Category: Chain of Command

CoC: Homerun at Osmanville

We’ve been playing through the 29, Lets Go! campaign for Chain of Command casually since the beginning of the year. We weren’t interested in fighting back and forth through the scenarios and replaying until the Americans won, so we just played each scenario once and moved on. Dan and I wrapped it up with scenario 5 last night. We’ve learned a bunch of lessons over the course of the campaign. One of the first was that this game tends to take longer than 2 hours to play. I’ve had a number of people tell me that they get through the average game in just about 2 hours, our experience is that with two players each game should take about 3 hours to fight to a conclusion. At the 2.5 hour mark we’re usually able to tell how its going to go, but we wouldn’t actually reach the objectives for at least another half an hour. Considering our time restraints (it’s an hour drive for me to get to the store) we generally call it right around 10-10:15 so I can make it home by midnight.

The building on the far left is the objective, the Americans have to either reduce my force morale to 0 or take the building and end the turn to win. Our Patrol Phase wound up with us deploying our jump off points about 3/4 of the way up the board, one either side of the second house and hedges there. Dan’s tank would, of course, have to deploy down one of the roads.

Dan chose his mandatory Sherman, plus a .50 cal and a .30 machine gun and the extra BAR for each squad. The .50 cal would go on to be the American VIP I believe, the reduction in cover being a major factor and one of the things that makes it almost mandatory for us now.

 

I chose a PAK38, an MG42, an adjutant and two pieces of barbed wire. With the Americans having TWO senior leaders and the Germans only having one I felt I needed to get mine on the board early. Rolling multiple 4’s would be an ongoing theme for BOTH sides during this game. I unfortunately left the barbed wire stands at home, so had to make do with a roadblock on the upper road. I think the barbed wire would have been a lot better, letting me deny the spot that the Americans used to great effect.

The game started off with a good American deployment at the house. .50 cal, one full squad and the platoon Sargent, I answered with two squads, one in the upper right of this photo and another just to the left with a clear line of sight down the wall in front of the house. I also deployed the MG42 in the second floor of the house. I fired on the .50 cal to no effect.

Dan opens up with his .50 cal dealing 4 kills to a German squad, it’s cover reduced to nothing do to the heavy weapon. My Germans respond with a double activation, deploying the Pak38 on the only road the Sherman can come down and firing on Dan’s mortar, doing only a single shock.

 

Dan responds with a double activation of his own, Firing the .50 cal on the same German squad up in the corner, causing them to break as the casualties and shock stack up. They will never recover from this and spend the rest of the game cowering behind several hedges.

Dan uses the Marching Fire ability to hop a wall and put some fire down on the squad I had deployed across from the house. The only thing that saved me was having gone tactical at the end of my last activation in fear of the .50 cal. Dan followed this up on his second activation with 2 kills and 3 shock! His mortar landed a round on the Pak38, adding one shock and a kill. I continued this throughout the game, using my senior leader on this squad to remove shock and have them go tactical, the only thing that saved them.

I used my activation to shoot on Dan’s advancing squad with both of my squads and throw some hand grenades to minimal effect, 1 kill and 1 shock.

Dan decided to bring on his Sherman at this point, unfortunately I didn’t have a full CoC die to fire on it with the Pak38! His main gun causes only shock on the anti-tank gun.

Thankfully I rolled another double activation! Firing with my squads and then following up with a Handgranaten attack I almost wipe out Dan’s squad at the stone wall, they break and Dan simply removes the 2 survivors from the table. I fall back behind the hedge I came from and go tactical again. There’s not much left of this squad but they would survive right up until the end of the game, falling back far enough that the senior leader could start commanding the MG42 to fire.

My Pak38 saw it’s short useless life ended as the Sherman hits it again, causing two kills and breaking the unit. The two survivors run for their lives with five shock on two men. (use I’m using a 105 howitzer as the PAK38)

I roll four 4’s, only activating my MG42 to fire at the .50 cal. Dan one ups me by rolling five 5’s and quickly ending his phase.

The MG42 FINALLY kills the .50 cal in the next turn, it had been hiding behind a stone wall for so long!

At this point Dan has not managed to cross the road. His men are concentrated around this house, with one squad inside, one advancing to take the position I had assaulted at then retreated from. That’s a .30 cal team behind the house taking shots at my squad after routing the Pak38 team. Outside of this photo is a mortar team and a Sherman right down the road on the left. It’s not looking good for the Germans, but the Americans haven’t taken the house yet. I’m down to one squad that you can barely see on the left of the photo above, one MG42 in the house and the remnants of a squad in front of my house. If I could hold them here I can win at this point.

