Virtual Lard 2

I spent Saturday 'at' (virtually) VL2: in the morning I ran an IABSM Lite game, with a couple of twists that were only possible on Zoom, and I played SP2 in the afternoon. For a much better report than I can provide for the latter,. do check out Richard Crawley's blog on the subject - great fun and outrageous French accents abound.  Many thanks to Richard for umpiring - excellent game.

I ran a small IABSM scenario set in my favourite corner of WW2 - northern Italy. I nicked an idea from Bloody Omaha in that the Germans were a very small, well dug in force (a section., two '34s, a Stug, a PAK40 and a sniper) run by me as the umpire, and the four  (reduced to three, sadly) players took a cut down British company - 2 sections, a carrier section. 4 Sherman IIIs.

The other twist was that they got a briefing and some recce photos, and from then on (as they were all connected via Zoom) they were restricted to a units-eye view (using an iPhone on a custom stand).

The British reccee photos: an overhead pass and, to quote, "One of the PRU Spitfires made a low pass over the valley this morning. Took MG fire from the church doing it, so the pilot really hopes you appreciate the effort."

They are attacking from the left (south). 

8 Platoon make it across the river, and flush out some Germans in front of the church, as well as an MG34 in the nearer farm,

7 Platoon meanwhile are being very wary of the main farmhouse, in which they keep spotting movement but aren't sure what. CSM Moxon is kept busy yelling for more smoke from the 2".

"Gunner - Jerry tank, right of the pine tree... traverse... no, further right of the wall... fire... GOT HIM!"

We didn't finish, in part because I had three relatively new to IABSM players and was wrestling a bit with the tech. I'd love to run it again: definitely a fascinating game,. and the players seemed to think the viewpoint idea worked.

Mat by TinyWargames, buildings by Empires at War, Battlefront and I think SHQ, figures by Battlefront, Shermans by PSC.

Show prep, and an AAR on one of my scenarios

Spent my gaming time today doing setup work for the show, since we're going to be kicking off trader and game stuff early this year.

Also, to my delight, the Eagles and Lions Wargaming guys on FB posted a video review (I don't think you need a FB account to view it, I may be wrong) of their go at my Valle Della Marie IABSM scenario, which you can find in the 2017 TFL Summer Special (which, like all Lardies specials, contains all manner of good stuff above and beyond that, and is invariably well worth your money). I also ran this twice at OML5, which folks seemed to enjoy. Basically it's a down-and-dirty clear Jerry out of the next bit of Italy scrap for the British.

Chef-du-Pont scenery planning

Merderet; Lower Normandy; France
Looking over the creamery (centre right).

Since we're putting Bloody Omaha out to grass (with possibly one more outing this year), it's time for another IABSM showcase table for 2020, I think. This is Chef-du-Pont, a plan from a few years ago I'm now confident to resurrect (which, you guessed it, is why I've been painting US 82nd Airborne!)

The action is available as an IABSM2 scenario in both "Where The Hell Have You Been, Boys?" (by Rich Clarke) and then again in "All-American" (by Dave Parker), and my aim is to upgrade it, nicking the best of both scenarios, for IABSM3. (At this rate I may have to make good on my threat of rewriting all the former's scenarios for IABSM3!)

I got some playing around with Google Maps and various things done this morning (before the cricket started), and I have a rough idea of what the table layout is going to look like.

The tricky bit is positioning the three areas of interest, the bridge at the SW end of Chef-du-Pont (with the Nestlé creamery, and the other factory to the north), Hill 30, and the Château de L'îsle Marie such that their relative positions are about right, and not too much of what's probably an 8' x 6'  board is wasted on flooded fields. Obviously some of it has to be, as the whole point is that the three areas are linked by causeways across the flooded Merderet, but equally I don't want massive areas of the board that are unused patches of wet, and I do want to be able to model enough of Chef-du-Pont for various scenario events to be meaningful (I'm being slightly cryptic in case you haven't read the scenario :D)

Work in progress in Omnigraffle.

