Wild Bill's Rumblings of War AAR Thread

[tabpub]

Well, I couldn't keep up with the AAR's so here are my thumbnails.

Ranville- was German, went with forward defense, Leonard charged all the way(seemed like it, at least), wiped out intial force, and each reinforcement wave died after that. My mortar spotter was so pinned and shaken by his fire that he only got of about 1 round the whole game.

High Cost of RE- was German, thought I was dead in the beginning, but immob'd the Croc and crew bailed. Reverse Slope defense chopped up the Can inf, but my reinforcing tanks and STug's were shot up, one by a 150m Piat shot for example.

Dompaire- was French, Killed the green PzV right off the bat and it went down hill the rest of the way. My Shermans died in the center sunken road, on the left flank, and my M10's on the high ground wouldn't stand and engage, they would smoke and retreat,as everyone else was being waxed. Planes did show, and shot up HT's and maybe one tank.

We Can't Wait- was American, Set up was bad, cuz I put all on the left flank, and reinforcements showed up, resulting in mammoth traffic jam. Got to town all right, but got shot up in the streets. At the end was lucky to hold one flag, as the 3! remaining afv's formed a laager to defend themselves vs the TD's. Plane came, saw and left without firing an apparent shot... :mad:

Sounds in the Night- was German, lost 2 platoons right off the bat trying to infiltrate bocage. Gave up on that attacked down the roads, right flank was quite successful, getting to the rear area before the American Reinforcement. Ambushed same, but the M10 got away(which held me up in the end). Ran out of infantry on the left to press on the rear VL.

Real Guts- was German, chopped up ami infantry, but couldn't hold VL's, lost Tiger to flank hit, Mk's IV's to long range fire.

Crisis at Komm- was American, ground through the town, replused the initial German attack, but couldn't press on with tanks vs Panthers. Got one platoon to Schmidt, taking VL, but rear VL was contested.

It was a grand tourney, and next time(hoffentlich)I will take notes as we go for these AAR's. Go Leonard, show them that Section 3 aren't as bad as our scores appear!

[John Kettler]

For sheer, unrelenting edge-of-your-seat excitement, abject terror and endless tactical nightmares, let me recommend playing the Americans

double blind in "Sounds in the Night." It was so tough I was lucky to emerge from fighting Tom with my scalp, much less hair. Though it was one of my few outright wins in RoW, I was nearly destroyed several times, and his initial blow was so powerful it vaporized an entire platoon, leading me to wonder if I had any chance at all. Repeatedly, he had me on the ropes and in the most dire of straits, and I barely bought enough time to save the big VL at the end. The tension was such that were I a chewer, I would've had no fingers left. The lethality factor in this battle is horrifying and unnerving, with squads and even platoons wiped out in a single turn.

The Americans need several more TRPs, for without them, the mortars are virtually useless. Unless this is a truly instant defense, the mortars should have final defensive concentrations registered across the entire sector. Wish there was a mortar only TRP for this application. Indeed, several of my teams got cut up after I withdrew them, since unlike in real life, they couldn't fight as infantry, only to wind up victims of Tom's flank attack. The American FO was worth his weight in gold, especially when in command. The FO was the glue that held things together through much of the fight. By contrast, the logic controlling the sharpshooter wouldn't let him fire at the short ranges found in this battle. More largely useless points. My AT guns were useless, too, except as something to fret about or for Tom to storm. Lost one that way. Would've killed to have those points in bazooka teams. My armor, sparse though it was, was vital to stemming an infantry attack, inflicting casualties, and paving the way for a counterattack on my right. Though one tank was gun damaged, its twin stopped a breakthrough attempt in my center and destroyed several key pieces of armor when Tom needed them most to finish off my severely depleted force.

The bocage implementation was poor, forcing some bizarre adjustments in the battle, but infantry was king here. The name of the game was controlling existing chokepoints and creating new ones as needed. One block alone had the best part of a platoon strewn around it, as did a house I identified at one point as critical terrain. A third featured an ambushed AFV and more dead Germans. I exacted a fearsome toll, but usually lost the block force, such was Tom's superiority,

close-in firepower and frequently, direct fires from his armor. Once his armor got past my blocks, things started to come unglued in a hurry, an event which regrettably occurred the same time my FO ran dry. I won by inflicting casualties, delay and disruption, NOT by destroying the German force.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Holien]

JK, you have hit the nail on the head with Silent Nacht.

