Beach Blanket Banzai...or something like that....

I guess I really should get around to blogging my latest ASL round, but I've been busy over the past few days. I will content myself to writing a small report, and perhaps my opponent will chime in with his views here.

Chris and I have been working through some playtest scenarios for the next Journal (actually I should say Chris and I as well as Chris and Doug). The latest was a PTO scenario that pitted a mob of Japanese assaulting a line of Americans armed with four anti-aircraft guns being deployed as machine guns. The assault takes place at night (NVR of 1 hex for those who understand such things). Play ettiquette at the moment places the home player on defense, so they can be ready to go when the other player arrives.

This gave me the Japanese on the attack. The scenario is really short, consisting of 4.5 turns to essentially kill all the Americans and capture/burn a couple of ammunition dumps. The Japanese have the advantage of moving at night, which meant I essentialy ran right up to his positions all over the map and prepared to launch into Hand to Hand combat from close range. The attacker at night has a higher chance of ambush, and coupled with the already stealthy, concealed Japanese and thier prowess at hand to hand, it could be a long night for the Americans.

On the American side, they get two (or three?) .50 caliber machine guns, and the aforementioned anti-aircraft guns that are a direct violation of all that is civil in ASL. Two of them are the dreaded quad-fifties, laying out a ridiculous 24 FP with ROF 2 (for those that undertstand such things). Here I am trying to get adjacent to these monsters (NVR = 1), with predictable results.

Actually, I can't really complain. It's a fair test. The American crews have a morale of six, so they are likely to break under fire. The problem was my approach and inexperience to both night and Japanese. In my lust for hand to hand, I got too close to the guns, within visual range, before I had the opportunity to advance in for close combat. I neglected to use starshells to illuminate the scene and lay down fire on the weak kneed crews before rushing in. I certainly would have done some things differently now that I see....but that's the story with just about every ASL round! I always seem to know what to do after being thrashed.

The banzai charge was a key tactic (gee....imagine that when the word banzai is in the scenario title). Chris showed me how to conduct a charge, and with his help, I managed to take out a gun and some .50 cals at a relatively light cost. Unfortunately, I bungled my approach on the other side of the map, and after having two of my three leaders go down under fire, there was no one left to initiate a charge into the guns.

The best moment (for me) was the creation of a DC Hero to go and try to take out an American position. My hero stepped up and strapped the Demo Charge to his body, prayed to his ancestors, and then charged into the American position, all for the glory of the Emperor. He managed to survive the charge and flung himself into the foxhole with the frantic American squad before closing his eyes and triggering the charge.

I rolled boxcars! The demo charge was a dud. A calm American stepped up and fired a round into my hero, sending him off to his ancestors.

Such is my typical ASL experience.

Overall, I really enjoyed the scenario, mostly because I got to be Japanese and it was a night fight. Stepping back from that, I don't think the scenario is really appealing to vetern players. It's really one big banzai charge, over in one big push. The Japanese either win or lose in one big flurry. Nice for a short game, but I don't think it was one of the better scenarios we've seen so far.

I think next week we are going to do some French-Japanese scenario that looked to be fairly long. Look for that report in the middle of the week.

On the 30th, Jeff DeYoung is coming down for some undetermined scenario. He sent me two choices but I don't own them, so I'm not sure what to expect.

I also made contact with Steve Garvey, whom I met at ASLOK. He's interested in doing a Red Barricades campaign here at my house with some regular scenarios every third or fourth meeting for a break. A long Stalingrad fight....that might need to have it's own seperate blog!

More later....

My new storage option

Cabela's -- Plano 7771 Hard Box

After viewing all the storage solutions observed at ASLOK, I have been thinking about ways to convert my counter storage to a more portable format. Right now I'm in the standard Plano solution, but they aren't really as portable as I would like. I spotted these Plano 7771 tackle boxes at the local Meijers and I think this might be the way to go. As you can see in the picture, the box will hold four Plano's internally that will easily accomodate four nationalities with a tight pack. Inside the top lid, three smaller Planos would cover most of the information counters. A large bin in the side would cover dice glass, card decks and quick reference charts. I figure two of these boxes should cover most everything I would need with a tight packing arangement. Not bad, and I'll be searching some more before pulling the trigger on anything.

I'm also thinking about clipping my counters. It's probably simple insanity, but at the moment it seems strangely appealing....

ASL First Fire - Central Washington ASL

ASL First Fire - Central Washington ASL

I stumbled on a pretty useful ASL themed blog here. Lots of great links. I plan on addind a perma-link to the right side of this one a little later.

The French

MultimanPublishing.com

I scored a very nice acquisition today while running down to South Bend, Indiana with the family for a 'get the hell out of Kzoo day'. We drove down to do some shopping and such, so while there I decided to visit any local game shops in hopes of stumbling on a copy of Doomed Battalions somewhere. I wasn't so fortunate, but I did find a rather large shop in Downtown South Bend called Griffon Games and Books.

This store is the dream of any military history enthusiast. Unfortunately, due to a bargain I made with my wife, I couldn't stay long to look since she was orbiting the block in the van while I looked for ASL merchandise. As it was, I dallied enough to send her around the block five times before emerging to jump in the van as she went by (parking was really a mess.) The entire basement of the store is nothing but books devoted to military history. We're talking about perhaps half the size of a mall Waldenbooks full of nothing but war stuff. I think he has about every Osprey publication there is. I can't wait to go back and give it a proper browse.

As for purchases, I scored the last copy of Croix de Guerre for $34 (MMP wants $45 plus shipping.) He had two copies of Hollow Legions, but I don't need them. Unfortunately, he's letting the inventory run out since no one seems to play in South Bend.

Great store if you are ever in the area.

The Future of the Blog

This was going to be a short term project to document my time at ASLOK 2004, but I've had too much fun with it to quit now. I've been thinking about it, and I'm going to keep it active.

This blog will continue to document my ASL games (usually at least once a week), as well as other events I plan on attending in Chicago and Detroit.

Looking ahead, I'd love to see this become the nucleus of a Southwestern Michigan ASL Group, with more content, reports, and other things that might add a little to the ASL community in some small way. There are six players that I'm aware of in the region, and I'd love to get some others writing here about thier ASL experiences. Something to think about.

So if you've enjoyed the Blog, stick around. Maybe it will turn into something.

ROAR: By Scenario Name

I thought I should post the ROAR record of each scenario as a summary. For those that don't know, ROAR is an on-line database of scenario playings, so the community can keep track of the results and know ahead of time if a scenario is balanced or not.

First Scenario - Totsugeki! Lost as Chinese.
ROAR has it Chinese 4 Japanese 3

Second Scenario - Hill 27. Lost as American
ROAR has it American 20 Japanese 15

Third Scenario - Awakening of Spring. Lost as German
ROAR - German 27 Russian 29

Fourth Scenario - To No Avail. Won as Russian. Playtest, so no ROAR results.

Fifth Scenario - The Hawk. Lost as American
ROAR - American 17 Japanese 17

Sixth Scenario - Panzer Graveyard. Lost as British
ROAR - British 51 German 56

Seventh Scenario - To the Matter Born. Won as German
ROAR - German 10 British 0....crap, that takes the gloss off the win, doesn't it!

Eight Scenario - Bloody Red Beach. Annihilated as American.
ROAR - Japanese 15 American 15

Ninth Scenario -Kettlehut to the Rescue. Lost as American but with wrong setup.
ROAR - American 1 German 0 (still too new to have much data).

Tenth Scenario - The Last Fort. Lost as German in a close one.
ROAR - German 2 Polish 3

Acquisitions at ASLOK

I purchased some things there that I should make mention of.

First was Schwerpunkt Volume 10. Schwerpunkt is usually packed with some really great scenarios, and this was my first ever acquisition. I plan on getting the rest of them over time.