Things have been skewed a bit to fit, but the general relative
positions are fairly close. I'm still considering tweaking the
town and Hill 30 round and down a bit more, but don't want
to compromise on the length of the main street in
Chef-du-Pont.

Having done that, the other problem is scale. I'm doing this in 15mm, and the ground scale is roughly 6mm, so all the buildings are 2.5x too large. Hence, the scenery is pretty much always going to be a sktetch rather than an exact replica.

The creamery, adjacent large building and chimney are pretty iconic, so no-will notice or mind overmuch if they take up too much 'real' space in the area allocated for them. What's now the Rue du Capitaine Rex Combs is lined on both sides by terraces, semis and a fairly distinctive farmyard, and I'm anticipating sketching that with some smaller terraces etc from Sarissa, 4Ground, Empires at War and anyone else who's ended up in my Normandy town collection. Then (if you look at the 1944 picture), the rest is hedged, tree filled fields to the water's edge, and a moderate expanse of empty field across the side road from the other factory (which needs to be there because Reasons). The Chateau is easy as Sarissa make one, and it'l be half hidden by woods anyway.

Not perfect, but it'll do to start work. Tomorrow, though, is play testing for the show day!

Updates for Bloody Omaha, IABSM cards giveaway

Over lunch I edited a couple of new cards into one of my Artscow deck files, for the activation deck for Bloody Omaha (which may give you an interesting clue as to what's been changed), as well as added enough extra cards for the deck I already use to re-run the Ken Macksey "Battle!" scenario, should I ever want to, without sticking labels on cards.

I ran out of card ideas for me, so if anyone uses agentbalzac's Allied and Axis decks from Artscow, I will soon have a number of spare cards printed in that deck's design to handle more platoons (up to 12 a side) and armour (up to 6 a side), as well as a Turn End card and a few odds and sods. If you are such a person, you'd like those cards (pictured below except for the Tea Break card), and you come see me at Partizan, they're yours..

(note the background has always caused Artscow to complain)

More Salute prep

Catching up again after a work day in London on Thursday - so this is Wednesday's update...

Wayyyy back when this Omaha Beach game was first mooted, I wanted to do a bunch of casualty bases to place when particularly big amounts of damage were handed out from the German positions.

This involved a custom order with Command Decision for their medics/casualties, but in the end I only had time to paint the medics. The Battlefront assault company boxes also contained a lot of wounded figures in the middle of being shot, which don't really work on active units, but I thought would make great figures to put on a small base with a Warbases 7mm dice frame to hold kill/shock marker dice.

So, this time:

I found (eventually) the small Really Useful Box with the primed casualty bases, and my four test kill/shock marker bases (as well as more of the annoying Battlefront wounded figures). Unfortunately, I haven't found the box with the rest of the dice frames in :(

WIP at this point - still needed bases painting, and some detail
brushwork.

The casualty bases are now done (Wednesday) - 24 of them with a red mark on the back so as not to confuse them with active units (all of which have a unit designation on the back - e.g. "<29th logo> G 5 Rifle 1"). If I happen to find the Warbases dice frames before about 8pm on Friday I may see what I can do with the casualty markers: however, it's probably worth noting that there are potentially 108 individual teams that could take casualties on the US side, and I'm absolutely certain I don't have enough frames...

...or for that matter micro dice, so if you see me dashing off to The Dice Shop art Salute you'll know why :D

Posh Lard 2017

As promised at OML5...

Sunday July 23rd - a day of Lard in the middle of Peterborough, within walking distance of the train and bus stations, onsite parking.

The club will be putting on a BIG (battalion scale) WW2 IABSM game with space for 5 or so a side: if anyone is interested in bringing anything else to demo, please drop us a note (address on the link). Admission is a fiver to cover hall costs, and can be done via Paypal at the link below.