It was truely fearsome and was the game that gave me most nightmares.

As the attacker you had a choice of the fire or the frying pan. Bocage or open ground. Either terrain would mean your forces getting mowed down.

I like many others choose the open ground and ran the gauntlet of choke points. With great luck and some skill I managed to get past these and unwind CDIC's defense line.

He lost the game in part because he failed to understand the use of TRP's. This has now been rectified and in our replay game he found how they could be used to devasting effect.

I guess we all have a primal fear of the dark.

H

[Thomas Norton]

I fought John. He came to the game with a reputation of being very skillful in the use of artillery. I would end up being a witness to this. By the end of this game, of my many infantry dead, over 50% would be the result of his use of artillery.

The German jump off point was directed along the double lane road that runs north, John's right flank, my left. The first three turns was a serious fire fight. I then infiltrated the American positions, marked by the foxholes, noted the dead half squads. We have plenty of time in this one, so I was advancing, double shift (aka leap frog), almost at company strength. These were good troops.

Started taking "strange" casualities. Squads were going to ground or moving strangely. Could not see why. Later, found out the Americans were shooting at sound contacts. You dont see it coming, but your men do. This should have given me a warning that my approach was being observed.

I did not read it for what it was. My good troops were about to be turned into hamburger.

When John's artillery and mortars hit, they were murderious in effect. My first platoon was cut down. I then shifted my approach away from what I now thought was his MLD. To my horror John was able to shift his artillery with

my advance. He either anticapated my responce, or he could observe the move and how was he able to bring down such acc urate fire at night?! It was then that I realized he had to have preregistered the area.

When my mobile force arrived, I advanced upon the other flank, John's left. Even when a penetration was achieved, his use of artillery/mortar support was extremely good.

I only went through one of the hedgegrows, as I had seen in many prior games that a waiting defense, even at night, will wipe your men out without much of an exchange. I believed John would be waiting. But a look at the map does show you that if you avoid the risk of hedgegrow busting, you are going to approach from one of two areas.

General Lee, discussed at length the risk of what he called "consolided attack" (yet he still sent Pickett). A night attack calls for just such risks, as supporting flanks are hard to come by!

When accurate artillery fire can be called down on your consolided approach, you die.

I personally thought the game would be a lot closer than the final result. But that was "points", whatever the hell that is.

In real world, I failed to breakthrough the American defense and got a couple of companies killed in the process.

John was not lucky, or rather he created his own luck. He applied the right stratagy and it paid a big dividend.

Again, a big thank you to Treeburst, Winecape, Will Bill, and all the playtesters, who provided me with the weeks of terror I lived though in this tournament. It was great to survive to the end and claim:

"He tht outlives this day, and comes safe home, will stand a tiptoe when this tournament is named.

And rouse him at the name of Wild Bills Rumblings of War. He that shall live these days, and see old age, will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbors (with great wine) and say I fought in the tournament.

Then he will strip his sleeve and show his scars,

and say "These wounds I had playing Sounds in the Night."

Sorry William.

Get some.

Tom

[CombinedArms]

If you want an example of cold logic and calculated murder, read Leonard Dickens AAR of his game against me in "Sounds in the Night." It's a tough enough scenario as it is for the Axis attacker (which I was), but against him I never had a chance.

[Holien]

Originally posted by CombinedArms:

If you want an example of cold logic and calculated murder, read Leonard Dickens AAR of his game against me in "Sounds in the Night." It's a tough enough scenario as it is for the Axis attacker (which I was), but against him I never had a chance.

If it is any comfort that scenario is a tough one for the attacker if the Allies make good use of the TRP and really work out what is possible for the attacker.

The hedge rows are death for any approach and people will take the open gaps. These if registered with the TRP's mean you have little chance unless you get lucky.

