Operation Bluecoat July Game

Hi all,

I was aware there wasn't a game report for July so have included some photos and brief report on the game and outcome.

Hill 192, Maisoncelles is a scenario from Olivier Perronny and pitches Guards Armoured Division against 9th SS Panzer Division during Operation Bluecoat, August 1944. The ptwo pictures below show the three objectives of the Guards, the most important being the 88mm gun on the hill, the other two being the road junctions. The other picture shows the initial set up with Guards position in red and the SS in blue.

The Guards attempted to push into the village of Maisoncelles with their tanks supporting the leading platoons, only to come under withering fire from the panzergrenadiers in the hedgerows. The casualties on the Guards started to mount and seeing that the objectives could not be achieved after the losses sustained, the Guards attempted to make an orderly withdrawal, only to fail their morale checks and leave the field in a disordered state. (that's Guards speak for rout).

Juno Beach Nan Red

Hi all,
A report on yesterdays game at the club which launches our Firestorm Normandy campaign

Juno Beach was the initial assault and the St Aubin sur Mer stronghold WN27 defended by a platoon from II/736th Grenadier Regiment, with a 5omm bunker gun, one 37mm tank turret bunker, an HMG tobruk, Pak, HMG and mortar support. In addition two pre-planned artillery strikes were available from the 7/1716th Artillery Regiment inland at Beny sur Mer with 4 x 100mm howitzers.
The Canadians consisted of a company from the North Shore Regiment supported by "funnies" and Royal Marines from 48 Commando, with a preliminary naval bombardment and artillery and air support.
As in the actual battle, the fight was a costly affair with the Canadians struggling under AT and mortar fire to scale the 13 foot high sea wall and penetrate the only exit of the beach which was mined and wired

The initial assault by the leading platoons and funnies succeded in creating two breaches in the wall and knocking out the 50mm AT gun but at a cost of the two platoons and supporting armour. The follow up armour a nd two further platoons succeeded in exploiting the breaches using CRABs and infantry to break into the position. This was not helped when they were mistakenly attacked by their own air strike.
The Tank Turret bunker was particularly successful at disabling several AVRE's and breaking up several infantry assaults on the forward wall.


The final blows inflicted on the Canadians was a pre planned artillery strike on the beach which knocked out half a platoon, and a mortar strike which wiped out the HMG platoon from the Cameron Highlanders of Canada just as they disembarked from the landing craft.
However by turn 6 the pressure told and the final morale check by the German defenders was failed prompting the surrender of WN27 as the Sherman Crabs and infantry started to break in.
If the losses sustained are broken down in thirds Killed/Ser.Wounded/Lt.Wounded, the Canadins suffered over two platoons worth of killed and seriously wounded taking the position.

August Meeting

This month saw a big turnout of 11 club members and 3 "casuals".

Two games ran, with JJ putting on a D-Day beach landing scenario in 15mm, whilst I ran the "Magnificent Seven" in 28mm.

Jack gave a painting master class. Given the quality of his painting I certainly took note !

In Normandy the Allies were having trouble getting parked in town. Things weren't helped by "Jabos" that wouldn't tolerate any loitering on the sand (when the RAF appears we duck, when we see the USAF everyone ducks, when the Luftwaffe is in the sky no one ducks). Last I saw the assault force was still making sand castles.

Meanwhile in Mexico Yul Brunner had decided that "no one throws me my guns and says run. No one." He led the other six to rescue the oppressed peasants the Evil ChasCalvera was holding hostage in the church (I guess the Yanks thought if someone was oppressing Mexicans it should be them).

Britt and Chris passed the blind Mexican sentry and Britt's throwing knife made sure one bandit would never see the dawn. Unfortunately Banditos never sleep alone and his bed fellow emptied his gun at the Hollywood stars. Yul Brunner and James Coburn would never take bit parts and remained unscathed, slaughtering their opponent in the ensuing hand to hand combat (two on one ? Hardly the American way).

