Henri Posted July 22, 2000 Share Posted July 22, 2000 The following contains a LOT of spoilers, but if you`re like me, you don`t give a damm and you`re going to read it anyway. Great scenario . I played as the Germans. My forces were deployed in column on the two roads on the East and West sides of the map. The rightmost column consisted of five halftracks loaded with a Panzergrenadier platoon. The other column was a mix of two Pumas, a Hetzer, a Panther, a halftrack and a platoon of foot infantry. the column was headed by a Puma followed by the Panther, and was bolstered by two MGs and an 81 mm mortar. About 1/2 km behind them was a column containing some Fallschrimjager infantry mounted on a halftrack and on two StuH42s, along with some foot infantry. The town to the North was hidden by three big hills; the western road went straightN towards a big hill, then swerved right and headed towards the town between the two big hills.The Eastern road headed NW, passed to the South of the rightmost hill, then turned right and passed between the two hills as it headed into town. My plan was to use the first Puma as a recon to spot the enemy resistance by going fast up and back down the road, its speed hopefully making him difficult to hit . In the meantime, the rest of the column would follow slowly behind while the platoon of foot infantry headed for the central hill. This column could either blast away at any enemies on the leftmost hill or support an assault by my infantry on the central hill. On the right, my halftracks would advance but disembark their infantry before the bend in the road so that the infantry could go after the rightmost Hill. If I could take both the central hill and the rightmost one, I would have a clear view into town. But I had not paid any attention to the fact that there was no objective in the town, the objective being to take the three hills . A light snow fell in the quiet afternoon as the Puma led by green Unt. Kubler revved his engine and lurched forward towards the bend in the road to the North, and the foot infantry to his right marched towards the central hill through the wooded terrain. He spun around the bend and saw the town in front of him, but no enemies; "no enemies visible", he radioed back as he ordered the driver to quickly turn around and raced back around the corner. Just then, an explosion split the silence and earth flew into Kubler`s face from an explosion a few meters away. The Puma lurched, and the green Kubler thought that the vehicle had been hit. "We`re hit! Abandon vehicle...", he yelled, and the crew piled out even before the Puma came to a stop. Unt. Claus in the Panther G following behind couldn`t believe his eyes: "Stinking cowards!`, he yelled, "no wonder we`re losing the war!" Grizzled regular Lt German, commander of the foot platoon headed towards the central hill, heard the explosion and saw a flash of light from the top of the leftmost hill; he quickly made arm signals to the vehicles on the road and yelled to Obg. Purps and his MG42 squad to veer left and to put the top of the hill under fire to suppress the mortar that he suspected. Behind him on the road, the 81 mm mortar crew debarked from their haltrack to participate in the fight. I ordered Unt. Streich, commander of the second Puma and experienced regular soldier, to repeat the recon attempt of the first Puma, since the offending mortar was now being suppressed by machinegun and mortar fire, as well as by the tanks on the road. He gunned the Puma which leapt forward and screeched around the bend, where Strech felt his eyes bugging out as he spotted two Shermans directly on the road ahead of him and what looked like an AT gun behind a stone wall at the edge of town. "T...TT...TURN AROUND!...", he yelled at the driver. He composed himself and realized that if he could turn around and head around the bend fast enough, the surprised Americans might not have time to react. The gears ground and the engine whined as the Puma quickly turned around and Streich watched the cannon of the nearest Sherman traverse in slow motion in his direction. "We`re going to make it", he thought, as he mentally calculated the time it wuld take for the tank to line up his Puma before it reached the bend. But he had forgotten the second Sherman, which already had its cannon in his direction, and which put a hole in the Puma with the first shot from its 75 mm medium velocity cannon. Streich and his Puma crew jumped out of the disabled vehicle and ran for cover as they were raked by machinegun fire from the nearby Americans. While Unt. Grosspietch in the Hetzer used his few HE rounds to suppress whatever was on the hill, Unt. Claus in the Panther G hunted forward up the road, peering at the top of the hill through the light snow and trying to get a vew of the US tanks around the bend. Suddenly he saw it: "A Sherman! On the hill ahead!", he shouted to the gunner. "Traverse up, fire, fire!..." The gunner raised the gun just a bit and fired. The 76 mm high velocity shell hit the Sherman on top of the hill dead on, there was no explosion, but the Sherman`s crew piled out. Jawohl! so much for the leftmost hill, he thought optimistically... Unt. Kubler, near his abandoned Puma and with a perfect view of the town from his location at the bend in the raod, saw the two US tanks move into the woods towards