I replayed this with CDIC and I took him to the cleaners when I played the Allies. That is one game I would hate to play again as the Germans as it is a very hard challenge.

I was soooo lucky in my game with CDIC that he did not make effective use of the TRPs and this amongst a few other things lost him the game.

H

[gredeker]

Since we're talking about Sounds in the Night...

I have a great screenshot showing the end-game carnage, but I don't have the know-how to post the file on the forum.

Could someone volunteer to host the pic?

[John Kettler]

Someone was discussing airpower earlier in "We Can't Wait." I found it devastating, but it could've been worse. It could've killed my tanks. Basically, it wiped out most of my light armor reinforcements, whether on the approaches or in the town proper. The numerous strikes hit with artillery already falling and seemed to last forever. Happily for me, I'd had the good sense to debus my troops earlier, so they survived to carry on the fight. My Jagdpanther somehow survived being bomb straddled twice, emerging unhurt and unshocked, though buttoned for a time.

In "Duel in Dompaire" it caught me in the middle of an attack across the wheatfields on the left. As I recall, it ate a couple of 251s and buttoned a Panther at an inopportune point. It wasn't fun, but it was a picnic compared to "We Can't Wait."

Got no shootdowns in either scenario.

Regards,

John Kettler

[wadepm]

I was the Germans in both "We Can't Wait" and Dompaire. I lost a couple of 251's in the town to straffing attacks but I can't understand how the planes were able to hit them. The plane's axis of attack was perpendicular to the street where the tracks were and they were snug up against the side of the building too. In Dompaire I lost a lot of tracks to the planes and had one plane take out a Panther while shocking a second cat and damaging the gun on a third. Ouch!

Greg, email me your pics and I will post them for you.

[wadepm]

Here is that pick from Redeker's game of "Sounds in the Night." I guess it pretty much speaks for itself.

[gredeker]

Wade, thanks for posting the pic.

[CombinedArms]

Originally posted by wadepm:

Here is that pick from Redeker's game of "Sounds in the Night." I guess it pretty much speaks for itself.

Yikes! That looks a lot like my game!

[Thomas Norton]

That had to have been terrible. I wonder how long it took to produce this. Wild Bill at his best/worse.

Get some

Tom

[Kingfish]

Even if those units represented one man that scene would still be horrific. Yet we all know it is far worse. 10 times worse.

[gredeker]

I just came from the "blowing bridges" thread and wondered...

Did anyone think of blowing the bridges in Real Guts as the German player? Could it be done soon enough to have an impact on the game? I'm thinking yes for the wooden bridge, but probably not for the stone one.

Thoughts? Comments?

WBW, was this envisioned as a viable strategy?

[gredeker]

To partially answer my own question, I ran a setup scenario of Real Guts. By giving the PB's and AT gun LOS to the bridges, I was able to drop the stone bridge (targeted by a PB and the AT gun) and get the wooden bridge to ** status (targeted by the other PB) before the American armor appeared. After the armor appeared, the PB tasked with the wooden bridge kept changing targets to a tank that was shooting at it. Funny how the TacAI works that way... The wooden bridge was finally dropped in turn 8, when all tanks still alive were temporarily obscured by smoke and/or trees, once again allowing manual targeting on such a mundane object as a bridge.

So in terms of "is this a viable strategy" I think the answer is leaning strongly toward yes. If this is not intended, than I think a disclaimer in the briefing admonishing German players not to drop the bridges is probably in order.

[Holien]

I had not thought of doing that and if I had I would not have done as I think it is a design issue unless told otherwise.

However, to be told takes away the free thought of players and now it has been discussed a lot of players will now be looking at opportunities to drop bridges.

The cat is now out of the bag and I am sure it will cause havoc in some peoples games.

H

[The_Capt]

Greg,

I think for a tourney it would be unsportsman like and would have to go to the designer for judgement.

CM lacks any rapid bridging resources and would force the Allies to fight an infantry battle.

But then again if all the Axis thought of it the score balancing would reflect that..hmm tough call.

[Kingfish]

Originally posted by redeker:

By giving the PB's and AT gun LOS to the bridges, I was able to drop the stone bridge (targeted by a PB and the AT gun) and get the wooden bridge to ** status (targeted by the other PB) before the American armor appeared...