On the other side of the village Chico (Horst Buchholz - who ?), Harry Luck (Brad Dexter) and Bernardo O'Reilly (Charles Bronson), were shooting it out with the 20 or so bandits rushing their way.

It was all too much for Chico, who went down in a moment of youthful inpetuosity and would never get to marry the local girl (never mind, she wasn't all that anyway).

Lee (Robert Vaughn), was struggling with his own demons, as he hid shaking at the sight of the first Bandit he saw. Luckily for him his "fearsome reputation" meant few bad guys would willingly face his six gun.

In a touching display Chris and Britt stuck close together as they moved on, gunning down everyone who tried to block their progress to the church. At least one bandit's dying breath was "but I was behind a wall". That won't help you in the sixties version of the wild west mate, you don't even get a mention in the credits !

Charles Bronson obviously had a death wish as he duked it out with 3 mexicans, killing them all with his star quality. Eventually Chas Calvera killed him with his "dirty fighting" as Mr Bronson tried to protect the children. Boo, Hiss.

The final scene saw Brad Dexter beat Calvera to death (all the messy stuff occured off camera), whilst Robert Vaughn found his nerve and came good in the end, abley assisted by Steve McQueen, whilst Yul Brunner and James Coburn released the grateful peasants from captivity.

I'm sure there is message in the sub-text here.

Many thanks to Chas, Guy, Steve M, Steve H and Eoghan who bore it all with good humour and bad acting.

Vince

July Game

What no post ?

June Meeting

June saw a large Spanish Civil War skirmish run by Chas. It was an early war scenario, so both sides were seeking to grab territory and had fixed on taking a village.

Two Nationalist columns approached the centrally located village from opposite corners, whilst two Republican forces came from the other corners.

The Government army rushed into the village led by the brave POUM militia's armoured car and occupied as many buildings as they could.

The Foreign Legion led by Brett took the edge of the village and exchanged machine gun fire with the Assaultos armoured car and Malcolm's workers militia, that were lining the edge of a wood.

Elsewhere JJ's militia contested a wood on the opposite edge of town with the mad Moroccans led by Steve M, whilst Rob's Carlists rushed into the village and straight into hand to hand combat.

Following a vicious melee the remaining Carlists and miltia settled to firing at each other from the buildings.

All around the village a fire fight ensued, with both sides die rolls leaving a lot to be desired, although some Civil Guard who tried to double down the road wished they hadn't and the odd unit of militia was wiped out.

The POUM armoured car (the mobile chip shop) sat in the middle of the square, where it failed to see any of the combats around it !

Eventually Steve's Moroccans and Falange tried to throw JJ's militia out of the church, whilst the Carlists assaulted the POUM armoured car.

It was touch and go, but massed fire cut down the Carlists and Ian's Stalinist 5th Column supported by the Chip Shop gunned down the Moroccans at the church door. The respite allowed JJ's militia to halt the Falange and the the Nationalists, bolt well and truly shot, conceded.

I thought it was odd that, having waited for half the game, in the queue at the Chip Shop the Nationalists went home as soon as it opened for business.

A good game to "Rate of Fire" rules, run with a light touch by Chas.

It was nice to see 250 figures in a fast flowing 28mm skirmish game and it could easily have gone either way.

I think Malcolm and I were competing for the title of "Worst Shots in the Game". I think I won, as my guys were supposed to be professionals, although I will let him have the "Blind G*t" award, for failing to spot a small war happening within a 100 yards of his Chip Shop.



Vince

May is done, bring on June!

Last Saturday was probably the busiest day the club has had, in terms of numbers of games, for a long time. Four games were played by 14 people!

First up was an ancients game between one bunch with lots of chariots and another bunch with not so many chariots, using the Impetus rule set. Andy and Brett faced off against Vince and Chas. Then Vince left to watch Exeter City scrape a win and Chas, according to Vince, threw it all away. I'm guessing that means they lost.

