. This will be modified +1 because we won the last battle and -1 becasue "Balls" does not like the platoon. I roll a 4 for no change.

Now we have to find out what to do about Sgt Barns. Turns out he will miss 2 battles. Will the Sgt Major help out? This is possible but we miss the roll. Will Sgt Turner (Gr I) come down from battalion? This is unlikely and we miss this too. Our only choice left is to pull from within the platoon. Pvt Andrews will take 2nd section. Turns out he is a depressing chap (pessimistic/alcohol) but a Gr II leader. Also 1st section shows up with a new section leader, Cpl Rich Clarkson ( Evil/ government Gr I ) And so it goes...

Hopefully this gave everyone a better idea how to play the patrol scenario of Platoon Forward and how to do the post game events. As always, any questions please let me know!

thanks and enjoy

Joe

PLATOON FORWARD PUBLISHED!!!

2011-01-24T18:08:00.001-08:00

After 2 weeks of nightly editing with Rich from Too Fat Lardies it is done and ready for your enjoyment. It can be downloaded at the Too Fat Lardie site for a mear 7 pounds or $11.33.

What a process. Doing all the editing and developing really made me hone some concepts that were vague in my head. Rich streamlined it and his charts are clear and concise. A big thank you to Rich for taking the chance and publishing this. As he told me, " This is uncharted waters. This is a unique product."
Remember, I am just a gamer who is sharing how he plays his games. Now I want to start hearing Your stories!!!
Any questions that come up I can answer them here, TMP or the Lardies Yahoo board.

A platoon moving forward

Thanks and enjoy!

Joe

Happy New Year!

2011-01-04T19:15:00.000-08:00

A death in the family makes you reflect. I have been very blessed and hope to share this with others this year. I had 10 people over in my house for the holidays and it was great! Even got several games in and took several snaps.

Biggest news is Platoon Forward is almost complete. Rich and I work on it every day. It is 75% done and looks great. I am really excited as there has never been anything on the market like it.
I really hope you enjoy it. Should be done in 4 weeks.

Played a U-Boat attack using my Release the Hounds rules. They held up well to this type of game.

Minesweeper Onyx protecting a convoy

I have been looking for early war Italian Torpedo boats in 1/1200 scale. The only ones I could find are late war made by Figurehead and they are pricey at $13. Now my friends know less about naval affairs than I. they think torpedo boats are all JFKs PT 109. So... I bought some Japanese light destroyers from Eagan's ships for $4.25. I think they painted up reasonably well.

Wakatake on the Left

Lupo on the Right

Come on-- its not that bad!!!

The grand event was a Lazy TW&T game with my brother. Meeting engaement in a town between the screaming eagles and the SS. This is my brother we are talking about here so historical accuracy that I pride myself on and fair play will not be found!! He did get me the Miniatures Building Authority Rathaus for Christmas which is a nice model. The only thing is I don't know why they didn't put a clock on the tower. Each of us got 2 squads and an armored car plus 1 tank as a reinforcement. Random entry and turn of entry.

The picturesque town of
Smokum with Dad
looking on

I entered 1 turn early from the near side on the above picture and he entered from the far side. I made straight for the new building (Rathaus)

My brave troops crossing the bridge

at Smokum

The evil SS enter and split their forces

My brave eagles made it to the Rathaus first. He had one squad go towards the Rathaus and one go towards the train station.

Evil SS assault the back of the
very nice looking Rathaus

I beat off his pathetic attack at the Rathaus. Meanwhile he had one squad move into the train station. I decided to move one squad against the train station with my Stuart tank in support.

Disaster! 4 Eagles down

Somehow he cheated. I lost 4 men crossing the square and the rest paniced. They would lose 3 more before the battle was over. we retreated to the Rathaus to lick our wounds.

The Evil assault on the Rathaus

We managed to beat the first attack off.

Not much to do with the battle
but I wanted to blow up his
Jadgpanzer

His second assault got into the building and only sheer american guts threw the evil, stinking nazi, jack booted killers out! However, we took significant casualties and the Jagdpanzer was still outside. The last piece of the puzzle was dinner was in 20 minutes. So the Lt came to his decision. We would break out of the Rathaus.

The Eagles breakout!

The breakout caught the automan slopeheaded dumb Jerrys completely by surprise and the american heroes did not lose a man!

It was a blast!!

Off to my Grandmother's funeral tomorrow. She lived 94 years and did alot of amazing things. She died peacefully in her sleep. You can't do any better than that!

God Bless

Joe

Merry Christmas and The Bluetails and 18 Mira update

2010-12-24T12:36:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! As stated previously I have much to be thankful for. I hope you do too.
Rich is shooting for a January release for Platoon Forward. Hopefully we all will be moving our platoons forward early next year!!

Played 2 BTH2 battles over the last week so thought I would post them. The scenarios for Squadron Forward are coming along. I have abandonded blinds. They are mainly there to see where the aircraft end up when the shooting starts. Instead I now roll for initial position. Think I am 75% there!

Yet another escort mission for Maj Evans and the P-51 D driving Bluetails. 6 fighters to move ahead of the B-17 stream and break up enemy fighters.
Characters
Maj Evans cunning Veteran
2Lt Pierce Mckennon Mercurical
1Lt Pudge Storch Coarse
2Lt Chase Blake Cocky West Point
1 Lt Chuck Weaver Slow Connected
2Lt John Turlock Cunning

3 elements of 2 pairs with Evans the only veteran. (new sq for me) The other 2 element leaders were Storch ( coarse texan but liked by the sq) and Weaver ( little natural ability but hard work compensated for this. Dad owned half of West Virginia including its senators)

Maj Evans thoughts were interupted by cannon fire hitting his plane!

A perfectly executed bounce!

4 FW 190D were behind them. The 4 mustangs started power dives. The 2 wingman shook off their pursers (who were rookies) while Evans and Storch were not as lucky. While Evans tried to figure out what to do next (he was tailed by an ace) he felt rather than heard a huge explosion and felt himself tumbling through the air. Training took over and he pulled the ripcord of his parachute. He would spend the next 5 months trying to figure out what happened while in a Stalag. Storch's mustang also was seen going down in flames but he managed to put out the fire with a power dive and make his way back to England.

Lt Weaver dove to avenge the chaos below losing his wingman in the process. He latched on to the tail of a Dora. Before he could pull the trigger cannon shells hit his mustang.

The hunter becomes the hunted

Thoughts of his first kill were replaced with survival. The ace that had got Maj Evans was on his tail!

Lt Weaver leaking fuel

(what other color should I use?)

Never a gifted pilot, Weaver barrel rolled and tucked into a tight turn and lost the Jerry. He managed to make it to an emergency field in France.

All in all a disaster for the Bluetails. 1 POW, 4 damaged and they only got 1 shot off.

My 18 Mira had a 3 on 3 clash with some more Falcons.

Characters

Yposminagos Camberous Lazy

Episminias Notaras Careful (Iron constitution)

Sminias Mexlexis Cocky Veteran

Lt Camberous leads the flight

random event led to ragged formation

3 Falcons are spotted 2 o'clock low.

Lt Camberous' first pass
The battle quickly turns into a dogfight with agile aircraft looking for an advantage. MSgt Notaras manages a kill! The Lt is damaged.

As a Falcon starts to hammer MSgt Notaras

Sgt Mexlexis shows up

Sgt Mexlexis shots a falcon off the tail of MSgt Notaras. Mexlexis, who was unpopular in the squadron, has just won over the senior NCO in a big way!! Both sides disengaged. The greeks claim one and have one damaged; a win!! MSgt Notaras has his skills upgraded to veteran.

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

Joe

Hellenic Air Force!

2010-12-13T18:22:00.000-08:00

Finally painted up my PZL 24s for the Greek Air Force. This is important because now my Italians have someone they can fight with on close to even terms! Plan to add some Bleinhems and MB 151s as well. As stated over Thanksgiving, character campaign for Squadron Forward is done; working on scenarios. This one is intercept.

Despite all the rhetoric, Sminagos [Captain] Andoniou had hoped it wouldn't come to this. Yet yesterday Italian troops had crossed over into Greece. Here he was flying CAP over the Greek naval base. It was unreal. All he men were untested. His right wingman today Antiposminagos [ 2lt] Kellas was one of the worst flyers in the group. Yet as first son of the ambassador to the US he had been passed through flight school. The Italians were known to be good airmen. He prayed Kellas wouldn't get killed and wouldn't cause anyone else to get killed. There, 2 o'clock low. 3 Falcons turning to meet them!

Blue flight
Sminagos Andoniou Pragmatic Veteran
Antiposminagos Kellas Pleasant Rookie
Yposminias Anagnotopoulas Cheap Average

Capt A leads the way!

Capt A also saw some bomber behind. He knew Red flight was coming up. He signaled to Cpl A to go after the bombers. He, with Kellas, would tie up the fighters.

Capt A's initial pass

A falcon crossed in front of him and his 4 guns sounded in his ears. Bullets tore into the wing of the falcon shredding its canvas and breaking spars but the plane flew on. [ Used my damaged table for BTH found in the Lardies special 2 years back. Got wing damage basic speed only]

A couple of turns later and he realized the PZL 24 could not turn with the falcon. He banked left and found himself behind an italian bomber. Lt Kellas could not keep up with the turns and had fallen behind. Capt A started to pound the bomber with rifle caliber bullets to little effect.

Capt A learning why 20mm cannon are better

than rifle caliber MGs

Meanwhile Cpl A had gotten into trouble. An experience (veteran) Falcon pilot had latched on his tail. All the jinking was not helping. Lt Kellas showed up but couldn't seem to get into position.

Things are looking bad for our Greek NCO!

LT top right.

Sorry for blurry picture!

After his gastank sprung a large leak Cpl A dove for the sea and the falcon pilot gave up the chase. The Italian turned on the other Greek plane, Lt Kellas. Unfortunatly it was no contest. Fortunately for Capt A, Lt Kellas managed to bail out of the stricken fighter and was picked up at the mouth of the harbor.

At this time Red flight finally showed up

Antipaspistis Argiropoulos Generous Average

Sminias Kamperos Evil Average with veteran flying skill

Sminias Mexlexis Egotistical Veteran

They went straight for the bombers who were almost at their IPs. A falcon intercepted Sgt Kamperos and shattered his instruments. Warrent Officer Argiropoulos lined up behind a bomber only to be killed by the rear gunner!

Capt A finally was rewarded when smoke started billowing from the fuselage of the bomber. Seconds later parachutes emerged as the bomber started a downward course. It never made it blowing up several thousand feet above the sea. He moved on to another bomber but this gunner hit him in the gas tank and he had to break off the action. The Italians bombers had an unmolested bomb run.

The Bomb run!

Fortunatley for the greeks, the italians did their part in proving that level bombing is a terrible way to hit ships, even when they are in port. All 8 bombers missed!!

Great battle. Numbers and spotting worked out well. Greeks did not fair well but Red flight was delayed. The squadron lost some cool points becasue they got banged up. After the battle the group commander sent the chaplain Fr Nastros down. He is a rather glum fellow who did not help morale out. All planes made it back to base but none are repaired for next mission. That leaves 3 ready with 7 pilots.

Italaians had 3 CR 42s and 9 SM 79s,

Special rules

Both flights are on CAP [ no radar here!] Roll a die. If even blue flight will intercept; if odd red flight. 3 turns after the greeks have spotted the Italians roll a d6. on a 5-6 the other flight shows. Add 1 to the die every turn thereafter.

Enjoy

Joe

Recon at Chateau du Pupon

2010-11-30T18:32:00.000-08:00

Felt like playing a battle in Normandy so using my 101st airborne unit. This is only their 3rd battle.

Lt Ramsey showed up at the Colonel's CP wide awake. He had actually slept for 5 hours. That was the most he had slept since the invasion 5 days earlier. There was an older frenchman in the battered room who stood too straight to be a simple farmer.
"Joe, glad you are here. As you know we are ready to break out of the beachhead. We want to use this route here as it is paved and good for tanks. Unfortunatley, retired Major Jean Claude here says there is a Chateau along it crawling with Krauts. That would be nice information to know before we start down the road." The frenchman spoke, (with an outrageous french accent) Colonel, it iz true. I know what I saw. Several tanks and large guns overlooking the road. You will be wiped out!"
"Joe, take a squad plus a bazooka and have a look. If there is little resistance take the place but don't play hero. Find out what is there and come back and let me know. Major Jean here will show you the way.

Your forces
Lt Joe Ramsey Scholarly/Techie Gr III leader
SSgt Bill Taylor optomitic/wealth Gr II 1st squad has high morale
Major (retire) Jean Claude Gr II 7 partisans armed with rifles
1 bazooka team with 2 men

What is your plan LT?

Chateau du Pupon

Lt Ramsey's plan was to go down the left flank through the fields to the barn. From there either enter the main house or climb the hill depending on resistance. The Major offered to lead with his men so Joe let him. He reminded the Major that they were not to start shooting; theirs was recon!

Things went surprising well as they made it through the field without a shot fired. The Major pointed smugly through the bocage at a tank in front of the main house. Nuts!

German tank in the way.

(Yes it is a Char-bis. Command

Decision tanks come 3 to a pack

and I had one left over so...)

Joe decided to let the partisans watch the house and he would send a team around the barn to the hill for a better look. As SSgt Taylor started off MG fire from the hill pinned him down. "Guess the party has started now" Joe thought to himself. The Bar layed suppressive fire on the MG, SSgt Taylor moved his men into the barn and Lt Ramsey brought up his bazooka. The tank meanwhile had started firing on the BAR team. 5 German soldiers came out of the main house and headed for the barn.

