Race For The Rhine - Part 3: Round 1 Results

In the first couple of campaign battles I kicked off by snatching defeat from the jaws of victory while defending in a Fighting Withdrawal mission, much to James Underwood’s (the opposition) amusement.  I managed to wipe out some tank destroyers and a recon platoon to snatch 3 victory points, but lost my Tigers and PaK40’s in the process.  Elsewhere James Taylor continued the ‘bad day on the job’ theme for the Germans, getting well and truly stonked by Paul’s British armour, and losing 77% of his army in the process!  He managed the same trick of taking out a couple of platoons however, and lost 4-3.

Battle number three took place the week after, with Phil’s Canadians (or rather his naval firepower) recording a good victory over Ian’s roughly handled panzer kompanie.  Battles 4 to 6 were fought out simultaneously on the 24^th October, and continued the trend of allied victories.  First to declare was Pete’s SS Panzergrenadiers, run out of town during a Fighting Withdrawal by Aidans British riflemen with suspiciously few losses for a supposedly fanatical force.  Pete assures me that his deliberate use of 1550pts in his first game is all part of a master plan which will come to fruition later, hopefully not too much later – Aidans losses were 0%. 

Next up Blue Team Dave brought out his SS Panzergrenadierkampfgruppe (what a mouthful) halftracks for a rare outing and immediately doubled the lot in front of Lukes US para’s.  Luke was kind enough to let him get away with that, but not gullible enough to let him get past turn two without a bit of a bashing.  Four burning StuG’s later and the SS attack had lost it momentum, and the battle with 500pts being wiped out.  Last but not least Dennis’ Panzer Kompanie managed to starve a draw out of Martin’s Americans, resisting until 10:20pm and managing to loose little in the way of their army doing so.  Martin came out with 3 points, Dennis with 2.

Battles for Round 1; Red’s British Guards armour overcame David’s Panzer Kompanie very swiftly to make the allied results 7-0, and put pressure on Ben and his SS Panzergrenadiers to pull something out of the bag against Andy’s US Paras in the last battle, or see the Germans sink to new depths.  With the aid of some cunningly camouflaged flamethrower half tracks Ben was able to deliver what all the other Germans had failed to do, and defeated Andy’s paras in an Encounter mission to jump to the top of the German league, and joint top of the overall standings with Aidan and Red.  Surprisingly the Allies are only 14 victory points ahead overall so far (34 to the Germans 20).

Round 1:

Allies	Vs	Axis	Result	Loss %
Andy Canham	Vs	Ben	1 vs 6	4.3 vs 0
James Underwood	Vs	Rick Andrews	4 vs 3	30 vs 31
Phil Tomkinson	Vs	Ian Shaw	5 vs 2	10 vs 79.4
Aidam Holman	Vs	Pete Derrick	6 vs 1	0 vs 11
Martin	Vs	Dennis Wong	3 vs 2	9.7 vs 28.6
Red Pendrigh	Vs	David Astbury	6 vs 1	0 vs 29.1
Luke Taylor	Vs	Blue Team Dave	5 vs 2	13 vs 25
Paul	Vs	James	4 vs 3	6 vs 77

Main Table:

