"Onward to the Rhine" A WW2 Scenario Sept 44

A Rearguard Action Somewhere North of the Seine

A Company of Panther Tanks advance cautiously through a French village.

It's that time of year again for a crack at our continuing sequence of games following the action across Western Europe from D-Day to the end of the war. Last time we recreated the closing of the Falaise gap and not surprisingly, although it was a close run thing, the Allies came away victorious.

Historical Background 

Although the Normandy breakout is complete many units of the German Army are making their way East and when the terrain allows or a good Commander sees an opportunity an ad hoc defensive line forms and where possible precious reinforcements are thrown into the front line. Kampfgruppes and composite units must try to hold off an Armoured Division with Infantry support.

Allied Armour advances across fields.

Game Map & Set up 

The game is played on a 12 ft x 6ft table, using 6 mm miniatures. We use a home brew set of rules based on the old Korps Kommander rule set. Each model represents approx 4 vehicles or pieces of equipment and each base of Infantry is around 50 men.

The Allied forces enter on the bottom edge of the table, German Forces Set Up anywhere on the top two thirds of the table. Germans should begin hidden, we use counters for each unit with a blank counter for every two real counters.

The Thick Crust method

The objectives are straight forward, the Allies need to break through the German lines and race for the table edge, the Germans need to stop them. The game should last long enough for the Allies to have a realistic chance of reaching the edge of the table so that depends on your rules, I would go for 2 x the number of turns it takes a Standard tank to reach one end of the length of the table to the other.

The Allies Orbat

Moving on table from move 1.

29th South Alberta Recon Regt (Morale 6)

BHQ - 1 x Cromwell Str 4                              Recce Co - 3 x Stuart V Str 3

3 x Coys of 3 x Cromwell Str 4                      1 Coy of 3 x Challenger TD Str 3

14th Canadian Hussars (Morale 6)

BHQ - HQ in Humber SC Str 4                       Recce Co - Recce Inf in Bren Carrier Str 6

A/T Co - 3 x 6pdr (Carrier tow) Str 3              Mortar Co - 3" Mortar (Carrier) Str 6

4 A/C Recce Coys - 3 x Humber A/C Str 4     1 Inf Coy of 3 x Infantry in M3 1/2 track Str 6

2 x Inf Coys of 3 x Infantry in Carrier Str 4

25pdrs in action.

2 x Infantry Battalions each with (Morale 6)

BHQ - HQ in Lorry Str 4                                  A/T Co 6pdr with Carrier tow Str 4

Recce Coy - Recce Inf in Carrier Str 6             Mortar Coy - 3" Mortar in Carrier Str 6

Engineer Coy - Engineer in Truck Str 4           4 Inf Coys each with 2 x Inf Str 6

2 Battalions of Royal Army Transport Corps each with

8 x Lorry Str 6

Attached 3 x 25pdr Str 8

Note The Infantry Battalions are from an Infantry Division and therefore would not have their own transport but use the RATC units, for the whole of the game their are only two battalions worth of transport. Any units which arrive as reinforcements must share the transport.

Taxi anyone.

Reinforcements

Once the Allies have moved all their initial forces on table they will be eligible for fresh troops. The first unit will be an armoured btn from then on draw randomly from an Armoured or an Infantry Battalion. There is an Armoured Division and an Infantry Division allocated for the attack so there are 4 Tank Battalions (1 additional Guards Btn with Churchill's, Morale 8) and 7 Infantry Battalions available. If you have full Divisions (as we have) you may consider adding further units (Artillery / Armoured Inf / Tank Destroyer etc) into the reinforcement pool. After the first unit arrives a fresh unit will arrive every 3 turns.

Firefly's go.

Tank Battalion Orbat (Inf as above)

BHQ - Sherman V x 4                                         1 Recce Coy of 3 x Stuart V Str 3

1 x Recce Coy of 3 x Humber SC Str 3               AA Coy of 2 x Crusader AA Str 3

3 Coys each of 4 x Sherman V Str 4                    1 Coy of  3 x Firefly Str 4


Note For ease of game play with our rules the Firefly's have been placed in their own separate Coy. For the Guards Btn just substitute all the tanks for Churchill's. All reinforcements arrive at the bottom of the map.