German soldiers advance towards the barn

The germans were able to drive the americans out of the barn. (The americans were trying to avoid casualties) After a bazooka round missed the tank backed up but continued to shell the americans.

Franco-American positions in the field

Joe now knew the Major was right. There were alot of Jerrys here. He decided he could not take the complex and felt he would take casualties in occupying the MG nest on the hill. He had seen all but the far side of the compound. He asked the Major if he would run to the far side and take a look while his boys keep Jerry's head down. The Major agreed.

Major Jean Claude's dash across the road

The Major dashed acrossed the road. Signaled he had his info and all allied forces withdrew.

Back at the CP Lt Ramsey was able to report there was a large french tank, a MG on the hill and at least 2 squads in the chateau. More important to him; he had not lost a man. The Colonel turned to the beaming Frenchman, "Well Major, guess I owe you an apology. Maybe you Frogs are okay afterall!"

Fun and short battle. The write up doesn't do it justice. Since you don't know the forces arrayed against you there is a fair amount of tension. As we entered the field I thought we would get shot. As we came to the barn I thought we would get shot. When we ran towards the hill I thought we would get shot. (wait we did get shot then!)

The german forces ended up being: dug in where it makes sense

d6 1-2 second string 3-5 1st string 6 paratroopers ( I rolled a 3)

1 LMG with gr 2 leader

1 squad with gr III leader

1 half squad with company commander (didn't roll for him as he never came out)

1 tank and 1 ATG (Maj Jean Claude missed the ATG; oops)

Enjoy

Joe

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

2010-11-25T07:47:00.000-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving! One third of our viewers are from Europe. Thanksgiving is a national holiday where we overeat on Turkey and watch american football. We also give thanks for the many blessing given to us and our country. It is probably the last holiday that is not comercialized. Hence I enjoy it. It is not comericalized but the next day is "Black Friday", the busiest shopping day of the year and the epitome of US commercialization.

I won't bore you with my personal life but I have much to be thankful for. I am not is a warzone though 54 of my friends are. Whatever your political views, please remember the Platoons Forward defending others and away from their families.

I thought I would update you on my projects. Please feel free to ask questions or offer advice.

1. Platoon Forward Rich continues to edit. I confess I did not think it needed it but now I understand why authors have editors. He has tightened it up and made it flow smoother. The graphics are great, the best he has done. I have added a table for officers to see "where they have come from". This affects how they are treated. If daddy is a senator or politburo member things will be a little smoother! If you have come up from the ranks (a mustang) your men will like you but your superiors will be a little cool.

Eye candy I found on my computer

I actually remember this battle.
Based on Chris' work on the French "attack" into
Germany 1939

Squadron Forward is moving right along. Release the Hounds has slowed it as I have been playing naval stuff as of late. I have the character campaign done. It is different than Platoon Forward. There are not as many choices once you are in the air and fewer on the ground as well. But you have the opportunity to develop individual skills. There is also a cool thing called squadron reputation. You want to be a big dog and belong to the big dogs. This helps balance different air forces and periods. The Romanians can do well just by breaking even. You manage a group of pilots but it focuses on individuals more than Platoon Forward. This feels right to me given the nature of air combat.

I am still working on the solitaire scenario generation system. The missions are easy, it is getting the force balance right for the solitaire opponent that is proving challanging. As the germans on the eastern front I am supposed to be outnumbered. As the russians I should have the number advantage many times. Want it historically accurate but able to give surprises like Platoon Forward.

I also have a project specific to Bag the Hun where I have been able to differenciate almost ever model of aircraft in game terms. I have called it Bling the Hun. It hopefully will appear in a Lardie special after Platoon Forward is published

Card for "Bling the Hun"

Finally I have been playing with "Release the Hounds" This started out as "Hello Sailor" for Too Fat Lardies but I changed 70% of it. It still has cards but movement is simultaneous. Combat is similar to Bag the Hun but naval style. Those of you that have seen my Brag the Hun, it is an evolution of that. I have opted for a overal initiative rating that seems to be working well. But each ship's commander will have a personality that can come into play through random events. I haven't started on a campaign game yet (Flotilla commander) but this will be aimed at small boat actions up to DDs. Anything bigger didn't fight enough to have a campaign! Again this will be solitaire friendly.

USS Porter in the Solomons

Her commander is agressive ( go figure!)

That is all my projects. It is enough to keep me off the streets. I would also like to thank each of you and hope you enjoy this site. I try not to waste your time. I have only kept track of "hits" since July and have had over 4,000 visits since then. Considering I post about twice a month I am amazed by that number; thank you. (Don't worry there will never be advertising here)

Happy Thanksgiving

Joe

The Admiralty wasn't as impressed

2010-11-22T18:14:00.000-08:00

Wanted to try out my naval rules with some fast moving small boats. Haven't started Flottila Forward campaign rules or solitaire rules yet but am kicking some ideas around. Do have a random events chart done. Am also continuing to edit Platoon Forward with Richard. We are a third of the way done!

English Channel November 1940 (Not sure if this is too historical but I had the ships on hand!)

Commander O'Toole looked at the measly forces on hand and sighed. At least his protests had allowed the addition of a Fairmile B launch. His mission was to escort several coasters (mainly coal) up north. As there were only 6 freighters a large escort was not thought neccessary. And besides, he was told, the Jerry DDs had sortied receintly and would not try that again.
Forces
HMS Clover (Flag) Flower class Frigate
HMS Onyx Algerine Class Fleet Mine Sweeper
HMS Lady Lillian ASW Trawler
ML 475 Fairmile B Launch
6 Coastal Freighters speed 10 knots
Visability 3 miles

Initial British Formation

Each hex is 500 yards

Around midnight Lady Lillian radioed she had sighted an E-boat off to port and was engaging. As was pre arranged, the motor launch and Clover turned towards the port side of the convoy to support and look for more E-boats

Lady L first to fight!

Lady L's second shot starts a fire on the E-boat. It turns and starts a retreat. She will spend the next 15 minutes trying to sink it to no avail.

Where are the other E-boats? The Fairmile runs into them south of the convoy and opens fire. Clover is still trying to join the battle and Cmdr O'Toole is seeing just how slow 15 knots can be! The Mine Sweeper, sure that a second attack is not looming, reverses course to join the battle.

12:10AM The E-boats sight the convoy

The 3 remaining E-boats increase speed away from the Fairmile to reverse course in order to begin a torpedo run on the convoy. The Fairmile starts laying down a smoke screen. 1 E-boat (under fire) fires long at 3k yards and misses. The others break to port of the smoke screen.

E-Boat passes through a smoke screen and

within 500 yards of HMS Clover

Both crews were too surprised to fire

E-Boats break left of smoke screen and

loop towards freighters

Cmdr O'Toole was astonished to find an E-Boat barreling out of the smoke screen and cut across the bow of the Clover. By the time the pom poms started firing it was half a mile away. He had thought they were still back with the Fairmile. He quickly turned the Clover around to place his ship between the E-boats and the freighters. He could see the E-boats as they were moving at 30knots but apparently they were having trouble seeing the freighters through the thickening haze. [ 2 random events had decreased visability to 2 miles] 1 E-boat fired torpedoes and missed. The second could not seem to line up a shot. It was probably due to fire from the Clover. Just as he seemed to give up, he turned towards the Clover and fired two torpedoes at the HMS Clover!

2 Torpedoes fire at the HMS Clover from 1,000 yrds

O'Toole screamed hard to port but a ship at 15 knots does not turn like a spitfire. One torpedo slammed home as Cmdr O'Toole was thrown towards the ceiling and then to the floor. It took just over an hour for the HMS Clover to sink beneath the cold waters of the channel.

Two weeks later Cmdr O'Toole recieved a letter from one of the freighter captains thanking him for breaking up the E-boat attack. The Admiralty, however, wasn't as impressed.

Losses

1 Flower class Corvette sunk

1 E-boat out for 1 week after a fire

1 E-boat with minor splinter damage and 4 casualties

Loads of fun and should work with any coastal set of rules!

Enjoy

Joe

The road from Kursk

2010-11-08T18:25:00.001-08:00

This is the 4th battle with my Russian squad. Their 3rd battle is posted 4 posts ago entitled "Brick lumber yard". Go read it to get re aquanted with them, I'll wait. Good.

Lt Konerko stood in front of the company officers. We finally have a crack at the fascists! We are to take this hill there with anti tank guns guarding this road. 2nd platoon, you have the honor of the direct assualt for Mother Russia. 3rd platoon, you will strike the hill from the right. 1st platoon will protect the left flank by neutralizing the trenches and bunker guarding the road. JrLt Bessonov failed to hear anything after that. His platoon would protect the left flank! Clearly the CO did not feel he was the equal yet to his fellow platoon commanders despite all men being equal in the workers paradise. And it got worse. After the meeting the CO pulled him aside and said, " Bessonov, you are improving but I have assigned a sub machine gun squad to take out the bunker. You and Shakulo worry about the trenches." Lt Konerko didn't even think he could handle the bunker!
Characters
Lt Bressonov Scholarly/ pleasure Gr II
Sgt Shakulo 1st sq addicted alcohol Gr II
Cpl Zurvich acting 2nd sq generous/ music Gr I poor morale
Cpl Corok acting 3rd sq negative/ government Gr I
3 squads, 1 MMG, 1 SMG squad, 2 T-34s

Looking from Russian lines

Trenches top left/ bunker top right

swamp center right

What is your plan Jr Lt? You get 2 stonks of 81mm fire but no smoke

Bessonov plans to advance up to the far edge of the swamp in a line behind his one tank with the 2nd squad ( his weakest)and MMG in the swamp to anchor. From there he would human wave assault the trench. Lt Konerko order the other T-34 with the SMG sq to follow the road and take out the bunker.

The attack begins!

JrLt Bessonov in middle with pistol

The russians catch several breaks early. The pre game mortars pin the germans in the bunker and the MMG in the trench jams early on.

SMG sq moving through wire on the right flank

The stunned crew in the bunker finally gather their wits and fire their 75mm gun destroying the T-34 tank just before it moves beyond their field of fire. Their shots are not enought to disuade the SMG squad however and they eventually break through the wire. In the center the T-34 causes a Stug to withdraw out of a gun pit and Bessonov manages to keep all the men moving forward. Just as he blows the whistle to signal the final charge into the trench an 81 mm shell lands in the midst of 2nd squad as german shells begin to land.

Human wave time!

You can see the explosion of the 81mm shell center right

Bessonov charged ahead hoping that his platoon would follow. 2nd and 3rd squad did. 1st squad sustained 2 casualties in the bombardment but the men refused to move. Sgt Shakulo started physically kicking the men; 3 responded. He took those three and started his charge!

Cpl Corok meets the enemy

3rd squad reached the trenchline first. 4 Germans with a LMG. The LMG cut the russians down like wheat. 3rd squad sustained 3 casualties and Cpl Corok was wounded. The attack was stopped cold.

Sgt Shakulo meets the enemy

Sgt Shakulo reached the trench with only a 3 men and an LMG. He faltered for a second but was determined not to let JrLt Bessonov get into the trench without him! "Fire" he shouted and threw grenades at the MMG crew. It worked, their gun was not as agile and the russians entered the trench killing 2 and the others ran like beaten dogs.

JrLt Bessonov and Cpl Zuvich meet the enemy

Bessonov could not believe Shakulo was entering the trench with only 3 men! His 10 had to win! The german LMG fired and his troops temporarily halted. Bessonov swore but Zuvich started shouting out a patriotic song. The men started singing and went over the top with their Jr Lt. [had a heroic event that I used to rally the LMG team automatically] After a brief struggle 2 germans fell; 2 fled and the trench was secure!

A tiger tank showed up to shell the trench but the SMG team moved out from the bunker they had captured and the tank, without infantry support, withdrew.

Great battle! The russians did not face a lot of infantry this time so it was a little easier than normal. Hey, sometimes the dice work in your favor!!

Enemy forces

roll d6 1 paratroopers 2-3 ss 4-6 regular line troops ( I rolled a 2)

1 squad with gr II leader, 1/2 squad with gr II leader 1 MMG with gr III leader

1 75mm ATG 1 Stug

1 module of 81mm Mtr with 2 pre plotted positions. 1 trench 1 bunker 4 hexes of wire

1 unit must set up behind the main line

Reinforcement on turn 4 1 Tiger (If 2 person game add 1 squad and gr III leader, I only rolled the Tiger)

Lt Konerko congratulated JrLt Bessonov after the battle on his leadership. 2nd squads morale also improved to normal. The 2 normal squad leaders for 2nd and 3rd squad are back next battle but Jr Lt Bessonov is fond of Cpl Zuvich now and would like to get him promoted into his own squad if possible. JrLt Bessonov also grudgingly admits that Sgt Shakulo is a good squad leader but still doesn't trust him. Several days later Lt Konerko informs him that Pravda wants to do a story on Sgt Shakulo and a reporter will accompany the squad next mission to see Sgt Shakulo in action. Should be interesting...

Enjoy

Joe

PS Richard Clarke is actually formatting the Platoon Forward rules. I am actually working with him on the edits. His art work and design is beautiful!! It will be worth the wait.

Channel Knife Fight

2010-10-05T18:06:00.001-07:00

Finally collecting some 1/1250 scale ships. These babies are big and detailed!! Of course they are more expensive as well.