Dan advances his Sherman down the road, FINALY having a full Chain of Command die I ambush with my Panzerschreck team. A long range shot immobilizes the tank and adds two pins! Dan pours fire into my last full squad for a second round as causes them to break, abandoning their position. I begin to run my leader over to try and remove the shock.

As I activate next to follow up Dan does the same to me, killing the Panzerschreck team before it gets off it’s shot. And of course I fail to get a photo of the tank at any point in the game! It’s a Sherman, you’ve seen tons of them.

At this point we call the game. It’s after 10 and I have one squad reduced to an LMG team, one squad breaking, whats left of the first squad I deployed never going to recover from it’s broken status and an MG42. Dan has a full chain of command die and I have a force morale of 5. Dan can easily use his CoC die to end the turn and remove the two broken squads. He has an immobilized tank that has a line of sight to the objective building with the MG42 in it and two full squads along with two senior leaders on this board. We forgo the 30 minutes of Americans mopping up at their leisure and call it an American win.

This is our fifth game of the year so far. We’ve both started using our nations abilities to good effect. Dan was using Marching Fire to pin down one squad while hoping between stone walls, I used Hangranaten to effectively wipe out a squad that was causing me problems. Dan’s gets his money’s worth out of the .50 cal, reducing my cover along with the mortar he took for the same reason. I’ve been using my leaders to have squads go tactical, and now I need to start using covering fire and overwatch more often. I think the Germans are hampered from not being able to take another squad in this campaign. They can take a squad of green conscripts once in the whole campaign, and I’m not convinced it would be worth it. I would have loved to have a fourth infantry squad, it would have allowed me to be much more flexible in my coverage of the approach to the house. All in all it was a great game.

 

 

Finishing some old work…

I had rushed a whole bunch of minis for a convention game last year and then never got a chance to finish them. One of the things I wanted to get done this year is not have half done figures on the board anymore. So I ordered some grass tufts from Australia and they finally started coming in. I sat down and started finishing the basing of my Germans, and the hand full of minis that still needed dry brushing and highlighting. 50 some odd figures later I took some photos before packing a bunch up for a game this morning.

Click on images for larger version, as always.

First up: Some support pieces, two Nebelwerfers and an Infantry Gun. All three of these pieces were fully painted, but not really based. The crew for the IG are magnetized. I finished assembling the Nebelwerfers right as Bolt Action v2 was announced and the template rules were rumored so I simply based the crew separately. 

Next up, crew for various support weapons, including the Nebelwerfers. These guys were fully painted, but needed basing and flocking. all but one are from the Warlord nebelwerfer.

A couple of my Warlord early war German Assault Pioneers. The rest are in the list I’m currently playing so I didn’t have time to finish them up. These guys only had base coats done sine they’re a recent addition to my army. So wash, highlight, base and flock. I started using the grass tufts on these guys, especially they larger bases I use to protect the outstretched equipment.

Some officers and NCOs. I’ve started using a coloring scheme for the minis bases so I can ID them on the table easier. As I’ve been playing more games in dimly lit locations and my eyes get older I’m tired of picking minis up to figure out what they are. Red rims means NCOs and officers. There is a British officer in there from my Ghurkas, he just needed flockign and the base painted so he got tossed in.

I was doing mainly my German figures, but these two American .30 cal teams were on the desk for some reason and all they needed was basing and flocking so they got done too. Light grey bases are for special weapons in squads. Since these guys are redeploying their .30 cal they will be used in Bolt Action squads that can take the .30 cal as a squad LMG.

German assault rifles. most of these were completely painted but a couple were from the last batch I did in the summer and needed dry brushing.

German non-NCO SMGs. In Bolt Action you can often add extra SMGs to a squad, so I had a bunch extra made up.

Panzerfaust armed riflemen. Lately my AT solutions for Bolt Action have been layered, with a vehicle (mostly a Puma) as my main AT weapon, panzerfausts in infantry squads to scare my opponent away and act as a backup AT solution and various artillery as a distant third option (mostly to add pins and stop them from activating). So I needed to finish up some panzerfaust troops. My regular troops will have plain black rims, just something to clean up all the paint on the sides and add a uniform look. Bright colors for what I need to pay attention to, dark for what I don’t.

