kensal

Turn 10 completed Finally, C Coy is advancing into East Buron and down the diagonal road, supported by Stuarts. The building to the left is the building by hit by fire, with the enemy team spotted on the road behind it.

Turn 10 completed A Coy is moving up to the western edge of Buron. A small smoke screen is being laid to the left of this advance to prevent flanking mg fire experienced previously. 51mm HE mortar fire is hitting the hedge line facing the north - south road into this part of Buron (you can see a small amount of smoke from this). Interestingly, the enemy team spotted moving west to counter A Coy can be seen emerging just behind this mortar fire from a gap in the hedge line and presumably with the intention of taking up a position facing down the road. That area will continue being hit by mortar fire and I am laying mg and rifle fire there too, to make the area too hot for them. Will they stick it out there or move off?

Turn 10 completed These two bods are hot-legging it west down the first east-west parallel away from D Coy. The building to the right is currently being saturated with mg and 51mm mortar fire from C and B Coys and hopefully that will discourage them from taking up residence there

Turn 10 completed The third D Coy platoon begins working through the eastern most orchard

Turn 10 completed (the situation map should have said turn 9, not 8). 2 platoons from D Coy are advancing round the eastern edge of Buron's orchards and have reached the first east - west parallel road.

Definitely the right decision - we have very limited opposition currently in Buron (afaik) and very substantial counterattack force possibly coming up. The Glens wouldn't thank Division for wasting substantial artillery assets on the assault when they may well be facing a powerful counter thrust by armour and panzer grenadiers

Pretty limited - I've got the Battalion's mortar platoon, consisting 6 tubes. However under the CMPzC rules (as I understand them), each fire mission is limited to a maximum area fire zone of 20m per tube. My mortars are in 3 sections of 2 tubes each, which means that each fire mission can only be an area fire mission with a maximum target zone of 40m. That restriction pretty much limits the mortars to hitting specific targets rather than operating as harassing fire over the objective as a whole. At the moment it is a question of locating the enemy's main defensive positions before committing these assets. My intel tells me that we are facing about a company strength force and that's quite a small force for the space being defended, so it isn't obvious at the moment where they are.

My tuppence worth: whether it is the "correct" use of smoke or not (who decided anyway what is "correct" and what is "incorrect"?), I use smoke a lot where I have to move forces across open ground towards an objective and I would drop that smoke just in front of, and on top of the suspected or actual enemy positions. As I see it the purpose of this smoke is to prevent the enemy from engaging my forces while they are vulnerable i.e. moving across open ground. That smoke enables me to move my forces towards the objective and into positions from which they can engage and destroy defenders piecemeal. That works for me, whether right or not.

Any comments on all of this are, of course, welcome.

Turn 8 completed, no casualties to report. Here is a situation map with pointy arrows and oval shapes: D Coy is continuing its advance to the south and will skirt Buron's east side and only then swing west. It hasn't met any resistance yet. Enemy presence has been detected along its axis of advance in the small black oval but I suspect that presence will be long gone before I get there. Just in case two mortar sections have been called in to lay down a stonk in the area. C Coy is moving parallel to D Coy but further to the west. Its job is to move into the eastern side of Buron and flush out any enemy elements. Already a small enemy presence in the black oval area has withdrawn (black arrow). Once ensconced in east Buron, C Coy will swing west and begin advancing along a wide front to flush out enemy stragglers towards central Buron to what is suspected to be the main or one of the main enemy locations in the large black oval. Enemy movement away from us has been seen. There are some heavy calibre weapons facing east (AT gun that took out our stuart) and a couple of guns facing south (you can see a puff of smoke just above the words B Coy where these pieces are still trying to get the 3rd A Coy scout. B Coy is holding back for the time being and it is using everything it can bring to bear to lay down some support fire into central Buron to support C Coy's advance. 51mm mortars are firing ahead of C Coy too. A Coy is moving forward on a rather narrower axis. Two 51mm mortars are going to lay down smoke to the left of that axis in the area where our scouts attracted some mg fire. The smoke is masking A Coy's movement across this exposed patch. I am expecting retribution from the board's smoke experts for this....A mortar section has been called in to lay some fire into the black oval area. At least one section of enemy has been seen moving west, presumably to try and block A Coy's advance. Overall Battalion is satisfied with the advance to date.

Turn 8 completed Not much to report - D Coy is moving into the orchards supported by the recce squadron, area fire going in from B Coy in reserve. C Coy is moving into position to protect D Coy's flank and swing into Buron. A Coy is forming up to the west. A Coy took one casualty from fire emanating from the centre of Buron. I'll post a situation map with pointy arrows and things next turn to show where everyone is.

I imagine he would have been in charge of the gaff within about 6 months and launching a lightning strike on Brazil...

Turn 7 completed Someone takes a pop at a sniper section moving through the wheat. Those with sharp eyesight will see a faint pinprick of light just to the left of Tommy's head, as the bullet wings harmlessly past Missing seems to have triggered our hero's decision to make like a shepherd and get the flock outta there. This is a wise decision because C Coy's advance elements are moving up the hedge line to the right...

Turn 7 completed D Coy checks out the trench system. The mg fire is from two stuarts to the rear, supporting the advance to the orchard

Turn 7 completed: Well, no casualties this turn and A Coy continue their advance through the wheat fields. You can just make out scouts hiding along the hedge line in the top right quadrant

Turn 6 completed A Coy scouts to the far west come under machine gun fire and go to ground without loss

Turn 6 completed: A Coy's eastern most platoon continues coming under heavy calibre and machine gun fire as it advances. It is ordered to shift the axis of its advance to the west and loses its radio operator

Turn 6 completed: D Coy's forward platoons edge forwards towards the orchards

Turn 6 completed: Stuarts to the south of Buron begin attacking suspected enemy positions along hedgerows

Turn 5 completed: 6 casualties this turn - 4 Stuart crew and 2 A Coy infantry. The result of being less cautious in the approach than is desirable but I am working under instructions to prevent the enemy escaping and I have limited time to achieve that and, furthermore, the approach to Buron over flat open ground is long. I think therefore the scout casualties were unavoidable. The stuart loss however was simply careless - the AT gun sited at the end of the road was in a likely position for such a piece and I did not need to test whether one was there at this stage. Sorry crew! The defenders of Buron clearly have more heavy weapons than stated by Division intelligence. I have taken fire from perhaps two 50mm pieces and something heavier - an infantry gun of either 75mm or 150mm. In addition one of the southernmost Stuarts, now to the south of Buron, has attracted what looks like a light mortar round - but smaller than 81mm so that cannot be. Possibly a rifle grenade.

Turn 5 completed: D Coy continues unopposed (for the moment) towards the orchards in East Buron

A Coy scouts continue towards west Buron

Turn 5 completed: You remember the A Coy scouts I was thinking were too exposed? Incoming! Phew, but that's a heavy calibre weapon! 150mm SiG? They move past the shell burst, only to see another shot... Smaller calibre, 50mm?, and more accurate

Turn 5 completed: The enemy is reacting to our flanking move. Unfortunately one of the southernmost stuarts is hit by an AT round from inside Buron All four crew are casualties

Yes - looking at the video, the battalion advance did look at times rather like what I imagine the Somme would have looked like.