Airpower

Each turn roll 1 d20 on a roll of 15-20 the Allies will receive air support, roll 1 d6. A 1 or 2 and receive a CAP patrol of 6 x Spitfires on 3-6 12 x Typhoons armed with rockets.

A rare site (in our game) Typhoons in flight.

The German Orbat

On table from turn 1 they should be allowed free deployment with no command radius restrictions.

Panzer Kampfgruppe (Morale 8)

BHQ - 2 x Panther Str 4                                           1 x Recce Coy - Panther Str 5


AA Coy Wirblewind Str 3                                        Engineer Coy - Eng in Sdkfz 250 Str 5

2 x Coys of 3 Panthers Str 4                                     2 x Coys of PzIVH Str 4

Independent Stug Battalion (Morale 7)

BHQ 2 x Stug IIIG Str 5                                            AA Coy Sdkfz 7/2 Str 3

Recce Coy - Recce Inf on M/C Str 3                         Engineer Coy - Engineer in Truck Str 3

3 Coys of 2 x Stug IIIG Str 4                                     1 Coy of 2 x Stug IIIG(105H) Str 4

2 x Infantry Battalions each with (Morale 5)

BHQ - HQ in Staff Car Str 3                                      Recce Coy - Recce Inf on bicycle Str 3

Mortar Coy - 120mm Mortar in truck Str 4               Inf Gun Coy - 75mm IG Str 6

3 Infantry Coys with 2 x Inf Str 7

German Recce has a cheeky look

Panzer Grenadier Kampfgruppe (Morale 8)

BHQ - HQ in Sdkfz 251 Str 4                                     Mortar Co - Sdkfz 251/2 Str 6

AA Coy - Sdkfz 7/2 Str 3                                            A/T Coy - Pak 40 (Ost tow) Str 6

MG Coy - MMG in Truck Str 9                                  2 Coys of 2 x Pz Gren in Sdkfz 251 Str 6

2 Coys of 2 x PzGren in truck Str6.

German Reinforcements (Morale 8)

The Germans will receive a reinforcement from their pool the turn after the Allies receive a fresh unit. All German troops will arrive on one of the two roads at the top of the map. While the Allies receive units in Battalions the Germans are down to companies. Our pool which we drew from random was,


1 Coy 3 x Tiger II Str 3, 2 Coys Tiger I Str 3, 2 Coys of Hetzer Str 4, 1 Art Btn of 3 x 105mm Art Str 6, 3 Coys of 2 x Inf Str 6 in Trucks.

Tigers are here

German Airpower

Roll 1 d20 in the air phase and Germans receive an air unit on a roll of 19 or 20. 1 to 3 it will be a CAP unit 4 to 6 ground attack.

To everyone's surprise it's The Luftwaffe  !

How did we get on.

The Germans had a couple of options in their game plan, the cheap Aldi Pie defence (thick crust with no filling) or the Morrison's Pie (thin crust with a meaty filling). For none UK readers Aldi are a cheap supermarket, Morrison's a bit more upmarket and from Yarkshire. The Aldi option was chosen and the front line consisted of most of the good stuff with very little behind it.

The basic German Infantry have no transport so they were placed in the rear two villages or Festungs as we called them. Fortunately for the Germans the Allies moved on across the fields and where easily picked off by the German armour which had lined the hill over looking the fields, two armoured battalions were sacrificed trying to get across the fields but with hull down Panthers vs advancing Shermans there was only going to be one winner.

More thick crust

The Royal Air Force where the big let down of the day, statistically they should have been over the table every 4 turns however they only turned up once in the game. The Luftwaffe put them to shame turning up twice, once for a ground attack and once on a CAP mission.

The Hussars pushed forward on their right towards the foremost village, this side of the table was held by the STUG battalion and the Allies made steady progress reaching the edge of the village away from the prying eyes of the Panthers. Once the Allies got their 25pdr Batteries in action they started to whittle down the German defences but the heavy losses early in the game had dented the confidence of the Allied Commanders and they called off their attack.