German rifleman, the bread and butter of any army. I have a LOT of them that need to be finished up, and a bunch that need to be repaired due to Warlord’s shoddy first generation plastics.

That’s about a weeks worth of work, maybe 10-15 figures needed to be dry brushed but it was mostly adding basing, waiting for it to dry. base coating the basing, waiting for it to dry. Dry brushing the basing and adding the flock, waiting for the glue to dry. Painting the rims, sealing with the airbrush and then waiting for it to all dry. Lots of waiting…

 

29, Lets Go! Scenario 2. Delaying Action at Arthenay.

Dan and I continued the 29, Lets Go! campaign with scenario 2, a delaying action at Arthenay. Our first game was a 4 player version of the Probe into La Cambe. Both Dan and Matt wrote up nice AARs of it on their blogs.

http://laststandatcairngorm.blogspot.com/2017/03/la-cambe-chain-of-command.html

http://saltflats1929again.blogspot.com/2017/03/chain-of-command-29-lets-go-scenario-1.html

 

I was an American player in the first scenario and my flank bogged down as two squads got caught out in the open after trying to exploit a double activation. I hopped over a hedge after rolling two sixes, counting on rushing forward and laying down some close range fire on the second activation. Unfortunately the next toss of the dice didn’t allow me to do anything with those squads. They got caught in the open and torn up over the course of a couple of German activations. The two Shermans that charged up the road to reinforce them got ambushed by a panzerschreck team and an off board 88 laying in ambush. It was getting late and we had to call the game. The Americans started with 11 force moral and I believe we were down to 6 at about 10:30 with my platoon pretty much combat in-effective and the two Shermans knocked out we all felt it was just a matter of mopping up the remaining units and we called it as a German victory. The Americans withdrew and called in artillery and leveled the farm (we didn’t feel like replaying the scenario).

 

Dan and I met to play the second scenario. Dan brought his Americans and I fielded the German side this time. Setting up the table as it is pictured in the campaign book leaves a lot of open field for the Americans to charge across. I was looking forward to the MG42 getting a work out. We played out the Patrol Phase and decided that the fields counted as light cover, so a jump off point could be deployed there. I put a jump off point in an orchard, a small walled section and I had to place one farther back next to a house becuase of the rules for the scenario. Dan had one in the field, one in an orchard at the edge of his table and one behind a long row of hedges. I was able to lock his patrol markers down and force him to put the jump off point almost at the edge of the table. This was my plan since I had two barbed wire sections to put down on the side of the hedge near the road, stopping him from hammering away at the MG42 in the walled in section at close range. It paid off since the machine gun team pretty much held that side of the table. Click on the photos to enlarge them.

 

Dan got a double activation right off the bat. This allowed him to deploy almost his entire platoon onto the table. Unfortunately they had nothing to shoot at! He held back his Sherman and forgot about a second .30 cal team for the rest of the game. Dan’s mortar team fired often but never caused a casualty. I guess it evens out my sniper being all but useless, causing a single casualty.

 

I had a good activation and deployed the machine gun team and one squad into the orchard. This squad would wind up holding off the Americans on that side of the board all game with fantastic rolls, 6-8 hits per phase stacking the shock and casualties. Lots of letters home to mom because of the MG42 there.

Dan had deployed a squad on the hedges which exchanged fire with my MG42 team behind the stone wall. The hard cover was working to my advantage and he decided he needed to rush the wall and kill my men. On a double activation he hopped the wall and moved forward, firing at close range. I had been luck all night with my casualty rolls but they were catching up with me. Four shock and a casualty racked up and the team was in danger of being pinned.

On my activation I deployed my senior leader to support the machine gun and a squad into the house to reinforce the flank. The senior leader removed some shock and ordered them to return fire. Despite the Americans being in the open I didn’t inflict enough casualties.

I decided to use a CoC die to end the turn, giving me the next activation. The senior leader removed the last of the shock and ordered the team to open up again on the American squad in the open. My reinforcing squad was in place and opened up on them too. The angles meant that only the MG42 team could get line of sight on them but 10 dice isn’t all that bad and then added to the GI’s bad day. Dan took the next opportunity to jump the squad back over the hedge just after they lost their junior leader.