Second, I purchased Netiher Fear Nor Hope from Heat of Battle, covering the 2nd SS Das Reich Division from 1939 until 1945. I've only played The Last Fort, but the rest of them look great. One scenario features six consecutive Russian Human Waves on the SS positions. Looks like fun.

I also purchased The Buckeye Pack from HOB. My grandfather served in the Buckeye division in the Pacific theater, and it seemed fitting to honor him with the purchase. I haven't played any yet, but Jeff DeYoung assures me that this is a great pack of scenarios.

Finally, I picked up Melee Pack I and Melee Pack II from the SoCal ASL Club. These were relatively cheap at $10 each, but I haven't really had a chance to examine them.

Unfortunately, Critical Hit had rented a suite upstairs for their sales, and I didn't know it until I had already blown my budget. There are quite a few CH modules I'd like to have, so I guess I'll just have to order them later.

The Last Fort (and the last battle)

After getting my rear end handed to me in Kettlehut to the Rescue, I searched around for another game. Steve Garvey, whom I had played earlier in To the Matter Born happened to be available and seeking a rematch, and after two consecutive crushing losses, I remembered enjoying his company in our last game, so I readily agreed to the battle.

We wanted to play on one of Jeff's 3-D maps, so after a few moments of routing around, we discovered The Last Fort from the Heat of Battle Das Reich pack. The Last Fort takes place in late September of 1939, and pits the SS against Polish troops trying to hold a village with a large fortified building up on a hill that must be assaulted. The victory conditions are very tough for the SS, as they must take a very large number of buildings from the Polish in a rather short amount of time. The Polish may be relatively weak, but they have a good amount of numbers and the SS has to move quickly.

Steve took the Polish, so I wandered off to return after he finished establishing his defense. The Poles get a few bunkers, some mortars, a few machine guns and plenty of warm bodies. Plus everyone starts the game concealed from me.

The SS have a large number of squads, quite a few leaders, a few demolition charges, two flamethrowers, a ridiculous number of machine guns, and two modules of Off Board Artillery (100 MM with no smoke and one pre-registered hex and an 80 MM with a radio on board). I liked the SS position. Instead of assaulting the fort directly, I chose to enter on the far flank and sweep up the board ninety degrees from the fort. I sent a smaller force toward the fort, but moving at an angle to meet up with my flanking force. I wanted to try to fix some of the defenders in front of the fort and limit his movement. I also pre-sighted the 100 MM OBA to pound a location in between the two offensive lines, hoping to later catch him moving as he tried to shift to his flank. The 80 MM radio was on the far flank and would be used to lay smoke to cover the advance over a small bridge later. The bridge had me worried, because I HAD to cross it by turn 6 to grab the building hexes on the far side, and the choke point would spell trouble. I wanted to cover it in smoke and march across under cover, at least that was the plan.

The game opened with me moving what seemed to be a ridiculous number of SS troops on the map. On the flank, I was probably excessively cautious as I took a path that kept me out of sight in the rear, but cost me a little time in the heavily wooded terrain. Eventually, I had to crest a small hill that slowed me down a little more. As the game progressed, I realized that Steve hadn't really defended the flank in a forward deployment, letting me get fairly far before I met resistance. Had I pushed harder, I would have been fine, so that was a mistake.

My radio operator was wounded on turn one by a pretty long shot, leaving him somewhat hobbled and slow. Unfortunately, I kept meaning to transfer the radio to an unwounded leader, but kept forgetting to do it. Turn after turn, he hobbled on, falling behind. I really can't explain why I didn't get him relief, but it never seemed to work out. Later this would cost me.
On the frontal assault, I managed to make pretty good time passing through a valley befire coming up on the Polish position. I had a few squads break under fire, but in typical SS fashion, they rallied and rejoined the fight. SS don't run, they just relocate to a better firing position. I began to bring down the 100 MM OBA, and this was another mistake. I was itching to begin pounding the area, and as a result I didn't wait for him to drop concealment. Because of this, I had to draw extra access cards (“Jah!! They ARE there, just fire the damn guns! No I can't see them, but I know they are there!”). This depleted my access deck unnecessarily, and sure enough, after a few missions, I drew the two red cards and the artillery command revoked my access and moved on to a different engagement. I manged to break some squads and strip some concealment, but the mission was largely wasted. Stupid mistake, and again I have no explanation.

The SS continued to grind forward, sweeping the Poles off the hills and taking a squad prisoner. Another squad was killed in Close Combat while my mortars got set up in a pretty decent position. I began to come up to the bridge, while he pulled some men out of his defensive position around the Fort and redeployed on the flank. He also managed to get quite a few squads to fall back over the bridge, evading the SS net and living to fight again. This would cost me.

It came time to cross the bridge, but my lagging radioman couldn't see the bridge enough to bring down the smoke. He did manage to bring it down on the fort, taking a few machine gun positions out of play behind the screen. I was left to run across the bridge taking brutal firepower from several positions, but we're SS...this is what we get paid to do, right?

As a result of an earlier Heat of Battle result, I had a fanatic SS squad. Their job was to go first and draw as much fire as possible. Off they went, marching down the road singing Deutschland Über Alles while the Poles unloaded with all they had. They took twelve down two shots, they took eight down two shots, they took four down three shots, and they loved it. They marched and sang, dreaming of the Iron Cross they would proudly show their village after expanding the frontiers of the Reich. They took Subsequent shots of four down two, leader directed machine guns with rate of fire. They took it all, and they carried on with their duty. In the end, they ended their movement safely across the bridge, right in the heart of the Polish defense, leaving a trail of residual fire in their wake. It was a proud moment for Das Reich.

After they made their historic march, I sprinted a large chunk of my forces up the road in a desperate attempt to make the crossing. I shouldn't have to do this, but I dawdled too long and also never brought the radio up properly. My guys were going to pay the cost of my foolishness. They ran in the wake of the Fanatics, and mostly survived. Some broke, some pinned, but most survived to get that foothold across the bridge. But the pin results left me short of my goals, and it was going to be very difficult to grab enough buildings to win the game. In the carnage of the road crossing, two heat of battle results spawned two SS Heroes. (The Bridge of heroes will be the subtitle of this scenario for now on.) One of those heroes would almost make a dramatic difference.

On the final German turn after the crossing, I managed to grab all but one of the required hexes to secure victory. No one else could reach the last hex with the available movement, but one squad and one hero could advance in during the final advance phase and battle in out in close combat with a Polish squad for victory. Unfortunately, the building was uphill, so the squad had to go CX (Counter Exhausted) to make the climb along with the Hero. The Heroic modifier canceled the CX result, leaving me at 3-2 odds, while the Poles hit back at 1-2. I need to win the combat to win the scenario.

He rolled a 3, resulting in the death of the squad and hero. I failed to kill him, leaving me one building short in another bitter defeat. It was a great scenario with a lot of replay value, and I liked it so much, I went up to the Heat of Battle people and bought the module pack.

I ended ASLOK 2-8 for the week, far from my too ambitious desire to win once a day. I'll talk more about that as well as a general wrap up a little later.

Kettlehut to the Rescue, sort of....

I apologize for my late updates on my final few games. I didn't have the time while wrapping up ASLOK, and since then I've been busy getting back to my normal life.

When last I posted, I provided a grim update on Bloody Red Beach. That was from Wednesday. Thursday, I returned to the venue full of a determination to redeem myself. As soon as I arrived, I managed to get a game with a gentleman from Colorado named Tom (Jazz). He wanted to play something from the new Schwerpunkt pack just released at ASLOK, and I was happy to comply. I chose "Kettlehut to the Rescue" since it looked interesting.