2 MAAS DDs Can you guess which one costs only $2?

Since I plan to play destroyer actions space and money should hold out. I will keep my 1/2400 stuff for the occasional bigger battle but once I saw the detail on these models it will be hard to go back. As you know I have never done any advertising here but I have to say Dave from

PT Dockyards was very helpful in getting me started in this scale. He pointed me to a 1/1200 forum where I found several good deals on ships. The best dealer to deal with has been John Eagan from Eagan Ships. He has not only provided guidance but great deals and lightning fast service.

So I had 5 DDs painted up and my Release the Hounds rules ready. What to do???

Commander Fitzhew stared into the night. The Admiralty had told him German naval forces were making a sortie into the Channel tonight. He didn't know if that meant TBs, DDs or even CLs but he meant to find them before he was found! He was to intercept and destroy the German force. He had 3 "J" class DDs in which to do it. The 3 boats had not worked together before but the officers seemed competent. His own crew on the HMS Jersey were well trained and eager to get a crack at Jerry!

CMDR Fitzhew 's column

Z 28 out looking for trouble

At 0134 a lookout noted at shape to port at 3+ miles moving away.

Initial sighting
Fitzhew upper left
Jerry bottom center
Squall upper right

A starshell from turret "A" reveiled a german DD. Fitzhew ordered all guns fire at will as he frantically searched for more ships.

Z 25 under a starshell

He could find no other ships but could see hits on the Jerry ship. (Unfortunatly these were from the HMS Javalin NOT Jersey; need to talk to the gunnery officer!) She started making smoke and turned to port. [Z25 had started flooding, slowed and turned to make smoke] Cmdr Fitzhew turned his column and raced in for the kill. As he did he started taking fire from his front about 4 miles away from another Jerry DD.

HMS Jersey moving up for "the kill"
Z25 flooding turns to port [center]
Z28 circling back to support [right]

Cmdr Fitzhew decided to ignore this latest foe and concentrate on the first DD. While advancing "A" turret was knocked out by the "long range" gunfire. No matter, Fitzhew was not to be thwarted, "Stay the course!" he bellowed. As HMS Jersey broke through the smoke he saw to his dismay a German DD broadside waiting for him at 500 yards. 6 in guns and 37mm rounds flew into Jersey. Damage over the next 2 minutes was substancial and the call came to the bridge that there was significant flooding midship.

HMS Jersey and Z25 toe to toe at 500 yards

Cmdr Fitzhew had no time to be disappointed. He still had a battle to win. Z25 had stopped making smoke and was speeding up [ she had stopped her flooding] HMS Javalin was 1000 yards behind still in smoke. He had no time for a coded message. He broadcast in the clear,

" Tim, am flooding; pass to my port. Kill the bastard" He hove Jersey to starboard.

LCDR Timmothy Overbrooke aboard the HMS Javalin was shocked by the message coming in over the wireless but as he broke through the smoke understood immediatley the situation. He narrowly missed the Jersey as he started to pursue the German DD.

HMS Javalin takes up the fight

After several volleys of gunfire, both DDs fired torpedoes at 1,500 yards. A British Fish struck home leaving Z 25 broke and sinking. Tim Overbrooke took his column to pursue the other Jerry destroyer but he slipped away into the chill night air.

Twenty minutes later, flooding had stopped on the Jersey and Cmdr Fitzhew had his victory.

When he met LCdr Overbrooke later that morning he said, " Tim remember, when it comes to radio discipline it is do as I say, not do as I do!"

Great battle and I really enjoyed the ships. Got some more Japanese and US ships from John and have an order of German and British stuff pending from the San Diego Ship Man. Rules played well though I still have to work on torpedoes.

Scenario Encouter 1940

visability 3 miles wind none sea state calm

3 "J" class DDs vrs 2 Narvik class DDs

Roll for position start

Enjoy

Joe

Barent Sea AAR/ Release the Hounds Playtest

2010-09-21T18:38:00.001-07:00

The first miniatures I ever bought were ships. They were cheap and I didn't need terrain. I soon moved on because all the rulesets I played were either too simple or too complicated. I wanted detail down to individual turrets and AA mounts but I wanted the games to be relatively quick; didn't want to keep track of hull boxes and wanted to play with my favorite ship, the destroyers! Command at Sea was a little too slow for my taste though their scenario books are still the best. I thought I had it with GHQs "The Game". Great rule set but destroyers are too easily taken out and PT boats are an afterthought. Have toyed with my own rules from time to time but could not figure out how to do realistic damage without "counting boxes" yet keeping the fidelity of individual turrets. Had a eureka moment on a plane to Sacramento 2 weeks ago. Ran up some charts and did dice playtests and it seemed to work. Time to try it out for real!
Scenario is heavily modified ( I don't have many ships) out of the Command at Sea Group Nord book. Basically the germans are trying to break through a british escort to a small convoy. The German's are petrified of losing their pocket battleship as usual.

Capt Sherebrooke was uneasy. Then again he was always uneasy out at sea during this war. He was senior officer of this small band of ships escorting 7 merchants. His crew on the HMS Onslaw were good as were the rest of the escort. They just might make it to Russia despite the storm. The weather was bad with visability about 4 miles and this promised to get worse. His thoughts were suddenly interupted by the officer of the day. " HMS Rhododendrom has sighted a german destroyer dead astern about 3.5 miles back. "

The Convoy

Very well. Tell HMS Orwell that we will execute a simultaneous 180 degree turn and she should find this destroyer. Tell Obdurate [with Obediant] that she should meet us behind the convoy. Capt Sherebrooke knew he did not need to tell the corvette to start making smoke nor the merchantman commodore to radio the light cruiser HMS Jamaica.

Fred moving up. He didn't see

anything until Orwell started shooting

The situation while orders are transmitted,

decoded and executed. The 3rd german DD is

off picture to the south

Straining eyes on the bridges of both british DDs were finally rewarded at 5 miles when the shape of a german DD hove into view. Orwell starts to fire but misses. Fred, thinking he has found the convoy alters course to starboard and the ships close. A gun duel erupts and both sides take damage. Orwell settles the argument when she hits Fred with a torpedo that leaves her flooding and on fire.

Lutzow hears the commotion and speeds up

HMS Orwell is so engaged in the fight she fails to spot the german CB. Lutzow fires at 5.5 miles hits Orwell. Orwell staggards and moves off stage. Lutzow, seeing enemy DDs close, calls back her destroyer screen and starts a lazy 180 turn. Capt Sherebrooke coutermands his last order to Obdurate telling them to close with Theo Reidel on the right and instead orders a torpedo attack on the Lutzow. Meanwhile he will turn and chase after the Richard Beltzen on the british left that has sailed right by them and is still searching for the convoy.

Time during Sherebrooke's orders

Beltzen top of picture. Fred in center on fire

Theo off picture to the bottom

Onslow starting turn for Beltzen upper right

Orwell under fire from Lutzow

Obdurate/Obedient still carrying out order to

go after Theo

Theo turns around failing to spot the convoy and roughs up Obdurate and Obdient slowing them down enough they are unable to carry out a torpedo attack.

2 British destroyers roughed up

Richard Beltzen does spot the convoy and makes a very lazy turn back towards the Lutzow. This allows her to get several shots off. One hits the bridge of the SS Pontfield. Thus confused she does not steer away from the 4 german tordedoes. One hits and sinks her.

HMS Onslow catches up at this time and the 2 destroyers trade torpedo shots as they pass.

Russian Roulette torpedo style

Unfortunaltly for Capt Sherebrooke, he loses this time as a german torpedo hits the Onslow.

The german destroyers recalled, the germans retire.

Forces and Fate

German

Lutzow CB fine

Richard Beltzen DD 5 turret out

Theo Reidel DD moderate damage

Friedrick Edkold DD heavy damage difficult to control scuttled

British

Onslow DD heavy damaged limped to port

Orwell DD heavy damage limped to port

Obedient DD moderrate damage continued escort

Obdurate moderate damage engines damaged; had to be towed; decision to scuttle

Rhododendrom Corvette fine

Pontifield tanker sunk

give victory to the Kreigsmarine

Great game and I liked the system. Have decided I like it enough that I will invest in some 1/1200 scale destroyers and smaller ships. For the bigger stuff will stick with 1/2400 but I really like the smaller boats. Once I get the smaller boats will post another playtest.

Realize this was a different post than what I normally do but thought it would prove interesting and hopefully provide an entertaining scenario.

Enjoy

Joe

FAAR mission #5

2010-09-08T18:29:00.000-07:00

I have been working on Squadron Forward for about 6 months. I have the character interaction pretty well set and the in game events. Am now starting the scenarios. I play 90% solitaire so am working on a force generator that will give a balanced game where I don't know what I am facing until I am in it. One of my few critisms of BTH2 is there are way too many blinds on the board so I don't wnat to know where the enemy is coming from but don't want 25 counters on the board either. Lastly both sides need a realistic chance to be able to affect a "bounce". So ready to try my first scenario; escort. We call upon one of my favorites, my Romanian IAR-80 squadron. This is there 5th mission and since this is 1942 they will be flying the "B" model.

Captain Sandru put down the phone. "Crap." The group commander Pomut had decided to fly with them tomorrow. Worse he did not want Sandru to go because he wanted to get to know the men. They were suppose to escort some JU-87s to attack a river convoy moving towards Stalingrad. Sandru had planned to allocate 4 planes to the mission but now he had better allocate 6 and place his best pilots on it to protect the group commander. To have him shot down would be embarresing; to have him wounded and land pissed would be a disaster!

Major Pomut coarse average skill (dislikes SQ)
Lt Macri Pleasant average

Lt Hapaina aggressive average
SLt Alexia Pessimistic average (avoids combat when able)

Adj Sef Ionescu Cultured Veteran skill
Adj Stag Toma Obnoxious average 1 kill

The day dawned clear and the Romanians found their charges without problems despite the language differences. The germans were prompt if nothing else. The Stukas flew at 16K feet so flak over the flont lines was not a problem.

In bound Ionescu smiles for the camera

4 minutes to target the Stukas called out bandits bearing down on them from 4 o'clock. Pomut leaves Hapania high and the other 4 race down. [my picture of the russian fighters is lost, sorry!] One stuka explodes as 3 LA-5s race through the formation. Major Pomut snaps off a high deflection shot that catches the new russian fighter in the engine and it explodes! Just as quick a 4th russian fighter appears on the Major's tail. Adj Sef Ionescus rushes to help as Captain Sandru gave him explicit instructions to bring the Major home alive. The Major starts a series of tight turns while losing altitude that his wingman and the russian can not follow. "The old man can fly!" thinks Ionescu.

1 more Stuka is destroyed and 1 damaged. Adj Stag Toma shoots an assaliant off Ionescu's tail and Ivan leaves the field trailing petrol. At this point the Stukas are commencing their dives. With 3 fighters against 6 IAR-80s the russians leave.

Stuka starting its run on a Fugas class minesweeper

Stukas on the attack The barges are camouflaged to
look like Command at Sea markers.
The MO-4 boat is the tiny one upstream

Direct hit! 500lb bombs make big holes

The Fugas class boat is destroyed by a direct hit. 2 barges are sunk. 2 Stukas miss completely.

The return trip is uneventful. The battle is considered a draw.

Post mission The squadron is awarded no cool points. Major Pomut's attitude improves to neutral towards the squadron. Adj Stag Toma's skill improves to veteran. Adj Bacui [did not fly but has a kill] is promoted to Adj Stag [Sgt]. Finally a new rookie pilot Adj Dusescu joins the squadron.

5 russian fighters were generated in one group. It seemed to work well; there were no in game events. For those of you using my LAAF anti aircraft rules the

Fugas MS is size 2 speed 3 [ can't go that fast in a river though] hvy 1 lt 1+

MO-4 motor launch size 1 speed 3 hvy -- lt 1+

Should be a good sceanario for BTH2 or Mustanges. A little large for CY6.

Enjoy

Joe

The brick lumber mill

2010-09-01T17:57:00.000-07:00

This is a platoon that has had 2 other battles. I will take some time here to illustrates some of the "off board" interaction of Platoon Forward that can affect how the battle plays out. Just to remind everyone, I don't make stuff up for this blog; I really report what I play out on the campaigns and games.

Junior Lt Bessonov was unhappy as he walked to company HQ. His platoon was performing poorly, morale was dropping and 2 of his squad leaders were out with wounds. His uninjuried squad leader, Sergant Shakulo, was his biggest problem. Not only was he an alcoholic but his first battle he had charged recklessly ahead [failed a leadership check] and lost most of the 1st sq. Bessonov asked the the company comander to pull Shakulo from the platoon and give him a new NCO. " Bessonov, you are new here. Half our NCOs are alcoholics. A good officer will teach Sergant Shakulo when to use his spirit in battle." Last battle Shakulo's performance had risen to below average but the platoon had again failed it's mission. Somehow a report had gotten to the company commander that Shakulo had performed well during the attack. Bessonov had even seen the two laughing and talking the other day! [ event showed that Konerko notices Shakulo] He had better watch Shakulo carefully or he might be getting the boot.

