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12-03-2012, 11:13 PM,
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vince hughes
Second Lieutenant
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Posts: 1,310
Threads: 61
Joined: May 2012
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Defending The Westwall : An End Of Series Review
Maybe their should be a completed module review section in this forum ? Anyway, if you want and have time for a long read. Here is a thread that a coffee may enhance ?
Having finally completed a module after 132 scenarios played, I thought, like Hugmenot and Matt.W before me, I would post a completion synopsis upon the forum. Following this, I would be highly intrigued to be able to benefit from anybody else that in the future takes the trouble to post their final results of the same completed Westwall module. Even more so if they are all played against a real opponent as were these 10 battles.
This 10 battle scenario pack which came out of AP as one of five downloads designed by Mike Perryman depicting the Siegfried and Aachen campaigns over 50 scenarios really does touch upon a subject in WW2 that I find absolutely fascinating. Without going into too much historical detail as to why it fascinates me, I’ll just say a defeated army perhaps not so defeated as thought by their enemies, and a fresh new allied army now dragged down and facing the rigours of attritional war themselves does make for a truly battle royale. This completed series was played by me solely representing the German forces throughout the module and coming up against three different US players. Wayne Baumber, Alan Sawyer and Tony Langston. The scenarios were played between Nov 2009 – Nov 2012.
As the defending Germans, the issues that became apparent to me over the series were six-fold. Those issues were a) Being outnumbered - b) VC’s often dependent on defending designated terrain features – c) VP’s for losses inflicted and sustained – d) Often having initiative 2pts lower than the Americans – e) Facing heavy OBA numbers – f) Facing numerically superior AFV’s and often a mass of APC’s.
This is how I decided or ended up tackling each issue in a ‘general’ basis. My main aim here is to stir discussion and receive the positing of other players ideas or previously used tactics, whether successful or unsuccessful.
A – OUTNUMBERED: In 7 of the scenarios the Germans are well outnumbered. Five of them are in straight-forward manpower and tank totals. The other two of the mentioned seven scenarios may have had INF units on a par in numbers but allocates the US side with between 15 to 23 x M3 platoons as handy firepower extras. It therefore became immediately apparent that spreading out my forces evenly would merely attract an enemy attack en masse on some part of the wafer thin line. If this occurs, the Germans can easily be rolled up and at the same time, only offer penny-packet weak resistance. To combat this, I found that rather than spread out units, it was often far more profitable to keep them in strong groups, capable of helping themselves, and where possible, trying to get their firepower to somewhere between 11-16 direct fire points and backed with a useful leader. At the same time, I also attempted to keep groups within a semblance of supporting distance of each other. Not always possible, but certainly something I had to bare in mind. In this way, direct closing US attacks would see DF against them going up 3 columns for Opp.Fire and being adjacent. This would leave the American asking or at least worrying whether such attacks were worth the risk in casualties. Such groups of defenders would also be able to confidently fight assault battles defensively on a decently high column that had a good chance of inflicting casualties too. In other words, I tried to make my stacks frightening and able to inflict VP casualties, but at the same time without being too juicy when compared to my other stacks. In line with this I had to be conspicuously aware of not stacking too heavily for fear of enemy OBA and also, avoid having a dirty great hole blown in my line should a real-juicy stack be overrun.
B – DEFENDING TERRAIN FEATURES: Unsurprisingly, given the subject matter, all 10 scenarios involve control of terrain features being required in some way or another. 9 of these scenarios require the Germans to defend them. Of those that require defending, 6 of the scenarios allocate Victory Points (VP’s) for designated terrain hexes that are controlled at the end of play. The way I chose to effectively defend in these situations was as follows. Pre-game I would add up the VP’s of all hexes that afforded such points. Then, with that total, work out how many of those hexes and their points totals I could get away with forsaking, or put another way, not bother defending, thus releasing me to use my perceived scant forces to defend lesser ground in a more effective way and in concentrated groups as desired in ‘case-A’ above. Thus, the plan being that the Americans could be given some ground without even having to fight, and yet, the ground given up would be worthless unless the Americans made their moves for the positions that WERE defended. In the last 5 scenarios, the Germans are also assisted by the mud. This slows down the Americans to a crawl in some instances and in each turn that American units fail to advance, time will be eaten up. This therefore gives the US commander double-trouble. On these occasions I even found it useful to deploy far forward if this meant that US forces had to start even further back. In the Lohn Town scenario for example, this actually gains the Germans three turns of ‘peace’ as the Americans set up positions have to be set well back.
