[Fall of France #11] Initial German Setup

[Shad]

No set up is fool proof and it can all fall apart with an erroneous move :-)

To drive home the point, I offer up my own poor leadership as an example. In an Alaska's War scenario I was defending a town from Vince's Japanese and carefully set up my men in the muck outside the town. Vince took the "long way", skipping down the road and completely skirting my defenses. Thereupon I was forced to slog through muck and be disrupted as a result.

It didn't end well!

Vince's AAR
my supplementary AAR

[Hugmenot]

Vince and others, is this the setup you were recommending?

The units in 0516 are dug despite the marker not being visible.

[Matt W]

Vince and others, is this the setup you were recommending?

Much improved. I would suggest a couple of small changes.

The major and the INF go where the captain is.

The captain should move to 0312.

That way you have more ability to spot along your front line and maintain your ability to activate your whole force in the large town at once. If the French slip to your west you can always reorient back into the town.

The two INF companies in reserve give you some flexibility as well.

[J6A]

Vince - I know I owe you some moves in our play of this...very busy and going out of town for a few days. I should be able to do the 1st couple of impulses tomorrow, though.

[vince hughes]

Vince and others, is this the setup you were recommending?

The units in 0516 are dug despite the marker not being visible.

Hugs,
Very similar. In fact, I am PBEMing this with J6A right now and he'll confirm that the set up is very close. We've completed 2 turns and now of course, with the French 2 hexes away, I can see them in turn 3, so action will soon begin. I will post an AAR of course. Are you playing this solo ? If so, when the French come on I will tell you what J6A did with his for comparisons.

[vince hughes]

Vince - I know I owe you some moves in our play of this...very busy and going out of town for a few days. I should be able to do the 1st couple of impulses tomorrow, though.

Josh,

Patience, patience. The art of PBEM ! Josh, its fine, and I await expectantly lol. Do what you got to do. You only have to send 2 activations with the initiative win and then it'll be over to me. The game is about to get a little hotter now !

[Hugmenot]

The picture shows the situation after Turn 3 and yes Vince, the French entered the board from the West this time.

The French have the first activation in turn 4.

This strategy has some roots in the patience displayed by Alan and Matt in our games, and in my inability to recognize cardinal directions.

The scenario was a draw; the French controlled 3 town hexes and reduced 1 German infantry while the Germans controlled 2 town hexes and killed a French HMG. Very ineffective shooting and assault from both sides.

[Matt W]

I believe that patience, especially when playing solo is one of the toughest abilities to develop. Many of the scenarios seem incredibly long but are bloodbaths when pursued quickly. I still move into assaults too soon, counting on column shifts to compensate for a lack of "softening up" the target hex. I try to see if I can effectively use the time but often find that I have, yet again, rushed it.

[Michael Murphy]

Over the years I've found that some of the least entertaining games are those in which I simply line two sides up against each other and blast away. Of course, some situations simply give you no choice if you want to win. I now try to spend more time advancing to contact and using (scenario) time to get myself into position. Some of these efforts have resulted in very interesting scenarios.

Of course, there are always exceptions to this rule. Just take a quick look at AK 2 (Capture of Giaragub). This is a one mapper with 199 (count 'em) turns. This does not include an intermission of 104 turns during which a sand storm prevents any action at all. The action goes from the 20 March 0400 turn directly to the 21 March 0600 turn. The unit density isn't all that great and frankly, I just don't grok this one at all except as a historical scenario. I would imagine that I could play this one to a victory in under 20 game turns, even within the tight casualty VP limits.

[vince hughes]

I would imagine that I could play this one to a victory in under 20 game turns, even within the tight casualty VP limits.

Erm ? No you wouldn't

Just played that thing and God it was boring ! The reason you could not do it in 20 turns is because night movement disrupts troops and artillery fire is limited by ammunition depletion.

Basically its a long drawn out pain and not worth investing the time.

When I played, I just gave up through basically being 'pissed off' ... I happily conceded as the Italian