the central hill and reported it with hand signals. Oh boy, in this soft ground and in wqooded terrain, there is a strong possibility that at least one if not both of those tanks will bog down before they get very far, I thought (I was wrong), as I made a mental note to remember their locations. In the meantiome, the halftracks on the other road far to the right had reached their phase lines and had debarked their infantry, who were now headed through the woods towards the Eastern hill. No enemies had been spotted here, so I ordered one halftrack to reconnoiter up the road, hoping that it would have better luck than the Pumas. My main problem at this time was that most of my infantry on the left flank were far behind my tanks, which could be dangerous if I met some AT guns. My best bet at this point was to lead with the Hetzer while my infantry in the center finished climbing to the top of the central hill. I ordered the 81 mm mortar observer Lt Hens to bring down a few mortar rounds in the vicinity of the stone wall where I thought the AT gun was, while the Panther let the Hetzer pass it and the other tanks in the column caught up. As the Hetzer approached the bend in the road,it caught sight of the AT gun behind the stone wall and opend fire on it; the gun returned the favor, but both missed -that mortar had better start droppin shells soon... Green Unt. Hunstedt`s StuH42 shelled the leftmost hill as he passed the Panther, in case some infantry was still on the hill. To the right, Lt. Neumann`s infantry headed towards the hill in a dispersed formation, while his Panzerschreck crossed the road at the bend and headed for some woods at the base of the central hill. Just as they got across the road, one of the Shermans appeared behind the central hill. The halftrack had just rounded the bend, and he spotted the Sherman as well as another one coming out from behind some houses in the town. He continued forward, then decided that it was enough, and he turned around. Once more, he succeeded in surprising the closest Sherman, but the one coming from behind the houses killed him just as he had finished turning around . The other halftracks quickly backed out of sight down the road. I ordered Neumann`s infantry to hide, as well as the panzerschreck, except for the infantry squad on the right flank, which had no chance of being spotted by the tanks. I was hoping that the tanks would come down the road where the Pzschreck could bushwack them, but instead they headed back towards the AT gun, who was exchanging fire with Grosspietch`s Hetzer. I ordered Claus to move his Panther off the road and head for the AT gun. The two Shermans reappeared and moved left by the AT gun as Claus tried desperately to get a bead, while the AT gun, which I guessed to be a 37 mm or a 50 mm, clanged two shells off his tank. The leading StuH42 had continued to shell the top of the Western mountain as he moved forward to the Hetzer, and he soon forced an infantry unit on the hill next to the flag to get up and run for cover. The Panther locked onto one of the Shermans while the Hetzer continued to shell the AT gun; Claus sent a high-velocity shell through the side of the Sherman with the first shot, and a few secnods later, the Hetzer destroyed the AT gun. YAA-WOHLLL!... The second Sherman turned back behind the central mountain while five tanks and a couple of halftracks turned their full attention to the infantry on the left hill, who were also being targeted by German`s squad on the central hill. A machinegun near the destroyed tank began to stutter at the infantry that had just dismounted fromthe StuH42s and other nearby vehicles, worried by the shells from the AT gun that had been bouncing off the Hetzer and the Panther. As the Sherman appeared back to the infantry East of the central hill, I ordered them to hit the dirt once more, while I got the halftracks off the road and sent them North between the trees to support a later infantry offensive there. The green Panzerschreck on the side of the central hill got the buttoned Sherman in his sights, but as he stood to fire, he was fired upon by four or five infantry units West of the town; he panicked and fired, but missed the tank by about ten meters . Then, out of command of his HQ, he routed and ran like hell towards the West, as bullets threw up the dirt all around him. The Sherman turned around and headed West again, where my tanks and infantry were shooting everything they had at the infantry that had appeared, which included a machinegun. I shifted the mortar fire to the machinegun, and ordered the Hetzer to hunt forward while the Panther covered him and the StuH42 pulled up behind and the other StuH42 fired shells at the survivors on top of the left hill. The Sherman appeared 300 m in front of the Hetzer, who rammed a shot from his 75 mm gun through the side armor of the Sherman, who exploded in a ball of flame. Now there appeared to be no tanks left on the US side. I ordered my tanks on the West road to move gingerly towards the town. A number of unidentified US units were visible on or near the West hill, and it became apparent that my expectation that the main enemy defence would be in the town was wrong: the main US infantry force was around the West hill -or so I thought... Lt. Hacker`s platoon advanced in the forested terrain East of the right