In the far corner we have Guy and Eoghan playing the all new Warhammer Ancient Battles 2. Guy had a massed horde of barbarian types, who threw themselves onto the pikes of Eoghans successors and died! Oops.

In the centre was Jack and his son Charlie. AWI was the flavour of the month there, with Charlie commanding the British as they drove the damned rebellious colonials off the table.

The remaining 6 players were involved in a Napoleonic battle depicting a "what if" scenario from Waterloo, using Rank & File rules. A few gallant Allied units (8 units of 5 infantry, 2 units of 6 light cavalry and 4 batteries of artillery) faced off against a veritable horde of French (16 units of 6 infantry, 2 units 6 light cavalry, 2 units of 6 lancers, 2 units of 6 dragoons, 2 units of 6 cuirassiers and 8 batteries). The Prussians were "on the way", with 14 units of 4 infantry, 2 units of 6 light cavalry, 4 units of 6 heavy dragoons and 8 batteries. The allies held for long enough that, by the time the French had broken their line, the Prussians were rolling up the French right flank.

All in all it was a good day. Next month there will be a Spanish Civil War game from Vince and Chas, plus another ancients game from Nathan, Gus and myself, using Greeks this time though.

Sadly I didn't take my camera, so there are no pictures.

Cassano 1705

Ignoring the nasty "buzzy" things on the "Bag the Hun" table, the gentlemen of the club prepared for a re-enactment of the battle of Cassano.

In 1705 Prince Eugene crossed the Italian border to relieve the siege of the cities and castles of Piedmont. Success would keep the duke of Piedmont in the war, failure would surely lead to his defeat. Key to this plan was the bridge at Cassano.

At Cassano the French deployed in and around the Cassano redoubt which protected their supply routes. They were confident the series of irrigation ditches to their front would protect their forces long enough for them to move to meet any threat.

Eugene, of course, had other plans and was across the first ditches before the French knew what was happening.

It was at this point our scenario started.

I led the Allies, taking the cavalry, abley supported by Clive on our left and centre and Steve M on our right. Facing us was Malcolm holding the redoubt and left flank, with Chas taking the centre and right flank.

The Allies rushed to cross the remaining ditch, with Malcolm doing his best to frustrate this. Chas deployed a holding force and rushed the bulk of his army from right flank towards the left where it could cover the redoubt.

As the Allies scrambled over the ditch they were "pinged" by skirmishing dragoons and infantry. A couple of units were caught disordered by charging cavalry and Clive's men suffered at the hands of an infantry firing line.

Weight of numbers drove the French back, but the ditch was slowing our advance, as units halted to redress ranks (JJ would have been proud !). Elsewhere Chas's men made a steady pace towards the fortification.

Allied dragoons forced their way through Malcolm's line and blocked Chas's progress, as Steve pushed the French left back.

Despite Chas's best efforts, the arrival of large numbers of Austrian cuirassiers caused several French units to fire high, waiver and run, but a new line held strong and both sides released their cavalry reserves.

Meanwhile Steve's first assault on the redoubt was turned back by a face full of cannister.

By this time so many cavalry were crammed into the centre that no one could move and Steve renewed his assault on the redoubt.

Seeing the writing on the wall, the Adder waved to the defenders of the redoubt as he crossed the bridge in his coach.

Malcolm's men were last seen being cut down by the bayonets of Steve's fresh grenadier units.

A hard fought battle and the French could complain that had their muskets been on target when the cuirassiers charged things might have been very different.

When told of the casualties amongst his forces Chas was heard to say "More men will be conceived in Paris tonight than were lost on the field today." His report of the battle is said to be very critical of his subordinates and the Chardonnay served with dinner.

I thought it was a good game with around a thousand 28mm figures on the table. The rules (Rank & File) gave a simple, quick game, with a believable result and we played at least 20 turns. Not a competition set, but fun for club bash involving lots of figures.

On the other table JJ & Jason couldn't agree on the difference between the front and the rear of an aircraft (remind me never to fly with them !) and JJ's pencil case got broken.

Vince