It's very likely we'll decamp to the local Thai restaurant/real ale pub afterwards - I'll try and ensure they have some cooking lager for Rich :D

http://www.peterborough-wargames-club.org.uk/tc-events/posh-lard-2017/

Battle Report - 19 Dec 2016 - IABSM "The Road To San Marco"

Another IABSM2 conversion, this from Rich Clarke's "Cymru Am Byth" scenario book which tracks the Welsh Guards throughout WW2.

Nice simple set up - the Germans are defending the town of San Marco as the Welsh Guards drive north from Perugia. This was a long-promised teaching game for the club, so we had old hands (if a little rusty) AndyM and MarkJ (long time no see!) commanding the Germans' scattered couple of platoons, a StuG, a PAK 38 and some off table mountain guns, and Carl took charge of the British company and two troops of Sherman IIIs, assisted by Colin, Ash, Pippa and Tom.

Things started badly when I realised I'd forgotten the box with the StuG III in it, but decided I'd brazen it out and let the Germans place a Tiger (with StuG III stats) on the table instead, 'cause after all everything's a Tiger when it starts out :D Carl was most amused. Other than that I made a few tweaks - the British didn't have 2" mortars and PIAT's listed, which seemed odd, so they got them, and the Germans' Kubelwagen got a Panzershrek, just to even things up a bit. (Still not sure what that's intended for - it seems not to be beefy enough to pull a PAK38).

I'll let the pictures tell the story, with a note that this was SO different to a Normandy game - the lack of head-high bocage makes for a whole different approach to the game.

The table. Mats by Deepcut, hills on the left by the Tree
Fellas, remaining hills by Andy Hawes, roads by S&A Scenics...

...factory by Sarissa, railings and  Italian town 3D printed by me.

The fun's already started, as a section of British 3 platoon, sent out in
advance by the CO to see what's afoot,  has dismounted from its trucks,
wandered into the olive grove and just about fallen over two sections of the
German infantry Zug. It was rather rapidly reduced to 0 actions...

Meanwhile, 3 Platoon's mortar is laying smoke...

...while a troop of the 16th/5th Lancers are forcing their way through
the olive grove. The German Zug is rather regretting its decision
to re-enter the trees... 

View from over the olive pressing plant. The other troop of the 16th/5th
has already lost its CO to the Stug - the double 6 to hit (and thus bonus 3
dice) doing most of the damage there. The brewed-up Sherman can be
seen in the distance just to the left of the chimney.

The smoke laying job has been taken over by 1 Platoon up in the cutting on
the hill behind the single house, as 3 Platoon's mortar team just got cut
in half by two MG34s.

The 'Tiger' lurking behind a house. (The roof material is Wills 00 pantile
sheet). Also visible one of the German MG teams and the overall German
CO. (And some Battlefront vineyards, with a heavy ink wash to hide
the hideously bright green!)

Starting to look a little dicey for Jerry now. The infantry Zug in the olive
trees is getting pounded by 1 Platoon and the Shermans, with 2 Platoon
still in its trucks following in the Shermans' wake. Their Panzerfaust has
just missed the lead Sherman centre left. The pall of smoke in the top right
corner reveals where the tanks on the road unleashed on the StuG.

And there we have it. The Germans are pinned and shocked, and about to lose
their bottle. The forces in the village are about to follow their orders, and
having given the British something of a bloody nose, are falling back.

And we finished inside the time available!

Battle Report - 12 Dec 2016 - IABSM "Vacqueville '44"

"Vacqueville '44" is a historical scenario from the 2014 TFL Summer Special, courtesy of the the man himself, Nick Skinner. I suspect it may have been sitting in his files a while, as it's clearly an IABSM 2 scenario, so a bit of tweaking was called for :D

Short summary - the US on their way inland from Omaha Beach have to deal with a German strongpoint in the hamlet of Vacqueville (just south of Vierville-sur-Mer). The summer special has a nice map, but I provided Carl and Tom (the Americans) with a reconnaissance photo from NCAP with some suitable annotations from which to form a plan.