road, without any opposition from the hill in front of them, but they were caught in some crossfire from the western hill area, from where US units were moving to the center. My tanks and mortars on the left, as well as German`s infantry in the center fired everything they had as more and more enemies appeared near the Western hill. Hacker and German now controlled the central hill, and I realized that I had made a mistake by orienting Lt. Heubaum`s rearmost platoon towards the center, since it became clear that the big fight would be for the Western hill, and I had no infantry West of the left road . So I ordered Heubaum to move to the left and to cross the road towards the wooded terrain from where they could approach the hill. I hoped that my tanks and halftracks and the infantry in the center could suppress the enemy enough to allow Heubaum and his men to cross the wide clear terrain safely. A few US units near where the AT gun had been were identified as possible bazooka units; so I shifted the mortar fire to the area, where an enemy MG was also spraying my infantry on the hill with lead. Mortar shells exploded all around, but it was difficult to see what damage if any was being caused. Then a US bazooka stood up and fired two rockets in a row at my Panther from about 300 m away, fortunately missing both times while machinegun bullets peppered the ground around him and mortar rounds threw up geysers of dirt; HE round from the Panther finally forced him to get down . The Hetzer, out of HE ammo and with no enemy armor in sight, decided to throw some smoke in the center . To my great relief, Lt. Heubaum and his men made it across the road safely and were now in a position to advance to the Western hill through covered terrain. As one of my StuH42 tanks advanced, a US bazooka took two potshots at it and missed both times, again probably because it was disturbed by the hail of lead from my tanks, halftracks, mortar and infantry all around it. I was running low on mortar rounds, but the concentration of US infantry, MG, mortar and bazooka near the destroyed AT gun was too good to miss. The ground erupted in showers of dirt and smoke, and the US units there were pounded into the dust. Some were seen running for the rear, while others hit the dirt. On the other side, I now controlled the Eastern hill, and the infantry there was blasting away at the US soldiers in the center and in the town, supported by the halftracks, one of whom was on the side of the hill while the other two were on or near the road advancing on the town and raking the US troops in the center with machineguns. As the halftracks advanced, the one on the road saw what appeared to be a couple of infantry units on the road in the town; the halftrack suddenly exploded into flames , which indicated that one of them was a bazooka team. But it was almost 400 m away, which seems a bit far, so maybe the halftrack was hit by a mortar round... Some of my units were running low on ammo, but I had the impression that a determined push up the Western hill would give me control of all three objectives . But now I noticed that the US were preparing to contest the Eastern hill with at least one platoon from the town. I ordered one halftrack and one squad to the top of the hill while the remaining halftrack on the road exchanged fire with the enemies in the town. Suddenly the crew of that halftrack on the road abandoned it and ran for cover, due to some unclear reason. Now I had only one halftrack and one low-on-ammo MG to hold the right hill with Neumann`s platoon . As the halftrack climbed up the hill, the squad on the hill was fired upon and had to hit the dirt; when the halftrack arrived to the top, it began to plug away at the enemy infantry, and one of them seemed to break and run. But now mortar rounds began to fall, and one of them hit the halftrack; at the same time, the squad decided that it had enough and routed from its positon, leaving the top of the hill undefended, and now I had only two out-of position squads and a MG with low ammo to hold off the attackers . I decided to take a chance on bringing some armor in support. I ordered one StuH42 up the side of the central hill from where I hoped it could support the Eastern hill, and shifted some of German`s infantry on top of the central hill to the right. Two American squads decided to make a run for the Eastern hill across the open terrain to the NW of the hill, but they were spotted by one of German`s squad on the central hill, who made them eat a bit of lead, causing them to have second thoughts. It now became clear that the town contained a whole company of US infantry, and they were intent on taking back the Eastern hill, occupied by the two remaining squads of Neumann . The squad that replaced the routed one was veteran, and to my relief, despite being fired upon by four infantry and some near-hits by a mortar, they held their ground. But now one of my StuH42s had maneuvered to the North flank of the central hill and began to fire on the americans trying to reach the hill through the clear terrain. At least four US infantry units headed for the hill before they were dissuaded by the heavy fire.I maneuvered the Panther to a point just above the StuH42 on the North flank of the central hill, from where it could support the Eastern hill. in the meantime, Heubaum`s platoon