Kettlehut has a small force of Americans defending a Chateau on a high mountain from an advancing force of Germans, armed with offboard artillery and a few tanks. The Americans are dug in on the hill and are reinforced with a platoon and two tank destroyers later in the game, along with an Artillery Field Observer (Lt. Kettlehut). Historically, the presence of the Field Observer directed counter-battery fire to silence the German guns. As a special rule to this scenario, the counter representing Kettlhut has to get line of sight to the far end of the board. When he does, the German player losses artillery support.

To simulate the preparation bombardment, the Americans must start the game by taking a task check for each American squad. Every other squad that fails starts teh game broken, while the others are pinned to start. I deployed on the hill with foxholes and three machine guns creating a nice killing field in front of the chateau. I placed a bazooka in a hole within range of a small wooden building in the path of the German advance, ready to smite any squads that took cover there. I placed the small mortar in a foxhole behind the chateau with a spotter in the building to call the shots, keeping the mortar both out of the line of fire and a hex further back to prevent the Germans from getting within the minimum range of the mortar (2 hexes). Overall I was pleased, but worried about the pre-start task checks.

I guess I should have expected what happened. Of the nine squads to start the game, two broke and two were pinned before the game started. THe left flank collapsed completely. The Germans opened up with a cluster of two machine guns on the opposite hill, directed by a 9-2 leader. The guns went on a rate of fire tear, spraying the Americans with fire and breaking just about everyone before it even got started. By the end of German turn one, I had two good order squads in play. The Germans swarmed up the hill and started taking broken Americans prisoner. By the end of turn two I was down to one good order squad with most of the rest hopelessly surrounded. It was bad...demoralizing even.

The Germans swept me off the hill in no time, securing the building when my reinforcements finnaly arrived. I was left with three American 6-6-6 squads, two Priest Tank Destroyers, and Kettlehut. With that, I had to take the Chateau back from about a dozen German squads and two tanks of his, plus the artillery that kept pounding my positions. Utterly hopeless.

We played it out, but it just didn't seem right. It was quite a bitter loss for me, since I so wanted to redeem myself from Bloody Red Beach. A few hours later, I received some consolation. It turns out that the scenario was printed incorrectly. The Germans set up on hexes number less than five on thier board, putting them right in the face of the Americans. Turns out it is supposed to be hex numbers greater than five! That would back the Germans up and force them over open ground, as well as letting any broken Americans to rout back to some cover to rally. It might have really changed things. I can't say I would have won, but I wouldn't have been crushed in one game turn. I'd really like to play it again the right way.

So I sucked up another loss and ran to 2-7. Still seeking redemption.

The end of ASLOK

I'm back home now and looking at returning to work tomorrow. It has been quite a whirlwind since Friday, which was my last day at ASLOK. I plan on finishing up some reports and give a closing post about my experience, as well as the future of the ASLOK blog. Stay tuned until tomorrow evening sometime for the last few posts.

Coming up for air...

I am at a Panera's just down the street from the hotel, taking advantage of the free wireless net connection and some pretty fine eating. I thought I should post a small update, since I've been out for so long. Since my last post, I have played two games, one of which went until 1:30 AM only to be resumed at 9:00 for another three hoursor so. I'm about to head back in to get in my final ASLOK game of 2004, and then back to Toledo for the rest of the weekend before returning to work, exhausted, shell shock and jittery.

Later I'll update the two games played, plus the one about to happen. I'm honestly hard-pressed to recall a more entertaining week than what has happened here. If you haven't done ASLOK, you really haven't done ASL correctly.

Later...

Bloody Red Beach

Today was the big day. Jeff DeYoung and I were going to engage in Bloody Red Beach from the Gung Ho! Expansion set. We’ve been talking about this now for several months, and I’ve been drooling over conducting an amphibious landing into the teeth of a prepared Japanese defense on Saipan in 1943.

Jeff has a spectacular 3D map for this, and you’ll see some pictures shortly. It really is something. He had a prepared defense and set up the night before in the interest of time, so when I arrived, I simply had to jam Marines into landing vehicles and start motoring into the shore. The night before, I found myself staring at the ceiling while laying in bed, stomach churning like I was actually going to climb into the boat in the morning. My hands were shaking a bit when we started the scenario.

The Marines are massed with 26 full squads, almost a full squad worth of leaders, including a 10-2 and a 9-2, and enough support weapons to make the most liberal of quartermasters blush at the excess. Five flamethrowers, five demolition charges, and something like 10 machine guns (Heavy and mediums). The Marines also get 9 Fighter Bombers with 150 MM Equivalent bombs and Napalm spread over the first three turns. Toward the end of the scenario an Naval Battery (120 MM) is available to pound the island. The Marines also get 4 Shermans, one of which is a Flamethrower tank! Glorious.

I don’t know the exact makeup of the Japanese forces, since I don’t have the scenario in front of me, but I know they get two 90 MM Mortars, two 70 MM Guns, some knee mortars, quite a few machine guns and a 20 MM Anti-Tank Rifle (of which I will rue). They are holed up in caves and pillboxes all along the beach, ready to whack Americans as they come ashore.

I loaded up my boats and divided them into three tasks forces, each mentally assigned to certain parts of the map. I wanted to try to keep my boats together in groups, but shift in various directions to offer some minor feints in case Jeff needed to move to react to the threats. He was free to inspect boat contents, so I thought it might be useful. It wasn’t, but hey…I’m trying to be S-M-R-T smart….

The boats started moving, as you can see here. I know it’s small, but there it is. The boats come in slow, taking about three turns to cross the reef and move on in. I should mention that they aren’t really boats literally. They are thinned skinned tracked amphibs. Once they cross the reef, they are actually on treads in about waist deep water while motoring in. The four tanks are dropped off at the reef by actual boats, and then they have to motor through the water to the shore (per special rule they have been waterproofed.).

Jeff held his fire for the first two turns, remaining hidden and concealed. I got three bombers per turn, but since they couldn’t easily see anyone, they really didn’t accomplish much. We talked about this, and I think this is the correct move. It’s tempting to try to rake the Marines from far off shore, but with so many bombing opportunities coming along, revealing your position pretty much assures the guns will be knocked out. Better to hammer the marines up close on Turn Three when the bombers are about to leave, which is exactly what he did.

When he opened up, he gave me everything he had. Before I knew it, a couple of Landing Vehicles – Tracked (LVTs) were knocked out with Marines spilling into the surf to wade their way ashore. Another went up in flames, taking the passengers with it into oblivion. The mortars began pounding the water while the bunkered machine guns raked the waves. My marines were holding tough though as I kept pushing to shore.

My last flight of bombers roared into action, dropping a load of Napalm on the top of one hill, cooking the crew of a 90 MM Mortar (you can see that here. The other bombers knocked out a 70 MM Gun, and the third didn’t accomplish much. His next fire phase saw another two LVTs knocked out, but no one made it out of the wreck alive. The carnage continued, with vehicles taking heavy fire as the Japanese came boiling out of the caves to saturate the water with fire. I cant’ recall details, only that the whole thing was a swirl of death.

Finally some of my Marines hit the beach. Once there, they are Fanatic on beach hexes, so they were accepting murderous fire while coolly collecting themselves for action. I had toeholds all over the beach, but I had taken murderous losses so far (34 CVP for those that know).

Then things started to get bad…

My Marines were angry and motivated by now. They have superior firepower, and in general the Japanese can’t stand toe to toe with them. Unfortunately, I decided to do something incredibly stupid, and if you’ve read any of these other posts, you would think I had this figured out….I went into Close Combat with the Japanese all over the map. Let me explain my lame thinking. Marines are fanatic on the beach, but I wanted to get up on the regular terrain to begin to assemble support weapons and lay down some fire bases. Terrain was choked, so in each case, the Japanese occupied the ground I had to have, and I didn’t want to hang out on that beach longer than I had to. The odds in CC were heavily stacked in my favor, so I decided the best way to get a firm footing was to whack his guys and occupy their ground.