The Americans in the wheat field were not having any better luck. They had stalled once they entered the fields and were trying to trade fire with the German squad in the orchard. Odds were on the Americans side since they had a squad backed up by a .30 cal team but the dice gods were not on Dan’s side. The German Orchard squad were crack shots. 10-15 dice per turn were resulting in 5-8 hits regularly. Dan was having some luck on the casualty results but it just kept adding up.

His return fire wasn’t as effective, either not enough hits or good results on the casualty rolls. I lost a couple men but the shock wasn’t coming quick enough. Repeated activation with the junior leader were keeping them in check. By the time the Sherman was deployed in support Dan had both his Senior leaders supporting that flank. The American infantry squad was whittled down to just one BAR and a couple rifles and the .30 cal was taking hits (although not many pins). It was all he could to do keep the shock down. He did manage to rally them back from a break though, losing the broken team that had failed to assault the stone wall on the other flank in the process. The Sherman and some covering fire from the squad held back in reserve quickly forced the orchard squad into pinned and to broken status, forcing my senior leader to dash across the road and halt their retreat. It didn’t matter, the hedge side of the board had collapsed and the Germans were pushing the counter attack.

After the Americans had jumped back over the hedge to take cover they quickly were pinned and then broken.

As they fled the Germans hopped up and charged the jump off point. Dan had been fairly lucky on his morale rolls, bringing him down a lot slower than I would have liked so I wanted to get the JOP from him. Plus, I have never taken a jump off point before so I wanted to have the glory! I had been holding a squad in reserve, not needing it yet and hadn’t decided where to deploy it. I quickly deployed it and charged it forward. The squad in the house had to run forward, adding shock as they went. Just as the reached the hedge the Sherman came on board and as it crept up it peppered the bushes with machine gun fire, threatening to halt me before I reached the JOP.

As the Sherman crept up again for a better shot my Marder’s that were laying in ambush opened up, brewing the tank up and ending the game. I had captured the JOP and destroyed the tank on in the same turn, dropping the force morale to 0 and forcing the retreat.

This had been the first game I’ve actually played to completion. Dan had been rolling ok with the morale loss and only lost 2 points once so it was a real challenge to knock him down I think. One more shock on my MG42 and the charge up to the wall would have succeeded I think. I had three full chain of command dice at that point (having started with two from the scenario) and I was forced to use one to get my senior leader to remove the shock and return fire with the machine gun. He was in a really exposed position and I was afraid that Dan would deploy his senior leader on that flank, rally the section and close in. The machine gun was already down to a 4 man team with two shock and without another activation he could have broken the team. I had a full squad right there and would have immediately engaged him, but that machine gun was essential in holding both flanks.

Hindsight is 20/20, I think if Dan had deployed his third squad to the hedges instead of behind the wheat field it would have made a huge difference. I certainly wouldn’t have taken the jump off point. Dan also forgot about one of his .30 cal teams and his mortar was pretty useless. if he had taken two .50 cal teams (they reduce cover) he would have taken the orchard. All of the hedges were only light cover, hammering at the squad there with a .50 cal would have resulted in far more shock and, more importantly casualties and he would have advanced through the fields, forcing me to defend from the house. I need to find my .50 cal teams and paint them up!

The Germans have pretty limited support options in this campaign unfortunately. They have no vehicles and no mortars, they can take an infantry gun once, and a Pak38 once. They can take a Pak40 for seven points, a MG42 or a forward observer for four, a sniper team for three points and after this second scenario they can take a squad of green conscript troops but will suffer a penalty to their morale rolls at the beginning of the scenario if they do. The rest of the options are roadblocks, barbed wire, entrenchments, mine fields, medical orderly and an adjutant. Pretty limited combat options. I had meant to bring my Pak40, but forgot. I’m glad I did since the MG42 was essential!

The Americans can take (and sometimes HAVE to take) Shermans, both .50 and .30 machine guns, mortars (I’ve never had much luck but they also drop cover by one level when they hit), flame throwers, engineer teams, extra bazookas (to hit what?) and have the option of doubling up on BARs. Obviously the Americans are on the offense and brought everything possible over for the invasion, but it certainly looks pretty lopsided. This is the third game of CoC I’ve played this year and I’m starting to get the hang of it!

Another week’s worth of work.

I finished up another group of minis and vehicles this past week. Click on the images for larger pictures.