The company commander, Lt Konerko, greeted Bessonov cooly. Jr Lt Bessonov, mother russia needs victories! When do you plan to contribute?
Our lines have stabalized while we wait for supplies to continue the defeat of fascism. Reconnasance believes that the Germanskiis are using a lumber mill as an observation post during the day to observe our lines. Tomorrow I want you to take 2 squads and infiltrate up there. Capture a prisoner or at least disrupt the OP. I will send a MMG with you {pre game reinforcement} and issue some SMGs from other platoons. Bessonov, I know you are new here but don't make me wonder if you will ever get the hang of this. Dismissed

Jr LT Bessonov Scholarly/pleasure Gr II
Sgt Shakulo 1st sq SL addicted/ alcohol Gr I 1st squad with low morale
Cpl Zurich acting 3rd SL Gr I
1st squad with 2 LMGs for this mission. 3rd squad armed with 1 LMG, 2 rifles and 7 SMGs.
1 MMG with Gr I leader that is hesitant

The brick lumber mill

Russians will enter from bottom left

German OP

Very early figures I painted up

Bessonov moved through the woods with his most dependable squad forward (3rd) followed by 1st sq. Since this is the Russian army the platoon leader leads. As they neared the clearing he moved the MMG towards the left to provide covering fire. 20 yards before the clearing they heard rifle shots.

Bessonov runs into sentries

As third squad laid down fire he ordered Shakulo to move right to support. The 4 german sentires, noting a large force started their getaway. The russians managed to pin them down however. Shakulo moved right in, killing 3 and capturing 1. Bessonov was elated and horrified at the same time. He decided he would go for broke and attack the OP directly.

He directed both squads to move foward past the mill on the right to a clump of trees. From there they would make the final assault.

Bessonov's charge

3rd squad on left

3rd squad took heavier fire and started to retreat. Bessonov had to stop to rally them.

The men proved difficult to rally as bullets continued to kick up around them. Suddenly to Bressonov's horror he hear the russian battle cry of "Urra" as Sergant Shakulo was leading his squad into the mill. Bressonov quickly grabbed the few rallied men around him (the LMG team) and raced to the mill in time to join (lead) the final assault.

Sergant Shakulo leads the final assault

The Germanskiis were not keen on defending the position and gave way quickly. JrLt Bressonov and the platoon had their victory albiet with a great deal of help from Sgt Shakulo. After the battle Sgt Shakulo stated he was just following orders. Bressonov wondered whose orders?

After it's great showing in 2 hand to hand combats 1st squad's morale improved to normal. In addition, Sgt Shakulo beat the odds (30%) and is upgraded to a grade II leader. [There are normally 3 events after every battle.]

Great battle! I really like these small ones. They play fast and are loads of fun. I could not believe Sgt Shakulo; his card draws and rolls were amazing. As a gr I leader he only had a 50% chance of initiating that final assault. When he could, even though a russian NCO would not show that much initaitve, I said why not!

German forces generated were as follows:

1 squad and 2 half squads 1 Gr III leader (officer) and 2 gr II leaders

1 squad must set up on the second floor of the mill with the officer acting as an observer. The other squad can be split into 2 half squads to act as sentries. If it is one half should be towards the woods and one half in the boxes on the other side of the board watching that half of the board. The germans can not move or fire until fired upon or they spot russians. The german officer can take no action for the first 3 turns as he is collecting his gear in case they have to retreat. There is a 30% chance of a squad and/ or halftrack coming in as a reinforcement 4 turns after the shooting starts. This did not happen for me but would have made for a different game! If they come in the russian need not take the mill, just disrupt its operations, perferably from the inside. You still need to capture a prisoner.

If playing 2 person the german should not know the russian objective. For the "Raid" scenario there is only a 33% chance that it is a prisoner snatch otherwise it is just to disrupt the opreation for at least 4 turns of fire and give more casualties than taken.

Enjoy

Joe

LZ Hotel

2010-08-24T18:00:00.001-07:00

Just finished reading Charlie Don't Surf. Wanted to try out Di Di Mau and Critical wounds so stopped my "3 battles for Hue" and went with a standard sweep. The standard sweep scenario will actually be in "Middle of Nowhere" which will be the asymetrical warfare expansion to Platoon Forward. This platoon was used 2 posts ago if you want to catch up.

Platoon

Lt McSwain optomisitc Gr II leader

SSgt Davis 1st sq meek Gr III leader and brilliant leader

Cpl Lawrence 2nd sq gambler Gr II

Sgt Colton 3rd sq cunning Gr I

1st and 2nd squad are up morale and 3rd squad is down morale. Also one of the M60 MMGs normally assigned is broken.

Lt McSwain looked at Lt Jaroze with relief as he spoke. " I know you were beat up last battle and lost one of your hogs so I have an easy one for you tomorrow, Ted. All you have to do is secure a small LZ, advance into a hamlet and wait. The rest of the battalion should do the heavy lifting on this one. " The only glitch is you can only land 2 squads at once. There will be one gunship overhead if you need it. There is a buddist school to the left of the hamlet; don't destroy it please. You shouldn't run into too much. Couple of snipers and maybe a VC squad or two.

Battlefield. LZ Hotel is at bottom.

Buddist school is white building upper left

What is your plan LT????

McSwain would land his 2 best squads with his one M60 in tandem. They would quickly advance north with 2nd squad going towards the jungle and 1st squad securing the school. 3rd squad would then land and reinforce whoever needed it.

1st & 2nd squad move out as planned

As the squads advance just like at Benning a MMG opened up from the hill from behind the school. This slowed SSgt Davis' advance. Worse, 2nd squad ran into VC when only 20 yards from the jungle and started taking casualties.

Cpl Lawrence 20 yards from the jungle runs into Charlie
In addition, 3rd squad was delayed for some reason. Lt McSwain got on the horn to Jarose. " Sir, we are taking MMG fire as well as from at least a squad in the jungle. I have WIA. Request the Cobra and my 3rd squad." [ At this point got a random event that brought in a new squad. So Lt Jarose decided to tag along and see what was going on for himself.]

Lt Jaroze arrives and speaks with 1st platoon

Lt Jaroze arrived with not only 3rd squad but with an addiitonal squad as well. The cobra suppressed the MMG allowing 1st squad to advance towards the school. Jaroze suggested that 3rd squad trail 1st and the other 2 squads advance on the treeline. During these discussions the VC advanced on the shaken 2nd squad and killed 2 before Cpl Lawrence hid the survivors in some bamboo.

VC attacking 2nd squad

Jaroze next request artillery to work the jungle over and this was granted. 3rd squad was slow so Lt McSwain moved to speed Sgt Colton up. SSgt Davis made it up the hill but the MMG managed to Di Di Ma and escape. 3rd squad with the LT took up positions in the schoolyard which was unoccupied.

3rd squad in the school yard

1st squad emerges from the hill and scatters VC in the village

After the artillery, 2nd squad and the extra squad entered the treeline again. The VC where still there but had taken 2 casualties. In addition, their LMG jammed.

2nd squad re enters the jungle

With the americans in good cover and artillery available, the VC chose to withdraw. The americans sustained 3 KIA and 6 WIA. The VC 4 KIA and 4 WIA. I called it a draw because the VC were stronger than expected.

After the battle Cpl Lawrence is finally promoted to Sgt. SSgt Davis made an off handed comment about Lawrence taking casualties and the now Sgt Lawrence has taken offense. Consequently Sgt Lawrence dislikes SSgt Davis. This will not help the platoon. Furthermore, due to the heavy casualties the platoon will go short next battle by 2 men. Such is life in the Middle of Nowhere!

Fun game. The VC had 2 random reinforcements which made them stronger than expected. I had 5 random events this game to include a human wave by a VC squad. Most games I get 1 or 2.

US forces as above Only 2 squads land 1st turn. Last squad lands on turn 3 or on the second turn of the reinforcement card. 1 addiitonal squad with a Gr II leader was generated as a random reinforcement. In addtion the Company CO came in; a Gr IV brilliant leader

VC forces that were generated were

1 MMG (50% of starting in a bunker; mine didn't)

3 VC squads (1 with poor morale)

1 LMG (50% of starting in a bunker; mine didn't)

1 gr III leader 1 gr II leader 1 gr I leadre who was hesitant

2 reinforcements were generated to include and additional vc squad with gr II leader and a LMG They entered through the hamlet

Enjoy

Joe

Costly day for the USAAF

2010-07-26T18:39:00.001-07:00

Sorry it has been a month since any postings. Had a family reunion and started a new job which has kept me busy. Played several small TW&T games and BTH2 games but took few to no pictures. Did play one B-17 raid this weekend though...

The men of Bomber squadron 222 "Iron Men" shuffled into the briefing hut. Target Kiel. Ingress over land to fool Jerry and egress over water; brilliant thinking?!?! Worst news was BS 222 was to be the low squadron for the group today. Only good news was plenty of P-51s and a smattering of P-47s to cover.

SQ lead Hell's Bell's Ace
Dangerous Curves
Belle of the Ball Rookie
2nd element
Return Ticket Veteran
Queen of the Skies
Miss Jane Rookie

Escort was 6 P-51Ds with 1 ace, 2 veterans, 2 average and 1 rookie
Random event added 2 P-47Ds with 2 Average pilots

Germans spotted US first and came in undetected. P47s trailing and P-51s echeloned to the left of the formation.

German force consisted of
6 FW 190 A8 R6s (the armored guys with 30mm cannons 3 Vets 1 Avg and 2 green covered by 2 ME 109Ks both average.

Iron Men flying with escort

Unfortunatly the first sign of trouble was when Sgt Singleton, the tail gunner of Miss Jane, called out bandits 6 o'clock high closing in fast!

4 P51s quickly split S'ed to engaged the 3 fighters attacking Miss Jane while 2 provided top cover.

Embarresed P-51s come roaring in!

Miss Jane took enough wing damage that she fell out of formation. The P-51s drove 1 of the armored attackers off but Jane was now in trouble. She next lost her top turret and waist gunner. Finally her number 3 engine exploded; 4 parachutes were counted.

The other 3 FW 190s fell upon Queen of the Skies. Their cannon were too much and she succumbed before fighters could show up with 8 parachutes counted. They then moved onto Return Ticket. Cannon fire also managed to knock her out of formation. But by this time the P-51s were making things too hot for the FW 190s and they decided 2 bombers was good enough for today and left. 4 of the 6 FW 190As had significant damage but none were shot down. 1 ME 109K fell to a P-47s guns. No US fighters were lost. On the bomb run Dangerous Curves took a direct hit into the gas tank and exploded with no survivors. The 3 shaken survivors of 222 scored no hits on the harbor. A costly day for the USAAF!

Fun game but pretty one sided. The bounce by the germans set the stage. I also upgraded the FW 190A8 to ROB 3. Will play several more games to see it this works. I used a modified damaged table based on my variant damage table for BTH found in a TFL special. I also used characteristics for fighters that I hope to pen in a future article.

Below are just a smattering of other pictures I have taken receintly

Inspired by Chris' latest Sharp's Practice

Supplement I played a British Pirate game

Had 6 IL-2s bomb some bunkers

The Bomb run

Earlier escort mission; this one in Tunisia.

All 4 P-38s shot down!

Thanks!

Enjoy

Joe

Plekui 1968

2010-06-29T19:13:00.000-07:00

Inspired by Rich Clark's article "Tet a Tet" in the TFL Summer special I played my own villiage fight using my 1st Cav. I stole his map and used a modified "Hasty Attack" scenario from Platoon Forward to generate the forces. This is the 8th battle with this platoon. 2nd Squad's morale went up after last battle due to Lt McSwain's leadership.

Lt McSwain entered into the hut where he and SSgt Davis had been hastily summoned by Lt Jaroz the company CO. Looks like Charlie is staging some type of attack into Plekui. Division is up in arms so battalion is as well. Crank up and enter Plekui and see what exactly is going on. No helos but we have trucks, one track and a tank. Move out in 45 minutes. You might hit some blocking forces on the way; push through and find out what is going on at division. Good Luck.

Characters
Lt McSwain Optomistic/movies Gr II
SSgt Davis 1st sq shy/ wealth Gr III Brillaint leader
Cpl Lawrence 2nd squad Gambler/greed Gr II
Sgt Colton 3rd sq cunning/ family Gr I
1st and 2nd squad high morale 3rd squad average morale

As you enter the outskirts of town you hear firing up ahead. What is your plan LT?

Outskirts looking from town

1st Cav will enter far side of board

Lt McSwain unloads the trucks. He decides to send 3rd squad up towards the houses on the right (his right/ left side of picture above) to find source of firing. 3rd squad has not done as much fighting as the other 2 squads and though they are not as proficient he is trying to even the workload.

A HMG quickly opens up from the red roofed house pinning 3rd squad. They do see an ARVN squad in the nearest house fighting it out with VC squads nearby. Lt McSwain, curses himself. He knew Colton wasn't up to the task. He orders SSgt Davis to infiltrate left through the paddies to take out the HMG, the tank forward to shell the red roofed house and the track to the right to lay down fire as needed. He will go forward to rally 3rd squad.

3rd squad proves difficult to rally. Suddenly out of the elephant grass to the right a rocket streaks toward the tank. The Lt doesn't need to look back as he hears the tremendous explosion.

Failure of 3rd squads attack. Lt McSwain

is the one still standing in front.

SSgt Davis made some headway on the right until they ran smack into a VC squad. They held their own but could not advance as the HMG turned its attention on them.

The Lt orders the track up to lay fire on the elephant grass. This track is designed for anti aircraft work with a gattlin gun and cuts an impressive swath through the grass. Meanwhile, 2nd squad goes wide right through the swamp as 3rd squad lays down supressive fire.