Achtung! Minen! (Minefield from a brilliant idea
courtesy of John Bond.)

AndyB took the Germans, who are very limited in terms of command, and rigged a fairly spirited defence, helped greatly by channeling the Americans around a minefield placed SE of the main farm complex to the SW of the farm track just before it pierces the hedge. He had a tripod MG42 and a PAK 38 firing from the south-westernmost buildings to discourage the Americans from end-around-ing in that direction, which pretty much meant the American attack was through the orchard to the NE of the farm.

One American platoon wound up pinned against the SW/NE hedge, while one came up the bocage-lined road and the other worked its way through the orchard from the SE. Their main problem proved to be a couple of infantry sections, one in the whitewashed house, one against the bocage. While the later was relatively swiftly reduced to zero actions, it did give the approaching platoon something of a bloody nose.

Farm buildings near the camera are 4Ground, the far two
are 3D printed.

By the time that first German section had retreated in disorder, the one in the whitewashed cottage had started to give a very good account of itself, causing most of that approaching American platoon to be very keen to keep its head down.

About then the turn card finally put in its sixth appearance, and the telltale rumble of armour could be heard. Sadly, not German. To add insult to injury, the American FOO finally managed to get some sense out of the battery of 105s on the other end of his radio, and (fortunately fairly inaccurate) shelling began.

The Americans have the orchard, but the Germans in the
whitewashed cottage and the carriage barn do have a
pretty good field of fire...

Sadly that's about where we had to leave it - we're definitely getting quicker with IABSM, and the practice definitely improves matters, though I will be switching from the official QRS (which misses a whole load of small special case rules that happen a lot) to the one from the Sgt Perry's Heroes blog.

Not sure who'd have won this - if the Panzershrek team made it to a suitable vantage point in time, I think the Germans might have been in with a shout, if nothing else because there'd have been a blazing Sherman or two blocking the road. Andy B did a great job holding off the Americans as well as he did.

Battle Report - 14 Nov 2016 - IABSM "Out Of The Frying Pan"

Another club Monday playing IABSM, this time with Carl, AndyMac and AndyB - we seem to be on a bit of a roll, which is good as it means the rules stay fresh.

The astute will notice I need to buy more roads.

As I'm probably writing the scenario up for the Lardies' Xmas Special, if Rich will have it, I'm not going to go into too much detail: apart from that, I was busy playing the Germans, so I didn't get many photos.

In short summary - it's Normandy, on the border between the British and American sectors, and an American company have gone and got themselves trapped (and well beaten up) raiding a German command post. Due to a German counterattack, the Americans can't send help, but (somewhat to their chagrin) the British can.

Sadly, the Panther is already toast.

The counter-attacking Germans are veterans, and well commanded, which makes an interesting distinction from the Americans (well-commanded but short in numbers and ammo) and the British (minimal commanders).

Low spot, from my point of view, were letting the German Top Ace get side on to an unspotted bazooka after his first action, which was probably a major contributor to the Germans not really winning at all.

Also? I must remember that all HE heavier than 2"/50mm mortars auto-pins.

The scenario did, however, seem to work, and we'll try it again in a couple of weeks just to see if it's balanced enough when the German CO isn't being an idiot :D

Battle Report - 7-Nov-2016 - IABSM "The Biggest Bloomin' Convoy..."

Having printed a positive fleet of US trucks (both WC63s and deuce-and-a-half's), I figured it was time to get them on the table.

Sadly, I've failed to find my partial sheet of Allied stars, and the new delivery from Dom's Decals is still in the post, so they had to go on the table merely painted without decals, but hey....

Ok... so. This was always going to be a bit one-sided, but we figured it would be fun...

