newlife

Problem solved. I just did a test with Tigers, and they can drive through 3 AS of vineyard before losing mobility almost all the way through the 4th. So I can risk cutting the corner a little tight.

So do I cut the corner short and risk immobilizing, or do I cut it wide and risk giving the Sherman a side shot at 20 meters, or do I back up and reposition in town? The last is the safest. The first two are the tempting ones because if I can get this Tiger to successfully turn the corner I have crazy position on a LOT of his vehicles moving forward. That tank could single handedly crush a significant portion of his units. Could. If it makes it around in working condition... Know that I'm not worried about the Sherman in front of him alone in the middle of the field. The Tiger near the SE ridge buildings already has a spot on that Sherman and is bringing his gun around. So that Sherman will be a little occupied.

TURN 4 The picture from behind the defender (looking to the east) Screen Shot 2013-05-14 at 8.28.15 AM by pj olandt, on Flickr Notice the sound contacts all the way up to the town, including infantry. Womble apparently bought halftracks and ferried his troops all the way up. So you'll be getting your MOUT! I'm assuming he must have cut his artillery off short if he's driving them up so close. Looks like my barrage will be a little late. Perhaps I can still catch something and maybe not ALL of his troops are on HT. You can see one of my Tigers amidst the smoke on the right side (south side). There is a Sherman about 20 meters away who is obscured by the smoke. I'd love to drive the Tiger out to close, but I have a small problem of making a clean turn around vineyards. Anyone know just HOW far vineyards spread their evil enfoulments? Notice the sound contact in the lower right of the shot below. I left the cursor on the corner of the visible vines. Screen Shot 2013-05-14 at 8.17.43 AM by pj olandt, on Flickr

Thanks guys. It's nice to know people are watching and appreciating. I think I underestimated the artillery. I'm now thinking its more in the 150mm range. The size of craters is bigger than I originally saw as most hits were on the buildings. I'm going to be a little delayed getting all the pictures out on the next turn. I have the turn back but the action is starting to pick up and becoming harder to distill into just a few pictures. Maybe I'll just start with the overview and work from there.

I've been thinking about how possible my tactics would be without the hand of Aces in the Tigers. The Tiger that took out the Sherman shrugged off 2 or 3 shots at 50 meters before killing the Sherman in one. For the same purchase power, I could have had 11 Panzer IVs. If had wanted to do what I'm currently doing, I probably would have kept 2 or 3 panzers guarding the north from behind the mountain top ridge. That would leave 8 tanks for the south. I would have had 4 power along the southern map edge to the SE corner with the other four following them halfway and then turning north, taking the SE ridge road only after knowing what was going on. So still possible, just not possible to immediately take the ridge.

The shelling damage stands at: 3rd Company, 2nd platoon: 8 KIA, 5 wounded 3rd Company, 3rd platoon: 7 KIA, 1 wounded 3 teams panicked, 1 eliminated Note that I'm counting a "yellow gun" as wounded, and any serious wounds and kills as KIA, as for my purposes they are identical until its time to score. 3 or 4 buildings have fallen. Next turn I'll give an updated unit sheet as lots of stuff will be moving next turn and it will help people have a sense of things.