First up is a pair of SDKFZ 251’s and a Stug III for my friend. The Hanomag’s are Warlord’s new 251/10’s that came with the Band of Brothers boxed set. I magnetized the Pak36, I still need to magnetize and paint the MG42’s, so I guess it’s not completely finished. The Stug III is a Rubicon model, with the barrel magnetized so it can be used as a Stug or a Stuh. Again I have to finish the other barrel. Three more Rubicon Stug’s are being built so both me and Murph can have two each. Murph wanted a simple Dunkelgelb paint job and some decals, so a simple wash and highlight was all it needed after that. We’re not trying to model any specific unit, and after an hour or so of internet research it seemed that by the late war they were putting markings where ever they wanted, when they even bothered. So I just kinda put things where they looked logical. I had assembled them before thinking about decals,  so I think next time I will move the stowage a little bit so I can put numbers on the sides. I have plenty more 251’s and 250’s on the way!

I finished two West Wind Kubelwagons. They were painted and waiting on decals so I could wash and highlight them. Once the above vehicles were done I slapped decals on them and finished them up! They’re nice little models, but they’re all metal so you could hurt someone by dropping them! I’m using these in Bolt Action so one has an MG42 and the other has an officer as a passenger. I’m planning on finishing two more for me and another two for Murph later.

Next up were some more 251’s and a Puma that I had finished painting and never put decals on. I went a little heavy with the wash, they were the first vehicles I had painted, but I think it just make them look a little dingy and road-weary. I have some German Pioneers for the engineer half track waiting to be painted up!

Group Shot!

The figures I got done were mostly artillery and mortar crew. Murph got a pair of medium mortars from Black Tree Designs on a recent sale and I managed to paint up a bunch of the crew, but somehow forgot to paint up the second mortar itself. They’re nice little sculpts and fit in well with Warlord’s for significantly cheaper.

I picked up a pack of West Wind’s Pak40 crew to supplement my Warlord weapons when I’m playing Chain of Command. CoC has most weapons with their historic crew complement, while Bolt Action uses a standard number across the nations for the class they fit the weapon into. Most of the crew in the pack are specifically Pak40 crew, but enough of them are generic that they could be crew for anything.

After that was a mix of weapon crew for several warlord weapons. Some Nebelwerfer, some mortar and some generic enough to be anything.

I also started some motorcycle and side car figures. I can’t paint the ‘inside’ of them when they’re assembled so I did the motorcycles first, leaving room for the side cars. These are more West Wind figures I got from Old Glory here in the US. Cheep enough after the discount card and they’ll give some variety to the force. I have several more coming in from Bolt Action and Black Tree Design. Murph wants to run multiple machinegun side cars in a mobile force so he put in an order and I’ve been thinking about doing some motorcycle troops as well. Between me and Murph I have seven machine gun side car combos, four motor cycle side car combos, six motorcycles with pylon passengers and six motorcycles with just the driver. So, you know, a platoon’s worth of troops on motorcycles. We’ve joked about just running a motorcycle gang for a game.

 

I also painted two Bolt Action troops with STG44’s that didn’t get photographed separately. They were sitting around on my painting desk with just a base coat of Field Grau, so they got tossed in with the rest of this batch.

Another group photo!

 

Next up on the painting desk are 15 US Army casualties and 6 German grenadiers. I’m looking to spice up my game photos and taking pictures of tipped over figures isn’t cutting it anymore!

 

No longer gathering dust!

I’ve had a pile of minis in various stages of painting on my desk for the better part of a year. I started a LRDG/Desert Rats force for my friend Murph in 2015 and made some serious progress on it. He changed directions with it and some of the men got put aside as I assembled and finished more Thompson armed troops. Late in 2016 we both switched over to making late war German grenadier armies and these troops got pushed further back into the shadows of the painting table. Time came to finish these guys up and get them off to Murph.

First up were the Desert Rats and SAS. These were all base coated and only needed to be washed and high lighted. 7 riflemen, one officer and a radioman from the Desert Rats are ready to go along with two SMGs and a Bren gun for the SAS.

Next were two sets of Black Tree Design American .30 cal gunners I also posted earlier. Washed, highlighted and sealed they’re now ready for action!

Rounding out the group are a couple of stragglers. A German medic that was waiting for decals and the officer from a pack of Warlord Gurkhas. I’m not a huge fan of doing decals, despite how much I like the look afterwords. So I was waiting on doing some vehicles so I could just sit down for a couple hours and do a bunch at once. This past week I got the decals done (pics from the vehicles later) and this guy is finally off the desk!

