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.
On turn 2 I got some reinforcements, 2 Panzer Ib’s, 3 Panzer
IIF’s and a Pioneer platoon. I have to
say, though, that the Pioneers did not want to be in the war. Nearly every shot they took was no effect,
and the sIG actually blew up the roadblock situated between the trees blocking
the road to the eastern most bridge. I
did get them up quickly on the east side in a couple of turns, into the
buildings on the north east side of the 51Y2 – 51EE5 road, which scared away
some British defenders.
I actually moved the platoon of tanks up on the west side
for a couple of reasons. One was I was
anticipating control of the stone buildings within a turn or two, which would
protect the tanks from ATRs and close combat.
Two was that I wanted these to mainly support the clearing operations
outside the city, and needed to bypass the obstacles and get them out of the
built-up area as soon as possible. And
third, as the infantry pushed forward, the vehicles might be in positions to
both chase after the carriers and cut off rout paths of the fleeing
Tommy’s. Plus I needed to have the tanks
outside the city to intimidate and even take shots at his oncoming Turn 3
reinforcements. I didn’t need that A9
roaming around creating havoc!
Somewhere around turn 3 I think the hidden British unit with
a leader and an ATR popped up in 51S3 to take a couple of shots with the
ATR. Fortunately, he only hit once and
it didn’t penetrate. I was able to clear
the city by the end of turn 3 (if I remember correctly) and by turn 4 I had the
HMG on the upper floor of building 51V2 to provide suppressive fire to targets
of opportunity, especially those in and around the bridges.
The next turn or two I kept pushing north. The sIG was able to destroy the roadblock and
then I was able to kill two carriers, one of which was around the wooden
buildings on board 23, and one of which was on 23I4 just in front of the
eastern bridge. This was fortunate because
it provided me cover later on as I advanced to the bridge.
At this point I was thinking there is no way I am going to
win this in time. Jeff was too good, and
I was not aggressive enough. A couple of
bystanders told me I had plenty of time, but I didn’t see it. Time to be a little more aggressive and keep
pushing, I thought.
We played cat and mouse with our armor for a turn or two,
until Jeff broke the main gun on the A9 after only a couple of shots. After trying to fix it once or twice, he permanently
disabled it and had to leave the field of battle on turn 6. Before that, however, he had immobilized two
of my Panzer IIF’s on the south side of the hedge in front of the victory
building at M5. Also on turn 6, I was
able to destroy one of his Mark VI’s guarding the 23P7 bridge.
By turn 6, I had my forces down to the buildings in 23J2 and
J3, the woods at 23L3 and M4, in half of the stone building at M5, in the woods
in O5 and the building at O6. On turn 7,
I used a Panzer IIF to overrun a lone unit in front of the bridge in the open,
squashed him, and overran another unit on the bridge. I busted my main armament in the second
overrun, but the second overrun was successful anyway. I used a Panzer Ib to scoot across the bridge
and fix a group of units in their location in 23H8, thus preventing their
firing on my units as they scurried to claim the bridge. All of his attempts to assault the tank were
unsuccessful (thank goodness).
On turn 7, I had secured the western most bridge, the M5 stone
building, and was set up to claim the bridge at H4. I had a whole platoon of squads plus a 9-2
leader in the wreck at I4 ready to jump, when one more defensive fire pinned
one of the squads. Dang it! Down to two squads and a leader against a
squad. No problem, I thought. Advancing
fire pinned the squad on the bridge – I was hoping for something better. But still, 2:1 odds with a 9-2 leader. I might actually win this thing! Jump into CC. Let’s roll. It all came down to one dice roll. I rolled
an 11. What! You’ve got to be freakin’ kidding me. The Germans had had too much French wine and
couldn’t pull it out.
Lessons learned (in no particular order):
- There is a lot of time in each turn. Halfway through the game I thought I was going to run out of time. Several people told me I had plenty of time. They were right. You can do a lot in a player turn and a game turn if you stay focused on your objectives and mission. Move methodically and with a purpose. Coordinate fire and movement. Use cover and concealment to haul up to get into position.
- Be aggressive (but not reckless). I was a little aggressive in the city as I moved to force him out as quickly as possible. There was a lot of good cover (inhibiting fire attacks) and concealment (blocking line of sight) so it was possible to move quickly and aggressively. Even outside the city where the bridges were, infantry working in tandem with armor allowed for some aggressive tactics. Overrunning the infantry can be dangerous, but it worked this time. I don’t think the Brits were expecting an overrun.
- Sometimes the bad dice do reflect reality. Jeff and I both had our fair share of bad dice during this game. And I seemed to have my stuff together and ready to win, only to find the CC didn’t go my way, even with really good odds. WTF?? Well, anyone who has been in combat or read enough military history knows that despite great planning and the odds in your favor, things can still go south. We can all blame the dice for one thing or another, but sometimes, even in real life, stuff happens. Sometimes combat just sucks, both in ASL and in real life.
- Finally, everyone has seen that sign from England in WWII, “keep calm and carry on.” It’s been overused with all of the silly variants. But it’s true. There were times I would have liked to throw in the towel, when I was pissed at the dice, when I needed that one more movement factor, or when I rolled a great shot but the LOS just nicked the edge of that building. I have seen and heard (and done) cussing and swearing and dice throwing when things didn’t go the way we wanted. Keep calm and carry on. Part of ASL like real combat is to take what life throws at you and improvise. Think on the fly and learn to work around the problems while keeping the mission always at the forefront of your mind.
This was a great little scenario and I loved playing
it. Jeff was a great opponent and I
learned a lot from his delaying tactics.
Now if I could just fix my dice…
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