Really, the numbers weren’t that bad…

You can see the pre-CC action here.

In one case, I advanced three full squads onto a depleted crew manning a 12.7 MM AA gun. I’m looking at greater than 12-1 odds, and it isn’t hand to hand, so the Japanese won’t get the -1 modifier. BUT, he won the Ambush roll, allowing HIM to declare Hand to Hand, getting a -1 for HTH and a -1 for Ambush. Next thing I know, he is at 1-8 odds needing a 3 or less to kill the whole stack.

He rolled a 3. BLAM, an entire platoon of Marines wiped out by a depleted Crew, who calmly reoccupied their gun and continued to pour fire on the advancing LVTs. I failed my personal morale check at that moment. But it wasn’t over.

We moved to the next CC action, where I needed a 9 or less to win. I rolled 11, leaving me locked in melee, open to the Japanese boiling out of the foliage to join the combat on his turn, and in short order, another collection of Marines were whacked. Suddenly my foot hold was essentially gone.

In the meanwhile, on the right flank, his little ATR (Anti-Tank Rifle) started to go to work on my landing craft. Before I knew it, another two LVTs were knocked out, leaving only a single leader alive and wading ashore with not a support squad in sight. The ATR ended up knocking out four crafts and immobilizing an amphib tank. Who fears an ATR??? Jeff just kept crushing me with it.

My moral continued to sag as the CVP total ran to the 70s. Per scenario victory conditions, the Japanese auto-win at 100 CVP of casualties. I pressed on and got my 10-2 on the beach with some men behind him. I took a flamethrower shot, only to boxcar the roll. I began to assemble machine guns and mortars, but in my confused state, I didn’t think about the fact that I couldn’t SEE anyone to shoot, so I was left lugging around the heavy support weapons when I really needed to be fleet of foot.

I took a moment to admire Jeff’s collection of maps, here. It was a moment of solace for me…

It just kept getting worse as my vehicles continued to wallow. He began to meet them at the beach, creating tank hunter heroes who ran out with Anti-Tank Mines, blowing themselves up and taking out my landing craft. Before long, we were at 100 CVP and the entire mess was over.

I was demoralized, exhausted, irritated at myself and ashamed of a pathetic performance. I tend to do this with big scenarios and I don’t like myself for it. I get so ashamed at my own stupidity in the game, I tend to become withdrawn. I HATE not giving my opponent a good game, especially when that person is a good player and I want to learn from them. I feel like I’m wasting their time when I do such completely stupid things, and then take it out on myself through irritation. I need to work on that…

The post-mortem revealed some major mistakes that I hadn’t caught on my own. All the while, my Shermans were wading ashore when I could have parked them out on the reef and used them to start blasting smoke on the guns and ATR. I could have even fired White Phosphorous and began to burn the Japanese. For some reason, I didn’t think the tanks could be used until they hit the beach. I could have even parked a few LVTs out there and started to use the large machine guns to spray the Japanese, maybe chewing them up a little to cover the others as they advance. It literally didn’t occur to me. I was so focused on reaching the beach, I didn’t think I could stop and engage. Missed chances.

Later, I realized I had a few chances to lay smoke grenades to cover my infantry as they moved, but I forgot to try. Of course, the CC lesson has finally been learned. Essentially – no matter what the odds, if it is numerically possible, count on the Japanese getting it done and adjust your move accordingly.

I feel bad about this thing. I’ve been so excited to play it, and seeing it decay into a nightmare was a big disappointment. I couldn’t muster the energy to get a second game today, and after hanging around a little, I came on home to Mark’s to get some rest.

As always, Jeff is a gracious and terrific opponent, and I only wish I could give you a worthy game someday. As it stands, I imagine it is a bit like beating a dead horse – momentarily satisfying, but essentially without any real value.

Back fresh tomorrow for some redemption…I hope…

Panzer Graveyard and To the Matter Born

This is going to be a dual update because I'm exhausted. Today was a 15 hour day, resulting in three games, and I have to be back in eight hours to start Bloody Red Beach, which will probably be an eight hour game.

I got a game with Bill Hayward, playing The Panzer Graveyard. A German assault with poor quality infantry and six PanzerKampfWagon Mark III tanks against a collection of British armed with PIATS and a couple of odd tanks. I really can't say much about this one, because it was a complete, utter, devestating annihilation of my forces. Bill is a long time player, and he conducts Maneuvers: a training session of newbies here at ASLOK. Today was my training, as he showed me how to dance tanks like it was a ballet. I can't even describe what happened, other than an utter rout like I've never experienced. I can't even isolate an amusing moment, because it is all a blur. I felt like selling my set and never coming back.

Bill was terrific in the post-mortem, giving me some key advice on tank handling. While demoralized, I did learn a lot and feel a little better now that time has passed.

After I was trying to recover from the thumping, Jeff DeYoung and the rest of his group showed up with about a billion 3D foam maps and a few tons of ASL gear. I helped unload the truck and stack everything in the main room while trying not to drool over the maps and avoid the stampede of people coming over to admire them. I met one of Jeff's friends, Steve Garvey. I wanted to get in a short game, so Steve and I played one of the 3D board - To the Matter Born.

Because Jeff is a historically ignorant snob, he failed to include the historical segment of the module, so I'm not sure what is going on. I have some Germans trying to defend a hill from some British soldiers entering in troop carries. The have to run through a screening force of Germans with PanzerFaust capability while driving toward the hill. Unfortunately for Steve, I managed to take out two carriers with 'Faust shots, and those carriers happened to be manned by two of his three leaders. I also shot up a bunch of guys who dismounted nearby. Really, by the end of turn two, he had suffered critical losses by he pressed on until the end, which left me as the winner.

Best sequence - a second line German squad killed a British squad exiting a vehicle, reduced another squad that jumped out adjacent to him, passing a Final Protective Fire morale check in the process, 'Fausted a carrier in the next fire phase, then jumped on a British squad with a PIAT and killed him in Close Combat. I think he might be ready to apply to the Waffen SS after that performance....unfortunately, he later ELR'ed down to a Conscript status. The dream was over....

I'm adding a picture here of my 'Hawk' setup shortly after the game started, since I forgot I had a picture. I'm also including a picture of Jeff looking desperate in the middle of a game of "The Rock" with Larry. Fine eating indeed....

Bloody Red Beach tomorrow, with a monster report to follow!

The Hawk

The Hawk

Tuesday saw a few more faces showing up here. I don’t know them, but I know I haven’t seen them yet. After hovering around a bit I found a guy waiting on a game and introduced myself. Mike Faulkner is a fellow from Florida who now lives in Cleveland. I’ve seen him here for the past few days, and he seemed to be a pleasant guy. Turns out I was right.

He had a list of scenarios he wanted to play, and one jumped out at me. HS-BRT1 The Hawk, from Blood Reef Tarawa. Tarawa is a small atoll in the Pacific, scene of a violent confrontation between the US Marines and the Japanese in 1943. A lot of medals were handed out at Tarawa, many of them posthumously. I asked if he was interested and he readily agreed, allowing me to take the Marines.

The Marines are assaulting a collection of four pillboxes, attacking with 6.5 squads, 4 demolition charges, a flame thrower and a 10-3 heroic leader. The leader represent a real life Lieutenant Hawkins. I don’t have the historical in front of me, but it roughly goes as follows:

Hawkins directed the assault against the Japanese. Wounded several times, he refused medical treatment and appropriated more demolition charges. When asked, he said he was going off to kill more Japanese. He led the assault effectively until being cut down by a machine gun. Despite his wounds, he lived another four hours and continued to direct the battle until the pillboxes were destroyed. He died on the island that night.

The Japanese are defending with seven squads, a Heavy Machine Gun, two Medium Machine Guns, and a 70 MM Gun, along with the four pillboxes and two fortified locations.

