Holzthum Village 2nd Assault Fails-Bloody Bucket (6b/9)

Another game in our campaign last evening, this was a Blitzkrieg from table 2 to table 3. In a Blitzkrieg you take the troops that have survived the last battle and you immediately attack the next table. There is no post battle campaign process. As you can see from below I was missing 2 full squads. The American were missing 15 men from the last battle.

Sturm Platoon #5

CD 5 Green FM 9

1 SL
3 man rifle grenadier team

1 Sturm Squad w/JL

1 Sturm Squad w/JL
1 LMG Squad w/JL 

Supports

Sniper x 2

Pregame Barrage

le. IG18 x 2 (but missing 5 crewman)

LMG squad

SL

Adjutant

Medic

American Rifle Platoon (missing 15 men)

CD 5 Regular FM 10

2 SL's w/ Bazooka Team

3 Rifle Squads w/JL

Supports (?)

2 Minefields

2 Barbwire

Entrenchment

0.3cal MMG team

Mortar Team

Bofors ATG

I am finding it very difficult to get a good patrol phase in any of these games because the Americans have got 2-3 free moves as the defenders as a part of the scenario design. Really can not advance at all before I am shut down. But not much use whining.

So this was somewhat of an unusual game. As you can see above, I had all my units deployed.....on Overwatch before one American unit deployed. Phase after phase went by, no change, I had 4 CoC dice and P-Y had almost 4. I just do not have the patience that P-Y has so on my next double phase, I jumped the LMG behind the centre hedge over and decided to try to move forward towards the road to try to capture one of the houses to use as a base of advance. See below.

The game then got interesting. P-Y decided to ambush with his MMG team into the entrenchment that was on the road. I interrupted him and was able to take out 3 crewman. He fired back, I was in the open, took a few hits, lost a man or 2 and some shock but was still good to go as I was not pinned yet. I opened up with my le IG18 on the road, no effect. The game then entered an extremely aggressive stage on both sides. P-Y deployed a Rifle Squad into charge range but I interrupted again by retreating, I needed only 6" to get behind the house in safety. I rolled a 1,1,2. I was done for, and my squad routed, but they were a support squad so only took 1 FM hit. But by now all Overwatch's were gone and P-Y got a double phase at a critical moment. He was able to wound my SL twice and kill my Rifle Grenadier team, my morale dropped to 3, I withdrew. I actually only lost a 3 core men in this battle as well as a support LMG team, but I had to add in the results of my previous battle as this was a Blitzkrieg.

The Summing Up: Battle 9 /Turn 6

The Americans have now lost 10 core men on Table 3  as well as 4 men from their support infantry teams and 2 men from their Bofors.

Sturm Platoon #4: 9 dead, 6 wounded.

Campaign Tracker

Germans

Men's Opinion -8 (-2FM)

Overall Commander Outlook Secure

Americans

Not tracked

Not looking good, the best FM I can have now is an 8, very unlikely to move first in any further games, CR of SL is 6". I still have the opportunity to attack another Table in Turn 6, it will be table 6 with Sturm Platoon #2.