Cpl Lawrence and 2nd squad advance

through a swamp

2nd squad manges to push through to the grass and actually takes one of the houses but looses 4 men in the process. It is too much. Lt Mcswain orders a pull back from the town. He explains to Lt Jaroz that he is up against at least a company and requests an air strike on the town. Jaroz knows McSwain to be a good officer. If he can't make it maybe this is something big. He tells McSwain to hold while he checks with battalion, LtCol Patterson.

So ends the first battle! I haven't lost in a while so this will keep me humble. I used the iniative rules from the Christmas special and the americans went 3 turns without getting the tank firing card. This allowed the VC to move up a RPG to take it out. Ouch. Guess the tankers couldn't figure out the target or had a brand new sergeant.

American forces as above plus 2 M 60s. . the M113 had a gattling gun on it.

When the americans reach the 3 closest building roll a d6. On a 1-2 there is a 6 person ARVN squad in there with a Gr I leader. The ARVN will get no more than 2 squads total. The ARVN will defend their building but will not advance.

2 Gr II leaders 1 gr I leader 1 squad with low morale

3 squads all armed with AK 47s. 1 HMG and 1 LMG team. 2 RPGs

a random reinforcement came in [ turn 4]that was a squad with a gr III leader. This was the squad that SSgt Davis ran into.

Great game. Hopefully you can do better than I

Enjoy

Joe

Sgt Saunder's Bronze Star day!

2010-06-14T18:03:00.001-07:00

Last weekend got back to a tried and true Platoon Forward battle using my 101st platoon! Situation Normandy D +2.
Characters
Lt Joe Ramsey Scholarly/Techie Gr III
SSgt Bill Taylor Optomistic/wealth Gr II 1 sq
Sgt Paul Saunders Cheery/comforts Gr III 2 sq
Sgt Aaron Goldberg shy/wealth Gr II 3 sq (weapons)

OBJECTIVE: Recon road and outskirts of town. Secure approach to town for rest of company.
There is a MMG in the white villa on the right. (Random event gave you 2 recon rolls pre game)
You have 2 squads; 1 with a LMG, 1 with a BAR and a 3rd squad consisting of a 60mm Mtr and a 2 man Bazooka team. WHAT IS YOUR PLAN LT?

Looking towards St Giraird from

the american positons

Lt Ramsy said we had to take this french town ahead so our boys could pass through. Shouldn't be too many Krauts but there was a machine gun next in the villa next to the road. No artillary or armor for support; just us airborne.

LT said we were going to do a right roundhouse on those huns and avoid the road and woods. Aaron's mortar would lay smoke on the villa while 1 squad's LMG would lay down suppressive fire. "Great! I am thinking. Guess who gets to be the assault element." Right as Rain Sergant!!

Sgt Saunders is not expecting German

paratroopers! Ooops

So the smoke starts popping and the LMG starts buzzing and me and my boys go tearing across this field. About 20 yards away their fire gets serious and we hit the dirt. At this point I see 5 Krauts in a built up position and they have rimless helmets. "Christ we are up against paratroopers!" Can't let me boys know what I am thinking though. I yell, "grenades" and we all throw. "Up and and at em" I scream and leap forward. I didn't realize only 4 men and the Bar follow me. (Other 7 men were shaken) We kill all 5 with only Simmons getting wounded.

Sgt Saunders finishes clearing the position

Lt Ramsey moving up with additional troops

The BAR team starts firing into the MMG and they hightail it back into town. Meanwhile I go back to my boys and tell them they better not ever, ever, ever do that to me again. They are screaming eagles!!!!
Lt Ramsy ocupies the villa and 1st and 3rd squad come up. We are told to advance to the hedge and once supressive fire is available move up again.

2nd sq behind hedge when german gun

rolls around corner (top middle)

We are catching our breath when the Krauts roll up this gun and start to shell us from the town! I look back at the villa and it is under MG fire from the town as well. I ain't staying behind this hedge to be killed at long range! I ain't retreating! Only choice left is to go forward. We advance to the first house but it is in line of sight of that blasted gun. We move forward again (Sgt Saunder's is being modest, all these moves were under fire) and arrive at the town proper where there are 4 germans setting up a machine gun. We don't even break stride but enter the backyard and take them out!

Sgt Saunder's squad encouters the MMG

We encounter fire from the house. After a brief firefight it's grenade time and we enter. 10 americans against 8 germans! I have never been so scared in my life. We lose 5 but only Snyder is KIA. The germans lose 7 with the last one running into the next building yelling his head off.

Using a german LMG we are in a perfect position to lay fire on the gun crew and they scatter like legs! I was just congratulating myself when potato mashers come flying in and 6 germans come storming in from next door without knocking first! The biggest problem is I have 4 WIA and only 4 effectives. I killed 2 of the bastards and the other 4 turned tail.

Honestly Sir I was just doing my job. Any of the NCOs would have done the same.

Great battle and quick too. No heroic events where drawn. Sgt Saunder's cards just came up at the right time consistantly and his die rolls were good. 70% of a bronze star and he made it. He also earns a dynamic commander card. At the ceremony the following month he meets Sgt Lujens a Sherman tank commander who was also awarded a medal for valor. The two become friends. Will they meet again? I would bet on it but don't know where or when.

German Forces Roll die 20% paratroopers 30% security troops 50% wermacht

2 Gr III leaders 2 Gr II leader

2 squads

1 MMG

1 75mm SiG How

Set up northern half of board. Can set up 1 squad dug in.

Orders are to delay american forces

Enjoy!

Joe

Neukirchen Feb 1945

2010-06-04T16:45:00.001-07:00

Grandparents visited over Memorial Day. Umpired a 2 person Lazy TW&T game between my Dad (german) and my son (american) Fictional battle took place in Neukirchen. Americans orders are to advance to the RatHaus and accept the mayor's surrender. If heavy resistance encoutered attempt to take the town. They are the spearhead of an armored force with follow up reinforcements close on their heels.
The Germans are a platoon of Landsers commanded by Hauptman Robert Vaughn (my dad likes the movie Remagen Bridge) 2 squads have nl moral and 1 has poor morale. You also have a 75mm ATG pulled by an opel truck. Your mission is to advance into the center of Neukirchen. Meet up with a platoon of Volksturm and defend the town. Americans have been reported 30 kilometers away so time is short! You are to become the town commander and have the authority to remove the mayor if need be. Rumor has it he would like to surrender the town if not for the volksturm.
Unknown to Robert Vaughn, the Volksturm platoon is actually an 8 man squad commanded by a Gr I leader. Also unknown to Robert, the americans will enter the south entrance of the board 2 turns before the Wermacht due to the vagaries of the umpire's die!

Center of Town. 4 men hidden in Kirche

4 men with panzerfaust just driven off

roof of warehouse on left.

Where is Robert?

Moments before, the americans, not trusting

the umpire, enter town very cautiously.

Good job son!

The Volksturm quickly melt away under M1 fire. They do delay the americans enough to allow the germans to enter the board. 2 squads quickly make for the Rathaus. The opel truck enters with Robert and a squad and quickly see a Greyhound down the street.

3rd squad quickly abandoning the truck when

faced with an american armored car!

At this point a P-47 enters and strafes the truck/squad and gun. Somehow they all survive

(who wrote those rules? see lardies special) but the men are shaken and run into the brick factory.

The2 german squads gain the Rathaus first and the americans have a hard time breaking in. they finally send a squad around the rear to gain entrance.

Close order fighting in the

grand hallway!

Robert is at the top of the screen

An epic battles wages in the Rathaus for several turns. A german MG jams and the americans managed to get a second squad into the building. Both sides suffer heavy casualties. Ultimately, the landsers are force into the upper left corner of the screen shot above. With 12 americans in the grand hall and a sherman tank and greyhound out front, Robert Vaughn leads his 7 survivors out the windows and down the alleys to escape. They will live to fight on another desperate day. As Robert Vaugh says in Remagen Bridge, "Who is the enemy?"

Great game. My Dad failed to comprehend that the 75mm gun was slow to move and set up once unhooked from the truck. He never got it into action and the greyhound kept the crew under fire.

Germans

3 squads

1 gr IV leader

1 gr III leader 2 gr II leaders

1 75mm gun w truck

1 8 man VG squad SMG armed with PF and gr I leader

Americans

3 squads plus 1 bazooka and 60mm mortar

2 gr III leaders 1 gr II leader 1 gr I leader

1 M8 armored car and 1 jeep with 30 cal MG

1 strafing attack by P-47 will occur during game depending on your rules

1 sherman tank comes as reinforcement on turn 4

Enjoy

Joe

Final Playtest! Philippine Sea late 1944

2010-05-16T10:51:00.000-07:00

Have the rules written for LAAF and for Bragging the Hun. Had some Corsairs painted up and 3 new Jacks as well. Time for a final playtest! I like to attack smaller ships, not only does it play faster but I have a chance of sinking them. Furthermore I don't have to worry about history getting in the way of the story. If I have the Yamato supporting landings off Guadicanal that doens't sound quite right!

The Japanese are desperate to get a supply convoy through to the Philippines. The oiler is their #1 priority. They have scraped together an escorting force to include the Tone and will try to get through the ring of american airpower. They have also assigned a CAP force to cover it's entry into Phililpine sea.

TO HQ IMPERIAL NAVY

TOKYO

FROM HQ NAVAL FORCES PHILIPPINES

SUBJECT AFTER ACTION REPORT OF US ATTACK ON JAPANESE CONVOY 22 DEC 1944 AND ANALYSIS OF LAAF AND BRAGGING RULES TO BTH 2 SYSTEM

Prepared by Cmdr Lee Gan (Due to US Freedom of Information Act we have full knowledge of US forces and plans)

Our convoy consisted of 1 CA (Tone); 1 CL (Sendi) 2 DDs (Kamakazi) 2 PG (Saga) 1 Oiler, 1 Large merchantmam and 2 medium merchantmen. CAP at the time of attack consisted of 3 Zero fighters and 3 Raiden fighters.

Enemy forces consisted of 4 Corsairs armed with rockets and 12 SBD Dauntless divebombers. (These should have been Helldivers but despite being an arsenal of democracy, at 1/300 scale the US currently does not have the funds to purchase these aircraft so SBDs were used instead. But admiral, you should see the detail at 1/300th...) It should be noted that the englishman who designed BTH 2 clearly showed his western bias when rating the Corsair's manuverability as a 6. It actually is a 5 with a good roll rate and was used correctly for this playtest.

It appears the devil's plan was to have the Corsairs sweep in first to supress the AA fire with rockets. 6 SBDs would attack the oiler, 3 would attack the large freighter and 3 would tarry and finish up whichever ship needed to be attacked.

The Blue Wave

Raidens ride the wave

The Raidens approached from 3 o'clock but were spotted early. The Zeros approached from 12 o'clock. The fighters broke up the divebomer's formation but the Corsairs kept them busy. Interestingly neither side could gain the upper hand which worked towards the enemy's advantage as the SBDs jinked their way towards the convoy. Only 1 SBD was shot down by a zero fighter. No kills for our brand new Raidens. 3 SBDs were forced to abort their deadly mission; one with a critical instrument damage, one with a fuel leak and one with the pilot WIA. This pilot, Ens Wholaver, blacked out and crashed his aircraft into the sea. Interestingly the brand new Corsairs also failed to score. 2 Raidens were damaged and forced to leave early.

Overall, I expected 1 more SBD and at least 1 Japanese fighter to have fallen in air combat. These lack of kills are attributable to the speed differences in the aircraft which made tailing difficult and poor shooting.

IJN Tone was the bulwark of our AA defense

Convoy right before the attack

CL far left; Oiler and Large MM next in tandem

2 small MM next in tandem followed by Tone

2 DDs flanking either side of large MMs off screen

2 gunboats flanking small MMs off screen

Attack came from top of screen

The Tone and Sendi opened up with heavy AA at long range and continued during their envelope of attack. The large mm combined guns with the starboard DD and managed to "Shake" an SBD early on. (This is the one SBD that missed the oiler due no doubt to this accurate fire) The Sendi then destroyed an SBD. As the attacker transitioned into Lt AA range the rocket firing Corsairs managed to supress the CL, PG and pin the DD. This significantly hurt the AA fire in the near attack run; decreasing it just over 50%. Several Corsairs recieved minor damage from flak but this is occured after they had fired their rockets. Just before a Dauntless started its dive for the large MM the Tone's 25mm guns finally hit home and it blew up in mid air! This is doubly impressive since our 25mm guns are far inferior to the devils 40mm guns for AA duties.

9 SBDs and 3 Corsairs started attack runs. They were in zone for flak for 6 turns. 2 SBDs were destroyed, 1 shaken and 2 corsairs recieved minor damage.

Overall these results are deadlier than predicted and the deadliest we have seen in any playtest. I would have expected a 35% chance of destroying an aircraft; the same for shaken one and close to 100% for one causing a plane minor damage. (nothing is 100% in probability except our ultimite victory!) The rules do play faster than the ones in BTH 2 as you are not looking up how many dice to throw. I attribute the convoy's success to their bushido spirit that overcame the odds facing them! Banzai!