C – VP’s FOR LOSSES INFLICTED AND SUSTAINED: One clear rule of deployment came through to me in these hard pressed-defence situations. Defend in depth and only defend the defensible. Do not try to cover all VP / VC locations (as per para.B above). To inflict pain in the form of losses on the aggressors, I realised that units and bombardments had to be concentrated into ‘clumps’ that could inflict losses on their own strength. I decided that defending penny-packet style led only to 7col DF and 8-16col bombardments. To inflict casualties with these required double 1’s and 6’s. Far too risky and reliant on good fortune. So where possible, infantry stacks of 11 or 16 DF often augmented with strong-points could turn out to be fearsome prospects, especially when advanced upon with the Opp.Fire bonus and in closing stages, the adjacent bonus. Stacks composed of a GREN, HMG and a leader with a ‘1’ bonus for firepower for 16pts, or 2 HMG’s and a strong-point for 22pts always proved troublesome thorns. Likewise, artillery needed, where able to fire on the 30col, whether as OBA or on-board. This of course was not always possible, and I resisted the temptation in such circumstances to place my mortars and the like in LOS of counter-fire just to gain the +1 self-spotted bonus. Mortars tend to die easily when they do this by attracting fire. Preserving them throughout the game so that they would always be there firing away was always more beneficial rather than exposing them to enemy attack via OBA. On the losing of steps, it is of no surprise to state that towns were always the best location to husband my resources and keep them safe. Entrenchments also go without saying when they are part of the OOB. Given the amount of US OBA in most scenarios, I mainly stayed away from woods when possible as they offer no protection from OBA and also disallowed the ability of digging-in. I should add here that a total aversion of woods should not be interpreted from this as it was very dependent on the US OBA capability. Light-woods and dug-in was often a preferred option in which to minimise casualties instead of normal woods. In the muddy scenarios, I also found it useful to place my defending troops where possible, 4 hexes or 800m from covering terrain to the enemy. With just a 2MF, this would mean that I would get 2 turns of Opp Fire against the enemy before they could even muster their own forces for any useful assault.
D – LOWER INITIATIVE: In no less than 9 out of the 10 scenarios in this pack, the Germans have a starting initiative of 2 less than the Americans. PG chat boards are filled with posts and AAR’s about one side’s higher morale and the obvious advantages that brings. But comparatively speaking, 2+ initiative is rarely mentioned. Yet, this advantage gives one side so many more possibilities. By winning the initiative dice roll by just one more than the opponent, they instantly receive 2 activations ahead of their enemy. The chances of losing initiative (i.e.: Your enemy rolls 3+ higher than yourself) are low, something like 1 in 9 times and perhaps less once ties are resolved. So with a 2+ initiative advantage, the Americans can generally count on going first and should, all things being equal, be enabled to play at least one bolder move per turn than their enemy in the hope of getting first AS, as well as react to adverse situations quicker than the Germans. The way I countered this in what seemed the best ways possible was a policy of sit-tight and take it. By using good leaders to support under fire units, I had the Germans suck up American fire first. This had to be done where the US still had other unused troops that could still move still in a later activation. The rule being, do not loose off or fire the German bolt whilst the Amis still had resources. Thereafter, there was one of three choices open to the defenders. Either fire-back when the US had activated those units threatening your stack, or, recover DIS and DEM units (some DIS units need to be recovered before this stage to avoid a second hit making them DEM), or, if the Americans came in close, fire point blank to get the enemy to soak up losses. On the subject of these defensive fire attacks, targeting useful enemy leaders, ENG, HMG and FLM units was a priority. This would make enemy assaults on my positions as weak as I could conceivably make them. Another tactic was to take out ‘cheap’ targets when able and safe to do so. By this, I mean hitting M3’s with AT fire or Opp.Firing at them as they come in close with available small arms fire that could get onto the 22col of the DF chart (I find the 16 chart too difficult to get X results). Although any morale checks are ‘misses’, an X wipes the vehicle out. The reason for this was to get the US initiative to roll down quickly. Once US initiative is level with the German, then the US player’sr method of play and tactics should change and become more containable ? It should result in the Americans becoming instantly less bold and the battle can be fought on a more even footing.