So in terms of "is this a viable strategy" I think the answer is leaning strongly toward yes.

While this might be a viable strategy, it is also a very big gamble for the German player. As you've stated, both PBs and the Pak40 were concentrating on the bridge. Meanwhile the Americans have a battalion of infantry already across the bridge, and your own forces are much too weak to stand up to that flood.

In fact, if I were the American player, and saw you targetting the bridge on turn one, I would:

a) Smoke one of the PBs, preferably the one targetting the stone bridge.

Target the now unmasked Pak40 with my 60mm mortars

c) Blitz the German line with my infantry. The bunkers, mines and German infantry will get their share, but they won't have the help of those 3 75mm guns.

[gredeker]

I think I need to clarify what I was thinking...

I'm agreed that anyone who drops bridges in this scenario fully deserves the title of "gamey bastard". I was just wondering out loud whether it was even possible, and if it is something that WBW even considered.

My totally unscientific one run-through test indicates that it may be possible to drop at least one of the bridges before the American armor appears. In my test playing against the AI (which was given +50% forces) the AT gun died on turn 3, and both PB's were dead by turn 10, so that's certainly a tradeoff. It also broadcasts exactly where all your AT assets are on turn one. Whether or not this is a workable strategy (aside from the gameyness of it) is still up for debate, but, if one were playing a "no-holds-barred" game, I'm thinking that it could possibly be worth it.

That's all I'm saying.

P.S. I wouldn't do this in a tourney, but I would like to know if WBW considered the possibility of a creative player taking that route.

[gredeker]

Well, the tourney is over and Wreck has been crowned the king.

I had the "honor" of playing him in Der Berg, a rainy hill climb for the Americans against a mess of Gebirgsjaeger (sp?).

My Americans have four Shermans to start with, then get four more Shermans later on, in support of a battalion of infantry (some of which comes in as reinforcements). I had two arty spotters, but they were only 75 and 81mm.

To make a long story short, I was bold when I should have been cautious, and cautious when I should have been bold. On the very first turn, Wreck ATTACKED - as the scenario defender. By turn 3 or 4, he had overrun and killed an AT gun, a .50, a platoon HQ, and my 75mm spotter. I found myself on the defensive on my right flank, at least until my armor could be brought up. On the other flank, I was probing in force through the tall pines, when over the course of two turns I lost two entire platoons in close-quarters fighting. This set a pattern early in the game, where if I attacked into the woods without armored support present, my guys always died. I was scenario attacker, yet I was always reacting to his moves. I was also too cautious regarding bogging my tanks, and kept my armor limited to the road for too long.

Later in the game, as I'm slowly grinding forward with my remaining tanks (two bogged, one destroyed by a direct 120mm mortar hit, and one roasted by a flamethrower ) and infantry, I'm finally making some progress, but it's too little, too late. I send two unsupported tanks on a totally gamey flag rush to the top of the hill - somehow they survive the PF shots and sit on the flag. Wreck moves infantry that still has PFs back to take them out, and does take out one of my Shermans, but the other one is still alive when the clock runs out (which was 40 turns, BTW). Both flags remained under contention at scenario end.

Final score was 56-34, Axis win. Details are below:

Allied Attacker (Redeker)

436 casualties (92 KIA)

2 mortars destroyed

1 gun destroyed

3 vehicles knocked out

Men OK: 184

Score: 34

Axis Defender (Wreck)

262 casualties (80 KIA)

2 captured

2 mortars destroyed

2 guns destroyed

Men OK: 92

Score: 56

Wreck is an incredible technician, and seemed to know how to play the game to the fullest, e.g. exactly how far to run into the woods so that the enemy loses LOS, incredible fire discipline, etc. He also analyzed the terrain well, choosing good sites for his two Inf guns and placing units near chokepoints and other key areas.

In summary, my early game experience getting smacked around put me into shock; I didn't really recover until turn 32 or so, when I finally started making some good combined arms advances on my left, then did the hail mary with the tanks on the right. This was enough to keep both flags under contention, but by then the lopsided kill ratio had decided the game.