The scenario opened with me dividing my forces to advance from both sides on a ring of mutually supporting pillboxes. I had two decent avenues of approach into the fortified locations, and out of the covered arcs of the pillboxes. I worried about splitting my troops, but the terrain is so tight, they couldn’t have effectively fought without being too crowded. It turned out not to really hurt me, but it was a worry.

I managed to scoot up close to the Japanese early, and the threat of my large firepower kept him hiding in concealment. I gave the heroic leader a demolition charge (DC) and got ready to try to place it on a large collection of Japanese in a fortified building adjacent to me. First, I managed to place a White Phosporous grenade on that stack, but it proved to be ineffective (I forgot they get the protection of the building on the morale check). Then to draw some fire, I sent a squad with a DC to try to take out a bunker from outside the covered arc. The Japanese in the fortified building tried to protect them, and managed to pin the squad, preventing them from placing the DC. The heroic leader then jumped out and placed the DC on the stack, sucking up some big shots, but he’s a hero. The DC was placed.

On the other side, using more smoke as cover, I placed a DC on the other fortified building using a 9-1 leader. He dodged some fire and got the job done. When it came time for the DCs to explode, the one placed by the 9-1 went off with snake eyes, resulting in two reduced squads and a wounded leader, along with a dead crew. We even had to check to see if the building caught on fire. Excellent.

The DC placed by the 10-3 then went off, and I rolled boxcars, resulting in a dud. The Bell Curve re-established itself to my sorrow.

The next turn saw the Japanese trying to avoid being shot by the superior American firepower. I fired the flame thrower into one of the bunkers, but a 10 roll resulted in that being the last shot - someone forgot to fuel the tanks. That would hurt me.

I kept my 2.5 squad stack with the 10-3 adjacent to the Japanese, hoping to hit him with a massive volley of fire. As soon as I decided to do that, I began to worry about close combat with the Japanese. I started checking odds and began to sweat. The Japanese are so good at hand to hand combat, it is possible for a single squad to kill everything I had there, and sure enough, Mike knew what to do.

A single squad advanced in, attacking at 1-4 odds, but with one of my squads exhausted and pinned, he only needed a 6 or less on two dice to kill everyone. I need about any roll to kill him, but mutual death would be VERY bad for me. Stupid Todd…stupid. He rolled a 9, which got my heart beating again. I snuffed his guy and thanked the ASL gods for sparing me from my error.

Turns out they were just being cruel. The next turn saw repeat of the DC placement by the 10-3, but this time Mike rolled snakes and inflicted a wound on the heroic leader. He retained rate of fire on the machine gun and hit him again, this time wounding him a second time and killing him outright when I failed a severity check. He followed up by hosing the rest of my troops, which promptly began to fail and die. On the other side, my DC placement went poorly with some terrific dice rolls on his part, resulting in the loss of half my guys in a short time. We did the math and I realized I couldn’t possibly win.

I would have done only a few things differently. Mike agrees that I did little WRONG, if just went poorly on the dice. Not to take anything away from Mike, as he did exactly what he had to do, but luck helps and hurts on both sides.

It’s a great scenario, and I would like to try it again and see how it comes out. Lieutenant Hawkins still died, but this time the job didn’t get done.

Lunch is now over and after posting this, I’m back to the grind. Stay tuned…

To No Avail

I’m standing around in the Ballroom checking out some of the other games going on, when a guy I haven’t seen yet steps up and says “You want a game?”

I shrug and say “Sure” and stick my hand out to introduce myself.

He shakes and says, “I’m Pete Schilling.”

Uh…Pete Schilling. Standing here shaking my hand. The guy who makes some of the best scenarios I’ve played. He asks, “You wanna playtest something?”

I follow him out to help him cart in some stuff and he hands me a couple of scenarios. I went with the shorter one only because my brother had to take me to the venue today because of his work, so I had to be ready to leave by a certain time. We dice for sides and he gets the SS, I take the Russians.

The scenario is called To No Avail, and has been through a few iterations according to Pete. It takes place in Stepankova, Russia on July 30th, 1943. After the Kursk action, a tired collection of SS, supported by some halftracks and 75 MM Guns on halftracks, roll into town defended by a small collection of Russian Guard units supported by a T34, a T70 Tankette and a 45 LL AT Gun. The Russians also get 3 foxholes, 2 fortified locations, 24 factors of AP mines, 8 dummy counters, 4 Wire counters, and one squad hidden in place. The goal is to defend a specific building on the map from the German advance, taking place across two map sections, mostly city fighting.

I begin my setup. A large gully runs across the entry map for the Germans, so I place the T34 and a squad with a light machine gun to screen the bridge over the gully. There is a one hex window on the side where he might pile through and miss the gully, but it seemed awfully crowded to me. I placed another squad on the far right with my only Anti-Tank Rifle, hoping to take a pop at a halftrack if I get the chance.


Falling back, I deployed a second line of squads in the city, making sure I had a clear path to fall back to the defense building. Wire counters cluttered the street in front of the victory building, leaving two paths through for my men, and bolstering those building hexes with fortifications. To cover a flanking assault, I mined the ground near the building, and placed the AT gun in a copse of trees to cover a long street that pretty much HAD to be crossed to get to the building. I wasn’t sure what to do with the foxholes, since they seemed out of place here. I considered putting the foxholes in a position that might help him, but then mine the hexes as a trap. In the end, it didn’t really look right, so I placed the holes out of play and ignored them. The hidden squad went with a 9-1 leader and the Medium Machine Gun in an upstairs location in the victory building, covering the approaches. I was fairly comfortable with the setup.

He deployed his tired SS on the one hex choke point that I didn’t think would work out all that well. The mob of troops advanced in a tight cluster, but I really couldn’t do much about it. The halftracks entered on the second turn, so I was forced to wait it out with my guys. My first turn resulted in one assault move with one squad, nothing else.

The Second German turn went well for me. I had one squad forward deployed with a Light Machine Gun, and he pushed hard with the SS. A fire lane went down, cutting off his advance, and the lane ended up causing some trouble. I broke a squad, continued to fire with the squad and left enough residual to clog up his advance. He ended up with a half squad in a position to jump into close combat (hand to hand is allowed in the scenario). He advanced in to CC, but then rolled boxcars, allowing me to withdraw and live to fight another day.

Meanwhile, the ATR wasn’t going to get a shot, so he bugged out and began making his way back to the main building. The T34 moved slightly to cover the road where the halftracks would have to pass. The T70 moved up to provide some support.

The Germans continued to advance, and the escaped Russian squad from earlier continued to harass them from good positions inside of buildings. The T34 had acquired a stopped halftrack, and I would have laced it on the first movement point if it tried to go anywhere. Instead, he stripped the armament and abandoned the vehicle, taking a crew and Heavy Machine Gun out with him. Fortunately, the T34 broke him with machine guns of his own.

Meanwhile, the Germans began to swarm towards the T34 to take it out in close combat. The SS had Anti-Tank Mine ability, so it was a threat. I caught an 8-0 leader and a full squad from across the map with the hidden Machine Gun, wounding the leader and reducing the squad to a half squad. He got to attempt the attack on the T34, but fortunately for me, the Mine Check revealed that the pockets were empty. The tank lived to fight on.

Moving ahead a bit, the Germans continued to grind forward, but I was extracting lives for the ground. The Russians faded back and stepped up to resist at the right moments, and I seemed to be doing the right things. As you can imagine in a city scenario, my tanks were constantly being engaged in Close Combat no matter where I went. Eventually, a squad managed to blow the tracks with a mine, leaving the tank stranded. Later, one of the halftracks with the 75 MM gun got the T34 with a High Explosive Anti-Tank round, but the tank had done it’s job, so it didn’t bother me much (I’m sure the crew felt differently).