As the above pics show, I get my first Sherman kill. 1 down and many, many, many, many more Shermans to go. I've yet to see pure infantry. Perhaps womble went all armor with just a few recon attachments. Perhaps its still slogging up the hill. I have a great deal of smoke blocking my vision. If anything, my southern flanking maneuver has provided increased visibility. Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 2.17.27 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr You can see the dead sherman bottom left, killed by the Tiger inside the courtyard far left. There is a suggestion of infantry on the other side of the wall by that courtyard. I already have some troops in there with more moving in. We'll see if the Americans try to contest it or back off with a Tiger in there. The other Tiger in that area is repositioning itself and will hopefully get a shot off on the Sherman near the center (along with all of his mates). It appears Womble may be trying to skirt the edge of town, or perhaps he means move his tanks directly into town. The lack of German infantry portable AT assets will really hurt here. The Tiger Plt. HQ that has moved onto the road headed towards the SE ridge (road on the left side of the screen) will be turning into the town and braving the artillery fire. He's headed for the clump of trees in the middle of all the smoke on the left side of the above picture. The Mountain Top Tiger and northern most Tiger are both repositioning. It will be a careful dance of flanking the enemy tanks while not showing my flank, and dodging the shelling. Here's an overview shot from behind the defender (from the west) Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 2.57.13 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr 2x 81s and a section of 120s have been called in on the TRPs in front of town. These will land in 3 and 4 minutes respectively. I'm guessing that is how Womble has timed their advance if they exist at all. I'm keeping one 120mm section in reserve. The Btl HQ is moving up to the Mt Top and will call it in on the first layer of buildings. Over on the far south (right side of the shot above) you can see the Plt and Tigers cleaning up the recon element. They should be eliminated next turn. Due to my guess of a rolling barrage and that Womble is not contesting the Southern valley directly, I am moving out 2nd Company's 3rd and 4th platoons out of town to the south. After his first line of shelling is done, I hope to reinsert them in front of the new shelling. This will expose them to long range attack from the southern valley, but that doesn't seem to be a big problem right now.

Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 1.42.03 PM Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 1.43.19 PM

TURN 3 Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 1.48.56 PM Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 1.50.45 PM Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 1.51.03 PM Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 1.52.02 PM Screen Shot 2013-05-13 at 1.52.59 PM

With the amount of points Womble has, I'm now anticipating a rolling barrage. Turn 5 he should start shelling the middle parts of town while his units move into the front section. My turn 3 orders are away, but my next chance I'll be calling in 81s and 120s on the TRPs. I don't have any infantry contacts, but he's probably hustling his troops up the hill. I won't be able to stop him cold at the front edge, but it would be nice to delay him long enough for his artillery to get ahead of his troops giving my guys time to recover. At the moment, 1st Plt and my attack forces are probably happy they got the assignments they did rather than playing dice with the artillery in town. Of course it will eventually get tough on all of them.

Meanwhile, the northern attack group gets into position and gets a flurry of contacts, including getting two shots off on a Pltn. leader sherman. Sadly the shots go high. Both tanks are hull down to each other. I've given my Tiger a 5 second pause and then retreat orders as he pulled into this position at a little too much of an angle. He'll pull back over the crest of the hill and come back up, this time closer to the wall. Meanwhile the other Tiger will pull just into the building area to fill that whole. My infantry should start taking buildings in that area next turn. The big question is how fast Womble moved his guys up to take the same buildings... Screen Shot 2013-05-12 at 8.30.51 AM by pj olandt, on Flickr This shot gives you a better view of why my Tiger needs to be pulled back. He's 45 degrees to several tanks that Womble raced up the hill. Its unclear whether he means to move them to flank my Tiger by driving close to town or not. Screen Shot 2013-05-12 at 8.31.46 AM by pj olandt, on Flickr I'm moving my CO tiger on the Mt. Top to a position to cover some of the exposed hill in front of town. I'm also positioning my Plt HQ Tiger over onto the road in anticipation of that move as well. On the shelling of the town. 1st Plt. is currently unharmed. 2nd Plt. has taken 6 KIA and 3 wounded, one whole team has been wiped out. 3rd Ptn. has taken 4 KIA and 1 wounded. As you can see below, 3 teams are now panicked. Screen Shot 2013-05-12 at 8.35.25 AM by pj olandt, on Flickr

TURN 2 The Americans manage to unload their recon team with bazooka okay. Screen Shot 2013-05-12 at 8.25.43 AM by pj olandt, on Flickr But as the driver tried to get the Jeep to cover, he wasn't so lucky... Screen Shot 2013-05-12 at 8.28.21 AM by pj olandt, on Flickr As it stands, the driver of one jeep is in retreat, one Jeep is abandoned, and the other destroyed. There are two recon teams (one bazooka seen) heavily suppressed and my infantry will be moving up next turn. I expect this to be cleaned up in about 2 minutes or so barring a larger force coming over the crest.