If anyone wants the end game file, e-mail me and I'll send it to you.

[ May 01, 2002, 02:01 AM: Message edited by: redeker ]

[Holien]

Hi Chaps,

FYI.

Here is a brief summary of the games played in the finals.

The game with Wreck was a short and evenly matched affair. I had the task of defending two buildings one stone and one wood at an exit to a beach.

I made the decision to try and defend the stone building and create some fox holes. The fox holes were perhaps a mistake as the start position of the Attackers was closer than expected and my units did not have time to re-combine.

The units that I did have were low quality and with a poor leader failed to dent his initial attack. My wooden bunker was taken by a long range Zooka shot and I soon lost control of both VL's.

My reserves managed to wrest control back of the stone VL and were in striking range of the wooden building. However, the Stone VL had a couple of lone Yanks within the zone to contest the flag, while my unit near the wooden building was not close enough.

I considered a gamey rush but rejected it on the basis of how the tourney had been set up. The premise behind it was "anti gamey" actions.

The score has been posted elsewhere and I do not have it to hand at the moment. I will edit this later.

The game with Redeker was "Flag Rush Hill". This was basically a joust between two armoured forces for a massive hill in the middle.

The map offered plenty of opportunities and apart from the hill in the middle was a great map to play on. The intial stages of the game I managed to infiltrate the hill mostly unobserved by Redecker.

I had three platoons covering the hill and controlling the VLS right upto the last few turns.

The middle game saw me trying to ensure that Redeker could not rush it in the last few turns. During this time I lost three TD's to one arty shell, three tanks to one MKIV. An arty spotter to a random shell and several 1/2 tracks.

I then tried to rush his flanks and the luck was again not with me. All this was to no avail as the flags were rushed at the end and contested.

I had however lost more armour in my attempts to prevent this and hence the game. Bad luck, poor judgement and good play by Redeker had stopped me here.

The final game with Warren was a close fought game in which Warren was more worried about my arty than he should have been.

He gave up too much land too quickly and allowed me to bring my tanks into play. His flammers died running and his guns were revealed too quickly.

His 120mm Morts were effective but I was lucky that he had only a limited load of shells.

At times he would have done well to have done what Wreck did and launch an attack. My men had been mauled badly at stages and would not have faired well if they had been attacked at certain points.

I worked on the principal of trying to engage his troops at distance as close up I would have been mauled (and was).

His lynch pin to his final defence was a cluster of troops protecting a bend in the road before the final run up the mountain. this was cracked by me getting the 81mm spotter in close enough to call down accurate fire on that spot of woods.

If he had counter attacked as I was working on this plan I would have had a hard time. Removing this choke point allowed me to get the Shermans behind him. His forces only broke down when they had Shermans in their rear.

The success of the game was in correct use of combined arms. Arty, Inf and tanks working well together.

Anyway this is just my take on the games played.

H

[Wreck]

Regarding the Berg, I had not really meant to attack right off the bat. Actually, I was just trying to move up to better fighting positions. The Germans are limited in setup with half their units to setting up way back in the rear. This is apparently the scenario designer's way to try to force the defender to fight in stages. Well, this is CM, and WWII tactics don't always apply. So I put my "reserves" out on either flank, where they could charge forward to positions that seemed like the Americans might come through them.

(A side note: I hate it when the scenario designer tries to micromanage my setup! Hey, *I'm* the player here buddy!)

Little did I know, that the American setup was actually very close to mine, especially on my left. So my guys almost immediately had contact. Greg had put important support elements out on that flank. It is hard to call this a mistake, though, because I probably would not have attacked if I had known where his setup was. In any case, I quickly figured what was up and overran them. By that time I could tell the flank was weak, and so I kept going.

I figured this would deter him from pushing that flank too hard, which it apparently did. I don't think he could have easily maneuvered more force over there in any case; it was not his main attack route.