This was much to the relief of the German players who must have had excellent poker faces. The thick crust had held but only just, there wasn't much left and the front line was just about to fold in the centre and there was nothing much to stop a race for the far table edge, just a couple of static Infantry Battalions who could easily be driven around.

More Shermans about to be Panthered

The Germans did get a Company of Tiger I on the table but they only just made it to the front line when the Allies capitulated.

With Project Jutland on the go it seems to be all Naval at YG for the moment however we have had a nice break with this game and next on the table with be our 28mm ECW collection for a crack at the First Battle of Newbury.

The Allied advance towards a Festung 

Project Jutland - The "5 Minute Fleet" & other stories

Batch 4 is launched

SMS Braunschweig cruises towards the action

Jutland the project continues with gusto, I am finding myself running out of ships to paint quicker than they arrive and once again the ship building yard is empty. I have orders in at a couple of suppliers so back to waiting by the letter box.

The 2 Sqns of the 5 min fleet

First up are the 6 Pre Dreadnoughts of the German High Seas Fleet, these models are from WTJ. Known as the 5 Minute Fleet because that was how long they would last if they came under fire, they were massively outdated at the time of Jutland and were withdrawn from front line service immediately after the battle. Thankfully for them they spent most of the battle at the end of the German line out of sight due to visibility.

2 photos of one of the 5 Deutschland Class Ships,  Schleswig-Holstein to give you an idea of the detail on the model.

There was just one of the preceding Braunschweig Class at the battle, the lead ship. Very similar to the Deutschland but some of the secondary guns were in turrets giving them better elevation.

A couple of Helgoland Class made this batch

I placed an order a while back with Magister Militum for the remaining 8 German Dreadnoughts required however following the sales at Salute they only had 2 left, so here they are. Great looking ships, not sure how much snapps had been drunk when they decided the turret layout, looks like a Friday Afternoon design to me !

SMS Frankfurt a Wiesbaden Light Cruiser

I also had a few Light ships in the box so they got done in this batch, so here is an update on the Germans.

Dreadnoughts - Required 16, Done 10. 6 on order awaiting delivery

Pre Dreadnoughts - Required 6, Complete

Battlecruisers - Required 5, Complete

Light Cruisers - Required 11, done 6, 5 on order awaiting delivery.

Destroyers / TBD - Required 61, done 24. 37 to get.

So of the 99 ships 51 are done or just over 50% with mostly Light stuff left.

Another 4 M Class Destroyers

For the British the progress is,

Dreadnoughts - 28 Required, Complete
Battlecruisers - 9 Required, Complete
Armoured Cruisers - 8 Required, 8 to get.
Light Cruisers - 26 Required, 8 complete, 10 on order awaiting delivery, 8 to get.
Destroyers / TBD - 79 Required, 24 done, 55 to get
Seaplane Carrier - 1 Required, trying to source a model of it.

So of 151 ships, 69 are done or 46 %. Apart from the Armoured Cruisers it's all Light stuff left.

Three more Light Cruisers for the British

X Wing - The Campaign - Game 25 - Star Wars Day

Hoth Evacuation

Welcome back, if you didn't know this is a continuation of the X Wing Campaign, full explanation and details of Campaign rules are here. The set up page is updated on a regular basis.

Mission Briefing

"Gentlemen,

Our forces on Hoth are under attack and the Rebel Forces on the ground are hard at it trying to slow the Imperial advance to allow Transports to escape the surface.

The Empire has set up a blockade using remote control space mines designed to trap and destroy our ships. Provide an escort for the Transport and see it safely out of the minefield and into hyperspace.

You ships have been fitted with special sensors to overide the Imperial Control of the mines.