Allies (me and TomG):

• one American infantry company in trucks in convoy, plus two deuce-and-a-halfs carrying Budweiser, Coke and cigarettes :D
• a troop of 5 M4 Shermans for convoy defence

Germans (AndyMac and Carl):

• one understrength infantry company
• 4 AFVs
• 1 Panther
• 1 Panzer IV
• 2 Stug III's
• 6 blinds (3 x platoon, 2 x company support, 1 x AFVs) + 4 dummy blinds

Woods by me + Woodland Scenics
Roads by S & A Scenics
Hedges/bocage by (I forget)
Mat by Deepcut Studios

The deployment rules were:

• The convoy enters bottom left: it moves on the Allied Blinds card, and may do nothing but use all its dice to advance at full speed down the road, until such time as any part of the convoy successfully spots a non-dummy German blind (or obviously gets hit by something by surprise!). At this point, the unit in question plus the units either side get their cards in the deck. On subsequent Tea Breaks, the next units down and up the convoy get their cards added (plus anything else that spots anything as before) [1]. 
• The Germans get to choose from the top left or bottom right corners to deploy - they may bring blinds on anywhere on the edge of the table within 2' of the corner they choose.

And off we went.

I make that about four feet of convoy...

The Germans went with the top left corner deployment option, allowing them to take advantage of a couple of woods for cover. They also had the considerable advantage of several goes through the (minimal) deck where only the Axis Blinds card came out.[2]

Eventually, at the point the whole convoy was on the table, a Panther appeared down the side road to the left of the convoy, and all hell broke loose.

Two shots, two trucks destroyed, most of the HQ section of the company spilling out onto the road. Fortunately? This included the HQ section's bazookas.

Explosion markers by someone off eBay :D

Unfortunately, one of them didn't survive the attack, and the remaining one couldn't shoot for toffee. That and the one round that hit clanged off the front armour of the Panther. 

Cards start being added to the deck, infantry start spilling out of the trucks and finding cover. Usefully (again), this included the 2 platoon's bazooka. It got a shot at the Stug which had immobilised one of 1 platoon's trucks further back down the convoy, and again there was a resounding clang of bazooka round off Schürzen.

About this point the Shermans managed to spot some German infantry (actually the 81mm mortar section) in the woods at the top end of the road, and began to do something useful. Sadly the Sherman in the middle of the convoy cops a point blank flank shot from the other Stug, and brews up (cries of 'Ronson' round the table!). 

Slowly but surely the US start to mount a fightback. More infantry deploys off the trucks, and a firefight ensues at the head of the convoy between 3 platoon and the German mortars, while the two lead M4s breach the bocage (and avoid getting stuck), and exchange fire with one of the Stug's and machine gun fire with an infantry section. The Stug gets a lucky shot which takes out one of the Shermans (sadly the tank section command).

At the rear of the column, the other two M4's likewise find a way across the bocage, and engage in a much more productive duel with the Panther and the Panzer IV. One of the M4s takes an engine hit in the first round, but the Panzer IV gets a direct hit and is KOed. Next round, both M4s pile in on the Panther, which is flank-on the other side of a bocage hedge, and one lucky shot wreaks carnage in the turret and knocks it out.

Meanwhile, a German infantry section close-assaults across the bocage, and drives off the remains of the Allied HQ section. 

And that's pretty much where we left it. Consensus was, we think, that the Germans had done what they came for, and (being down to two tanks) now would be a good time to bail, especially since the US infantry were starting to deploy and defend the convoy. 

In summary - what a blast :D TomG's first game of IABSM, and he is completely hooked!

[1] This isn't quite how we played it, but how we'd do it in hindsight.

[2] I know some people play without a Tea Break until non-blinds cards are added. We never have - it adds to the fog of war, and that's a win over the rather frequent appearance of the Tea Break card: statistically it all evens out in the long run, but makes for interesting fun in the short term.