It may seem like a lot, especially after my last post earlier this week, but these guys were about 90% done, just sitting there. It was nice to be able to get these off the desk without doing a whole lot of work.

Group shot!

So that’s 20 or so guys off the desk! I have a whole bunch of German Pak40 crew and mortar teams on there now and the remainder of these Desert Rats that were only primed. I’m hoping by the end of next week I can have them all base coated and ready for a wash.

 

This week’s progress!

With the new year I’ve been making a lot of progress on painting and assembling minis. I had started 14 minis last week for my friend Murph’s late war grenadiers and just finished them today. I also found 7 that I had finished but not sealed or added washers to and finished them up last night. I like the mixed nature of the late war German army and with the first batch of minis I made for him I had mixed up the gear a lot. I added pouches and packs from Russian and American sets and gave them Russian SMGs and painted them grey. This batch that I’ve started on I switched up the uniform color to a more green Field Grau, to emphasize the supply problems and mix of uniforms. The grenadier set already does a good job with the weapons, including a good mix of kar98’s, gewehr 43’s, MP40’s and PPSH submachineguns.

First off are 2 Panzerschreck teams from Black Tree Design.

Next up are two panzerfaust armed troops. One of them is running with an armload of panzerfausts. The instruction sheet that came with the box had a fellow made up similarly and I loved the idea. I have quite a few panzerfausts laying around since the sprues come with one loose one and one in the firing position, plus some leftovers I have already. Not enough to make a boatload of guys like this but enough to make one or two. I have a guy waiting to be primed that has a panzerfaust in one hand and a teller mine in another. I think it adds a little character to the squad.

Four more riflemen, you always need more riflemen.

One trooper with a STG44 assault rifle. The assault rifles are a little worse in Bolt Action v2 than in v1 so we don’t need as many.

3 men with MP40’s, two with caps to signify that they’re NCOs. Also, they’re pointing, NCOs always point…

And a group photo!

 

The figures I found:

Five riflemen, this brings the total up to 18 riflemen. Probably enough for awhile.

An officer with a map and field glasses, and a lone machinegunner.

I also mistaken discovered the best matte spray I’ve found yet! I use my airbrush to seal my minis and I grabbed what I THOUGHT was the matte varnish but would up being the matte medium fluid. Hot damned it cuts down ALL the shine on the minis! I went back over it with the matte varnish becuase I’m not sure how well it protects them, but I finished it off with another layer of the matte medium fluid and I’m really happy with the results.

 

I have a pile of half finished guys sitting on my desk waiting to be done for next week. About a dozen Perry desert rats and some Black Tree .30 cal US troops. I need to move my painting desk so the pile of half done things I was slowly working on in between Germans gets bumped up in priority.

 

 

Airborne: The Battle of Carentan review.

I’ve only been wargaming seriously for about six years now, and have only been playing 28mm WWII for three years. Compared to a lot of people I’m like a babe lost in the woods. After a year of playing Bolt Action my desire for something more historical lead me to Chain of Command and growing interest in the battle for Carentan shortly after D-Day. The problem with Carentan seems to be that it was a relatively short battle and, although pivotal in securing Normandy and linking several forces together, it went fairly quickly and without too many problems. It seems to get glossed over and aside from some chapters in what amount to biographies of men or units there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of academic style writing on it with maps and non-anecdotal reports. This past year was rough and I was planning on picking up a couple of books I had found out about and doing some more research to make a series of linked scenarios around Carentan for Chain of Command and Bolt Action. I was just starting to think about it again and trying to figure out when to start to get ready for an October convention when I see an ad on The Miniatures Page for Britton Publisher’s Airborne: The Battle of Carentan, procrastination won out once again! After a little searching and an unkind utterance in regard to the website I plunked down my $11 and bought the PDF.

The book has 12 scenarios ranging in size from a single squad to company level engagements. A quick count shows 1 squad level scenarios, 4 platoon level scenarios, 3 company level scenarios and two scenarios each that are either platoon vs company or squad vs platoon engagements.

It starts off with several pages describing the background to the battle, the German forces involved, how they rate the troop qualities, and describes a number of important considerations such as the hedgerows, marshes, bridges and the Belgian Gates that held off and funneled the American troops as they approached Carentan. Throughout the book there are some very good contemporary military maps, aerial reconnaissance photos and modern satellite images and in a couple of places some photos of gaming table setups.