May the Force be with you"

Team "Rebel Scum"

Rick O'Shea in his K6/B Wing (Hex Ace) (Squadron Leader)
Spike Sharpie, PS 4 E Wing (Triple Ace)
Pop Cicle, PS 4 K-Wing (Ace)
Crank Case, PS4 Y Wing (Double Ace)
Captain Tangent, PS3 T-70 X Wing
Baby Brian, X Wing

GR-75 Transport with Combat Retrofit (+ 2 Hull, +1 Shield)

Team "Glorious Empire"

Tie Bomber PS7 Major Rhymer
Tie Punisher PS7 Redline
Tie Fighter, PS 6 "Backstabber"
Tie Fighter, PS 4 "Dark Curse"
Tie Fighter x 4, 1 PS4 and 3 PS4

Empire ship selection is as follows,1 Tie per Rebel player, every third Tie will be a random named pilot, all other Ties are random Sqn Pilots (Roll a d6, 1 or 2 PS1, 3 or 4 PS3 and 5 or 6 PS4). Add 1 Tie Bomber with random pilot and then a Tie Punisher (random pilot) for the 4th Rebel player, if you get bigger games add a Tie Bomber for the 7th Rebel player and every 3 there after.

Load outs are as follows;

Tie Bombers & Punisher - 2 x Concussion Missles, 2 x Proton Rockets and 1 x Proton Bomb

Set Up

Note the Map program doesnt have K Wing / T 70 / Punisher on yet

Game should be played on a 4 x 3 table.

Set up

Rebel Players set up the transport in the top left corner of the table with all rebel players within range 2.

Imperial players set up anywhere on the bottom table edge range 1 from the edge.

Set up 6 counters using the reversable Imperial / Rebel counters, Imperial side up as shown on the plan forming a corridor from one corner of the table to the other.

Game lasts until one side secures victory or the end of turn 8 when the Transport will jump to safety.

Special Rules

Mine Control - All mines start off under Imperial Control however this can change.

In the activation phase a ship can use an action to change control of a mine, simply flip the mine over to the new controller. Mines can change ownership any number of times in a turn. To change control the ship must be within range 1.

In the combat phase a ship can sacrifice a Focus or Dodge token to detonate a mine, you must have control of the mine and be within range 3 of it.

Mine Detonation - There are 4 types of mine, they are determined at random and just to spice things up a bit the type is not decided until it explodes ! Determine the type at random with counters or dice. Mines detonate when the phasing player declares the detonation in their firing phase.

1) Explosive Mine - Straight Forward bang, roll 1 d6 on a 5 or 6 the mine is super size. Each ship within range 1 of the mine is attacked with 3 attack dice, range 2, 2 dice and range 3, 1 dice. No dodge allowed. Super size mines are double damage.

2) Stress Mine - Add a stress counter to the 5 ships nearest to the mine (within range 3), if there aren't 5 ships go back to the one nearest to the mine and start again, repeat until all 5 counters are used.

3) Ion Mine - Add a Ion counter to the 5 nearsest ships to the mine (within range 3), if there aren't 5 ships go back to the one nearest to the mine and start again, repeat until all 5 counters are used.

4) Gravity Mine - Moves any ship within range 3 a randon distance directly away from the mine

Jump to Hyperspace  - To leave the table you need to declare your attempt and then try and gain 2 critical hits, hits from previous rolls carry forward. You cannot attempt to jump until after turn 4.

Turn 1. Roll 3 attack die

Turn 2. Roll 3 attack die + Pilot Skill / 2 (round up)

Turn 3. Automatically jump

GR-75 Transport - Dont bother with energy allocation etc, the ship will travel in straight line between the mines (as it winds up its hyperspace drive), the ship will take 8 moves to get from corner to corner at a constant speed.

Victory Conditions

Rebel Victory -  Save the Transport from Destruction and watch it go into hyperspace at the end of turn 8.

Imperial Victory - Destroy the Transport before the end of turn 8.

Draw - Any other result.

How did we get on

Same 6 as the last game for the Rebels however my usual fellow Empire Commander had come down with a spot of Ewok Fever again but Richard C deputised ability for him

Initial success went to the Imperials in what would turn out to be an extremely close game, initially I thought the Imperials would struggle, then it looked like an easy win, then it swung back to the Rebels, it was one of those games.