took the Western hill without taking any casualties, thanks to support from the center and the heavy tree cover . A remaining US infantry platoon on top of the hill was overrun by Heubaum`s three squads and annihilated when they made the mistake of running away instead of surrendering. Now I had two tanks on the central hill as well as Hacker`s platoon, all of which had an unobstructed view of the clear terrain where the US company was attempting to assault the Eastern hill. Neumann`s veterans held the hill despite being hit with everything the Americans could throw at them while Hacker`s men and the tanks blasted away at their tormentors. The game ended with a German Major victory , the Germans having taken 24 casualties to the americans`91. I was fortunate in being able to get rid of all the US armor early in the game without losing any of my armor. This scenario shows the importance of holding the high ground, because I could not have held the Eastern hill with a single platoon against a whole company of enemy infantry without support from the central hill, which also played a major role in suppressing the US infantry on the Western hill and in the town. Henri Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Heinz 25th PzReg Posted July 22, 2000 Share Posted July 22, 2000 Hi there Henri Great AAR!! Why dont you take some screenshots of your battles, and send me the AAR. I will then put it up on my new CM AAR page. I am sure your AAR`s will be even more entertaining if we could see some screenshots of the action. Head over to my page and check out the new instructions: http://home.online.no/~andhess/cm/ Regards, Heinz ------------------ "To subdue your enemy without fighting is the supreme excellence." - Sun Tzu, The Art of War Visit my AAR site: http://home.online.no/~andhess/cm/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wild Bill Wilder Posted July 22, 2000 Share Posted July 22, 2000 Thank Henri! I appreciate the kind words about this scenario. Its still one of my favorites! Very, very nice AAR! I felt like I was reading an actual battle. You're quite the writer! ------------------ Wild Bill Lead Tester/Designer Combat Mission-Beyond Overlord billw@matrixgames.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Henri Posted July 22, 2000 Author Share Posted July 22, 2000 <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Wild Bill Wilder: Thank Henri! Very, very nice AAR! I felt like I was reading an actual battle. You're quite the writer!<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Thanks , I have almost as much fun writing them up as playing them; contrary to my usual habit, I wrote this one as I played it, so except for a few additions, when I wrote one part, I didn`t know what was going to happen next. Maybe some day I`ll write one up as a short story;it might be fun to write one up in the Tom Clancy style ("...the Tiger I traversed its turret left at a steady 5 degrees per second, and shot an 88 mm shell at a velocity 695 meters per second, which dropped at a rate of 32 feet per second each second, and struck the 100mm-thick and 20-degree sloped armor of the Sherman..." -but that is a bit like work :eek . Or maybe like a John Wayne movie: `...Major John Wayne motioned to Captain Woody Allen to come over, as he stood among the whistling bullets and crashing mortar shrapnel: "C`mere, Woody...look, I suspect that there are Germans in this area", he drawled, "but we better beat the crap outta them, cause we don`t have the chance to fight outnumbered too often!" Woody gulped:"Major, maybe we could wait for reinforcements -and I saw some young juicy little girls in the town...". Major Wayne`s eyes became slits and his mouth tightened:"C`mon, how are we going to make popular american war movies if we always fight with artillery and bombers? You can play with little girls in the next town. All right, let`s go!", Wayne yelled, as he led the way into the battle. Your scenarios are really great fun to play. Henri [This message has been edited by Henri (edited 07-22-2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Henri Posted July 23, 2000 Author Share Posted July 23, 2000 <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Heinz 25th PzReg: Why dont you take some screenshots of your battles, and send me the AAR. I will then put it up on my new CM AAR page. I am sure your AAR`s will be even more entertaining if we could see some screenshots of the action. Head over to my page and check out the new instructions:<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I`ll see if I can salvage some screenshots. Henri Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Von Brizee Posted July 23, 2000 Share Posted July 23, 2000 I got my ass handed to me the first time I played that as the Germans. My stupid Panther spun around instead of going reverse and that kind of ended it for him. And then the US Tank Destroyer appeared on the hill and not one of my vehicles turned to fire at it and he got side shots on all of them in a minute. My platoon of PanzerGren to the right side just went move fast in their halftracks and I busted into the Americna rear somehow, only losing one halftrack on the wya over. I poured my men out into the town and they put up a really good fight until it was all over for them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Henri Posted July 23, 2000 Author Share Posted July 23, 2000 <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Von Brizee: I got my ass handed to me the first time I played that as the Germans.