The noose was tightening around the victory building, as you can see here. I managed to get most of my troops back into the building and settled in for the final assault. This is where it got funny.

I had two squads and an 8-0 leader in a fortified location, dug in and ready to suck up the firepower with a lot of protection from the stone building and the fortification. Sounds good? Then he took a shot that resulted in a Heat of Battle roll on my 8-0 leader. He went berserk, and the two squads obediently went berserk with him. Before I could yell “Hey!” the berserk guys charged out of the fortification, out into the road, making a beeline for the nearest SS troop. They wanted blood, and they found it. Pete rolled a 5 on a 36 -3 shot, leaving nothing but dead Russians in the street. Just like that, I’m short a bunch of guys. You know, we take the time to fortify these buildings so you can stay in where it is safe….not run out into the teeth of it. Sigh…

But on the positive side, the Germans just ran out of time in the end. The final turn required a mass push by Pete, and some good rolling left broken and dying SS all around the building. It was touch and go, but I managed to lay enough residual fire to keep everyone off of me.

My very first win at ASLOK comes against Pete Schilling! Even if it was a playtest, I am proud of the effort. Pete was a blast, and I had a great time with him. Great sense of humor.

That was the only game of the day, as I’ve been a bit worn out by four games in a little over two days. After resting up, I plan on trying to get three in on Tuesday.

Not a good idea...

They take the parking pretty seriously here...

The Last Gasp of the SS

After my morning of American-Japanese carnage in Hill 27, I returned to the hotel looking for more. I met Ken Mioduski, and we agreed to a game. Ken is the first American I’ve played here, hailing from somewhere in Maryland. He had a stack of scenarios he was interested in playing, and after a brief examination, one just leapt out at me.

The Awakening of Spring (G33) is a late war Eastern Front scenario, set in Hungary. The 6th SS Panzer Army, still largely untouched, was committed against the advancing Russian in a futile attempt by Hitler to counterattack around the oil fields in eastern Europe. Essentially, this is the final offensive of the German Army in the east.

The scenario occurs during falling snow, providing some cover beyond six hexes of range. The SS have to predetermine one of two victory conditions: either accumulates more than 20 Casualty Victory Points than the Russians (kill them) or exit more than 36 points on the far side of the board (break through the line). After looking at the very large open mapbaord (4 map sections), I decided that the lack of cover and distance were too great of an issue to exit, so I went for the kill condition as a judge of victory.

The Order of Battle for both sides is impressive. I’m going to detail the tank collection because I just love tanks, and these are the cream of the crop. Pay attention Mike, this scenario was made for you.

For the non-ASL reader (those that I am trying to recruit), I want to explain some of the numbers below. When a tank shoots another tank, you subtract the armor factor from the To Kill of the gun, leaving a number. You then must roll less than that number with 2 dice to affect a kill. There are lots of little details, but that should give you an idea.

The Germans get 10 armored vehicles, consisting of the following:

Two JagdPanzer V Tank Destroyer: JagdPanzer literally translates as Hunter of Tanks, and this one has the tools to get it done. It is armed with the 88 MM LL Main Gun (27 To Kill Number), capable of putting holes in almost anything (except for the Russian monsters we are about to see). While it doesn’t have much in the way of machine guns (3 factors) it does have Nahverteidigungswaffe capability. This is a 92 MM High Explosive projector used to protect the tank from close assault by infantry. The Jagd has a thick front plate at 18 AF, offering protection against normal tanks.


Four PanzerKampfWagon VG (The Panther). According to the rule book – “The US Army judged that it generally took five Shermans to destroy a Panther.” It is armed with the 75 MM LL Main Gun (23 To Kill). The Panther carries 18 Armor on the front, and bristles with three different machine guns at 10 factors. It also has Nahverteidigungswaffe, so any infantry would have to be either insane or desperate to try to take this thing out in close combat. You’ll need a big wrench to open the hatch and get the grenade inside. On the downside, the Panther has to take a stall check every time it begins to move, owing to the mechanical problems experienced by the Germans in the late war.

Two PanzerKampfWagon VIB (The King Tiger or Koenigstiger). Armed with an 88 MM LL Main Gun (To Kill of 27) and a ridiculous frontal armor of 26, the King Tiger is a beast. It carries the standard machine gun assortment as the Panther and Tiger, as well as (altogether now) the Nahverteidigungswaffe. On the down side, the mechanical reliability of the tank means that each time it starts to move, a 12 on two dice results in the track falling off, leaving it immobilized for the duration of the scenario.

There’s the German side. Let’s take a moment to let Mike clean the drool from his chin.

The Russian starts the game with two Guns that will give me some trouble.

First is the 100 MM LL PTP obr 44, with a Kill Number of 27. Second is the 85 MM L obr 44 Artillery Piece, with a To Kill of 17. The artillery isn’t a strong anti-tank gun in this scenario, but against the flanks or rear, it can be quite effective. Both guns are deployed hidden, only revealing on the map when they fire.

On turn three, the Russians get reinforced with some elite infantry and 6 tanks of their own.

Three IS-2m tanks, armed with a massive 122 MM L Main Gun (To Kill of 25) and a front plate of 26 armor. It has an interesting collection of machine guns, including a rear facing gun for protection against infantry armed with bolt cutters. It also suffers from ammunition shortage, carrying 28 rounds according to the book, so it breakdown on an 11 or higher whenever it shoots. The To Kill number makes it a great match for just about every tank out there on my side.

Three SU-100 Tank Destroyers. This thing is armed with a 100 MM L main gun that is actually an adapted Naval Gun fixed to a tank body (To Kill of 27). It carried 11 armor on the front, meaning it dies if hit, and has no protective machine guns, requiring an infantry screen to keep it safe.

The six Russian tanks are going to be a problem as we shall see later.

The scenario starts with my SS running across open ground as fast as they can, trying to close with the Russians in the tree line. My tanks set up an overwatch position and begin to lay down some covering fire, trying to push the Russians back into the trees. The falling snow gives me enough cover that my first turn passes without any casualties. Almost immediately, the Anti Tank gun reveals itself and takes a solid front shot on one of my Tigers. He hits, but then rolls boxcars on the kill roll, indicating a dud round. His quality control must be lax.

The first Russian turn results in a few mortar shots and some machine guns raking my soldiers, but to no great effect. The Anti Tank gun sends another round into the Tiger, and this time the tank is knocked out and the Crew killed. Fortunately, I now know where it is and start laying in fire. A Panther scores a critical hit (snake eyes) on the gun, resulting in a dead crew. In my next turn I swarm the area with tanks and infantry, indicating that no Russians will be permitted to approach the unmanned gun. I’m fortunate to loose only one tank to it.

On the left flank, the artillery piece reveals itself in a little copse of trees on my flank, in a position I overlooked as suicidally forward deployed. I bypassed this location, only to see the gun pop up with some great flank shots on a couple of Panthers and a King Tiger. Unfortunately for him, he scores a hit but doesn’t penetrate the armor. I wheel the tanks to present the front plate and move in to try to take the gun down. He manages to retain concealment, making it hard to hit (“Where’s the gun Otto?”).

In the next turn, my infantry gains the first tree line and the Russians begin falling back to a second line. I haven’t killed many yet, but I certainly have more firepower than the Russians. The Artillery piece continues to annoy, taking a long shot across the map to puncture the turret of a Tiger and killing the crew. I manage to score a hit with my Panther, but I roll a dud round! A second shot flies down range, and again it ends up being a dud.

My Slave Labor needs a bit of motivation in the ammo factory.

Since my tanks aren’t getting the job done, I detach two squads to sprint back toward that damn gun. Someone has to take it out. Another fire phase passes and the gun manages to deliberately immobilize a Panther, knocking the track off. That ends up being the last shot as the crew finally looses their nerve under fire and break. My two squads trot up and send them on their way to the graveyard.