Corsair on final run in for rocket attack

on Kamakazi

Corsair just moments after successful

rocket attack on the Saga

3 Rocket attacks were executed. All hit their targets as expected. The first on the kamakazi took out 2 25mm gun mounts with significant crew casualties. These rockets not only supressed the AA fire on the ship but the loss of these guns depleted her AA capability for the rest of the battle. The second rocket attack was on the Sendi. These rockets caused some shrapnel damage and pinned the AA crews but no mounts were damaged or destroyed. The third rocket attack was on the gun boat Saga. While small this ship has 10 25mm guns so was critical to the light AA defense of the convoy. Unfortunatly the rockets caused a fire to break out on the deck and rapidly spread. The confusion of damage control parties and the smoke kept this ship out of the battle for the rest of the action.

Overall this is a small sample size on which to judge. The fire is unusual but possible occuring 20% of the time.

As you know we have improved upone the englishman's to hit procedure as well. His process has divebombers too accurate particularly the western ones! 7 planes dropped their bomb. (they all dropped 1000lb bombs, for simplicity we ignored the 2 100lb bombs). 3 bombed the oiler with 2 hitting. The one that missed was the shaken pilot. 2 bombed the large MM with 1 hitting. 2 bombed a small MM with both hitting. I would expect a hit rate on a large MM of 60%. 5 hit out of 7 which gives us 70%. Close.

The first bomb that struck the oiler penetrated several decks causing significant structural damage. (about 25%). The second bomb that hit buckled the already weakened keel and caused a fire. The ship was 75% damaged and had lost most of its speed.

The next ship attacked was the large merchant man. The first bomb hit a 25mm AA mount aft and exploded. This destroyed the gun and crew but prevented more serious damage to the ship.

The next bomber to attack was destroyed by the Tone. The third missed.

The last ship attacked was a medium merchantman. The first bomb penetrated several decks causing significant structural damage (about 25%). The second bomb struck aft into the engine room causing significant damage there and causing the ship to come to a complete stop.

Immediately after the US attack the oiler was burning as was the PG Saga. The large merchantman was superficialy damaged and a medium merchantman was significantly damaged and dead in the water.

Overall the results were realistic. They do show variation but this takes into account variables such as where the bomb hits; does it penetrate ect. It takes some time but definitly adds flavor to the battle.

Lastly the Fate Of Ships table was consulted. The oiler sank. The fire on the Saga was put out with only minor damage. The medium MM through heroic efforts of her crew managed to start engines and limp to port with about 33% of her cargo intact. She will not return to Japan however.

In conclusion it must be stated that we lost this battle with a minor loss. Our oiler did not reach the Philippines. The devils lost 4 SBDs and we had a large MM and 1.33 medium MM get through but it was not enough to claim victory. The english system of BTH 2 with our vast improvements added to it is a great system that does produce a fun and reasonably historically accurate portrayal of air sea combat in WW II. Most importantly it will give us the detail to brag about our final victory over the west!!!

Cmdr Lee Gan

Great battle and I am now done with BTH 2 for a while! I am ready for some Platoon Forward Russian Front style next.

Thanks

Joe Legan

Site not dead!

2010-05-09T19:16:00.000-07:00

Capt Sandru making ace!!

Apologize for the lack of posting. A bussiness trip; real life and working of 2 projects for BTH 2 have kept me from playing any real games of late. Both projects should be in the Lardies summer special. The first is LAAF; simple anti aircraft rules for BTH 2. I have gotten some great help on this from Dan Nelson. The second is Bragging the Hun. It is more detailed damage tables for BTH 2 so you too can brag about your exploits back at the squadron bar! Ran 4 playtests this weekend including a particularly exciting one. 9 SBDs against 2 Tone class cruisers and 2 Japanese DDs. 1 SBD shot down by flak ( as expected) 6 of 8 SBDs hit their targets ( higher than expected but I am not messing with the to hit tables) First cruiser had a fire start/ 50% damage and had a 5 in turret destroyed. Fire burned out of control and gutted the ship. Had to be towed home! Second cruiser had bad flooding and heavy casualties. Flooding took a while to control and cruiser ended up limping home towing the first cruiser. Not bad for 8 SBDs!

Only real battle I have played was with my IAR -80 sq. Capt Sandru did make ace by downing 2 IL-2s while 6 IARs were flying CAP over a german TB and 3 Mine sweepers that had just delievered supplies in the Black Sea. They were attacked by 10 IL-2s escorted by 3 Yak-1s. Cpl Forscu was killed. Only one bomb struck home on the torpedo boat doing some minor damage. Flak scored no kills.

Next weekend I hope to have time to either play a russian front battle or a BTH2 battle with some corsairs I am currently painting up.

Till then thank you

Joe

Ethiopian training excercise 1935

2010-04-21T18:33:00.000-07:00

Before Sgt Bustamanti and platoon fought a guerilla war in Ethiopia they participated in it's liberation. This comes from the opening days of the war and shows how Buffo gained his reputation and loyalty of his men.
During the Italian invasion roads were important for the attacker for supply. Despite the Ethiopian disdain for defensive combat their Turkish and Belgian advisors convinced them to construct defensive works to stop the aggressors.

As Lt Chianti walked up to Capt Butro he already knew what had happened and what his platoon would be asked to do. He had heard the firing up ahead as the column had stopped. He was thrilled that the Capitano was trusting him to re open the road from whatever rabble was blocking it. He believed in Italy and a new Roman empire. He was hoping some of the glory would rub off on him!! His mind snapped back to what the Capt was saying. "We have a tank and a sahariana to support you. We will also give the trees and the hill a drubbing with artillery before you go in. I suspect this will be much like a field excercise. Good Luck"

Characters:
Lt Chianti Romantic gr II
Sgt Buffo Bustamanti confident/ family 1st squad Gr II
Cpl Petracela cultured asl Gr II
Sgt Polti obnoxious 2nd squad Gr I
Cpl Riccelo Cheap asl Gr I

1 Platoon 1 45mm mtr 1 MMG 1 L3 tankette 1 sahariana jeep 2 stonks of 75mm arty with more on call if you need it

Looking from Italian positions

column took fire from trench in trees

black markers are suspected positions

WHAT IS YOUR PLAN LT??? WHAT IS YOUR PLAN MAD PADRE??

Lt Chainti decided subtlety was not needed here. He sent one squad to the left of the road and one to the right. The tank would go down the middle with the jeep swing wide right to pin down any forces in the building.

The artillery hit the trenches in the trees and shocked the wahlas. The artillery fell short of the hill and a MMG opened up from that position.

Initial advance

Buffo's squad quickly gaining the trees

Buffo's men moved smartly and gained the trees before the Wahlas recovered. There they traded shots with the savages.

On the right the MMG slowed 2nd squad greatly causing casulaties. Then it stopped! (broke) Polti rallied his folks with LTs help and moved up.

Sgt Polti's squad gains postions in front of
the hill with difficulty (nice jacket)

At this point Buffo led his men into the trenches to avenge their grandfather's defeat in this country years ago. The Ethiopians rose to the challange. At last, combat worthy of a warrior!

Combat worthy of warriors!

Buffo in the center

Buffo's leadership and skill carried the day as 5 of the 8 warriors fell with the rest retreating. The survivors moved to the hill where they were rallied by their officer. Buffo moved to flank them but warriors appeared on his left. ( they had moved from the building around the hill to flank Buffo) to make matters worse the MMG started up again and 2nd squad was taking heavy casualties. The Italians were pushed back.

At this point Capt Butro appears with a forward observed. After talking with Lt Chainti it was decided to pound the hill and then have another assualt led by Buffo.

Artillery pounds the hill
Yes, that is a french gouimer MMG! Sorry

The final assault. Even the tank gets

into the act

Buffo's men charge up the hill as smoke still hangs in the air. The fighting is furious but Italian elan carries the day! The Ethiopians, defeated but not broken retreat up the road. 1st squad is too exhausted to pursue; some training excercise!

Great game! At first it looked like another Italian blowout with Buffo gaining the trees and the MMG breaking. After the 1st trench cleared the Ethiopians stabalized as the MMG came back on line. I actually called it a draw as the Italians took a long time to clear the road and took 11 casualties.

Ethiopian forces

3 "squads" 1 with a LMG

1 MMG

1 Gr III officer 2 Gr II NCOs and 1 Gr I NCO

1 pre plotted 75mm artillery strike. Don't need to pre plot turn just location. (Someone will send out a signal that says "fire it now")

Forces set up dug in

the asl for 2nd sq was killed during the assault. He will be replaced by Cpl Fan. Lt Chianti tried to get Sgt Polti replaced and was unsuccessful. 2nd's squad's morale went down after the battle. He has decided to swap Sgts and give Polti the better squad and Buffo the worse one. We will see how the squads react! Buffo was praised by all for his bravery and elan. He met the CSM of the battalion and he earned his Grade III rating.

Enjoy

Joe

FAAR defends Lardinski bridge

2010-04-15T18:07:00.000-07:00

No platoon forward this week as I have been playing BTH2. I really like this game. I have also been testing some flak rules and some bombing tables that will hopefully be in the summer special if Nick and Rich run out of stuff to print!
Started my Romanian ME 109G squadron. In two missions they have 4 kills and have lost 3 planes. Personnel losses have been 1 KIA, 1MIA and 1WIA. They have 1 Cool Point. [ the goal in Squadron Forward is to obtain cool points thus becoming the envy of friendly squadrons and infamous to the enemy ones. This also allows you to pick up women I am told!]
Their leader board:
Lt Florescu 2 kills Yak 1m
Lt Ancu 1 Kill P-39
SLt Marulis 1 kill shturmvik

First mission was a fighter sweep where they were bounced by 6 Yaks.

On the wrong side of the bounce! Adj Sef Mirou and

Adj Ursuche (MIA) both be shot down

Lt Florescu getting one of his two Yaks

The second mission was 4 ME 109Gs defending Lardinski bridge against 2 P-39s and 6 Shturmviks. They didn't fair particularly well losing Slt Gulan when his plane exploded. Adj Burileanu is a rookie, quickly lost his formation and became wounded. He managed to bring his plane back but the CO, Capt Selei, is very unhappy. 1 P-39 downed and 1 bomber. They didn't loose cool points due to lousy bombing with only 1 250lb bomb hitting the bridge doing light damage.

Melee near the bridge

Russian bombers thwarting my efforts at

testing the new bomb damage charts!

[Rockets worked well at the flak though]

I also have a P-47 sq in europe, a P-38 squadron in the pacific, a wildcat sq and a Tommahawk squadron in the Med running.

Lt Jablowski failed to Bag this Hun

However this Jap is in the bag!

Japanese get revenge

Again abysmal bombing thwarts my in game testing. [no I am not tinkering with the to hit tables, just bad die rolling] 1 bomb does damage at the airfield. However, that bomb hits the fuel dump so bullseye!@

The rules are actually done. Now I just have to write them up pretty.

Plan to have an Italian attack on the Ethiopian army this weekend

Joe

Dawn Raid Ethiopia 1938

2010-04-05T19:02:00.000-07:00

My Italian platoon in East Africa holds a special place. It was with this platoon that I started the whole concept of platoon forward. I was inspired by Chris Stoesen's East Africa suplement and Max Maxwell had a colonial article in the Lardie special. I started focusing on a single individual, Sgt Bustamanti and it has evolved from there. I digress...

For once I hope we have good intellegence thought Lt Chianti. Supposedly rebel leader "honest Abe" had gotten his hands on a french 2pdr. The plan was to cross the river at dawn, raid the hideout and capture the gun before the Wahlas could figure out how to set it up. It would either be in one of the buildings or a cave near the river. Mula Tono felt Abe would have no more than 30 men at the hideout. Capt Butro would be north of the river with a blocking force if things went poorly.

Characters
Lt Chianti Romantic Gr II
Sgt Bustamanti cheerful 1 section Gr II
Cpl Petracela ast SL cultured Gr II
Sgt Polti obnoxious and anti war 2nd section Gr I
Cpl Riccelo asst SL Cheerfulll Gr I

Italian platoon consists of 2 sections of 19 men each. 10 man assualt element and 9 man LMG support element containing 2 LMGs I rate the breda LMG as only earning 2 dice.

Map looking across the river

River fordable only at both ends

Note MMG on hill far right

Lt Chianti was going to take Polti's section across the left ford which was the easy one to cross. He was going to position the MMG and light mortars on this side of the river to fire at the main building where he figured the main resistance would be. Sgt Bustamanti would cross on the right. Sweep the cave and move towards the buildings. Speed was essential if they were to capture the cannon!

Sentry at dawn not very watchful

Lt Chianti got half the section across before the sentry fired a warning shot to wake the rebels. He led his men forward towards the big house. Suddenly from the doorway of the courtyard...

Rebel with Italian LMG

Machine gun fire from the building caused his men to scatter. He rallied them as mortar shells rained down on the building. Sgt Polti finally showed up. Lt Chianti stood up, raised his pistol and yelled "Avanti!" as his men charged the building. The rebels melted out into a field behind the building. Chianti quickly searched the building but no cannon.

Sgt Bustamanti runs into trouble at his crossing

MMG fire greeted Sgt Bustamanti as his men forded the river. As he moved back Wahlahs appeard out of the cave. Cpl Petracela's LMGs quickly sent them packing. Buffo knew he had to get across the river fast; MMG or not. He ordered his men forward and they obeyed. The MMG strangely fell silent [ jammed and was never fixed!] They were across!

Now they started trading shots with the rebels but their LMGs told the tale as the rebels fell back

Sgt Bustamanti nearing the cave entrance

As his troops neared the cave they saw 3 mules leave the cave burdened with metal objects. The cannon! Stop the mules men, he directed

Lt Chianti also saw the mules and went sprinting after them through the field. The demoralized bandits put up little resistance when surrounded by Mussolini's finest

Mules surrounded (They just look like a german shepard)

Lt Chianti in the field with pistol raised

4 rebel prisoners were taken along with the cannon. Lt Chianti gave report of the triumph personally to LtCol Aquino who was quite pleased! The only mark on the day was "honest Abe" was not among the 20 men encountered.