Convoy!

Thursday to today's 3D printing. Little bit of cleanup still needed but we have:

• 8 x GMC CCKW 353 Deuce-and-a-half, variously with steel cabs and canvas-topped
• 7 x Dodge WC62 30cwt (one open back and cab, not in picture)
• 4 x Dodge WC53 15cwt
• 1 x Dodge WC54 ambulance
• 1 x Dodge WC57 reconnaissance car
• and a stray Studebaker US6 which seems to have missed the Lend/Lease boat, for the hell of it ;D

Not only will they do for a convoy, one of the scenarios in Belleville or Bust needs a vehicle park at some point!

Designs from m_bergman on Thingiverse

Battle Report - 17 Oct 2016 - IABSM "Caught With Their Pants Down"

The last wargame I played with Nick, in fact: the photos are his.

Usual in-a-rush-so-not-figuring-out-forces setup - US company (3 platoons, HQ with 2 bazookas, 2 mortars, two MMGs), vs the 'classic' IABSM depleted German company (3 platoons, two of which only have two sections) + HQ (2 tripod '42s) and an off table 81mm mortar battery. The US had 3 M4 Shermans, the German's a Jagdpanther.

I took the Germans, deploying (on blinds) one platoon dug in along the edge of the wood centre left, a platoon and an MG42 along the hedge to the centre right, and leaving one in reserve in the farmhouse at the crossroads with the other MG42, along with the Jagdpanther to cover the road.

And it all went horribly wrong.

As you can see in the first picture, there's a US blind making its way up the road. "No problem" thinks I, that's at least two moves up the road. I try and fail to spot it behind the bocage.

The card sequence from here went, as I recall it, "Allied Blinds" "Tea Break", "Allied Blinds". And suddenly, with some decent dice rolling for movement on the part of Nick and Carl running the Americans, the blind is revealed as a full platoon, and it's literally right across the hedge. In close combat range.

Let's just say that getting caught with your pants down (we suspect literally?) by a full platoon is not pretty. What didn't get engaged in close combat, of course, made it into the activation deck for the next turn, and you get a free guess which card of "Allied Platoon 3" and "Axis Platoon 2" came out of the deck first...

Meanwhile, over by the hedge on the other side, there was a lively firefight going between the Allied platoon 1 and the Germans lining the wood. And at least the German FOO woke up and called in 81mm fire on the preregistered target (you wonder WHY that house looked a bit wrecked by the side of the road?). At least we got the US pinned down a bit there until they managed to pull out of the fall of mortar rounds.

Sadly, it didn't go well from there. I decided to pull back the remaining advance platoon to the second hedge line (the L-R road) from the wood, and unfortunately, half of it got caught by some rapidly advancing Americans. And that, as they say, was that.

Too Fat Lardies demo offer

OK, so, as I now a) have both forces for Dux Brit without having to borrow Andy's (which makes me nervous!) and b) am recovering to the point where I can drive distances on an evening again, here's the deal.

If your club is within a sensible distance of Peterborough (90 min drive - including London) and you'd like a demo of Dux Britanniarum or Sharpe Practice 2

Lessons learned

A short post, as I just got in from club and am about ready to fall over (on call all week from last Wednesday doesn't help).

A full report from tonight's IABSM scrap will follow, but I think Andy and Carl wouldn't argue with my observation that when you have tanks and infantry, sending the latter across an open Normandy field without support from the former (and without scouting ahead first) is a recipe for getting very shot up.

1) Dummy blinds are not just there to fool the enemy as to your intentions. They can spot. This is very very useful when you have no idea where the enemy is.
2) Infantry trying to engage enemy infantry who are in hard cover need support from something big and nasty that can fire HE. Even if its at long range: the boom is just as big!
3) It takes most of two platoons to clear an unpinned section out of a building. That was just brutal.
4) Neither Reuben or Rich should be allowed to shuffle activation decks :D