Over at town, the artillery is falling. The picture below gives you a sense of what is being targeted. This is the view from the east (so the attackers view). He has small caliber (I'm pretty sure his 60mm) targeting the northern rock wall and the bush line just south of the city, 4 tubes on each area. Then he has 4 guns of some sort of 105 or 107 mm hitting the small advance cluster of buildings. I choose not to place anyone here as it had bad escape routes and poor forward visibility. So these rounds will do nothing and I hope he keeps those up for a while. He has another 4 gun battery of 105 landing on the front line of buildings. I do have guys here and suffered 4 casualties (one team has now panicked). Continued shelling of this area will eventually break the teams I have in the forward buildings. The two clouds at the bottom of the screen are my harassment rounds of 120 landing. These most likely hit nothing, but it will certainly make Womble worry about where to advance. I'll keep these going only for another minute or 2 as the 120mm mortar section has a 4 minute delay on my TRPS (add in another minute for cease fire orders), and I want to hit him with those. Screen Shot 2013-05-11 at 5.02.52 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr On the left of the shot above you can see some of my infantry east of his 60 mm fire on the south side of town. These guys cleared the beat zone just in time as you can see below... Screen Shot 2013-05-11 at 4.59.02 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr

Turn 1 Sit Rep: All right! Here we go. Anticipation of immediate of action was not without reason, although it's not the 20 on 5 tank action I was worried about. Two recon jeeps pop over the SE corner deployment hill heading for the southern map edge mini valley. 4 of 5 tanks had visual, one got a shot off that went high, and the MG fire mostly went wide except for a late penetration on the jeep carrying a bazooka team. The screen shot below shows the SE corner situation. The 2 jeeps are visible in the bottom left. In the upper left you can see the two Tigers of the southern attack group. You can pick out the dust trail of the northern attack pair just under the mountain top label. In the upper right you can see the american artillery starting to hit. Screen Shot 2013-05-11 at 4.20.18 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr I'm guessing Womble has now spotted these tanks... Screen Shot 2013-05-11 at 4.17.08 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr

I'll give one thing to Womble, his troops are cool cucumbers: Screen Shot 2013-05-11 at 4.01.33 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr More to follow...

I love this! As for Iron, I find it VERY useful as it helps me know what my units "know" about their surroundings. As for finding units, you just deselect the current unit and you see everything. It's a personal thing of course, but I've never seen it as more work.

Now I got ya. The northern most Tiger might end up being left on an Island and is my weakest position. The central Tiger near the mountain is pictured in the shot below. To the far left of the pic you can see the northern most Tiger. Whether or not this rear Tiger will be able to support the northern most is a question of spotting. The Northern most Tiger can't really support the central rear Tiger, but the central rear Tiger is so far back and has the Mtn top to its right shielding it from the southern half, that I'm pretty sure it will be fine. It's greatest threat will be immobilization by a bombardment. If things get too hot frontally, it can just reverse behind the mountain. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.18.28 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr The southern singleton Tiger is situated far back and can reverse into an orchard for additional protection. It's also essentially supported by the two advancing groups. In the pic below, there are three Tigers. (I didn't clarify this the first time). On the left side, you can see the waypoints of a Tiger coming from the nearest setup zone to head down the road to objective A. The central Tiger will motor out straight ahead. The right Tiger (plt. HQ) under the tree will sit in place on overwatch. It's in very little danger of being flanked and has great visibility to support the others. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.49.06 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr

After a little thinking I believe I have a better answer to your question. Essentially, what are the objectives of my attack? I have three: AttackObjectives.001 by pj olandt, on Flickr Objective A: The Primary Objective is to occupy the SE ridge and buildings upon it. This accomplishes three things. First it flanks any attack from the E through the central orchard. The hill curves away but holding objective A greatly hampers things. Second, getting a MG into the 3 story building on the ridge gives a powerful overwatch position to whoever controls it. I'd rather be that person. Third, it prevents a left hook by the attacker to the south of the city and entry there in an attempt to bypass any massive fortifications on the NE side of town. Objective B: The secondary objective is denial of the southern protected map edge to the enemy. This area could be used by enemy armor to pop up and back at will destroying my southern flank. Even if enemy tanks here never pushed forward to the Farm, they would make holding Objective A impossible, resulting in the loss of the Tigers from a flank or rear shot if they were not immediately withdrawn. Objective C: The Tertiary objective is to secure Objective's A flank. Objective A can be held if C is not taken, but tank and infantry movement would be severely hampered and tanks would be forced to face towards C using the buildings to shield them from the north, or face to the north using the building to shield them from the E. So I split the Tiger Pltn and 2nd Co essentially into three parts so that the northern attack group can secure Objective A immediately. The southern group secures objective B on the way to C providing flank security for the northern group. A separate detachment is necessary due to the possibility of a smoke mission allowing enemy tanks into the mini valley between the farm ridge and the southern map edge. Any such attempt will be met with the southern task force. The final group is the standoff firebase that supports both groups from the rear.

