Breakout from the Bridgehead

Last night I managed to get my first proper game in a while against my regular opponent.

We played Fall of the Reich (One of the Battlegroup supplements). We decided that we would use British Airborne against a scratch German force made up of mostly support Halftracks and Volks Grenadier.
Next was the scenario and we decided to try Bridgehead Breakout and work out forces to roughly 450 points a side.

For the Airborne I took pretty much most of what was painted (they are newly painted by James so good to get them on the table).

Two Platoons of infantry each with a Vickers.
Then from the Overlord book we used the points and battle rating for the Airborne HQ and Recon squad.
These were backed up by some off table 3" mortars.

 As you can see it was a fairly small force and lacked a bit of punch.

The German force was likewise based around two platoons of infantry.
HQ in a Halftrack
A Flame Halftrack
A support haltrack (cannot remember the name)
A Pz II (the fact that this was a mortar spotter caused me some issues in the first two turns).
An Infantry gun was also taken.
Some additional morale (rolled a 1 for this)
Finally support arrived in the form of 120mm mortars (off table).

The infantry

The support

The battle rating for  the Paras was 39
The Germans was a lower 28

For objective we had the bridge (as per the scenario), The farmhouse in the center of the table and the industrial building along the main road running from the bridge. We felt that these should create some interesting situations and challenges (rather than just placing markers somewhere on the table).

The table

When I use the term "bridge" I mean Ford

The Germans only started with the Pz II on the table where as the Paras managed to start with five units on the table. The recon squad was backed up with a Piat team behind the hill while another squad along with a Piat team and a platoon command deployed into the woods ready to advance to the farm house and secure the objective there.

 The first turn saw the Para infantry squad try and advance only to get pinned by mortar fire called in from the PII (a Recon command vehicle so had Mortar spotter).

 The Paras and a Piat team make it to the farm house. Securing the objective. However support would not be coming anytime soon.

The Germans come on boldly across the fields having seized the industrial building and make a push for the farm house.

 The Flame Halftrack burns out both the Piat team and the squad. Leaving the farm house open for the taking.

 The paras manage to get across the ford, only to be stopped in the woods and corn stubble. The orders being poor (on average 6-7 a turn) meant the Paras could not get the impetus needed to make a push on the farm house.

 Salvation in the form of air support. Karma played a role as we only had a Hurricane to use as a Typhoon. This proceeded to miss with all rockets and cannon fire over the next few turns.

With the Germans in control of two out of three objectives and the Paras pinned around the ford, it was time to concede the field and fall back. The paras strength has really been sapped in the battle for the farm house. Some unlucky order rolls and an aweful lot of failed morale checks leading to pinned or retreating units meant the Paras just could not muster the strength to recapture the farm house.
The Germans on the other had got quite lucky with a few vital order rolls and Beyond the Call of Duty morale rolls. The German losses were actually quite light and they had mustered in strength around the fields and farm house.

The game was a lot of fun in the early turns when, both sides made use of the Reserve move order, leading to plenty of Reserve fire orders. It was really difficult to get the Paras moving once the attack had stalled and lacking any long range threat to the half tracks (other than pinning them) forced the paras on to the defence.

Into The Woods

This week I made a start on the woods for my gaming table. I have plenty of trees that work for 28mm games and are all based individually. Recently I have been playing a lot more games in 20,15 and 6mm so needed some smaller scale trees.

I managed to obtain around 50 trees from Ebay for under £10 including shipping. They are very nice trees and really work well with 15 and 20mm figures. The only drawback is that I could not work out an easy way of basing them individually so opted to make bases that hold around 5 trees each (I have tended to prefer individual trees and then use felt templates if wanting to represent a wooded area). I have made the bases from fibreboard as it is easy to cut and shape, doesnt warp too easily and is cheap.

The fibreboard bases with trees

 After drilling the holes for the trees I used PVA to fix them to the base and then applied some filler to help hold them in place and give the base some texture. The filler also helps them look more like trees with roots etc.

The bases with added texture

 I still  need to texture the bases with my sand mix and then paint the bases. Should not take much longer to have them done. Then I will start on my river sections, also fibreboard and filler. Just need to work out how I am going to get the shade for the river. I am thinking somewhere between green and brown for the water.

Also on the work station are my Vietnam figures. Another batch have been undercoated and the basecoat is being applied. Once these are painted then it will be time to try out the rules for "Charlie Don't Surf".  Which I am looking forward to trying.

Drybrush applied to the robes and the flesh tone started. 

Hopefully I will have another update shortly based on boardgames that I have been playing and received in the post.

Back to Nam

After a hectic couple of months, I have finally managed to get started again on my Vietnam project.
Just finished basing an other platoon or so of VC.

15mm VC PeterPig and Battlefront

They are quite nice figures and so far have been ok to paint. The only thing with this batch is it includes some of the Battlefront VC figures which are not up to the same standard as the Peter Pig ones.

Once these are painted then it will be onto the buildings before trying to finish the US forces. Which also includes sourcing some Huey's ( I really hope that Battlefront get round to doing some plastic ones).

Also on the painting desk are my Wild West figures. Hopefully I will be able to make a start on these soon enough.