Bob’s Black Bulls 11th Armoured Division.

Well having had major re-organisation I added setting up a Generic table for the 1st Scenario.

Down the centre is an industrial area and rail head, which still has damage from the end of the last war. A couple of farms and woods break up lines of sight.

I have randomly picked each forces table side, the U.S are o  the left and the Soviets are on the right ( sort of reverse of political spectrum)  as can be seen by the models on table, though they have just been put down pre game and are not in their deployed positions.

The Scenario from the book

Protests in much of Eastern Europe particularly Warsaw have been crushed by Soviet Troops leaving many protesters dead on the Streets. The Western Allies demanded the Soviets responded by re-inforcing their occupation .Protests throughout the Soviet Zone of Germany and Poland saw further brutal suppression.

On 6 June 1948 British, U.S. and German troops cross the border under the pretext of protecting German and Polish Civilians.

The lead Elements of the U.S forces crossed the Oder and Neisse rivers at various points , advancing in a West-East axis , quickly overrunning any token resistance and approached Wroclaw. Fast moving lighter Armoured columns ran into an advancing column of T44’s and unidentifiable tanks, and a savage firefight broke out.

The army list for each side are provided from the forces booklets in the starter sets which detail what can be command , Core and Support units giving the max of each type:

U.S Force

Command

1x T26E5  Assault Pershing 5pts Volley Fire Skill 3pts

Core Units

3x T26E5 Assault Pershings 16 pts

3x T26E4 Super Pershings 14pts

3x M26 Pershing 8 pts

5x M4A3 Easy Eight Shermans 10pts

Support Units

4x M36 Jackson Tank Destroyers  8pts

4x m18 Hellcat Tank Destroyers 6 pts

Total 70pts

Soviets

Command

1x T44  3pts  Punch it Ability 3 pts.

Core units

3x IS-3   10pts

5x IS-2  12pts

5x T44  11pts

5x ISU 130 15 pts

Support Units

4x T34/85  8 pts

3x T34/85 6 pts

70 pts total

Well over the last few weeks I have beavering away painting up both the Starter sets for Clash of Steel and some other units to round out the Forces , and I’ve nearly enough U.S and Soviets to do 1st game.
(note I have had enough British and German to play for a couple of weeks but I’m being awkward reasons below)

But the question to the masses do you want me to go back over how I painted the various forces , or would you prefer I go straight to the battle report ?

Now those that know me will know I’ll tinker with the rules a bit, mainly in this case as intend to play it solo . The 1st 2 player will be rules as read. The reason for the amendment’s is partly :
1) I dont like I go you initiative
2) a more random initiative will make playing both sides easier and fairer
3) I will be amending the random scenario and objectives to fit in with the narrative I have for the 1st and possibly series of small games.

This comes to the reason I haven’t played with Brits and Germans so far, as the base narrative of the game is a Western Allies (plus a slowly recovering Germany) vs Soviets , and my plan is to play the initial clashs of the respective forces described in the background of the game.
Starting with the U.S and Soviets.
Not only that I’m initially leaving out the more exotic vehicles for the this initial clash where possible , and play a game with forces that could have dnd sid sometimes meet in Korea 2 years later.

As part of my current flit between period and Genres, I am now heading back to this one with the release of above.

I had said no new projects then I got into Legions Imperialis,  but both this and the Western Gunfighters projects are not new. With this I’m just extending the time period my 11th Armoured is engaged in.

For a long time I’ve wanted to do a what if, had the war continued , without bloody Zombies,  Mechs, Monsters of the I’d etc, and actually use some of the built and used post war kit, that in many cases were used in Korea. Funny in how in all the above weird wars , allied vehicle and air technology seems to be ignored in favour of even more exotic designs than some of the weird ones that were actually considered.

Apart from that who doesn’t want to play with Maus, Tortoise, and IS3?

Plus it has actually got me to get around to finish the 6 King Tigers and Jagdtiger which have been sitting in a trap for over a year !

Sorry I forgot most Important part of move 2 after some considerable prompting from the umpire who had spent a week painting them, and wished he’d seen John’s Americans at weekend@!@@

The arrival of the Rifles Carrier Platoon (German should surrender and go home. Hurrah!)