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> I may have been a bit lucky in getting all the US tanks without losing any of my own, especially when the AT gun bounced three shells in a row off my Hetzer (or was it the Panther?). I think that getting control of the central hill is the key to this scenario; if I had not been able to shift my forces on top of that hill to support the rightmost hill just in time, I am afraid that I could not have held it . I may have been a bit lucky with my mortar too , although FOW prevented me from seeing exactly how much damage I was doing to the enemy. I also think that the US deploymentfor this battle was far from optimum, but of course they were in the process of leaving, so...If I were playing the US, I would hide a tank and some infantry just behind the central hill, making sure that they are well supported from the flanks. Henri Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Highlander Posted July 24, 2000 Share Posted July 24, 2000 I PBEMed this scenario vs a friend double-blind. I was the Germans. My plan was to use the two platoons on the left to envelop the center hill, with the Pumas, Panther, and Hetzer in support, and use the right flank platoon reinforced by the Stugs and their accompanying engineers to take the right flank hill. After securing the center hill, I could advance on the left flank hill if the situation permitted. I had my Puma's scouting the left road, and lost both to the TD and Shermans. My lead platoon on the left moved up the center and around to the right to assult the center hill from the right side. My follow on platoon moved across the left road and moved through the woods along and up to the left hand side of the center hill. My armour traded shots with a MG on the left hill, and I got my Panther up to where the road turned to head towards town, and took out the M10. On the right side I moved the full platoon to assult the eastern (rightmost) hill from the right side, and the engineer platoon (2 squads) towards the hill from straight on S-N line. My Stugs provided some support, but I got careless with them, and moved them up the road to where they could see the town, and the Shermans took both of them out. On the center hill I charged my lead platoon up the hill and sheltered in the trees on the S side of the hill. I was suprised to find no defenses there. However about 1 minute later, an artillery barrage came down and killed aprox 20 men in one minute. One partial squad remanent with the 1 survivor of the platoon HQ crawled up on top of the hill and sheltered in a crater. The other partial surviving squad broke and fled the other direction. My follow up platoon advanced and positioned itself on the left side of the center hill, and started coming under fire from infantry to the North of the road and on the left hill. Suddenly, a full platoon or more of infantry charged across the road at the center hill, and overran the remants of my lead platoon. My platoon deployed on the left side of the hill got into a firefight with them, but they had support from another platoon on the left hill and I was getting the tougher end of the deal, as the Shermans were also providing fire support from the town. Over on the right, my two pronged attack came off almost perfectly, though he was aware of it, he wasn't prepared for how swift it was, and I was able to catch his platoon guarding the hill spread out, and wiped them out with light casulties on my part. I attempted to reorganize my troops and move some of the down the hill into town, but mg and tank fire pinned them down before they started the moves. In the center what was left of my follow up platoon was able to clear some of the counterattacking troops of the center hill but not all. During the last two turns, I moved both the Hetzer and Panther up to the bend in the road to engage the Shermans, and on the last turn they took both Shermans out. Final score was something like 45 to 42 a draw. I held the right hill, he held the left, and the center hill was still in contention. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lloyd Heilbrunn Posted July 26, 2000 Share Posted July 26, 2000 I played this one the last two days as the US vs the AI.Had a great time climbing the hill on the left with a mortar team while sneaking two bazooka teams thru the woods on the right to overlook the righthand road.One HMG and Sherman had no trouble covering the left hand road, luckily only halftracks and armored cars came that way and none survived more than mere yards around the bend.The AT took out a Armored car and SP(?)Gun before biting the bullet.The sneaking paid off as the Bazookas got both the Panther and a Puma!! The tired guy with the Mortar chipped in with some vehicle too far away to ID. My only other major loss besides the AT was the other Mortar team who was also in the woods on the right. Once the Puma and Panther died I brought out the TD and other Sherman to mop up. 9 Vehicles destroyed, and a 75%-24% Allied Victory Great fun scenario.......Thanks Wild Bill!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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