BDF VGTA 1500

Interesting developments. Some German successes countered by devastating fire, especially from the 105mm howitzers. The US infantry are also showing their mettle with HOB creating a HERO and some 8ML units.

BDF VGTA - OPENING MOVES

BDF - 1400 VGTA

The Volksgrenadiers are poised for another try. Infantry guns and mortars are set up to bombard Baraque de Fraiture while VG companies stand ready to infiltrate around the flanks. The US have very little ammo for the remaining M15A1 - so have to save it for really lucrative targets.  The main defensive fire will come from 105s firing blindly into the woods and M8 armored cars making forays to disrupt the outflanking Germans. A lot could end up depending on the riflemen in their foxholes.

BDF 0924 AFTERMATH

Dawn reveals snowy fields littered with dead Volksgrenadiers. A small party made it into the houses only to be blasted out by 105mm shells. Parker's gun crew battlehardened and added two heroes to boot.

Main damage done to the US is ammunition for the aaHT. Very little left to meet the next attack.

BdF MEATCHOPPERS @ 0800

BdF ONE HEROIC VOLKSGRENEDIER!

Following an HOB DR, the Germans generated a HERO. I now allow SMC without any MMC to be STEALTHY unless green. So this guy grabbed some PFs and crawled down the road into Baraque de Fraiture. He weathered a fair bit of FP but was hard to spot (net +6 H for night and stealthy concealed).

He made short work of the first M16, setting it on fire though a few crew did escape. Later he set off after the other M15, but was unable to finish it off. It did burn through the last of its ammo trying to kill him. He was also able to kill of the .50 cal crews in the building, though was wounded.

F&M BdF MEATCHOPPERS

F&M SECTORS of ATTACK/DEFENCE

Some information in the German Army Handbook gels well with F&M.

In the defence a German platoon holds a sector of 200-500m width.

In the attack they cover a sector 150-200m wide.

This fits well with what works in F&M. It's possible to bunch up, but the rules for LULLS and MOTIVATION failure make it less efficient. Better to hold a position in greater depth then excess strength.

AFVs attack with about 100m between tanks.

BRECOURT MANOR again

About half way through and Winters' men are pinned down by MG42 fire from the hedgerow.

The end. All four guns destroyed and all Germans except a lone heroic leader manning an MG42 are killed or scared away. US losses are a 1/2 squad and a CREW reduced to a team. PVT Malarky became HEROIC.

CREWS and TEAMS

These guys have been confusing me.

I've reverted to the idea that CREWS/TEAMS with an SW take the first hit, but CREWS with an SW are reduced to a TEAM. CREWS/TEAMS without SW are both KIA if they fail an MC, but needn't take the first hit.

I've decided to refigure my US PIR squads accordingly.

A 2 man 1-2-8 TEAM* mans the M1919A4 and ports the ammo.
A rifle group of 7 men is represented by a DEP 6-4-8
An SMG cadre of 3 men is represented by a 3-1-8

Each platoon is 2 of these squads plus a mortar squad of:-

2-2-8 + 60mm mortar and 4-4-8 plus 2 x ammo counters.

A Bazooka team 1-2-8 with BAZ rounds out the platoon.

There is a case for allowing 2 platoon leader SMC per platoon.

82nd Airborne platoons seem to have dropped into Normandy with about 2 BARs. 101st did not.

*Lt Winters' ad hoc force at Brecourt Manor have reinforced the MG TEAMS so use CREWS.

Each 12 man squad has a US# of 5.

Later squads using the M1919A6 delete the 1-2-8 TEAM and were often just a 6-4-8 or 8-4-8 rifle group plus M1919A6 and 2 BARs per squad. Far fewer smgs were used as the war wore on. The bipod M1919A6 was unpopular and many were reconfigured back to the M1919A4 format. In this case a team should replace one of the rifle cadres.

TEM and HINDRANCE - radical change

The idea is to remove the TEM for vegetation and make it an [H]. The effect is to make targets in woods etc harder to engage but easier to hurt. I also make RUBBLE a +2 [H] in addition to it's TEM of +3/+4. It is now possible to see through up to 50m of RUBBLE/WOODS, though it would be difficult to engage such targets - +6H. I've heard veterens report that rubble was 'easy to hide in' and it seems to make sense compared to a building with a limited number of windows etc.

