AAR - UK Sabres at Dawn

[THH149]

Howdy fellas,

I played Sabres at Dawn last night H2H turn based via LAN against my regular opponent, and had a blast.

I was the loyal Syrians defending their country while my colleague WindyHillbilly was just another British invader.

For those who dont't know the scenario, a brief recap: a Syrian Green mechanised force with BMP-1s, ATGMs and MGs defending an industrial warehouse comples (East Yard). The Yard is fronted by large wheatfields covering a hill to the front, and a hills to the rear and right flank of the Yard, with a stream between the field and the Yard crossed by a bridge.

To the Syrian right is collection of buildings (Tool Factory) also behind the impassable stream with a bridge crossing, and behind them is the hill to the right of the Yard. The Brits advance from the North to capture the Yard as their primary objective, others relate Blue and Red casualties. The layout is shown below with the AI's Red deployment,

Blue force has a collection of Spartans (with 7.62 MGs), Scimitars (x4) a Javelin team and an Apache helicopter, but were light on with infantry. So if I could destroy a Scimitar and keep the infantry out my rocket and missile teams would have a better chance.

To get into the Yard, the Brits have a choice of forcing the Yard bridge crossing or using the Tool Factory or both. If the Brits choose the Tool Factory, they have the option of advancing directly ont he Yard or moving over the hill with sight lines into the Yard, then right into the rear of the Yard (a left envelopment).  Either way, the Syrians need to oppose both crossings but the Tool factory cant be given sole focus as its a long way from the victory area.  

For my set-up I put one ATGM and a MG onto the hill behind the Tool Factory, an MG into the Tool Factory to cover the bridge,  a BMP behind the Tool factory as well as a BMP on the right hill. I didnt move the trenches around (I forgot I could and should have as they're mostly on the front of the hill rather than the crest or reverse slope)  The rest went into the Yard - including three BMPs that could fire onto Blue forces as they approached the Yard from the East or from its bridge.

One key factory influencing my set-up: all the Syrians are rated Green, so are unlikely to stand up to a firefight of any kind - their first shot needed to be very effective before they ran. The ATGMs needed to stay hidden, fire at good targets and then crawl away to avoid return fire if possible. The Brits however only had 4 Scimitars with 30mm guns so would be the real trouble makers, while the Apache would stop me from moving and force me to stay hidden. My dispositions would likely be the same the whole game, with movement mainly between Yard buildings or moving MGs or ATGMs back into firing positions. RPGs would therefore likely need to fire from buidlings and suffer the backblast.

The British attack was cautious, focussing on the Tool Factory, and securing the crossing. The MG team promptly surrendered, the BMP behind the buidlings was destroyed and the Apache knocked out the BMP on the hill behind the same.  The Spartans and Scimitars moved forward up the hill behind the Factory.  By this time, the ATGM team had fired two missiles - one hit the dirt and another went overhead the target - not unexpectd as the team was under pressure.  Once the Factory was secured and those forces began to clear the hills to the right and rear of the Yard, Spartans approached the Yard from the north and pushed infantry across the bridge.  All hell broke loose and they copped the fire from a squad, MG and BMPs firing area fire, but, very few casualties caused with Red force panicking from return fire.

Spartans and infantry proceed to clear the road from the bridge to the rear of the Yard, but I had one trick up my sleeve.  Of the two RPG teams i had deployed Hidden behind the Yard wall one was able to get his shot off and burn a Spartan. Finally, I felt I was putting some hurt on the Brits. The other RPG team lost heart and simply ran away.

On the hill behind the Yard the Syrians were trying to re-locate their MGs and ATGM after running away from being fired on.  Nothing worked very successfully, and I suspected they needed more time to recover than what I was giving them.

The last remnants of the Red force were holdouts on the west side of the yard and the last two BMPs. One BMP reversed into the LOS of the Scimitar, and another died from a squaddies LAW. 

With 15 fifteen minutes to go but the last of my squads destroyed in a fire fight, it was all over and I offered ceasefire. WH, as a gentleman always does,  accepted.

 

I was surprised that the Brit Victory wasnt more complete: the loss of a Spartan and a few intense firefights at point blank range causing ten casualties was to much to earn a more compelling outcome. 

Am I surprised by the total loss of the Syrian force? Not really - they were Green, and had outmoded missile weapons (BMP-1s and AT-4a Fagot/Spigot) that were constantly being spotted and put under fire by Brits before the Syrians could spot them (I presume of function of the equipment and the units Green status). The game still had 15 turns, so if my opponent hadn't been overzealous he would likely have avoided his losses: Green troops would have more time to run away.

If I had to change the scenario, I would give 10 minutes less time, make the victory point calculations fully transparent to both sides, and allow Red force to earn more VP for having a smaller force at scenario end (ie allow Red Force to suffer more casualties before losing VPs), allow Red force to earn more points if they could hold even a single room in the Yard, and maybe make the ATGMs teams "regular" rather than Green.

The other factor I didn't fully appreciate was that the Yard was only worth 100 VP out of the stated 900 on offer - the rest were from casualties. So the Yard was essentially more important in the way it could be used to force Brit losses rather than its intrinsic value.

Things I would try next time:

• shoot and scoot with the BMPs using their missiles to target vehicles, noting that spotting time would be slow and this would still expose them to Scimitars.
• extensively rework the trenches so they had better fields of fire, avoid the forward slope of hills and provide safe places for infantry to recover on the reverse slope.
• put the ATGMs in keyhole positions rather than wide fields of fire, so they were less nervous and had less return fire to be concerned about. 
• build a stronger defensive position on the hill behind the Tool Factory to enfilade British forces attacking into the Yard (a calculated risk that Brits would suffer more casualties that way).

Have you played Sabres at Dawn? What do you think?

I've since played the scenario twice more - once as Syrians and once as Brits iin real time against the AI.  The Syrians earned a Tactical Defeat (I guess that means it was a Brit tactical victory) and lost all their guys again.  As the Blue force, I played with just the Scimitars and its HQ element, and a Javelin team, Blue lost two scimitars and the HQ vehicle, but still earned a Syrian minor defeat at ceasefire. That Blue force playing demonstrated that the Syrian AI can hit and destroy Brit vehicles if they're unsuppressed.

Best

THH