E – FACING HEAVY OBA NUMBERS: This has been addressed in most paragraphs above. But the use of towns and entrenchments would bring down the effects of this by 2 often life-saving columns. Refusing to present targets not only aided reduction of losses and VP’s, but would often frustrate the enemy player. What can be more annoying than having a powerful resource and not getting to use it as one would like. Refusing to come out into open ground, staying in limiting terrain unsighted whilst the Americans were more than 3 hexes away. Agitating the player in this way probably brought on some benefits I was never aware of!
F – TOO MANY ENEMY AFV’s: The Americans are usually equipped with good numbers of AFV’s whilst the Germans usually make do with either a couple of StG’s or a Tiger tank. The German armour, due to its fearsome guns are most often at their best being used in positions that show what they CAN do rather than WHAT they do. By holding them back rather than firing at bait targets, their ability to neuter American armour is possibly just as an effective a tactic to use as it is to try and fight a few enemy tanks and then lose your own eventually. That all said, if the American player activated all his units and easy targets presented themselves, there was no harm in using my own resource in these situations. What I always avoided was firing them off early and allowing potential unactivated enemy units with a +2 initiative to get a two move jump on fired Tigers or StG’s. If these beasts get swarmed by infantry then they would have been in serious trouble.
So they were main issues facing the German defenders. There were most certainly plenty of others, but the above 6 points kind of threaded through consistently in the module.
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12-03-2012, 11:19 PM,
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vince hughes
Second Lieutenant
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Posts: 1,310
Threads: 61
Joined: May 2012
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RE: Defending The Westwall : An End Of Series Review
THE SCENARIOS
In the losses column INF = any foot troops that are INF, GREN, ENG, FLM, HMG etc. OFF = Leaders and GUN = all ordnance including 81mm mortars. AFV and APC are self-explanatory. All losses are shown as steps and not counters (except leaders of course). When speaking of ‘sessions’ of play, they amount roughly to 5-6 hours a session.
(1) A BITTER IRONY – 13 SEP 1944: (played against Wayne Baumber) A small introductory scenario gets this module underway that fails to warn the German player of the impending pressure scenarios that follow. Set just outside Aachen, the battle takes place on a large hill on a single board (25). Outnumbered German forces are tasked to having at least one undemoralised unit on a road hex by game end. The scenario is a delightful one session 12 turn game in which our one went right down to the final dice rolls. In the end, the Germans desperately clung on with mortars and a grenadier platoon that were coming under severe American pressure. I see in other AAR’s the closing acts have been close affairs too. German Victory. LOSSES – US: 4 INF, 1 OFF : GERMAN: 7 INF, 1 GUN. MY RATING 3
(2) RECONNAISSANCE IN FORCE – 13 SEP 1944 (played against Wayne Baumber) This is where it starts for the German defender in terms of too many enemy forces. Schmidthof is the town under attack and a mobile American force complete with many tanks and no less than 21 x M3’s are asked to kill the enemy, take entrenchments and town hexes across boards 22 & 25. The Germans are allocated minefields, tank-ditches and wire, but need to place these on a broad front. Victory is decided by a points count. For me, this was one of Wayne’s best ever attacks I’ve been on the end of. He tackled the fortifications well and kept a good command/control of his forces. For a good while I was left pondering whether I had set my fortifications up terribly wrong (mainly linear). However, when looking back, the move of the game was a 50-50 encounter that Wayne instigated when he threw his tanks in at my StG’s that had been holding things up. With initiative equal, the firing stage would come down to the initiative roll and unfortunately for me, he won it. Superior in numbers, his tanks blew through the StG’s and opened the way to victory. German losses were high in men, whilst the Americans lost machinery. Major American Victory over 2.5 sessions of gaming. (can’t find the points totals on this one). LOSSES – US: 8 INF, 24 AFV, 13 APC : GERMAN: 27 INF, 7 OFF, 4 AFV, 6 GUN. MY RATING 4
(3) IF ONLY HE COULD COOK – 15 SEP 1944 (played against Wayne Baumber) Another two boarder (22 & 23) and a generally bloody affair over 2 sessions. The Americans are committed to attacking the area of Mausbach where they find defensive positions laced with entrenchments and strong-points. Both sides have a comparable number of infantry. The trick for the Germans on this one was to severely draw down and in on the area they had to defend (as mentioned in post.1). I think they basically shrunk down into around a third of their defensive area but which held by far the majority of points. The Americans came on in two main groups where one group was stopped dead in its tracks with heavy losses. The other group eventually made some headway past the first defensive objective, but they too were soon stopped hard and dead. I also remember benefitting from a very good leader on one of the flanks where his morale bonus and firing bonus outweighed any US OBA efforts. Main point here to victory for me was the pre-game decision to contract the line. Major German Victory. LOSSES – US: 28 INF, 1 OFF, 2 AFV, 1 APC : GERMAN: 20 INF, 3 OFF, 2 AFV, 2 GUN. MY RATING 4
(4)FILLING THE GAPS – 16 SEP 1944 (played against Wayne Baumber) This one, for those of us playing Siegfried type scenarios came as something of a respite to the German defend mentality. Here the German 12th Wild Buffaloes Infantry Division is unleashed in the area in a one session scenario. This one has them fighting for the town of Verlautenheide in a balanced scenario in terms of game-play and forces allocated. A one- boarder (11), this scenario developed into what I think both Wayne and I found an exciting little battle. By the end of the 12 turns it was the Germans that gained the advantage after a stuttering start and it was the Americans who had to do all the running to salvage a draw. Good scenario! LOSSES – US: 8 INF, 2 OFF : GERMAN: 7 INF, 1 OFF, 2 GUN. MY RATING 4
(5) DUELING FOR THE HIGH GROUND – 16 SEP 1944 (played against Wayne Baumber). Boards 25 & 22 supply the ground in which US troops once more have to assault German positions. VP’s are awarded for killing the enemy, controlling entrenchments & towns, and holding or capturing 40m hexes. The US advantage comes in its 15 x M3’s, OBA and 10 tank platoons. Against this, the Germans own a Panther platoon, high ground and entrenchments. This scenario shows how the German tanks, rather than being used can instead, work a big advantage merely by presence. Frightening the M4 crews into holding back as the VP loss for them would be crucial. In this battle, the German network of defences seemed to confound the American efforts from all angles as the defenders concentrated their forces, trenches and tanks into one area of the high ground and then extracted a high toll on the US attack. The game was over within one session. Major German Victory. LOSSES – US: 7 INF, 12 AFV, 9 APC: GERMAN: 2 INF, 1 AFV, 1 GUN. MY RATING 3
(6) CROCODILE ROCK – 22 NOV 1944 (played against Alan Sawyer) : BotB provides the terrain with boards 9 & 10 placed in a long battlefield end-to-end. For the next 5 scenarios the weather now favours the Germans as West Germany is swamped with mud and movement gets very slow indeed. The Germans in my opinion are seriously outnumbered in this one and are forced to defend a town and high ground. Under-moraled Volksgrenadiers carrying a deficit of 2 pts on initiative and outnumbered more than 2:1 in foot troops, 6:1 in AFV’s and 6 APC’s also add to the US OOB. The US again has good OBA. Now the trick here is to remember the US needs to clear all town, 40m and road in 20 turns. So the German tactics were to make sure they had enough to hold a piece of town by game end. The Germans get two Tiger platoons, but these will be forced to use road and town as mud slows them otherwise to a 1 hex movement. Here again, their presence is more powerful than perhaps their committal as they hopefully fend off US armour from taking part in the attack. Two more factors have to press German priorities. The US has 2 x ENG platoons, plus fire in the form of a FLM platoon and a fearsome British Crocodile flame-throwing machine. To win, there is no doubt these US assets will have to be held back by the Volksgrenadiers. The battle saw the US held up on the road for sometime and then outside the town, German fire did enough to hold off assaults in any strength. No flame shots could be fired and the Tigers frightened off US armour. This was a win that I was very pleased with as previous battles on PGHQ had been US wins. German Victory. LOSSES – US: 8 INF, 1 OFF, 2 AFV, 1 APC: GERMAN: 9 INF, 1 OFF, 3 GUN. MY RATING 3 (but it felt like a 4 with the win).
(7) LOHN TOWN – 22 NOV 1944 (played against Alan Sawyer): 3 x boards from the eastern front sets are used in this one and once again the mud pervades throughout. Here again, the Germans are numerically challenged and asked to defend a number of features of hills and towns to gain points at the end of the scenario for control of them. Half the German force are VG and therefore ‘7’ morale. There is a trick available to the defenders though. The Americans, if not in town or woods have to set up 6 hexes away from the nearest defenders and 4 hexes otherwise. The brave minded defender can set his VG’s far forward thus, using the mud to his advantage, gain three turns of time where the Americans have to move up to get them anywhere near the German start points. My plan, using this tactic was then to have the VG’s retreat back to the VP features, albeit harangued by the horrid US OBA and join other German troops there. Through luck, only 1 step loss was suffered and the Germans ended in good shape to defend. To be fair, the Americans became demoralised in their whole attack and it was never thrown in with any zest. German Major Victory. LOSSES – US: 8 INF, 1 OFF, 1 AFV: GERMAN: 3 INF, 1 OFF. MY RATING 3
(8) MAKING HAY – 23 NOV 1944 (played against Alan Sawyer) Old favourites boards 24 and 25 are the scene for another mud fest. Germans outnumbered 3:1 and deficient by 2 in initiative defend hills and towns again. By this time, the mud seems to have got into my opponents brain and he was sick of it before the game began. Despite this, he set his attack off and struggled logistically trying to get troops forward cohesively in the slush. The Germans can not pester the advance too much with only 1 x 16 OBA. The Germans set up to defend the town of Putzlohn with only screens on the two adjacent hills. Things looked rough for them until the Americans tried to close. Some horrible opportunity fire cut down a fair few of them and soon after the US attack again fell flat, allowing the Germans to keep Putzlohn. Major German victory. LOSSES – US: 8 INF, 1 OFF: GERMAN: 2 INF, 1 GUN. MY RATING 3
(9) HUCHLEN TOWN – 24 NOV 1944 (played against Tony Langston) Two boards (22 & 24) are placed end to end. Again the Germans were placed to defend the main town of Hucheln and didn’t bother with trying to hold any of the forward settlements. The Americans comprise of a very much all-arms force and as a newish player , Tony probably struggled to get his American force to act in unison with each other properly. As they tried to close on the town, the Americans struggled with how to keep losses low and advance over the open ground. Casualties became heavy and disorder was rife in the ranks. German AT guns had a field day and US losses were far too high. Major German Victory. LOSSES – US: 13 INF, 3 OFF, 11 AFV, 9 APC: GERMAN: 3 INF, 2 OFF, 1 GUN. MY RATING 3
(10) LIKE A DOSE OF SALTS – 25 NOV 1944 (played against Wayne Baumber). The largest scenario in the pack in terms of boards with 4 of them required. The usual outnumbered German force of which half or more are VG’s with a morale of ‘7’ and trailing in initiative by 2 are asked to fight a regimental size American force. VC’s in this one are different to others. The US are asked to capture town and road hexes, and dependent on how many they do capture, a minor or major victory is awarded. The Germans are asked to take out 20 enemy steps or hold a town hex on board 10 or 23 as well as a road hex. A very patient methodical US advance set the tone for a very slow grinding down of the defenders and as explained previously, the Germans need to soak up attacks before doing anything themselves. In a very exciting battle, the US lost too many men and as a result then threw everything at the defenders as the only way to win outright rather than draw was to clear the boards of the enemy. With too many forces against them, the Germans had to hope for FOW to draw a turn or 2 to a close. This failed to materialise and on the very last turn, the US grabbed a major victory condition against a German minor victory in a nail-biting end. Net result, US Minor Victory. LOSSES – US: 16 INF, 4 OFF, 4 AFV, 2 GUN: GERMAN: 27 INF, 10 OFF, 4 AFV, 9 GUN. MY RATING 4
My overall impression of this module is a high one indeed and a series rating by me of 3.40 shows that it was massively above the average when compared to my average grading of 3.08. That equated to 7 x 3 ratings (standard) and 3 x 4 ratings (good). In other words, none of these scenarios were below par IMO. The series of battles has been put together well and despite the results shown above, other results on PG-HQ will show that differing results are more than possible. In fact, some of the results here came very much against the grain when compared to previous plays. That shows a lot of playability and worthy of head-to-head play for scenarios 1-7. Scenarios 8, 9 and 10 were experiencing their first plays so there was nothing to compare these against. Another nice touch is that I hardly remember any errata ? Of any errata I found, three of them were merely the town names that were named erroneously in their spelling. Hardly deal-breakers (though a couple of times it caused me to struggle to find them when searching on google maps ). Does this game-pack give you a feeling and sense of the travails that both sides had to go through on the Westwall? I’d say it does! I certainly felt the arduous requirements of trying to hold a lot of objectives with what seemed too few troops. And the American players must have felt the difficulty of pressing forward against determined ensconced defenders (and in one player’s case, the mud!). So any prospective Westwaller reading this summary, I hope you keep a note of the battles and losses and perhaps somewhere down the line in years to come, somebody will be comparing like-to-like with this effort. In closing this summary I’ll draw one incident to your notice. I am sure that somebody like Peter Lloyd or Poor Yorek will recall the exact details but it goes something like this. At the time, a jingoistic American newspaper article noted with supreme optimism “The Westwall should fall easily enough. It is manned by nothing more than old men and boys!”. One American soldier was quoted in response with words to the effect of “It might be defended by old men and boys, but these fuckers are still stuck behind six-feet of concrete armed with a heavy machine-gun!” This scenario pack gives you a taste of that. Try it and see for yourself!
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12-03-2012, 11:51 PM,
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Matt W
Lieutenant Colonel
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Posts: 1,037
Threads: 22
Joined: Jun 2012
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RE: Defending The Westwall : An End Of Series Review
Vince,
Wonderful summary. I have played this one through scenario 7 and have many of the same comments. I did, however, try the penny packet defense in some cases in order to delay the Americans. Warning, it doesn't work for beans. The penny packets can be dealt with by a portion of the American force while the remainder, which is generally more than enough moves on towards the objectives. The trailing forces typically arrive in time to provide the final boost to the attack on the objectives.
The American player needs to be acutely aware of the potential for losses. While they have overwhelming force in many cases, the Germans can, and will, dish out plenty of punishment if you expose that force foolishly. Tons of inferior armor merely make for high loss totals if it doesn't use effective cover and work for crossfire.
As to the OBA. Most of the "Invasion of Germany" scenarios reinforce the idea that the German army in that campaign and others on the western front faced a vastly different threat than on the eastern front. While they were certainly outnumbered by the western allies it was the tremendous superiority of artillery that made for the greatest difficulty. The Allies were not as willing as the Soviets to accept high losses through assault and would be happy to pummel a position into dust prior to trying to take it. Unfortunately for the Germans they were on the receiving end of this. Their ability to stand up to this bombardment and continue to fight is the story of the campaign for me. These scenarios clearly illustrate that aspect of the fighting.
I believe that writeups like this help immensely in giving some "feel" to the products. Each game or supplement tells a story to the players. Certainly Daniel and I came away with a greater understanding of the Peruvian-Ecuadorian conflict with War on the Equator and I can tell you tons of stories about the Razakar militia of Hyderabad now that we are 7 scenarios into Indian Unity. These aren't just collections of scenarios, they are campaigns and the veterans, in writing up summaries such as this, provide the community a look into the product that goes beyond the scenario summaries on the AVP website. Thanks Vince. And here's hoping that others jump on the bandwagon.
BTW, Vince, that ribbon looks good on you.
No "minor" country left behind...
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12-04-2012, 01:06 AM,
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vince hughes
Second Lieutenant
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Posts: 1,310
Threads: 61
Joined: May 2012
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RE: Defending The Westwall : An End Of Series Review
(12-03-2012, 11:51 PM)Matt W Wrote: Vince,
Wonderful summary. I have played this one through scenario 7 and have many of the same comments. I did, however, try the penny packet defense in some cases in order to delay the Americans. Warning, it doesn't work for beans. The penny packets can be dealt with by a portion of the American force while the remainder, which is generally more than enough moves on towards the objectives.
The American player needs to be acutely aware of the potential for losses. While they have overwhelming force in many cases,
As to the OBA. Most of the "Invasion of Germany" scenarios reinforce the idea that the German army in that campaign and others on the western front faced a vastly different threat than on the eastern front. While they were certainly outnumbered by the western allies it was the tremendous superiority of artillery that made for the greatest difficulty.
I believe that writeups like this help immensely in giving some "feel" to the products. Each game or supplement tells a story to the players. Certainly Daniel and I came away with a greater understanding of the Peruvian-Ecuadorian conflict with War on the Equator and I can tell you tons of stories about the Razakar militia of Hyderabad now that we are 7 scenarios into Indian Unity.
BTW, Vince, that ribbon looks good on you.
Matt,
Thanks for a full response to the post, it is appreciated. I have purposelly truncated your 'quote' above in places to answer those parts showing.
The summary has been brewing slowly since the completion of the module. Adding here, deleting there and re-reading everywhere .... and I have still found mistakes now that is posted 
I wanted to 'lay-down' the experience so that others who HAD played it could comment on how it relates to their plays, and for those about to play, especially if less versed in outnumbered defence play, a few ideas of what to expect and maybe how to tackle it. I also intentionally left out American counter-counter-measures in the hope that the Ami triumvirate of Wayne, Alan and Tony can add THEIR side of the story and how to combat prepared defenders.
On the OBA, it realistically served a purpose of very often though not always keeping my maligned troopers head down and in cover. Rare was the time it seemed that they could roam freely across the game-board. It usually came down to times when they were out of LOS or when tastier targets were on offer. It also helped the US on a couple of occassions against German AFV positions. I think Wayne will agree that a decent OBA strike he had on a StG platoon, subsequently demoralising or disrupting it, opened a pathway for a decent and safe US advance
in scenario 10 (Like A Dose Of Salts).
The module gives some other relaistic outcomes. Studying the numbers chart, look at the amount and percentage of 'experienced' German officers that had to be sacrificed to hold that line. Always an underlying issue for the Germans was the slow and sometimes fast evaporation of experience and I saw that occur in these scenarios. Also, man for man, German-US losses were about the same, 107 v 108 steps overrall. But look at the material lost by the US. So many more tanks and a plethora of 33 APC's bit the bullet. German ordanance suffered likewise once their positions became revealed. Here again, these numbers seem to tally up well with the written material on the subject.
This is at least the third write-up on a completed module and it may be a useful folder with such a title to stick these threads (and no, I don't wish to receive offers of other places I can stick it  ).
The ribbon I have to say has turned out nicely. Its quite out there on its own in terms of colours. I like it ! I'm looking to perhaps joining P.Lloyd in the North of Elsenborn Ribbon club or Roer River Battles, we shall see. Aachen looks a bit more intense and will see me visit there later.
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