Player	Company	Round 1	Average % Loss	Points Total
Aidan Holman	British Rifle Company	6	0	6
Ben	SS Panzergrenadier Kompanie	6	0	6
Red Pendrigh	Guards Armoured Recce Company	6	0	6
Phil	Canadian Assault Infantry	5	10	5
Luke	US Parachute Rifle Company	5	13	5
Paul	Guards Armoured Squadron	4	6	4
James Underwood	US Tank Destroyer Company	4	30	4
Martin	US Armour (?)	3	9.7	3
Rick Andrews	Panzergrenadier Kompanie	3	31	3
James Taylor	Grenadier Kompanie	3	77	3
Blue Team Dave	SS Panzergrenadierkampfgruppe	2	25	2
Dennis	Panzer Kompanie	2	28.6	2
Ian Shaw	Panzer Kompanie	2	79.4	2
Andy Canham	US Parachute Rifle Company	1	4.3	1
Pete Derrick	SS Panzergrenadier Kompanie	1	11	1
David Astbury	Panzer Kompanie	1	29.1	1
Player	Company	Round 1	Average % Loss	Points Total
Aidan	British Rifle Company	6	0	6
Red	Guards Armoured Recce Company	6	0	6
Phil	Canadian Assault Infantry	5	10	5
Luke	US Parachute Rifle Company	5	13	5
Paul	Guards Armoured Squadron	4	6	4
James Underwood	US Tank Destroyer Company	4	30	4
Martin	US Armour (?)	3	9.7	3
Andy	US Parachute Rifle Company	1	4.3	1
Player	Company	Round 1	Average % Loss	Points Total
Ben	SS Panzergrenadier Kompanie	6	0	6
Rick	Panzergrenadier Kompanie	3	31	3
James Taylor	Grenadier Kompanie	3	77	3
Blue Team Dave	SS Panzergrenadierkampfgruppe	2	25	2
Dennis	Panzer Kompanie	2	28.6	2
Ian Shaw	Panzer Kompanie	2	79.4	2
Pete Derrick	SS Panzergrenadier Kompanie	1	11	1
David Astbury	Panzer Kompanie	1	29.1	1

Round 2 Games:

To be played by the end of the 5th December if possible, let me know if you have any issues.

Allies	Vs	Axis
Aidan	Vs	Ben
Red	Vs	Rick
Phil	Vs	James T
Luke	Vs	Dennis
Paul	Vs	Blue Team Dave
James Underwood	Vs	Ian Shaw
Martin	Vs	Pete Derrick
Andy	Vs	David Astbury

I leave you with a report from the mouth of Aidan following his defeat of Pete’s SS.  Warning - German players may find the Allied bias a bitter pill to swallow:

“I have very little comment on the subject of last nights gaming. None of it coherent. Most of it involves laughing. A lot. 

in brief:

A fighting withdrawl: Defending are the Hitler Youth, Attacking are the Kings Shropshire Light Infantry.

The huns deployed first, spread thin by the need to cover three objectives: infantry platoons on the flanks, mountain guns and panzers in the centre, and nerbelwerfers at the back. The plucky brits placed their 6pdrs, mortars and vickers in the centre, the main weight of shermans and tank riding infantry went on the right flank, but my largest rifle platoon and half my carriers went on the left: The british plan was simple, Attack on the right, draw as many jerries into a meatgrinder as possible, and then use the carriers and rifles to swamp the objective on the other flank.

This started well, my shermans, carriers and rifles on the right barrelling forward and peppering the nearest huns. A rocket attack spoiled the effect a bit bailing a firefly and forcing a platoon to abandon their lifts however the threat was real enough to have panzers racing through to the rescue through the smoke screen laid to prevent any more help from the rockets and mountain guns. However they were too late: My other rifle platoon dismounted, and with covering fire from carriers and shermans went into the woods to eject the fanatics, while a firefly dealt with the armoured cars. The Youth fell back, allowing the Shropshires to occupy the woods behind the objective. The jerries were back for more moments later with the panzers close behind (but not close enough!) and with some good dice looked like they'd evict the Englanders, but the moral check was passed, the counter attack went in and the Youth were annhialated in short order. Thus when the british turn three started a quick measurement confirmed it: The Shropshires had done it without losing a platoon!

Oh, and the main attack on the left? Never actually moved...

Lack of practice meant mistakes: turns out my mortars do have a range more than 24" (id apparently handicapped myself against Rick the other week!), And not only did my platoons on the left not move but Pete forgot his storm trooper moves for both games that we played! Oh well...

As the campaign game only took an hour we had another game. an Encounter this time. My strategy was similiar except my shermans and their attached rifles were in reserve with my carriers. The battle was much closer with my centre hardpressed and down to a handful of teams when they finally saw off the panzers with my last 6pdr and last PIAT doing sterling work! My attack on the left nearly failed with my platoon decimated just short of the objective. They hold on and three carriers arrived to support them. They went in again driving off the Youth, and came under attack from all sides but somehow held on and despite being down to 3 teams and a carrier manged to survive the attentions of the Mountain guns and forced a second fresh platoon of SS to fall back leaving victory to the shropshires! And the Shermans and Rifles in reserve? Even by turn 5 they hadnt arrived! only 1 of 5 reserve platoons made it onto the table!”