Almost missed your post. I split the Tigers into the Northern 2 and the southern 5. The Northern 2 are positioned for the following reasons: The Tiger near the stone wall is set to harass forces coming through the NE orchard. This Tiger can also reposition itself to have the building cover its left flank and shoot at units moving towards town. The Co sits up on the hill to help out Tiger 1 from a distance and kill things. The southern plt. is further subdivided into 2 pairs and the HQ. The Northern pair is rushing to take position behind the ridge buildings. Their left flank will be protected early on by the natural curve of the hill and orchards. I guess there is an outside chance of an early tank barnstorming up the road into position on their far left, but I'm betting against it. Anything coming over the hill from Womble's setup zone in the south will be in LOS of 3 Tigers (2 moving, 1 stationary) 2 ATGs and potentially 2 Inf Guns. It will be interesting to see if he does a 1st turn Armor push up that hill. The southern pair of Tigers will cover his SE corner and if needed after minute 1 can swing left for shots over to the SE ridge. As to why I did this? I'm crazy. I'm betting a great deal on the superior frontal armor of the Tiger, and that he'll need a great many more Shermans than he may be committing to this side. Of course his main push may be on the south side betting that I didn't cover it as intensely and I'll see 10-20 Shermans popping up over that ridge turn 1. In that case I might lose 1 or 2 Tigers on the northern attack arm. If the main thrust is here, the CO Tiger can reposition quickly to help out, leaving just the northern most Tiger alone. So 6 of the Tigers can operate in concert, even if they are located in separate places. Turn 1 I am doing some gambling that they may be temporarily out of position. Does this answer your question? I know you have intel background (and hence a much deeper appreciation of what is going on) so I'm not sure if I'm properly understanding the level of your question. The setup is in so I can't change anything, but I'd love to know what you would have done differently. Thanks for asking!

Ouch, another ATG is sighted by Bil before it fires. Or is this the one that was firing on the Elephant and lost its bonus concealment?

The observant will notice no 1st company. I couldn't afford them, but instead of deleting 3rd company I deleted 1st in the off chance I can make Womble think I have an extra company. I did the same with the Tiger platoon, keeping 3rd plt. instead of 1st. I doubt Womble will think I have a FULL Tiger company. Some random notes, all units are Regular, Fit, Normal motivation, and +-0 leadership. It was easier setting them all to the same thing than forever juggling values with a near battalion worth of units. I think I upped the motivation on the two southern ATGs with the few leftover points. I have two 1st turn 120mm mortar missions on the NE and middle orchards. Each is set to a single gun and harass. I also notified Womble of this under the assumption this is a harass mission that has been going on for a little while in anticipation of this attack. (That and so he didn't call me a gamey bastard). Although I'm using 7 Tigers and attacking down a map edge while defending for my very first DAR, so I might have already ruined my reputation right there. Natch, I should have bought rockets or planes to seal the deal. If I wasn't clear earlier, the goal of the attack to take the SE ridge is to deny use of the ridge buildings on the offensive while confining his attack space into a dense package for my artillery to pound him. We'll see if this actually succeeds!