His main route had to be the center, if only because that was where the road went. We both knew that the road was vital if he was going to be able to use most of his tanks; the ground was damp or wet and therefore using tanks offroad was going to be dicey. (I saw a lot of bogging going on, but only two immobilizations resulted, even though he was offroad a lot of the time on my right.) But the center was the easiest to defend, because I had been allowed to set up there. I had foxholes, and a secondary line, all of them on the reverse slope (effectively). The mountain is so steep that the military crest was halfway down the mountain, mostly, in open ground. This suited me fine. His attempts to crack the center did work, finally, but only after he brought up the tanks close enough to force me back. (This gave me several half decent faust attempts at about 50m, but unfortunately none of them worked.)

On my right, very early I could see his guys moving forward across open gaps so I knew how many were in the woods in the valley. And I knew my troops would beat his, in close, if they could get anywhere near even numbers. So I went for it. That was a nice slaughter; two of my platoons killed two of his losing about one of mine in men (but not in MG42s). I was feeling good about it until an entire company charged down in hot pursuit. Naturally I ran like hell with my survivors. They escaped cleanly, and were enough to prevent the company from being able to advance quickly. He brought over some tanks, though, and gradually pushed me back.

By the midgame he had taken enough control of the center that he could get tanks past the roadblock. And I had very little back there to hold him back from charging up the road; however, he did not know that. In the end he went for it anyway, and I could not stop his two tanks from running around to sit near the big flags. (I did have one faust shot at the first tank, which missed at ~20m.) Then I had squads coming in from all directions in the last two turns to try to kill his tanks; I sneaked carefully up so as to see them at reasonable distances in the last turn... and... only a couple men fired their fausts! One tank was killed, but the other survived to neutralize the flag. Grumble, grumble.

Anyway, a good, hard fought battle.

[Wreck]

The Ranger Challenge I have not much to say not already said. With only 12 turns and no reinforcements, the American's strategy is pretty clear: go fast and immediately. I did that, and it pretty much worked, enough to win the scenario anyway.

Flag Rush Hill was actually a very cool scenario IMO, but there were nuances that had to be grasped to get the most out of each side. In particular the German has to know to use his arty on the Hellcats, or he is gonna be hurt by them. Warren did not do this, and he was indeed hurt badly by my 'cats.

But there was also the matter of overall strategy. As a battle hardened tournamenthouse.com vet, I know how to do "fair" meeting engagements. One of the keys is to take terrain ASAP when it is cheap. I came out of the blocks charging, moving up most of my men via tank or 'track via covered routes, then running forward. Warren did not come out charging at all, so by about turn 3 I had secured half the map as mine, with a quarter or so his and the other quarter in between. This gave me much more maneuver room, which is very important in tank battles. The more area you have to move around safely in, the more hulldown, wooded, flanking and/or keyhole lines of sight you can construct against given enemy locations. And those things are what you must do to fight each tank battle unfairly.

The key battle came early, on the left, where both of us had set up our main strength. One of my platoons had run into one of his in a woods in a depression. I had one other platoon in range, but it would have to charge over open to get there. And only he could see the area with his tanks. So I could either retreat my platoon with losses, or commit full bore but take the tank fire. I committed, suspecting that the infantry fight would draw out his tanks. It did, and I was ready for it with my tanks. This resulted in several two or three on one tank battles, most of which I won. One of his Panthers had something like 6 shots bounce off the front before finally getting whacked. Gotta admire the hull on those babies.

I ended up losing a platoon more or less, but he lost his platoon also. And he lost a MkIV or two and three Panthers, while I lost a Hellcat or maybe two. After that it was a matter of pushing the advantage.

There are many tricks in the armor-armor book, and I swear I used every one of them in this battle. Perhaps I will write up an illustrated armor how-to some day (I have most of the turns saved).

[ May 01, 2002, 11:41 AM: Message edited by: Wreck ]

[Bil Hardenberger]

Originally posted by Wreck:

(A side note: I hate it when the scenario designer tries to micromanage my setup! Hey, *I'm* the player here buddy!)

When I designed Der Berg it was to be a primer for mountain warfare tactics. For this to work I had to enforce some strict setup zones for the German player. My attempt atmaking the player act doctrinally. These were relaxed some by Treeburst when he adjusted the scenario for the ROW tournament. If these had been eliminated, the German player would easily win the scenario IMO.

Bil