There must be a big target painted on the K Wing as it got another kicking this evening, end of turn 2 it was in the wrong place and got a round of missiles from the Tie Bomber and some Tie lasers, then it ended up in a crossfire of the Bomber and the Punisher and was hit again, it managed to use the SLAM action to its advantage though and managed to escape into hyperspace with one hull point left.

One of the crucial points of the game came on turn five when the Imperials decided to set off two of the mines in range of the Transporter, the risk was lots of their own ships in range of it, one mine did some bits of damage but the other one was a stress mine, lots of Ties with stress.

Another mine was set off by the Imperials the next phase and it was another Stress mine, queue lots of Ties with lots of stress, I really though the Imperials had lost it at this point.

But the Punisher is one hell of a tough bird, it got in behind the Transport and on turn 7 reduced the Transporter to one hull point whilst the Punisher was reduced to the same by the gaggle of Rebel ships around it.

On the final turn the Punisher fired first and took out the Transport and that was it end ex.

So an extremely close game, no Rebels were shot down but both the K and E Wing were down to 1 hull point when they punched the hyperspace button.

Result (2 pts for a win, 1 for a draw)

Empire Win

Campaign overall score is, Empire 23 pts, Rebels 27 pts

X Wing madness will return with game 26 on the 26th of May 2016 when a day trip to Alderaan goes very wrong.

GEEK ZONE

Jim head mechanic in the Rebel Garage is researching K Wing spares on eBay.

Pilot upgrades prior to start of game 25


Spike Sharpie bought a Z2-K8 Droid for his E Wing

Pop Cicle bought some Seismic Charges

Crank Case added Advanced Proton Torpedoes to his Y Wing

Captain Tangent added a shield upgrade on his T70 X Wing

Rick O'Shea boosted to Pilot Skill 6

Rebel Pilot results below,

Pilot Spike Sharpie - E Wing (PS4), survived, 0 kills, 3 GC - Totals, Missions 25, 10 GC, 19 kills

Pilot Rick O'Shea - K6/B Wing (PS6), survived, 2 kills, 5 GC - Totals, Missions 24, 7 GC, 35 kills

Pilot Pop Cicle - K Wing (PS4) survived, 0 kills, 1 GC - Totals, Missions 18, 3 GC, 6 kills

Pilot Crank Case - Y Wing (PS4) survived, 0 kills, 1 GC - Totals, Missions 19, 2 GC 12 kills

Pilot Captain Tangent - T70 X Wing (PS3), survived, 0 kills, 2 GC, Totals, Missions 13, 4 GC, 1 kill

Pilot Baby Brian - X Wing (1) survived, 0 kills, 1GC - Totals Missions 3, 1 GC, 0 kills

Not Present

Pilot Ensign WK Jnr (PS3) - T70 X Wing - Totals Missions 8, 15 GC, 7 kills

Pilot Obi Two - X Wing (PS1), Totals, Missions 2, 3 GC, 0 kills

Pilot Oi M'Groin - Y Wing (2), Totals, Missions 4, 3 GC 0 kills

Pilot Sir Jeremy Dodger - X Wing (2), Totals Missions 3, 7 GC, 2 kills

Pilot Twiki Bond - A Wing (1), Totals Missions 1, 6 GC, 0 kills

Roll of Honour (At the going down of the twin suns, we will remember them)

 

Pilot Brian sadly lost after only 2 missions, RIP

Pilot Commander Wayne Kerr veteran of 7 Missions, RIP

Ship Zone

Uber geeks area for those who want to see what our intrepid pilots fly.

A Kalidor Crescent is bought for 5 GC and adds a pilot skill slot.

Spike Sharpie, Kalidor Crescent with Sniper Trait - E Wing with Shield Upgrade & Z2-K8 Droid

Pop Cicle - K Wing - with Seismic Charges

Rick O'Shea, Kalidor Crescent Lighting Reflexes and Playing Possum- K6/B Wing with Heavy Laser Cannon, Engine Upgrade, Advanced Sensors and Reflective Coating.

