Flames of war - Late war - No retreat

Forces 1500
Read Bear Heavy Tankovy (FT)
HQ IS2 (+1mg)
3x IS2 (+1mg)
3x IS2 (+1mg)

5x T34 (+2x85 upgrade) (CT)

10x Sappers (CT)

2x Katjuscha

Home army battalion (FC)

HQ

Sniper

Piechoty company

Kedyw Company (FT)

Kedyw Company (FT)

3x Pak38

6x Mortar

3x10,5 cm

4x HMG

Armored car platoon (FT)

Tiger tank (FT)

So onto to the first battle of 2016... This battle takes place in the outskirts of Warsaw, between the Red army and the Polish home army. The scenario is a "no retreat" mission with modified deployment areas. The Poles holds half of their platoons in reserves and the Soviets takes the first turn.

Turn 1

The Red horde rolls onward to the Polish line and opens up with the heavy breakthrough guns. One unlucky team of Poles are killed in the fire.

The Polish sniper reveals itself and destroy one Katjuscha. For the infantry the order is "No Retreat"!

Turn 2

Quite some lucky shooting from the T-34:s destroys all three captured Pak AT guns. The IS-2:s are now close enough to make an assault and force the Poles to break off after initial causalities. One IS-2 is however destroyed by the Piat and Panzer-faust armed militia. On the right flank another IS-2 manage to scare the Sniper away.

The Polish defenders are reinforced by an infantry platoon of Kedyw from the reserve.

Turn 3

The lone Katjuscha unpin and kills a Kedyw team in its return fire. The IS-2s and the T-34 advance further into the Polish lines.

The Poles now calls for their secret weapon, a Tiger tank borrowed from the Germans.  The polish Kedyw at their left flank advance towards the middle with a "on the double move". The Tiger sadly fail to hit anything with its RoF 1 8.8 cm gun. The sniper takes up a new position but fails to hit the Sappers with its rifle.

Turn 4

A very lucky shot from a T-34/85 penetrates the armor of the Tiger and the Poles have to abandon the machine almost as fast as they got it. The IS-2 platoon accompanied by the CiC attempt an assault over the rail tracks but the Poles are quick to reinforce their lines. After 5 or 6 round of combat from each side, the last surviving Polish, the CiC captures two bailed and one bogged IS-2 himself! The soviet CiC flees to a Nearby T-34 where he takes up new headquarters. The Sniper is chased off by the Sappers.

The poles now bring forth another secret weapon -  a group of homemade mortars. On the left flank the Poles charge the unit of Kedyw towards the mighty IS-2, but in faith that Stalin wont notice their actions, they IS-2s cowardly retreats from the assault.

Turn 5

The Soviets reinforce their position by filling up with more infantry on the objective. The Heroic Polish CiC, sadly out of command, is obliterated by the heavy gun from one of the IS-2. Or maybe he is just good at hiding? 

A Squad of captured German Scout cars arrive to support the lines, but with little power to deal with the IS-2. Close enough to contest the objective the Poles still have not lost their faith.  Artillery fire proves useless in an attempt to destroy the T-34:s and the "home made" mortars manage only to blew one of their own crew member to pieces.

Turn 6 

With combined fire from the tanks and the infantry the Kadyw Squad is reduced to half their numbers and forced away from contesting the objective with an subsequent assault from the Soviet Sappers.

After a good Piat-hit that bail one of the T-34:s, a last attempt is made to retake the objective by assaulting the defenders. The assault is however stopped after heavy defensive fire from the tanks and sappers. The Poles retreat to the ruins of Warsaw while Stalin will be delighted to hear the news.

Soviet 5-2 victory.

Flames of war - Xmas competition

The annual X-mas Fow event has been concluded at "Bunkerkommando" Lund. A series of three battles for each player are played. Each player fields an army of 1500 pts chosen from any late war book. The order of battle is as follows:

Axis

Ausbildung 500 (I) (CT)

Ausbildung 500 (II) (CT)

German Grenadiers (CV)

German SS Panzergrenadiers (FV)

Allies

British tank (CT)

US armored rifle (CV)

US tank (CV)

Soviet tankovy (CT)

Round 1

The first mission is played as a random Meeting engagement mission. All players have access to special game cards witch can influence the battle in one or another direction. I failed to note with player had witch card and the battles below are to some extent influenced by these.

Ausbildung 500 (I) vs US armoured rifle (Allied win)

After a few lucky artillery strikes destroying a king tiger and a panther, the Germans fight an up hill battle against two platoons of dug in bazookas. A last brave tiger assault is attempted, but just barley fail to push the US of the objective.

Ausbildung 500 (II) vs Soviet tankovy (Axis win)

In this battle the heavily outgunned Soviet tanks stands low chance against the heavy German tanks. The Germans takes no casualties.

Grenadiers vs British tank (Axis win)

After an initial push the British tanks finds them self in having abandoned their own objective, witch is secured by the flanking German reserves. 

SS panzergrenadiers vs US tank  (Draw)

After three hours of bloody fighting this battle was considered a draw.

   

Round 2

This round is played as a random defensive battle.

SS panzergrenadiers vs Brisish tank  (Draw)

After heavy fighting both sides finds them self in a standoff where the surviving SS grenadiers is to heavily dug in on the objective. In no manner an assault could possibly dig them out without cheating the dices. The game ends in a draw due to time shortage. A fun and even game.

Ausbildung 500 (II) vs US armoured rifle  (Axis win)

A quite fun game where the Germans just succeed with every save and morale on their heavy tanks. The US infantry is slowly grinded down in a reversed "Fury-movie" manner. They did however have some help of a special game card, giving the heavy tigers the equivalent of Japanese national tank rules.

Grenadiers vs Soviet tankovy (Draw)

A hard battle for both sides with heavy losses. The Germans just failed to hit the Soviet tanks, but the Soviets also failed to penetrate the line. The battle over due to time shortage.

Ausbildung 500 (I) vs US tank (Axis win)

On this quite open battlefield the German heavy tanks brutally destroy the US Sherman before they could achieve anything.

Round 3

The last round is played as a Random mobile battle.

Grenadiers vs US Armored rifle (Axis win)

It's Cauldron and a good alpha strike from the US rifle kills one of the infantry platoons early on and claiming the objective. To many causalities causes the US armored rife to break due to failed company morale before turn 6 (and the possibility to win on objective).

Aubildung 500 (I) vs British tank (Axis win) 

With a quite open battlefield the British tanks fare pore against the heavy German tanks. This Cauldron battle is quickly over in a German victory.

Ausbildung 500 (II) vs US tank (Axis win)

The Axis score a fast victory in this match up, with superior tanks against humble horde of US Shermans.

SS panzergrenadiers vs Soviet tankovy (Draw)

In this surrounded mission the German SS grenadiers fends of a horde of soviet tanks. The time is up before the game ends and with a heavy death toll on both sides this can be considered a Draw.

Comments

This series of battles resulted in a convincing Axis victory, with only two games won by the Allies. The match ups where not very good, as few allied tanks stand a good fighting chance against the "over represented" German heavy tanks (not counting any jumbo shermans or teleport tank destroyers). This obviously affected the results. It's however interesting to see so few infantry companies, as infantry battles tend to end up more static. 

Bottom line, this was a very fun series of battle, with some nice influence of random game cards. As usual its more about finding the good match ups to get the funniest battle.