Good game but everything broke the italians way so it was quick. They forded the river easily and quickly. The MMG jammed turn 2 and was never cleared. The rebels (freedom fighters) never rallied their LMG team even though they needed a "8" or less on 2 dice. Lastly, for the first time my system of generating forces let me down. The rebels generated only 1 "squad" with a leader so I added a second squad and leader. I think I will play this scenario again with my vietnam troops and see if it is any closer. I didn't think the Italians would ever be on the winning side of a blow out!!

Italian Forces

1 Platoon plus 1 MMG and 1 45mm Mtr

Ethiopian Forces

1 Gr III leader, 1 Gr II leader

1 squad with italian LMG, 1 squad of 10 warriors

1 MMG which must set up on the far hill. It is covering the likely approach of the Italian forces

Special rules

Rebels may place a sentry near the main building. Both squads must deploy in either buildings or the cave which in the north end of the hill nearest the river. The cannon must also be in one of these 3 locations. It is disassembled.

Every turn the freedom fighter roll a d6. When the cumulative score reaches "10" the mules are packed with the cannon and can move. They will move 3 hexes [ 60yards]each turn. If they make it off the north edge of the board the Ethiopians win. If the Italians capture the cannon they win.

When the Italians cross the right ford they do so easily on a die of 1-3. A 4-6 means their intel was faulty and it will be difficult taking a whole turn in the river to ford.

If you have read my morale rules in the latest Lardy special I suggest you use them for the Italians. I set their morale level at 14. The Ethiopians ignore morale as they have to move their cannon at all costs.

Enjoy

Joe

Patrol along the Kokoda Trail

2010-03-28T18:48:00.000-07:00

This is the 3rd battle with my aussie platoon. Lt "Pinky" Seibert was wounded last battle and has not been replaced. He will miss 2 battles. This platoon has poor leadership with 2 Gr I leaders and the platoon sgt a gr II [McDonnel] who was just promoted to Sgt after last battle. The company commander has decided to send the Sergant Major out with 2 sections on a combat patrol.

Sergant Major, your map is below. You start at the bottom edge and must recce the whole board. Come up with your route and order of march. You have 2 sections plus a 2in mortar.
See what the Japs are up too and good God man, be careful!
Characters:
Sgt Maj Peters Gr IV
Cpl Tommy Higgins 1st section Gr I
Cpl Jeffrey Stokes 2nd section Gr I hesitant commander

Sgt Major decided to start along the left of the board, skiriting the jungle and make a clockwise circle of the board going around the rocky hill. 2nd section would lead and when contact was made he would move up to help Stokes who was the weaker of the 2 weak leaders.

Map depression is left and

rocky hill is left center

Cpl Higgins was glad to be on a mission with the Sergant Major. Hopefully he would see what an idiot Stokes was and how deserving he himself was of another stripe. Higgins was sadden when 3rd section's Cpl McDonnel was promoted to platoon Sgt. McDonnel was good, just not as good as himself. He was out to prove it to the Sergant Major today.

Unfortunalty for our heros, the japanese [also on patrol] saw them first and moved to set up an ambush...

Sgt Maj Peters sees Japs on the hill

and past the jungle

The Sgt Maj called out Japs on the hill and past the jungle! He ordered Higgins to take his section into the jungle and Stokes into the Kunai. 2in mortar was to start pounding the hill.

Japanese knee mortars in

my version of bamboo
Japanese squad on hill

Higgins got his folks into the jungle and started firing at advancing infantry. Unfortunatly a LMG from the hill and mortars pounded his position and the men waivered.

Meanwhile a second LMG opened up on first section from the hill.

Japanese advance on Cpl Higgins

Cpl Higgins had to pull back into a depression before they were overun!! Why wouldn't these bastards rally!!!! [ It is tough to be a Gr I leader]

Meanwhile, 2nd section had pinned the LMG on the hill. Sgt Maj screamed, up and at em boys!

Up and at em boys!

The aussies took out the LMG but before they did a final burst caught 2 men in the stomachs. Sgt Maj Peters hit the ground knowing it was bad. An IV was started; he refused morphine knowing he was the only competent leader but then he lapsed into uncounsouness. Cpl Stokes was at a loss at what to do next. [The hesitant commander card came up at the worst times] They had lost 4 of the section taking out the LMG. There was still a jap squad on the hill. They traded shots and even repeled an assault. Stokes could not get them rallied to charge and could not un hesitate enough to have them retreat.

Cpl Higgins in the depression

Meanwhile, Cpl Higgins could not get his section to rally! The japanese gathered for another charge.

The final charge
2in mortar shells try to halt the advance

12 Japanese led by a sword wielding NCO moved into the depression.Cpl Higgins managed to get extricate his folks without losing a man. He then went back and picked up the the 2in mortar and quitely snuck away.

Casualty wise it was a closer battle with the aussies sustaining 14 and the Japanese 8. Clearly the Aussies were driven from the field. With 2 poor leaders they could not rally their folks. 2nd section finally got away when Cpl Stokes was wounded. Had the Sgt Maj not been wounded it might have proved a very differnet game.

Japanese forces:

1 gr III leader 1 gr II leader 1 gr I leader

2 squads with LMGs

1 knee mortar squad [3 mortars and 6 riflemen]

Enter north edge of board on patrol Randomly determine edge and turn of entry

Cpl Higgins was unsuccessful in having Cpl Stokes removed from the platoon and he had a 50/50 chance of becoming a Gr II leader and missed. Sgt Major Peters lived but was invalided home to australia. The new Sgt Major is Joe Cook and he already dislikes the platoon. Lt Seibert is working at battalion was convilesing and had done some good stuff for the company that has earned the gratitute of the company commander. Cpl Stokes is out for 2 battles and Pvt Collins will have the section Gr I no hesitant commander card.

Can Sgt McDonnel whip these guys into shape? Will Cpl Higgins ever earn his Gr II?

Enjoy

Joe

First sortie for Adj Sef Ionescu

2010-03-07T17:42:00.001-08:00

Traded in my playtest copy of Bag The Hun II for the final. Great artwork and some inspiring rules! Rivet counters won't like them but they reward good tactics and show why a veteran pilot is always dangerous. Needless to say did not play Platoon Forward this week but a bit a good news on that front. Rich of Too Fat Lardies has agreed to pubish it and stated he will do so right after he finishes Charlie Don't Surf. I expect to see it this summer. Soon you will be inspiring me with your tales of heroics!!

Still tinkering with Squadron Forward and my Romanian Air Force...
Adj Sef Ionescu had been in the AAR for 9 years and had finally wrangled a combat assignment when his friend (wingman) was posted as the wing commander of a fighter base at the start of the war to rid the world of Communism. If you read the last post you will remember the escadrille was down to 4 planes. The mission assignment today was a fighter sweep. Lt Macri would lead the mission along with the flight sergeant. The 2 wingmen would be Adj Stag Toma and Adj Baciu.
Characters:
Lt Marci Plesant
Adj Sef Ionescu Cultured Veteran pilot
Adj Stag Toma obnoxious
Adj Baciu cunning 1 kill

Shortly after takeoff Lt Macri had engine trouble and had to abort. (random event) There was discussion of cancelling the mission but Ionescu felt strongly that they should at least stay over Romanian lines and protect the troops. He was spoiling for a fight!

3 IAR-80s in a loose "V"

The blue stand denotes veteran pilot

(You can get away with that solitaire!)

"Bandits 4 o'clock low" Toma calls out. Obnoxious on the ground, Toma was a fine wingman in the air and his eyesight had prevented a bounce today! 5 I-16s. Ionescu pulled the V around right and allowed Baciu to detach as the battle was joined! (Toma had complained that he was senior but in the air performace counted and Baciu had downed a plane.) The battle is joined

A swirling dogfight ensued with the IARs using their speed to accelerate out of trouble when needed. Toma Lost Ionescu early on (on purpose?) as Ionescu dove and quickly turned hard to port to get on the tail of an apparently lost (sprog) I-16. As his machine guns rattled he saw hits in the cockpit of the small fighter. [ Using a modified version of my damage table that appeared in a Lardie Special a while back; the I-16 had back seat armor which turned the damage roll from a temporary loss of control to a cockpit glass smashed result; curses!] The startled pilot throttled down, flipped the agile rata into a left turn that Ionescu could not quite follow. He lost airspeed pulling Gs and dropped a level of altitude to aviod a stall.

Meanwhile...

3 I-153s show up to party

A random reinforcement brings 3 more russian aircraft into the battle. 3 against 8! Baciu is quickly shot down but bails out unharmed. Adj Sef has seen enough. He tells Toma they have to retreat!!

Sound retreat! Toma on the tail of a I-153 upper left

Adj Sef Ionescu swinging wide of his prey middle right

Adj Stag Toma pulls the trigger as the I-153 fills his sights. He sees hits on the engine and then the plane explodes in a ball of fire! Joyously he dives for the deck and heads for home. Adj Sef thinks, "There will be no living with him after this."

Enjoy

Joe

Aeronautica Regala Romana

2010-02-23T17:42:00.001-08:00

I have wanted a Royal Romanina Air Force since I got into miniature aircraft about 2 years ago. Scotia does the IAR-80 aircraft but I could not find decals and did not feel I could free hand the Maltese Cross like markings. Enter Mike Grant Decals and I could see my quest becoming a reality! The following has nothing to do with Platoon Forward but thought it was too cool not to post. Hopefully you will agree...

Ready to Bag the Ivan!

59 Escadrile of 8 Grupul 22 June 1941 Time to take the Squadron Forward!

Capt Sandru Likeable Veteran CO

Lt Hapaianu agressive

Lt Macri Pleasant

SLT Alexiu Pessimistic (shys away from combat)

SLT Nicoara Cunning

Adj Sef Grecu

Adj Stag Fortu Glum Sprog

Adj Stag Toma Obnoxious

Adj Stag Chera Mecurical Dead eye Sprog

Adj Baciu Cunning Sprog

Did not roll up the first battle as I had worked too hard on these planes and pilots for them to get smoked their first time out. 6 plane patrol that would meet 6 I-16s Tip 10s. Capt Sandru takes the rookie Fortu as his wingman, Lt Macri takes Toma (even though he is obnoxious hopefully he will make a good wingman in combat) and the SLts take each other. No one knows that Alexiu shys away from the guns at times yet. Lt Hapainu and the Flight Sergant Grecu stay behind to provide leadership in case we do get smoked.

I do dice for spotting and postion and we bounce the I-16s!

SLT Alexiu gets the first shot in for the FAAR!

SLT Alexiu gets a good bounce in but manages only to damage an I-16. The russians break and a swrilling dogfight ensues. Alexiu's wingman's plane gets damaged so he stays on the fringe of the fight after that to protect his wingman. Capt Sandru, being a veteran, manages to down 2 I-16s and damage another!

Capt Sandru showing how it is done!

The next mission was as escort to a reconnassance aircraft. 4 IARs participate and encouter 5 I-153s. ( I did dice for this mission) The rookie Baciu bags an Ivan so elevates to average status. Adj Chera is shot down but is reovered by romanian troops. Unfortunatly Adj Sef Grecu's plane is seen to explode during the battle with no parachute seen. (The IAR-80A had no self sealing gas tanks)

The third battle again sees Capt Sandru on a free hunt. Unfortunatly due to combat losses and damaged planes (we started with 8) there are only 5 IARs available. This time we run into 10 SB-2 bombers escorted by 6 I-16s.

Third battle over a lake

Outnumbered by the escort the romanians fail to knock a single bomber down. Capt Sandru does add anther I 16 to his score but Adj Stag Chera (sprog) looses his leader and is shot down during the melee. Word is recieved that he is safe and should return to the unit in 1-2 days.

So our squadron has shot down 4 aircraft, damaged 4 and we have lost 3 aircraft of our own. We currently have only 4 planes ready and 8 pilots available. Capt Sandru has 3 kills and Adj Baciu has 1. A new Flight Sergant, Adj Sef Ionescu has just joined the squadron. He is a veteran flyer and use to be the wing commander's wingman when the old man was a Capt. Will he be an ally or spy?

Am formulating Squadron Forward campaign rules slowly and it seems to be coming together. Am figuring out how much in the weeds should the player be regarding fixing of aircraft. Am using Bag the Hun by Too Fat Lardies as the tactical rule set.

Just spray painted my ME-109Gs (from I-94 enterprises) yesterday but anxious to see how this new flight sergant is going to work out!

Enjoy

Joe

Hill 422 Greece 1940

2010-02-16T18:50:00.000-08:00

Went to the Williamsburg Muster last week. Great little show. Picked up several greek NCOs to go with my greek platoon. Hence you know where the battle would take place... This is my 5th battle with this platoon. These guys have had it rough with one loss and 3 draws. Lt Sposito missed last battle recovering from wounds. In the hospital he met the division commander Gen Pitaccio who pinned on his wound badge personally.

Lt Sposito had had 4 quite days since the Italian offensive had run out of steam. His platoon was holding part of the battalion line. He had a small hill called 422 and the edge of a small village. His platoon was still a mess since returning from the hospital. Hellik was a drunk. Pitsikas was a good private but just did not think like an NCO. Basakidas was the only good one of the bunch and he liked to drink too much as well. He had complained to his CO but the Capt Makarezos only brushed him off and told him that a good officer would turn the NCOs into good leaders.