Finally comes the brave HQ support team. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 3.21.15 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr These guys actually volunteered to sit up on the mountain top spotting for me. I wish I had been audio taping when they spoke up! I quote "We're not able to call in artillery, are mostly useless on our own, and you won't miss us if a first turn bombardment wipes us off the top of the mt." Such good guys. I'll hate to lose them. The Btln. Headquarters sits bravely behind these guys by a good 180 meters in a nice little rock wall box. Once the support team either bites it, or proves there is no danger, the HQ can move up to call in artillery. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 3.25.49 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr

Here you see some elements of the northern attack group and the some support elements. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.49.06 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr The northern task group of 2nd Plt 2 Co and 2 Tigers will head immediately along the road and tree plantation to the buildings on the SE ridge. The Tigers will get there by the end of turn 2, the infantry by turn 3 or 4. The Plt tank HQ will sit back under a tree on overwatch. Once the attack is successful, this tank will reposition into town. I am blatantly ignoring best practice of key-holing the two AT guns. They are sighted to help cover the SE ridge while the Tigers are on the move. If an early swarm comes over the ridge these are needed to help eliminate/occupy enemies while the tigers react. After I've taken the SE ridge these will help guard against tanks trying to get in behind the Tigers on the ridge. For this to work, they needed good sighting of most of the ridge. Should my assault fail, these will be easily spotted and taken out by indirect fire. I'd rather they help the initial assault succeed than be key-holed, risk them not helping the Tigers if the enemy doesn't pop up in the right hole and having the assault fail. In contrast, the Infantry guns ARE keyholed. Each has a little window of ridge to cover, including seeing a building or two on the ridge. I intend for these guns to lay a shell or two into these building on turn two when they are likely being newly occupied by the Americans. The guns have HEAT rounds for anti-tank action, but in this case they are back-up. I hope to use them for indirect fire on the north part of town after the ridge has been taken. These guns are sighted to hit frontal armor of tanks and as such even though keyholed are not ideally set-up. Again this is the risk I'm taking for the offense. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.50.19 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr The southern attack group is another platoon and the final 2 Tigers. They have a straight drive along the bottom map edge to the SE corner. As you can see, there is a small valley between the farm hill and the map edge that can not be seen from the rest of the map. This is one of the reasons why I'm attacking here. This is a likely attack route that I'm hoping to nip in the bud. Near the SE corner the ridge ends which means Womble will be briefly in view of my ATGs and Northern attack group before they reach cover. I have my two 81mm mortars on this side hitting this area with light direct-fire missions in case he lays down smoke here. The mortars should continue to fire through the smoke providing at least a small harassment fire. southern attack group from my perspective Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.51.20 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr They view from the SE corner, with my southern attack group approaching this position on the left of the picture. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.52.12 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr

2nd and 3rd Plt. will hold the most likely approach to town. I bought about 14 antipersonnel mines to deny the enemy the use of a rock wall and to break up any assault through another vineyard. The two red dots are TRPs sighted to catch troops on the move instead of their gathering point across the field. The americans will be attacking uphill and the hill levels out just before town. I want my guys ground level so that enemy tanks will have to come much closer to get a bead on my guys. The tanks can see the 3rd story from a distance, much harder to see the 1st story. Therefor, I won't really be engaging his troops while they are in the central orchards. Everyone in town is hiding out on the first floor of the building they're in. There is no more than a single team per building. I expect to lose some teams here, I'm just hoping that it won't be complete annihilation. 2nd Plt. 3rd Co highlighted. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.36.39 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr 3rd Plt. 3rd Co highlighted Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.37.15 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr

Normally I wouldn't put 1st Plt. in such a vulnerable spot with such a hard retreat. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.07.43 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr But with the manpower I have I didn't want to overload the town with likely heavy bombardment. It's already a target rich environment. So the plan here depends upon the strength of contact. If his main thrust is not coming from the NE, then I hold this wall and retreat north if necessary. I want to funnel him all towards the middle. There is a Tiger using a small building to guard its right flank and is sighted to have a good view of likely armor approaches through the NE orchard. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.08.42 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.09.06 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr My welcoming party for Womble: Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.44.31 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr This plus a full plt. should do a number on forces coming this direction. The Tiger on overwatch from the mountain spur will also be able to help out in part here. Screen Shot 2013-05-07 at 2.18.28 PM by pj olandt, on Flickr If womble makes a hard play for this wall, then the guys will just have to get back to town the best they can. I'll attempt some smoke missions to cover this retreat, but mostly I'm expecting these guys to get chewed up, just AFTER they do a number on the enemy.