ASL AAR Double Trouble, AP 84

Dave G and I played Double Trouble from the new Action Pack To the Bridge at the St. Louis Tournament.  I was the Brits and Dave took the Japanese. My mission was to either to take possession of all of the buildings in the play area, or inflict >= 5 VP more than the Japanese.  Each non-hut building counted as 1 VP. 

Dave set up a couple of squads in the buildings around 6BEE12, and a foxhole with a squad and a mortar in/around 6BGG13.  He also set up a majority of his troops in buildings 5AB7, 5AB9 and around the buildings in 5AC14 and D13 and D14 and around B12. 

I divided my force into two groups that would eventually converge in a pincer movement on both sides of the Japanese lines.  Group 1 would use cover provided by the jungle and the smoke created by the mortar and take the buildings on my right side of the map, around the 6BEE12 area. After taking these building and eliminating the Japanese defenders, this group would swing back around and attack the remaining Japanese force being held and assaulted by Group 2.  Group 2 of my force would move through the jungle as cover and hit the Japanese force occupying the buildings and positions along the 5A rows c and d.

My first mistake concerned my force distribution.  Group 1 was much heavier than Group 2.  I should have put additional units in Group 2 to order to inflict more casualties on the Japanese forces on board 5A. 

AAR: ESG 109, Backs to the Wall

On Saturday at the 2014 St. Louis Tourney I played Jeff D. in Backs to the Wall, ESG 109.  I played the Germans while Jeff played the Brits.  I like early war scenarios because it seems that there is more need for combined arms tactics; the infantry must work with the armor in tight unison on both defense and offense.  In this one the Germans had to cross a densely built-up part of board 51 to then break out of the city and capture two bridges and a stone building between them.  The Brits had to delay the Germans long enough and hold just one of these key terrain features to win.  They got a couple of roadblocks, some light armor with some nasty armament, 9 squads and some support weapons, including ATRs.  The Germans got some Panzer I’s and II’s, 15 squads and some support weapons.  The bottom line is, I lost on the last CC dice roll.  I had one bridge and the building, with a sizeable force set at the canal line.  I had a 2:1 odds with a 9-2 leader leading the close combat to secure the last bridge.  I needed effectively an 8 to kill the Brit defender.  The odds were definitely in my favor.  I rolled an 11.  Ugghh.  But it was a great little scenario, and I learned a ton from playing this.  Jeff is a much better player than I am, but at least I gave him a run for his money. 

I have to apologize up front that I was so busy with the game that I didn’t take any photos or even take any notes.  But I’m going to walk through the scenario and then give my “lessons learned” at the end.  SL was the second game I ever bought and played back in 1980 (I even have the original game with the receipt inside the box!), but, due to real warfighting, spy work, a civilian job and a beautiful family, I’ve only been seriously playing ASL about 4 years, off and on, so these lessons may be obvious to most of the experienced players. 

I set up at the forward edge of the battle area (FEBA, row 7 on map 51), so that my infantry would be across no man’s land and up to his FEBA on the first turn.  I used the sIG Ib to lay down fire to cover my move.  At the end of Turn 1, most of my units were in the stone buildings on hexrow 5 at least, shooting at his troops in the stone buildings.  I was able to get a couple of luck shots, but nothing much.  I just wanted to move and get my guys in position.  On turn 1 I could see the road block in Z2. 

I jumped up pretty quickly so in his turn 1 the Brits started moving a force of theirs back to eventually position themselves on both of the bridges.  The goal was to get to the 23F3 building and on the bridge at 23P7 within a couple of turns.  The Brits still left a good number of units in the stone buildings to hamper my movement.