Bocage gets to have a TEM and H, and to block LOS except to just behind the bocage. This makes it quite serious cover.

[H] also works in synergy with concealment. Stealthy troops concealed in woods/rubble add a +6 to FTC against them.

I'm not sure how this will work out in practice. Several scenarios will be very different. Cassino especially.

Though I do like how this works overall, an issue with woods occured to me. You can't easily see though wood and out the other side unless they are very sparse and probably best represented as orchards. I don't think you can see more than 25m through woods even if you're in them. Proper woods will have one tree every 3-5m. So looking at them from one side thered be about 2 trees per m. I remember once trying to throw stones through a wood without hitting a tree. None of us could throw one more than about 10m.

LA FIERE 0600

F&M MOTIVATION FAILURE

 

STACKS that fail MOTIVATION on an MC are marked BREAKING OFF UNDER FIRE.

 

STACKS within 50m (regardless of LOS) of a STACK that fails MOTIVATION are marked as BREAKING OFF (but not under fire).

ALL such units whether under fire or not are termed BROKEN (for brevity). BROKEN units take an MC on any ATC or PTC while BROKEN.

BROKEN units that fail MOTIVATION are marked as SURRENDERING.

I had been playing this wrong (a hangover from an earlier version) and counting all BROKEN units as DEMORALISED. But I don't mean this to be the case. It's hard enough to keep BROKEN units on the map since they are reduced every time they fail an NMC and surrendering to nearby enemy.

F&M CAV table

I'll start off declaring I think ASL makes it too easy to kill tanks this way. Immobilizing one is quite easy though. 'Proper' tanks are also a lot harder to take on than the early war or lighter AFVs like armoured cars. This is my latest sytem for this.

Typically, an 8ML stack 25m from a normal tank with +4 DEF need to roll <= 2 to pass their CAVFTC versus a MOTION AFV. If they just go for immobilization they need <=4. NIC can help a lot. If they are in the location of a non-MOTION AFV then it's <=7 to attack [<=5 if they had to move there]. This has never come up in any of my games, but seems about right after a few trial runs.

F&M TERRAIN CHART

I've been refiguring the TEMs for different terrain types and no longer allow a VEGETATION TEM to combine with an EARTHWORK TEM - but I increased the TEM of FOXHOLES etc to compensate. You can have one but not both. Of course, AIRBURST applies even in an EARTHWORK unless you have overhead cover. AFVs don't get the TEM for their location except earthworks. It's complex and I need to make a word document laying it out properly.

F&M AIFT ANALYSIS

I'm quite pleased with this. It shows that - using F&Ms AIFT - the probability of causing an M[FAIL] increases linearly as FP increases until we get to about 8FP, whereupon it starts to plateau out and above 24FP there is very little return for extra FP.

Here again is the AIFT for reference.

And the results chart.

GAVRUS A3 1700

GAVRUS 1600-1700 comments

Lots of action. I've made a point of being more aggressive. Running risks I'd normally not dare to run.

The results are interesting. By pushing in large numbers you can usual get a decision in a area, even though losses might seem high. It is probably better to have high losses and achieve something than have low losses and achieve nothing much, but it's case by case.

At first the British didn't get any heroes, but now there are two manning an ATG and causing enormous trouble. The artillery zeroed in on the orchard is also devastating. Lots of POWs this time too.

More comments later.

A huge artillery mission landed, but did little damage in the end. The heroes were KIA in 0m range fire and the Germans have managed to get themselves organised a bit, though a 2" mortar caused a squad to disappear and a lot of other troops to surrender, though they are not in danger of capture.

Surprising - when I saw the map covered in shell bursts I thought that would be that - but they got away with it.

GAVRUS A3 1600 29th June 1944

GAVRUS A3 Commentary

OK. Trying again. It's tough for the Germans to pass the kind of PMC caused by events like at 1500 when the UK artillery hit with 3 salvos of 5.5" artillery! I've actually changed the rules slightly so they only get one battery of 'thickening fire' when they roll doubles. It's still dangerous.

However, the Germans have recovered and are into the 'big woods' south-west of the bridge and also are getting organised to storm Gavrus itself. Both of the forward observers who were such a problem have been more or less neutralised now. So it's not as unbalanced as I'd thought before. Better deployment of the British helps them to hit back at the Germans too.

GAVRUS A3 PROGRESS