Op Layers and the end of a campaign

[sburke]

Well the St Lo campaign has come to an end with the Germans delaying the allied offensive enough to cause them to fail to meet their objectives.

Almost a year in running, this has been a phenomenally great experience. Thank you broadsword56 for the concept, the effort, the maps, the scenarios and being a gaming partner who just enjoys the spectacle and play. It has multiplied my enjoyment of CM many times over and spoiled the crap out of me.

For those interested, the last battle we fought out in CM was an allied hasty assault on a fortified position - the Chateau of La Luzerne. The battle didn't quite pan out the way we'd hoped as the Chateau collapsed several floors all the way into the basement leaving a gaping hole in our battlefield (and a bunch of German pioneer corpses). We'd hoped it would hold up longer, but war is hell. As it was the German defenders were able to inflict enough punishment on the attacking US force before surrendering to make that unit incapable of exploiting it's gains. The OP layer came a hair's breadth from causing an urban fight in the suburbs of St Lo before the US force simply ran out of steam to press home the attack in the time allotted.

The highlight of this fight for the Germans were the PzShk teams which took a severe toll in Allied armor. Their StuG brethren for the most part were ineffective. They were far too vulnerable to flank attacks. 3 of the 4 succumbed without being able to contribute much more than being a deterrent. The 4th did account for 4 Shermans. The AT guns were almost useless, a combination of bad luck (also known as enemy artillery) and poor positioning by their commander. umm yeah that would be me.

So what did we learn? Well for one, though it is a lot of work, the reward is huge. We had no special rules, no umpire to play blind. Just a board game for an op layer and two players who wanted to have consequences to our battles and a more realistic determinant on when to call for a withdrawal or surrender. We both felt that St Lo provided a very good op layer in restricting options for both sides and forcing planning decisions. The initative and morale issues really added a lot to the tension of the campaign. Broadsword can speak to that more having run the OP layer.

The only sucky part is it finally ended and before we could fight for St Lo. Reason enough to have another go at it some time in the future. Next up is hard to determine yet, but the one we were shooting for was a MG campaign - so BF hurry up with the module will ya?

[Broadsword56]

Thanks for the wrap-up summary, sburke. A great time was had by all.

In a nutshell, what happened is the American XIX Corps lost about 24 hours in the second or third day of the 8-day campaign. A combination of factors contributed to this:

1. Truly shameful performance of the green 35th (Santa Fe) Infantry Division -- many of whose units arrived late, failed to activate, and performed poorly in combat (one company on reserve/flank guard even got itself captured when the Germans launched a surprise armored counterattack on the American LOC).

2. The historically accurate, stubborn German bocage defenses that bogged down and chewed up all the US attacks, except for the last one at La Luzerne -- but that came too late to save the campaign.

3. Some seriously lousy die-rolling for the Americans that caused the 29th (Blue and Gray) Infantry Division to underperform and exhaust itself, despite having some open corridors to Saint-Lo, with lead units halting 2km from the city.

We both had a positive experience with the one built-up town map we fought on (La Luzerne), and felt it showed us a lot of what works and doesn't work in CM in that type of terrain. Basically, the more destroyed and ruined and rubbled the town, the better it plays. It's the intact buildings that tend to cause problems (either by limitations of the game engine or by collapsing too easily on occupants). Some standing buildings are necessary, and they do a lot to channel attacks/defenses, affect LOS,a dn other important things. But we can do a lot of other creative things with spot elevations, rubble piles, perimeter walls, ruined buildings, etc., to make good urban maps that play pretty well.

Although the La Luzene chateau collapse frustrated sburke (he lost a Pioneer platoon that had planned to make it a defensive fortress), it was interesting because it had a sunken basement and a parked ammo truck down there for resupply. Also, because the chateau was made of three adjoining structures, the collapse still left a multilevel ruin in one wing that the Americans were able to use as a refuge/rally point/OP. And some of those German pioneers even survived the building collapse to continue waging grenade and close combat within the basement, many turns later. I kept seeing GIs get hit and wondered what was killing them, because I couldn't see the Germans who were doing it. (We imagined that they were holed up in a wine cellar, picking off every American who went down there to investigate!) They eventually had to be rooted out with grenades and tommy guns.

I think the results of La Luzerne showed a realistic result: The US attacked a fortified village with about a 6:1 force ratio and eventually won, but took about 35% casualties in the process. The Germans took about the same level of casualties, but because they were a company defending against a battalion-plus, attrition eventually won the day and the last 65 panzergrenadiers surrendered.

What got sburke to throw in the towel at last was a great little sequence where my scout car surprised his last remaining StuG from behind. The scout car crept around a bocage corner and took out the StuG with one shot -- up the tailpipe from about 150-200m.

[sburke]

What got sburke to throw in the towel at last was a great little sequence where my scout car surprised his last remaining StuG from behind. The scout car crept around a bocage corner and took out the StuG with one shot -- up the tailpipe from about 150-200m.

Another item that was kind of cool about this was part of the reason I missed it was my StuG had not spotted it. I had other units that could see the M8 but I wrongfully felt it didn't have LOF to my StuG. Not that it much mattered - There was no way the StuG could get out of LOF fast enough to alter it's impending death.

Another aspect that was interesting is I had actually no idea how much damage I was inflicting. Visibility during the fight was abysmal. I don't think we had a single turn there wasn't artillery falling somewhere. Between that dust, the smoke etc I could only get glimpses of individual soldiers trying to get through the minefields and barbed wire. This did however help my AT teams as they were able to use the lousy visibility to advantage. There was even one interpid fellow who completely mis interpreted his orders, charged out from behind a building in clear view of a tank and was able to get a kill before the accompanying infantry gunned him down.

I had several discussions with Broadsword over the last 10 turns or so as to whether the Germans were capable of surrendering or should. C2 was shot to hell and some units were still fighting and inflicting severe casualties. The loss of the last armored vehicle and having only I think 2 shrek rounds left as a whole new section of Shermans rolled into sight sealed the deal.

[mjkerner]

Great stuff, fellas! Broadsword, I still owe you that email regarding the MG Op Campaign. There's another new MG game out that could be used, but you already put a lot of time into WED. Also, Decision Games has a remake of SPI's Wacht am Rhein for when we get to the Bulge, and even better, Hell's Forest, also a company/battalion level game like WaR for the Hurtgen Forest Campaign. I just bought them both. For future consideration when CM:Bulge gets here.

[Broadsword56]

Also, mj, consider the great classic Panzer Command (Victory Games 1984) for the Eastern Front. It's the chit-pull, company-level system that was eventually adapted for MMP's two Market-Garden games. I just picked up a used copy for $30, so it's a steal compared to new games today.