Both guns down, but now the Russian tanks arrive on the far side of the map.

To this point, the infantry advance is going quite well. SS tend to do that. The Russians are falling back to a small collection of buildings for the third line of defense, and now I think I made my largest mistake.

The ability of my tanks to take care of themselves against infantry led me to run them up a little ahead of the main body, trying to establish positions against the Russian tanks about to arrive. It worked out fine, as he really wasn’t in a position to confront the tanks with his infantry. The Russian tanks took up good firing positions and stopped, popping their hatches to get a good look around.

This is where I made my mistakes. I still had five turns of play, and if I had waited for the infantry to catch up, I could have used their Panzerfaust threat to harass the tanks. (The late German infantry seems to have a Panzerfaust in every pocket – think similar to a bazooka, but a lot better). A ‘faust can penetrate about anything if the infantry can get in close enough.

But I didn’t wait. I pushed my tanks into a duel with the Russian armor, knowing that my big guns could likely kill them if I could score a hit. Unfortunately, I didn’t. In the space of two turns, the Russians destroyed each and every tank that came into sight. I managed to get a few shots in, but I couldn’t score a hit anywhere. Nine tanks were either burning or knocked out in a nice display of shooting. If I had waited for the infantry, I could have presented enough high risk targets to overwhelm the Russian tanks, who had a higher than normal chance of breakdown with each shot.

After the German disaster, we did a count and realized I could not possible accumulate enough casualty points to win. He had 75 points, to my 16, and while his tanks were worth a lot and I still had the Panzerfaust options, he was about to drive his tanks away from my reach, meaning I lost.

It was a great 6 hour game, and I regret losing it like that. I learned once again that tanks MUST have infantry support, even if they have enough defensive weapons to take care of troops. In this case, my tanks didn’t need protection as much as they needed help against the Russian beasts. File that one away as a learned lesson.

This is a wonderful scenario, and I’d love to try it again to see how it goes. Now off for another game!

Tragedy

I spent about fourty minutes and a very detailed post of my last game here when my laptop seized up, dumping the entire text. I'm still trying to get over it. Tomorrow I'll try to reconstruct it and get it posted for your entertainment. It was a scenario worthy of a few thousand words. Stay tuned...

Climbing the Hill

I arrived at the venue this morning around 11 AM after a pretty good night's sleep. After snapping a picture of the ballroom for your pleasure, I moved out to find a game in the sparcely populated room. Most of ASLOK doesn't really get going until Tuesday or so, from what people are telling me, but there are plenty of people here to play.

I was directed to Darrel Lundy, from Wellington, New Zealand. Darrel was in the middle of recovering from an appalling incident where his British and Allied Minor storage box had sprung open in his luggage. If you've ever seen the British Order of Battle, you understand his pain at recovering all of the counters and restoring them to thier proper homes. He handed me his scenario books and told me to pick something that didn't require the Brits.

After a little searching, I decided I was itching for more Pacific Theater action, and settled on Hill 27, a scenario from the Operation: Watchtower historical study of Guadalcanal from MMP. The scenario pits 10 American squads with two medium machine guns and two small mortars in defense of a hill from a flush 14 Japanese squads, also with a couple of mortars and machine guns. The Americans get some foxholes, as well as four labor counters to represent entrenchment efforts already under way when the Japanese show up at the base of the hill. It looked like a lot of fun, so we diced for sides and I ended up with the Americans.

The Americans are great soldiers, but I have a history of failure with them. They pack an enormous amount of firepower, but they have very weak morale, which means they tend to break and run under fire. Fortunately, the rally to action like no one else, usually returning to the fight after a short cigarette break. The problem for me is in covering the running guys while they get theiract together.

The Japanese advantages have been covered in the Totsugeki scenario I discussed yesterday. They hardly ever break. They just get a little weaker when shot, but they keep coming. Thier skill at hand to hand combat is something to be feared, and they have the ability to form Banzai charges which we will discuss later (ominous foreshadowing).

I didn't realize what I was getting into until I saw the board. The hill in question is naked. It's like it has been napalmed down to the strata, with practically no cover anywhere at all. My foxholes were crucial to defense, because there was no where else to hide. The up side is that the Japanese have to assault up hill across open ground into two medium machine guns with -1 leader direction on both. That usually spells death, except for Banzai charges (hint).

I took a picture of my deployment for your pleasure. My mortars hawe a minimum range of 3, so I deployed them back out of site and was planning on using spotted fire from the guys on the hill top. The machine guns are up where they can rake the slopes as the Japanese advance.

After the first turn, the Japanese were at the tree line, and we began to exchange fire. I scored a critical hit with a mortar, wounding a Japanese leader and reducing a squad. My other mortar dialed in but did no damage. My machine guns stripped concealment, giving me a clear view of the Japanese horde about to storm the hill. The first Japanese fire phase was harsh on me. I ended up with three broken squads, runing back to the reverse slope to have a morale building conference with a leader standing by for just such an event. You can see the results here.

Japanese turn two opened with screams of "Banzai!!" from the jungle as half the Japanese force boiled up the hill side with a leader swinging his katana from the front. A banzai charge allows the Japanese to move as a mass, with higher morale and extra movement points. They don't pin, no matter what, which means only death will stop them. The Americans opened up with everything they had, small arms, machine guns, and prayer. My leaders stayed cool, directing fire and whittling away Japanese as they advanced up the bare hill. The Japanese leader went down early, and the squads began to melt with each step. I exhausted every shot I had, sustaining fire on the machine guns (risking breaking them), and even ended up in Final Protective Fire as the surviving Japanese jumped into my foxholes with my men. Of the 6 squads (I think) that launched the assault, only two made it to the target up on the hill.

Unfortunately, while I exhausted my fire opportunities, the other portion of Japanese triapsed up the hill unmolested, taking up positions next door to my remaining troops. It wasn't looking good. After all the shooting was over, we conducted close combat, with the Japanese getting thier customary -1 on the die roll. In most cases, we ended up with mutual annihilation, leaving nothing but bodies and weapons laying in the foxholes. The non-banzai Japanese advanced up the hill and pushed the Americans back, while the broken Americans fled down the slope into the Jungle to regroup. In two turns, the Japanese took the hill but at enormous cost. There weren't very many of them left, and if the Americans could regroup, they had a chance to storm up the slope on their own.

The next three turns were spent with Americans at the treeline applying superior firepower up on the Japanese position. I was whittling them down, but I would still have to make that mad dash up the hill by the end of the game to take enough hill hexes (four) to secure victory. After dancing around for awhile, I was on my last turn, requiring a frantic charge into Japanese machine guns, albeit manned by far fewer Japanese than started the scenario.

If you know anything about ASL, you can guess what happened. Low morale Americans can't be asked to run into fire. We're good at shooting people from a distance, and we prefer to build vehicles to go do jobs like this. Unfortunately, when none are at hand, we usually decide we'd rather hang out in the jungle until the Naval batteries cleanse the hill. Everyone who stepped through that treeline immediately reconsidered and ran away under fire, leaving me with my second loss of ASLOK.

In typical Japanese fashion, they got the job done, but they certainly aren't in any shape to do much more. The wasteful nature of the Imperial Japanese Army continues to astonish me.

Darrel was a wonderful opponent, and we were both laughing pretty extensively by the end of the scenario as my Americans tried to emulate the SS on offense. I'm heading back in to pick up another game now. Maybe some more Pacific Theater. I might take the Japanese, or maybe some Marines. Now American Marines CAN get the job done!

Later...

UPDATE: Picture links fixed. Thanks Chris!