The assualt in the Bridge finally gave the British a sight on the lone Pak 75 that had despatched the Innes of Courts Staghound command vehicle (cheers from Gerry).

In a rather gutsy move Jo’s Scout troop sped round to put it under my fire quickly dispatching the crew..

This wasn’t as suicidal as 1st thought as on the 88mm on one of the JagdPanther on the far hill was in range, but it did manage to put a hole in the AEC armoured car forcing it to bail out.

That was pretty much all the excitement for move 2 as the British continued to jockey positions for an advance, and a steady flow of Germans arrived including Tigers.

Gerry as did I later has probably realised that the A.I Germans are actually winning at this point, having destroyed the American Airborne onthe Bridge and forming an increasingly strong defensive line around the bridge. This is also slowly dawning on the players who are beginning to realise this has been helped by their reluctance to push units forward.

Although we only got 2 moves it was a good social event , Everyone again enjoyed themselves , the FOW rules worked the mechanics well and didn’t get in way of playing the game. Plan is to carry on in a month due to various commitments,  plus we found Sunday lack of pu lic transport put back the start by an hour, so back to Saturdays. 

In the meantime the Guards on  the Right flank, having lost a Stuart to a Panzershrek , began to give the Germans a dose of the same medicine, Pulling back the Stuart out of range, just about every tank troop I  range began to pound the building into even more rubble, and reduced the defenders to only 4 bases   who unable to respond bugged out.

This is were during the interlude lull Kevin realised he had done part of it wrong, most of the 95mm Howitzer tanks had been using the Artillery rules and he had hadn’t realised that they don’t get the brutal trait if use that way, Has nobody could remember how much difference it had made we let it stand.

That pretty much wrapped up move one, The British tried to sort out the traffic jam to be able to breakout of the hedgerows , and by now the main force of the Panzer Lear had begun to arrive  but were having the same problem as the British as they were all atlrriving down the one side road.

Keith kept rolling for the same deployment marker. Purely random but it was if the dice gods had git into the narrative spirit!

Move 2. All the dice in the bag plus extras for new arrival s bag was getting packed, need a bigger bag! Keith has got one but forgot it.

With the end of the Bridge now bereft of Americans , the German Infantry in the are consolidated their hold by forming a defence line on the railway line, with a company of Stugs moving in Support.

Unfortunately this was spotted by one of the British scout units who were able to bring down Artillery fire from the newly arrived Battery of Sextons, and a few casualties resulted.

In the meantime the other 2 platoons of the Rifle Brigade in Sextons arrived and began to deploy into the Farmhouse and on attempted to cross the canal Bridge

Well not quite bright ans Early on Sunday morning we reassembled for dat 2 of game. Now it seems we have settled into a 2 move day, move and beer and Doughnuts break , 2nd Move and Pub. But we are pushing the envelope on the initiative on this, It may be an idea to drop the number if dice to just command units and move whole Squadrons and company’s on drawing of dice.

The Germans quickly decided to move their unit of exposed Panthers , which in theory could have been caught side on by Shermans and Cromwells crossing the Bridge.

They had two options move into treeline by canal, but this would stiil leave flank over from flank, or take up position in high ground behind station.

On a die roll favouring the later option they chose the latter.

On the whole the British Armored Advance seemed stalled at the Headrows with no one wanting to advance .

So itcwas decided to bring on the Infantry with Jo debusing his Infantry Platoon to seize the farmhouse on the left flank, in an attempt to get sight of and shoot at the Jagdpanzers in the court yard.

Being a little wary of this possibility and with no Infantry support, heard the Infantry assault on the empty farmhouse plus the known Sherman force to the front and promptly fell back across the railway line to the line of trees.

What was left of the American Airborne decided to make a last stand at the British end of the bridge, digging in and hiding amongst the vehicle wrecks.

This unfortunately was spotted by virtually all the German Forces, who began to pound them with all the available gun in sight, until they and the anti tank gun with them were wiped out.

I found some more photos of the 3nd move so: