Winter-offensive: Uranus tourney AAR

Last Sunday I took part in a small Mid War tourney.
This is a little AAR of the 3 rounds i played.

Name tourney: FoW Winter-offensive: Uranus
Players: 20
Rounds: 3
Time for each round: 2.30 hours (including deployment)
Missions: There were 10 tables with each table having his own mission so nobody was playing the same mission.

My Army

US Airborne from North-Africa

HQ with 3 bazookas

Parachute Rifle Platoon #1: Two Rifle/MG Squads, 1 Mortar Squad (2 Command Rifle/Mg teams, 6 Rifle/Mg teams, 1 M2 60mm Mortar), 1 Bazooka team

Parachute Rifle Platoon #2: Two Rifle/MG Squads, 1 Mortar Squad (2 Command Rifle/Mg teams, 6 Rifle/Mg teams, 1 M2 60mm Mortar), 1 Bazooka team

Parachute Mortar Platoon: Two Mortar Sections (2 Command Carbine teams, 4 M1 81mm Mortars)

Parachute Engineer Platoon: HQ Squad, Weapons Squad, Operating Squad (2 Command Carbine teams, 4 Rifle teams, 2 M1919 LMG teams), 3 Bazooka teams

Self Propelled Anti Tank Platoon: HQ section, One M10 3in GMC section, 1 AA MG

Field Artillery Battery: HQ section, Two M2A1 105mm gun sections



For the AAR and more pictures click on the "Read More"link.



The AAR
(click on the small pictures for a bigger version)

Mission 1: Jay White's Hasty Attack mission (http://www.flamesofwar.com/Default.aspx?tabid=111&art_id=687&kb_cat_id=32)

Opponent: German Panzergrenadier Company


As my opponent was a mechanized company i became automatically the defender.
After reading the mission i had the feeling that it could be a tough mission for me. The only advantage i had was that the Germans only could win if they claim the objective, in all other cases i would win. I started to deploy 1 Combat platoon, my engineer platoon and the field artillery battery. I kept the others in reserve.
The Germans started the attack. With only 2 platoons in reserve and only needing to roll a 4+ to get them on the table, his reserves appeared very quick. Being dug in and gone to ground it was difficult to shoot my paras from the objectives and although he had many shots at my artillery battery they stand firmly. He lost his first 1 team. A Marder. Finally in turn 4 my first reserve showed up. I choose for the Anti Tank Platoon. As a result he lost 1 tank team. With my artillery being pinned down for several rounds i couldn't do much with these and with the M10 being bailed the shooting was out of my force. The 2nd combat platoon arrived, which directly got pinned, as well as my mortar platoon.
Now the Germans decided that it was time to assault the combat platoon protecting the objective. First the tanks after some fierce battle the tanks didn't made there motivation test to counter assault and had to pull back. 1 got bogged. Now the half-tracks filled with troopers assaulted. I could to withstand the attack and withdraw back to my dug in positions. In my turn my M10's shot the tank platoon blow half-strength and he ran of the table. Then he shot the remains of my combat platoon from the table. The objective was no longer protected. But..time was up. As he started the last round i had a leveling turn remaining. In my leveling turn i had the opportunity to move my Self Propelled Anti Tank Platoon close enough to the objective to contest it.
Result: 6-1 victory for me.

Some Pictures:













Mission 2: Fighting Withdrawal

Opponent: Italian Infantry


Next mission Italian infantry (although i only saw 1 infantry platoon).
Roll for attacker / defender. Result i was defender so i started again dug and gone to ground with all my troops on the table. I held the M10 platoon in Ambush.
The Italians started the attack. First came my artillery under heavy fire. Followed by heavy firing on my well dug in combat platoon that defended the objective placed by me. But with 6's to hit or with weapons more then 40 cm away not much happened to them.
Slowly my artillery took casualty's but in my turn 3 it was the 1st platoon i took from the table. So 1 platoon not destroyed. In this turn i also sprung my ambush. Only to do some minor damage to the Italians. My mortars put some smoke on the advancing tanks so he had to move to see me and to shoot at me again. Moving through difficult terrain but he made all of his bogging tests. The next turn he shot my 2 M10 to smoking wrecks but with leaving the rest of the platoon untouched i quickly withdrawal them from the table. My Mortars then bombarded his infantry platoon. After 2 turns doing this: Result goodbye platoon.
By turn 5 the Italians then suddenly decided to go for the 2 objectives placed by himself. This was too late. First the Italians were running out of time second the Italians could never get to claim 1 of the objectives.
In my turn 6 i pick the object that is in danger of the table. Then the Italians needed turn 7 to get to the other objective which i could pick from the table in my turn 7. But the Italians already run out of time.
If the Italians would have gone for these objectives in the first place i would have had to fight a much harder battle. But instead the Italians kept on going with shooting at my well dug in paratroopers.  The Italians launched an assault only once, he did win the assault but it was too late.
Result: 6-1 victory for me.

Some Pictures:











Mission 3: Hold the line

Opponent: Italians Compangia Paracadutisti


Again facing Italians and again i am defender.
The game where i made biggest tactical mistake ever. Instead that i choose for the free open space to deploy my army i chose for the side with the heavy boccage. Result was that i saw not much to nothing. Count with it that each time when the Italians did a smoke bombardment and needing a 6 to range in they did roll that 6. So i had no vision at all to make use of my field artillery.
Also it took 4 whole turns when the first reserves showed up. But it was too late the Italians already reached the objective. After some fierce shooting and fighting from both sides my defending platoon was destroyed. Not being able to get a new platoon close enough to contest the objective the Italians could claim it at the beginning of their turn. The game almost went as quick as i tell it here.
Result: 6-1 defeat for me

Some pictures.










The end result: I became number 6 in the total ranking of 20 people.
The tourney was a lot of fun and i had a lot of fun playing the games. Even game 3.
Next tourney at the same place is a Late War one. Maybe i can win that one. ;-)

Thanks for reading and looking.