Characters
Lt Sposito Pleasant Gr III
Sgt Hellik 1st squad Alcoholic Gr I
Sgt Pitsikas 2nd sq Course peasant Gr II
Sgt Basakidas 3rd sq Generous who likes his wine Gr III

Board looking towards the Greeks positions

Hill 422 on the right with a trench and

several small buildings on the left.

Sposito was rotating the squads at night using a squad in the trench with a MMG and a squad

in the buildings but only half of that squad alerted. The rest of the men and he stayed in the village about 100 yards back. He had no reason to expect an attack tonight...

3rd squad with Sgt Basakidas mans hill 422

yes it is dark!

Lt Sposito was awaken by machine gun fire. He waited to see if it continued; it did. He gathered 2nd squad and moved up the road. 1st squad was in the buildings and 3rd squad was on the hill. They had no flares or starshells. This was the greek army in 1940 afterall!!

The Italians had launched a raid from their left flank. The object was to capture a prisoner from one of the buildings. A random event had 1st squad asleep (I am not making this up I told you I always report honestly!) so 3rd squad on the hill did notice the bulk of the force moving forward but not on the far edge where one squad cut the wire and slipped towards the unoccupied barn.

Lt Sposito had Sgt Pitsikas wait on the road while he entered the building. Sgt Hellik explained that there were 2 Italian squads forward of his positions. The Italians had probed but were driven back with some loss. It apeared another half hearted Italian effort. Sposito acknowledged and went to check on hill 422. As he passed Sgt Pitsikas he told him to take his squad to the barn and set up his LMG in case the Italians tried to flank the greek villiage and wire.

Italian squad through the wire and

approaching the barn undetected

1st squad has half a squad in each half of the building
2nd squad is behind the building moving towards the barn
Italian squad is moving up to assualt the building

As Lt Sposito learned of 1st squad's somulence from 3rd squad all hell broke loose at the building. Lt Spositio hurried back. Apparently some Italians had infitrated through the barn and were stopped by the timely arrival of Sgt Pitsikas' 2nd squad.

Timing is everything! Sgt Pitsikas arrives.
(One of my new NCO figures!)

During this firefight the Italians managed to move up another squad to assault the house!

Italian Lt leads the raiding party in

As Lt Sposito arrived close combat raged in the house. Lt Sposito wondered if the Greeks were still asleep as they were slaughtered. 9 Italians against 5 greeks/ 5 greek casualties and no Italian! Sgt Hellik tried to fight his way in to save his men but only managed to lose 3 additional greek soldiers. As Sposito sent a runner to pull men from the hill to defend the villiage the Italians left with 2 prisoners. A disaster!! Lt Sposito wanted to kill Hellik but decided a courts martial would be better.

The next morning Capt Makarezos was furious. When Sposito brought up Hellik's derilection of duty he was cut off. "How many times have I told you not to blame your failings on your NCOs! If he was asleep why were you not there checking on him. If YOUR court martial did not have to be approved by the General I would file it today! Get out of here."

Great battle. 1st squad asleep really made it interesting I thought the Greeks had it until horrendous die rolling allowed the Italians to waltz in and waltz out. Lt Sposito was downgraded to a Gr II leader and Sgt Hellik has had a command confusion card added.

Forces

3 squads (Greek squads were 10 men 5 rifles and 5 man LMG team) substitute a MMG for 1 LMG 1 of these squads starts off board in the village and arrives on the 4 turn or 4th turn of the reinforcement card.

1 salvo of 81mm fire pre registered

Italians

3 squads plus an additional LMG (can have additional SMGs as this is a raiding party)

2 Gr III leaders 2 Gr II leaders

Italians win by taking a prisoner. Can attack hill and/or buildings

Special rules

Scenario takes place at night.

1 greek squad is asleep. randomly determine which one. In a 2 player game obviously don't tell the Italian player!

Enjoy

Joe

A chapel named St Anne

2010-02-03T18:50:00.000-08:00

This is yet another battle with my american platoon in the opening stages of the Battle of the Bulge. For more background see the last post from Jan 19.

Lt Brown was dreaming of Christmas at home when his platoon Sergeant SSgt Klug came in with SSgt Roth. Roth was the Plt Sgt from the Hvy Weapons platoon. Brown didn't particularly like him as he was a pushy New Yorker but Klug and he seemed to get along fine. "Sir, SSgt Roth's brand new Lt is lost with a bunch of his guys up the road. They were pulling back here when they ran onto some Germans. They are overdue by 3 hours! A frenchie [ ed note: This would be a Belgian who speaks french] says there are some americans trapped in a chapel 2 klicks from here. It has to be the Lt. Capt Lincoln is up at battalion and anyway sir he doesn't have the balls to go on a rescue mission. I think we gotta go sir. Those are americans up there." ended SSgt Klug.
Brown looked out the window and considered his options silently. Capt Lincoln was a decent fellow but was very cautious. He would not risk an unsupported platoon in the unknown for 10-15 americans. Brown was politically savy and was currently flying high but Brown also had a fierce loyalty to those on the front lines who did the fighting. He rang battalion and of course was not allowed to speak to Capt Lincoln. "Could you please tell Capt Lincoln that I have seen some Germans along my front and am sending out a patrol to gather some information please." he said with a grin.

Characters
Lt Brown Cunning Gr III
SSgt Klug 1st squad delightful Gr II
Sgt Claypool 2nd squad cautious Gr III
Sgt Gerrard 3rd squad cunning Gr II

Lt I got lost Gr II Hesitant commander
SSgt Roth Gr II

Board looking from the american entrance.

Trapped americans are in the Church and jeep in

the yard. Germans set up in the woods on the

right and along the hedge behind the church

Blown up halftrack on road

WHAT IS YOUR PLAN LT?

Lt Brown was going to lead with Klug on the right and Gerrard on the left. He would hold Claypool and Roth back until he determined where the enemy strength was. Roth would then set up to attack the strength while Claypool went around the strength into the church to rescue the machine gunners.

Germans in the woods pin the americans while their

commerades behind the hedge close assault

As Brown's forces advanced to contact they heard machine gun fire rage around the chapel and mortar shells hit the grey roof. A mortar off to the far left on a hill slowed 3rd squad's advance to the wall of the church. SSgt Klug advanced rapidly and entered the woods only to find a german squad there. Brown sent Roth's 50 cal up to support Klug and sent Claypool across the road into the churchyard

SSgt Klug in the woods to the right of St Anne's

Sgt Claypool discovered there was a Marder covering the road and several shells convinced him to bring his squad back to the safety of the woods.

Lt "I got lost" speaks with Sgt Gerrard behind

the church

(I know his helmet has a horizontal stripe; sorry!)

A wounded Lt came out crying to Sgt Gerrard and 2nd squad who had managed to make it into the chapel courtyard. The germans have taken the chapel! I have several wounded men in there. You must help me take it back; no I order you to take it back. Gerrard looked at Cpl Morgan his assistant squad leader, " It is what we came to do Sergant" he shrugged.

Sgt Gerrard told the Lt since he was wounded he should sit down and stay out of the way so he would not get "more injuried". 2nd squad worked there way into the church. Fortunatley there were only 5 germans left in there. After a short fight which did cost 2nd squad 2 KIAs St Anne's was liberated once more. There were 4 dead americans and 4 wounded besides the LT. The wounded were successfully evacuated while the rest of the platoon held the germans at bay.

Later that evening after Lt Brown had given his report to Capt Lincoln the Captain spoke. "Brown, that was a tactically unsound move you did today. But you destroyed a Marder and saved 5 trapped americans as well as raised the morale of the entire company. Thank you. That is all; DISMISSED!

Great game though I should have moved faster to save the folks in the chapel. At set up the american postion looked strong. Once the germans got into the chapel they chewed up the heavy weapons folks.

FORCES

3 squads

1 50 cal MG

1 60mm Mtr

Trapped in the chapel 1 3 man LMG and 1 5 man half squad plus 1 jeep with 30 cal

Germans

75% chance of Volks grenadier. I rolled a 4 on a d4 so used regualr wermacht

2 squads

2 Gr II leaders

1 Gr I leader

1 50 mm mtr

1 Marder III

offboard 81mm mtr

turn 4 reinforcements 1 gr II leader, 1 gr I leader 1 squad and 1 MMG

This is a variant of the couterattack scenario. To win the americans must control the church for 2 turns and evacuate the trapped troops then make their way off the south edge of the board.

Enjoy

Joe

Recon near the snow mountains 1944

2010-01-19T19:02:00.001-08:00

Sorry for the delay in posting. Real world encroached as well as ACW Sharp Practice courtesy of Chris and more BTH II Squadron Forward. Still figuring out the Squadron thing but I think I will have to use a full squadron rather than a half. I keep losing pilots left and right! Below is Capt. "Bones" Stewart about to get his second kill while tailing a ME 109G.

"Bones" getting 1 of his 2 kills during an escort mission. The other mission

his squadron was spanked losing 3 planes without a victory

Received "winter" boards for christmas. Finally got a chance to use them. This is an american platoon that has had 4 missions previously. Lt Brown is well liked by both the company and battalion.

Lt Brown, battalion is not sure what is going on, Capt Lincoln started the conversation. It appears Jerry is launching a major winter attack and our troops in the snow mountains are in danger of being surrounded. We need to know where Jerry is and in what strength. I want you to personally lead a recon up towards Stornach. Find Jerry and get a sense of what he is up to. I have 2 halftracks and a greyhound to get you moving. Brown, LtCol Jackson needs some answers and personally asked for you. I know you can get us some. God speed!

Lt Brown cunning/ family Gr III

Sgt Claypool 2nd squad careful/ knowledge Gr III

Sgt Gerrard 3rd squad cunning/ arts Gr II

Americans enter along road from this edge

Hill in center, forest on left

WHAT IS YOUR PLAN LT?

Lt Brown's plan was to have the greyhound lead 50 yards ahead followed by 2nd squad in a halftrack followed by 3rd squad. He would accompany Sgt Gerrard who was the weaker of the 2 leaders. Upon any contact all infantry would dismount. If applicable, 2nd squad would go left and 3rd would go right.

Initial contact

Greyhound would not survive

As the greyhound rounded the curve around the hill it stopped and fired 2 shots before it burst into flame. " What the hell?" thought Brown as both squads spilled out of their halftracks. He did not wait long for an answer. A PSW 222 AC came around the hill and started to fire at the halftracks. A lucky shot knocked the 50 cal off the lead halftrack and it almost ran Brown over backing up out of the battle. Brown sent his bazooka up to where 2nd squad had formed a skirmish line and sent 3rd squad towards the hill on his left. Meanwhile the 50 cal on the second halftrack forced the armored car back around the hill.

Sgt Claypool sent his squad torwards the hill and Sgt Gerrard's squad ran into SMG armed volksgrenadiers moving through the forest around the hill.

VGs trying to flank the americans. You can see

Sgt Gerrard on the hill ready to fire

Brown, upon hearing fire in the forest, moved in that direction. Sgt Gerrard had moved his BAR team down the hill and into the huntsman's shack. With the German's pinned, Lt Brown gathered the rest of 3rd squad and led them into the forest to hunt Jerry.

Hand to hand combat outside of the huntsman's shack

3rd squad 1 WIA Germans 2 KIA 2 POW

The surviving VGs retreated to the edge of town.

Brown pushed 3rd squad through the woods to the edge of the town. There they found a very nasty surprise!

Very nasty surprise set up 40 yards from Lt Brown's position

Meanwhile back at the right side of the hill. Sgt Claypool looked into the town seeing nothing but the armored car and a LMG set up in the house closest to the woods. (the ATG came in as a random reinforcement and set up behind the building out of sight from the hill) As he pondered his next move from his right in the empty fields came clattering a stuart tank! Sgt McCanty had been separated from his platoon earlier in the day and had moved towards the sound of guns arriving on Sgt Claypools right. He quickly drove off the armored car and preceeded to move into the town (leadership check led him to charge the german positions!)

He drove past the building and turned, quickly setting alight the truck that had brought the ATG up when a lone VG appeared out of the building with a panzerfaust.

And the world held it's breath!

The panzerfaust fired with a roar and went wide right! The hull MG convinced the german to retreat into the house. Lt Brown charged the house with 3rd squad and lost 3 WIA before he pulled back.

At this point Brown reasoned he had accomplished his mission. He knew where Jerry was and that he was definetly on the attack. He decided he would take his 2 POWs back to company along with his brave stuart tank and let the brass decide the next move.

Great game that was quick as well taking about 2 hours solitaire. This was a meeting engagement which is fun as you don't know how it will turn out or what you will meet.

American forces

1 Greyhound AC

2 Halftrack

2 squads with 1 bazooka

1 stuart came in as random reinforcement but I think you have to include McCanty

Germans

1 PSW 222

2 trucks

1 SMG armed volks grenadier squad of 9 men.

1 LMG team of 4 men

2 Gr II NCOs

1 75mm ATG with gr II leader and truck as reinforcement on turn 4 (this also was random reinforcement but ended up saving the day)

Special rules

Both sides enter opposites sides of the road in column. Roll d4 for turn of entry

Check for bogging of trucks and halftracks if they move off road.

Sgt McCanty is very aggressive and will charge almost anything

Enjoy

Joe