War Driving while War Gaming

I'm sitting in an industrial park down the road from the venue, looking for open WiFi networks. It literally took me about five minutes to find three open networks, so here I am with free high speed internet, courtesy of some flooring company. Their network isn't secure either, since I can surf quite a few computers in there, but that isn't why I'm here.

Now that I found a node, I can start uploading pictures later. But for now I'm off for more ASL. Check back later.

Totsugeki!!

After spending the night in Toledo, we got up early today and headed to Cleveland. It's been a cold day, hovering in the high 50s, low 60s, with a solid overcast that makes it feel even colder. The weather seems appropriate for ASL...

After visiting with my brother and his family, and seeing my wife and daughter off on thier return to Toledo, I headed over to the venue to see what was going on. As this was my first ever ASLOK, I wasn't quite sure what to expect.

The hotel was PACKED with a large number of people in formal dress. That was one clue that they probably weren't the type of people I was looking for. I wandered around for a time, discovering that the hotel was hosting a large wedding, explaining the type of people I was hurtling into repeatdly as they sloshed drinks around. After a time, I decided that I wasn't going to find anyone today, so I headed back to the main entrance, only to spy a guy in a t-shirt with a big tank on the front. The tank was a giveaway.

It turned out to be Scott Byrne, who's name I discovered after a quick introduction. Scott is from Caberra, Australia, here for, of course, ASLOK. He introduced me to another charming 'chap' named Steven Linton, also of Canberra. It turned out that a small contingent of four or five of us were wandering the hotel looking for a game and a room, and we shortly stumbled on a few more of 'our people', two of which were European (I'm sorry to say I didn't get names). One of the organizers did manage to secure a small banquet room and we migrated there to pick up some action.

In talking to Steven and Scott, I couldn't help but be impressed with thier devotion to the game. Obviously, they had flown here from Australia, but more impressively, they were heading to Belglium after ASLOK. They are renting a car for ten days to travel through the European battlefields, ending up in Normandy before taking on a French ASL tournament, then on to England for another ASL tournament before heading back home. Six weeks on the road, all devoted to ASL and WW II. I wish I could join them!

By now it was already near six PM, and I was interested in a short game. Steven graciously volunteered to play me, and I asked him to choose anything he'd like. He settled on Totsugeki!, a small scenario of Imperial Japanese and Chinese fighting over some 75mm Artillery pieces. It's a classic scenario, but one I have never played before. I asked for the Chinese and prepared my defense.

The Chinese forces represent a fairly low quality company holding three 75MM guns, while being hit from behind by a heavy company of Japanese troops, armed with Demolition Charges and a small mortar. The Chinese have an advantage in that two squads can set up hidden (recorded on paper to be revealed suddenly on the map) and one squad of troops designated as a Dare Death squad (these guys can automatically go berserk when in line of sight of enemy troops, charging through hails of fire to engage in hand to hand combat). Other than that, all the Chinese have to do is hold on to at least one of the 75MM guns be the end of the scenario.

The Japanese have what usually works for the Japenese - the utter refusal to stop. They just keep coming when normal soldiers would break and run. They're like hardy insects that simply ignore having limbs ripped away. The jungle terrain also makes almost all encounters point blank affairs, usually ending in some sort of close combat.

The game started with a uniform Japanese advance into a few forward deployed units. My guys were ready to fire one good volley before falling back to more defensible positions, but once again, I failed to appreciate how fast the Japanese can move. After laying down some fire that proved to be ineffective, a Demolition Charge was tossed into my location. Fortunately, with a combination of good dice rolls for me and bad dice rolls for him, the explosive had little effect. I managed to fall back, even though I had no right to survive that close up brush with the Japanese.

I continued to fall back under his advance, managing to hit him and fade away into the jungle, until I found myself on top of my own guns with no more room to retreat. I had extracted a cost from him for his advance, but the Japanese were still quite healthy. Finally, around the third turn, he slipped a half squad of Japanese in past my defense while I was holding fire, waiting on a larger target to present itself. That half squad caused trouble in my rear, entering into Close Combat with one of the 75MM gun crews. I had this half squad cold with a hidden Chinese squad armed with a Medium Machine Gun, but I wanted to remain hidden for a little longer to catch a larger target in the kill zone. In retrospect, I should have taken out the half squad when I could have.

The Close Combat tied up my gun, opening the door for some more Japanese to swarm through the jungle. I had more Chinese just inside the treeline, and managed to lay down some fire that slowed him down a little, but then the surviving Japanese hit me back and my low quality Chinese began to melt away, breaking and running deeper into the jungle. The first of the three guns went down to the advancing Japanese.

I continued to play hide and seek in the jungle, trying to slow him down as much as possible while spinning the guns around to face the coming assault. Close combat started to become the normal engagement mode, as the jungle left us adjacent to each other more often than not. This is where I got a little lucky. In three seperate engagements, Steven needed a 9 of less on two dice to kill me, and three times he rolled a 10. Quickly, my Chinese demonstrated their own proficiency with the bayonet.

But there were far too many Japanese. The second gun held on until turn 5, until he swarmed the gun with too many squads for me to shoot, resulting in yet another round of Close Combat. My Dare Death squad went berserk when he spotted a large group of Japanese. Unfortunately, accurate shooting cut them down before they could close range enough to draw steel. Two guns down, one left to defend.

I pulled the last of my forces together in the final gun hex, with Japanese closing in from all directions. Some good shooting and another good round of close combat suggested I might pull it off, and for another turn it looked grim. Finally, I could not hold against the firepower of the Japanese applied to the low quality Chinese, and the last of my forces broke and ran, to be rounded up and dispatched by the remaining Japanese. The final gun fell to the enemy on the next to last turn. In the end, the Japanese company that started the battle was reduced to three and a half squads. But they got the job done.

Overall, I felt....

Steven was exceedingly gracious in his game play, offering correction to my mistakes during play, and providing a very eye-opening post-mortem, showing me several mistakes and lost opportuities that had frankly never occured to me in the scenario. Like someone said, in ASL you either win or learn. No scenario is ever wasted.

As an aside, I met Mark Pitcavage of Desperation Morale fame. Mark is practically a legend in the game, with his name attached to a great many things. He was a warm and friendly guy, who immediately invited me to the thrice yearly OfficeFest ASL gatherings in Detroit. If you have some time, check out Mark's ASL Museum, full of some great pictures.

It's now 1:30 AM and I have to get back to the hotel early to pick up some more game play. Tomorrow I'll have some pictures of the venue, and hopefully a report of at least one win. One win per day is all I really want!

Images...

Suddenly, my image host doesn't seem to be working right. I'll try to get that corrected tomorrow. For now, I apologize for the broken pictures. Try to ignore them for now.

NARA | Research Room | World War II Photos

A collection of appropriately themed photos for the coming events. Nice archive...

Preparation.

Today is Friday, and I'm heading out to Toledo after work. I'm travelling light for an ASL event, taking only my Rule Book, the Chapter H Vehicle Notes, and the small binder with all the charts and tables. I'm also taking my dice glass, but I hope to find a decent dice tower sometime during the week. After using Jeff's towers for awhile, I'm now in the tower camp.

I feel like I'm missing something. My duffle bag is stuffed with the aforementioned binders, my laptop, various and sundry cables, digital camera and my iPod recharging plug. I think that's all I'll need aside from the regular luggage.

I'm actually dreaming about ASL right now, which is quite sad. I have visions of my last big clash with Jeff a few weeks ago (and for the life of me I can't remember the scenario name!). I was the SS rolling up on the Brits and Americans in a Market Garden scenario, which saw three SS tanks go down to Critical Hits in the same turn. It was brutal.

More recently, Chris rolled snake-eyes in three Close Combat rounds in one scenario just this past Tuesday, putting an end to my Germanic-Polish Coup dreams in a Journal playtest.

Lately I've been feeling a lot like......

But what can you do?

Can't wait to get there and get started!