WK Jnr - T70 X Wing with R2-D2 mech

Crank Case, Kalidor Crescent with Barrel Roll - Y Wing with Adv Proton Torpedoes (x2) and Autoturret.

Captain Tangent - Kalidor Crescent, T70 X Wing with Shield Upgrade.

Obi Two - X Wing unmodified.

Baby Brian - awaiting new ship

Oi Mi'Groin - Y Wing with R10 Astromech and Autoturret

Sir Jeremy Dodger - X Wing with R2-D2 and shield upgrade

Twiki Bond - A Wing unmodified

Previous Game Links

Campaign Rules & Game 1 Graduation Day

Game 2 Political Escort and Game 3 Listening Device

Game 4 Kill the Relay and Game 5 Destroy the Carrier

Game 6 Secret Weapon and Game 7 Triumph and Rescue

Game 8 Pirates

Game 9 Tie Droid Assault

Game 10 Long Way Home

Game 11 Spy Trap

Game 12 Role Reversal

Game 13 Runaway Tantive

Game 14 Robot Wars

Game 15 Precision Shooting

Game 16 Ground Attack

Game 17 Run Scientist Run

Game 18 - Floating

Game 19 - Mine Shaft 

Game 20 - Rescued from the Moon

Game 21 - Shadow Squadron

Game 22 - Filling Up Under Fire 

 Game 23 - Rescue the Queen

Game 24 - Off at a Tangent 

Project Jutland - WTJ and the Grand Fleet Review

British Big Guns Complete

HMS Canada at full speed in the twilight

Welcome back ye followers of Project Jutland, last week saw me finish off the last nine of the British Battlecruisers and Dreadnoughts for the game, 24 of the main battle line, the 4 15" Fast Battleships and the 9 Battlecruisers all done ! An ongoing 6 mm WW2 game has been hogging the table for a couple of weeks delaying the photo session.

The final batch consisted of those 4 Fast Battleships, HMS Canada, 3 Iron Dukes and a rogue HMS Indefatigable, who somehow got missed on the first pass.

The final 9 British heavies

What was slightly different with this batch was that all but one (Canada) was from the US company WTJ, very different to the classic cast metal kits GHQ provide, they are effectively printed (the lovely owner of the company did explain exactly how they were made but my eyes glazed over !).

The above photo gives you an idea of what they look like when they arrive at your door. No fiddly build stage just straight glued to their base. I give them a bit of a scrub in soapy water before priming them but I have never had any problems with paint lift and importantly no breakages of guns barrels etc. If you haven't already seen WTJs stuff I did a review and comparison blog post HERE.

15" guns, fast speed, good armour, shame about the ammo

I have included a bit of a comparison photo between Royal Oak which is from GHQ and Valiant which is from WTJ, both great models, more detail especially on the deck with GHQ plus the ability to rotate the turrets. WTJ wins hands down on price though and they really don't look out of place next to each other, some of the other manufacturers in this period and scale have very little detail and to me are just recognition models.

The Iron Dukes all WTJ

Here we have the Indefatigable from WTJ next to her sister New Zealand who is a GHQ model. The comparison is the same as the 15" ships above, less detail on the WTJ but still a very acceptable model.

The last ship of the batch is this beauty from GHQ, I really like the way this ship has turned out, can't put my finger on why I just like it.

Grand Fleet Review

KGV leads the line.

So there you have the meat of The Grand Fleet, Armoured Cruisers and Light Forces to complete but this is the fighting end done. For scale the table is 12 x 6 and as you can see with bases touching the battle line only just fits.

Project Jutland is on a slight hold at the moment, my German pre Dreadnoughts have arrived as have a batch of light stuff from GHQ however 6 of the remaining German Big Guns were out of stock so I will have to wait until they arrive. I was going to crack on with the light stuff but realised I had run out of bases, more have been ordered from ERM but I will have to wait as Tony is having a well deserved week off.

With all the Jutland excitement I have neglected our WW2 Baltic Campaign so I will get back to that this week.

Useful Links

Guide to Painting and Basing the Ships
Project Jutland - Dreadnought Wonderland
Project Jutland - Rule Britannia