Panzer Grenadier Battles on March 28th:
Spearhead Division #15 - Dillenberg
Divided, get Conquered ...
Author Poor Yorek
Method Solo
Victor Germany
Play Date 2012-08-31
Language English
Scenario WiSo019

This is still a work in progress, but it's looking good for the Germans (I'll finish this tomorrow). After three turns (and now night is lifting), Germany has killed four US steps with two others in an assault.

US set-up was perhaps not so great, although initially looked good. Das Reich must advance northwards across hilly, wooded terrain with a single road. US sets up 2xINF just north of the road junction on the southern board; sets an HMF+INF in two adjacent hexes (1208/1209) guarding the road on the southern 20m hill line of board 10. Mortars and two other INF in Tri le Chesling. Lastly, an INF+57mm dug-in to either flank, each 4 or 5 hexes E/W of the road.

At first, plan looked great: for two turns the first road block held tough against massive DF (note: -1 col shifts for: night; lt woods; hill; dug-in to compensate for the +2 adjacent bonus). With some concern, an assault went in using the Stugs + 2xGren ... surviving the US First Fire, the Germans "did their thing" with a combined arms assault (rolled '6').

2xGren groups also went after the US flank groups and have tied up those units.

As other SS units advance to the board edge, the two US HMG+INF groups decide that fighting it out in the town may be the better part of valor.

To be continued/ended tomorrow ... but wondering whether I might should have held the US force in a single grouping (or at most two). It seems that whilst the "road block" scheme might appear to slow down an advance, experience seems to suggest that, on average, division of force this way seldom seems to prevail (outside of the vagaries of die rolling).

So, after some unpleasantness ...

Turns 6-8 are mostly consolidation and Germans attempting recoveries from effective US artillery strikes.

The approach and assault on Tri le Chesling begins in earnest on Turn 9. The 2nd SS splits up to attempt an approach from the West (taking advantage of lt woods and hills) and also from the east to avoid the US being able to focus +1 combat modifiers on a single axis.

At turn 9: step losses => Germany = 1 US = 9 (but Germans had suffered a serious amount of morale failure which broke up the attack rather nicely).

At turn 12: step losses => Germany = 8 US = 15

At turn 14: step losses => Germany = 10 US = 17 Two hexes of Tri le Chesling were contested in assaults; one hex controlled by the US with a DIS-INF(R); rest controlled by Das Reich.

Thus, a minor German victory achieving "Eliminate at least six American steps whilst losing fewer German steps than US."

Game note: surprised by the 8/6 US morale as 82nd Airborne is usually depicted as 8/8. Perhaps as explained in the scenario notes, this is due to fatigue post march.

4 Comments
2012-09-01 07:21

How about finishing the game before posting a win/loss and AAR :-(

2012-09-01 09:28

How about refraining from snarky comments?

FWIW, I got to a certain point in the game late and wanted to write down my thoughts on the action whilst fresh in my mind. If the US pulls out a victory, I'll delete the original play and change it using the Modify Existing Play. I am sorry that this appears to bother you.

That being said, however, surely a better approach would have been to PM me on the Boards or have Shad send me an email, to wit: "Poor, for the sake of consistency, we'd prefer that AARs wait until the scenario is completed."

If we open the door to commenting on each others AAR's in public you might find yourself "called out" for AARs for which you seem not to understand the set-up instructions c.f. WiSo001 where your AAR states "The setup has the Americans in the town on board 24" in clear contravention of the set-up instructions which has the Americans begin on board 25. I don't think we really want to start down this road.

2012-09-01 10:08

I find it a bad precedent to post win/losses before the game is finished. This opens the door for others to post, started turn 1, but will finish someday down the road. I am sorry you think this is snarky, but I find posting before the game is complete worse.

(edited 2012-09-01 13:27)

As I stated, the scenario is now done and the AAR completed.

Camp, I don't mind your suggesting this is a bad precedent - perhaps it is. That was my forth scenario of the day, and I simply thought to write down what had happened up to that point. I wasn't thinking about precedent.

My issue with you is how you approached the matter: both that you raised the question publicly and with such a tone in the original 7:21 post. You could have simply written the first two lines of your 10:08 post to me privately and I doubt there would have been any problem. How would you have reacted had I posted under your WiSo001 AAR "How about following the scenario set-up instructions?"

I fully intended to finish the scenario on the following day and have now done so and completed the AAR.

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