Every scenario has a paragraph or two of the setting and lead up to the scenario, a solid breakdown of the forces involved, the victory conditions and the historical outcome and aftermath. It also has GM’s notes and deployment rules where needed, and also has footnotes and citations to the books referenced in the sources section. This book is well researched and a treasure trove of information for the battle of Carentan.

This is the fourth book in their Airborne series chronicling the battles from D-Day though Carentan. They’re $11 for the PDFs or $17 for the printed versions. With 12 scenarios in each book you could spend years fighting these battles out! This is the first scenario book I’ve read that wasn’t from a games manufacturer and I’m very pleased and the variety of scale included in these scenarios, a friend of mine wants to try out Nuts! and I think the smaller scenarios would be perfect for it. I’m very happy with this book and will almost certainly pick up the rest in the series.

 

Forgot to add links to the books the first time around!

Britton Publishers Facebook page

https://www.facebook.com/brittonpublishers/?fref=ts

Britton Publishers storefront

http://brittonpublishers.com/Skirmish_Scenarios.html

 

 

 

Chain of Command 2v1

Last week before the big Bolt Action event I played a game of Chain of Command with a couple guys that I meet up with occasionally. The last half of 2016 was a little rough and I hadn’t played anything for awhile so I was eager to get in a game when Dan suggested Chain of Command. I already had to pack up the car for the weekend so I just brought everything along and threw the table together while waiting. We did a simple attack/defend scenario with two regular German platoons defending against one American attacker.

 

Dan used his Americans, with a .30 cal and a mortar for support, plus an extra squad if I remember correctly. Howard and I had only a tripod mounted MG42 to back us up. The German counter attack came quick as I had a couple of good rolls and took three activation’s, locking down a side of the board with one squad and started throwing some pins around and kept the Americans behind a hedgerow with two squads taking cover behind a stone wall. Howard’s platoon took the long way around the board and eventually did some real damage to the American platoon by rushing a hedgerow and creating a crossfire, decimating a squad with a hail of grenades. The Americans eventually took the flank that I was holding down with a lone squad and threatened a jump off point, but had suffered some morale loss during the turn.

We had to call the game due to time, but the outcome was clear: The Germans were threatening two jump off points and the Americans had two broken squads (or what was left of them). I had a full Chain of Command die and could almost certainly end the game with a good round of fire and then use the die to end the turn, routing the broken units and cause a complete loss of morale. The Americans were at 5 morale and even good rolling on their part would have brought them to 1 or 2 morale, severely limiting their activation dice and just prolonging the end.

I’ve played several 3v2 games and the suggested balancing of adding a full CoC die to the side with fewer players worked well enough. I think Dan was simply out activated, an extra chain of command die wasn’t nearly useful enough to balance the game. I think next time we do a 2v1 game we will make the lone player elite, with six activation dice. I originally thought that an extra die of support would do, but without the dice to activate that’s not much of a help.

Big Bolt Action day at the Schenectady Wargamers Association

I’m participating in a large escalation league that includes groups in New Jersey and several locations in New York including my hometown club the Schenectady Wargamers Association. We had a large event at their monthly gameathon this past Saturday and it was a a huge success. We’ve tried getting the local Bolt Action community up and running and it’s been hard with mixed support from game stores and Bolt Action themselves. I got a buddy into the game a year ago and he finally got fed up with the lack of success and we teamed up to get something going. A new game store opened in the area with a group that was already trying the game out and we had a van full of people from 3 hours away come also! The tally was 6 tables with about 15 people playing at least one game each! It was a huge success and we’re looking forward to our next full day event in June, along with the escalation league days leading up to that.

 

We started the league off at 500 points, to get players used to the new version of the rules and changes to the missions. This gave us the added bonus of not having to fill 6 6×4 tables with terrain. I have a bunch of terrain that I use to fill out 6×4 tables for Chain of Command and Bolt Action and can put together a good looking table. But filling 6 tables up takes a trunk full of scenery! We were able to get the tables looking OK, although the felt clothes haven’t been painted yet and are bare. Next month at 750 we’re planning on using the same setup so I’m hoping that they’ll be spray painted and more of the bare terrain is painted!

Unfortunately the fantastic table my friend Ron set up, with 3d hills and streams and all scratch built buildings won’t upload for some reason. By far the best table we had.

The games went well, several players were experienced Bolt Action version 1 players and some had a couple of version 2 games under their belts. There was a lot of rules reading and lesson learning going on!

Here are some photos of the game play: