Going with a Bang

We had a very close and exciting game on CoC Monday night in Montreal. My favourite scenario in the 1940 source book is Going with a Bang. It is challenging to blow the culverts. This was a pickup game, and as I played the attacker in the last game, I went with being the defender (Chasseur Ardennais) in this game.

Chasseur Ardennais 1 Platoon (FM 9)

Core

SL

GdC 1
GdC 2
DBT Lance Grenade Section
Demolition Team

CoC Dice

Supports (5)
2 Demolition Teams
Franc Tireurs
Red Dice

Schützen 2 Platoon (FM 9)

Core

SLx2

5cm Mortar Team

Squad 1

Squad 2

Squad 3

Supports (9)
Shabby Nazi Trick Jean Claude
Shabby Nazi Trick 5th Columnist
MMG Team
le.IG 18 IG

The Patrol Phase

I will not bother with an AR but will follow with a few photos taken when the game was over.

Charge set!

DBT Team

I was able to quickly weaken the le.18 IG

The German left flank

Almost broke!

The German line of attack

Troops are actually in the house.

The Belgian line of defense

It was a fun game, I made a big mistake exposing my 1st demolition team early in the game trying to take out the exposed culvert. The game then settled in, Pierre-Yves deployed all his squads early on in hard cover behind the wall. He set up a pretty good base of fire. I countered by placing my 2 large Group de Combats in the two houses on my flanks. I then placed my DBT section behind the hedge on my left flank. They wew pretty successful with throwing down smoke mortars.

It was an odd game in respect to dicing, the Chasseurs start with a CoC dice and I was able to accumulate a total of 3 CoC dice before the game ended. I never got a double phase but I believe P-Y had 3, my to hit dice were great but my save dice were awful. I thought I was done for after my 1st demo team was wiped out, but soon enough both our Force Morale's were down to 5 and I had an oportunity to Interupt several of the German phases. I could blow the ciulvert but German FM was 4, I used another Interupt to fire at a team in pinned in heavy cover, they were 6 men with 10 shock. The CdG fired with 16d6, one shock only. The Germans fired back at the DBT team which was supported by the SL, the JL already being killed. Multiple shock and kills, my SL was hit and wounded, the DBT section broke, my FM was down to 1. Time to call it a day, a German victory in one turn!

It was really a great game, and P-Y although new to the game is a great player. I will see if I can get my revenge on Saturday when we start the All American: The Battle for Fière campaign. I am playing the American paratroopers, should be fun.

Chasseurs Ardennais

Cap Badge of the Chasseur Ardennais

After having a good look through the 1940 CoC Blitzkrieg, I felt the most interesting force to game with would be the Belgians. They put up an initial heroic defence especially in the Ardennes, in which the Chasseurs Ardennais played a significant role. The Blitzkrieg source book laid out a fairly simple core platoon with limited supports so I said why not?

In 20mm, there are only 2 suppliers of metal figures that one could use being Early War Miniatures and FAA Miniatures. I decided to go with EWM as they had a slightly better selection with more supports and they are I believe a good supporter of TFL. The order was placed in September 20th, and was mailed out about 3 weeks later. I believe the figures were cast to order. It was pretty expensive coming in under $175, but this gave me a pretty complete core and support force with a few extras. They arrived within a couple of weeks.

I will discuss the miniatures after the photos, but they certainly were a little rough. My painting scheme was as follows:

• Green Tail Light (Vallejo Panzer Aces 308): Chasseur Ardennais beret
• Leather Brown (Vallejo 871): Webbing and ammunition pouches
• Green Brown (Vallejo 879): Uniform
• Black (Vallejo 950): Boots and gaiters
• Khaki (Vallejo 988): Breadsack
• Russian Uniform Green (Vallejo 924): Gasmask container and mess tin

They were primed VMC Panzer Grey using an airbrush and then hand painted. I used Citadel Sepia as a final wash. They came out OK as long as you do not look too closely and certainly on the table they look like a coherent force. I have just recently bought a bunch of metal washers as I wanted to started transporting my CoC troops in magnetised boxes. Up until now I have been using coins. Made a big mistake here though as I not not test the washers to see if they were attracted to magnets. They were NOT! Clearly I do not know much about metals, and of course I never checked until the figures were all based.

My Belgians with the core platoon and supports.

Group de Combat One, this is quite a powerful squad with a Fusil Mitrailleur Team with 2 FM1930 Automatic Rifles and 8 riflemen as well as a Fusilier Grenadier Team equipped with 3 grenades and 1 smoke grenade. They are led a JL with a SMG.

Group de Combat Two, similarly equipped. The FM 1930 AR has a Firepower of 4, so the  total GdC fires with 22d6 .

The DBT Lance Grenadier Section. A JL and 9 riflemen who fire with 10d6 under 18" and use their DBT Launchers at >18" giving 2HE each. They also have 3 smoke grenades each.

The platoon has only 1 SL which is definitely a limitation.

Some ancillary figures: FO, Sniper, Medic and extra JL.

A 5 man Fusil Mitrailleur with a JL and a FM1930 AR mounted on motorcycles

MMG Team here with a Maxim, if equipped with a Hotchkiss M1914 MMG they fire  9d6

47mm FRC M1931 ATG with 5 crew and a JL.

A small 3 man engineering team, no engineering models out there ufortunately, these guys have Adrienne Helmets

T13 B1 Tank

Very nice but very expensive Retrokit Model.

T13 B3 Tank

Armour 3, AP 6, HE 4, Low Profile

I have to admit that I sort of wished that I played CoC in 28mm after painting these figures. Warlord Games has a very nice set of Chasseurs Ardennais which look like they would be nice to paint. I suppose that I should not complain as this is a pretty rare force which can really only be utilized in one very short campaign. The infantry are not bad and do have some variation (5-6 models) but the support troops are a bit of a joke in that I really only think there are 3 basic models which one has to use for the MMG, ATG Team and the DBT teams. There is only one figure with a SMG.

They were very poorly cast, faces a complete mess. I am not sure what the original greens were like but they could do with an improvement. And amazingly enough it appears in early November they re-mastered this line. I am not really happy that I was not told this as I think I made a fairly major purchase but so it goes. I see they have an Off-Table Mortar team now as well as some Belgians tanks so I suppose I will be making another order.

May 10, 1940: Advance to Martelange

 

Blitzkrieg 1940 was released for Chain of Command in the early fall.  This much anticipated  CoC source book is the first released and covers the Western Front in 1939-40. It contains several new army lists, some new rules as well 5 new scenarios. It is a great resource.

I have a good German force already in place and aside from some Early War German AFV's, I can easily field a complete force. But what force to pick on the Allied side? After having a good look through the army lists and knowing my penchant for the underdog (read Winter War Finns), I decided to go with a Belgian Force. Having the Skirmish Campaigns book Hunters of the Ardennes; I decided to go with the Chasseurs Ardennais.

Intersting core platoon with 2 very large infantry sections of 16 men as well as a D.B.T. 50mm mortar section. I will go more into the figures selected as well as the painting process in another post, but suffice to say I painted a lot of figures in 3 weeks.

Going back to the Hunters of the Ardennes booklet, I decided to go with the first scenario describing the original advance of Schützen Platoon of the 1st Panzer Division just after crossing the border of southeastern Belgium from Luxembourg as they advance toward the village of Martelange in the early morning of May 10, 1940. Trying to slow them is a platoon of Chasseurs Ardennais. The OB in the SK booklet had a squad aside with some supports but I decided to go with full platoons as laid out in the 1940 CoC source book using the Going with a Bang scenario. For details of the scenario please refer to the source book, but essentially it describes an action with a defender withdrawing before a superior attacker while carrying out demolitions to slow the advance. Just perfect for the first day of the German attack into Belgium.

Myself and Greg played the scenario this past Saturday. Since this was the first outing for the Belgians, I took the liberty of playing the defender.

The German entry is in the foreground. They are advancing to the northwest to the village of Martelange up a paved road. On their left flank is a hill with a dirt road. Their are a few wooden houses, some light forests as well as some hedges (medium obstacle blocking LOS) and a small stream (minor obstacle) to their right flank. The scenario is set up so the defender has 2 blow 2 culverts on the paved road. Once the terrain was set up I diced for both the position of culverts as well as their size. I threw high so both culverts were large (requiring a cumulative task roll of 12) but placed within 24" of my table edge.I felt this was the best result.

The present google earth view, showing very simlar contours. As ypu can see the road is right on the border. Quite a few more houses now of course. Really difficult to identify the stream so I made it quite small.

View looking to the south. The culverts were placed under the paved road on each side of the house in the near ground.

The Germans start with 4 Patrol Markers on their edge while the Belgians start 24" from their edge. As you can see this gave the Belgians quite an advantage in the Patrol Phase.

The final position of the JOP's, we decided to go with 3 each. I was quite happy to have the high ground.

FORCES

Germans (First Panzer Division)-FM 8, 14 Supports

Schützen Platoon

Panzer I

Red Dice

Pre-game Barrage

Flamethrower Team

le.IG18 7.5cm Infantry Gun

Belgians-FM 10, 6 Supports

Chasseurs Ardennais Platoon with a demolition team

Entrenchement

47mm FRC M1931 ATG 

So the game began, as usual I took few pictures. I used a new teddy bear fur mat as the base terrain, not really sure how much I like it. I think it needs to be trimed down and I need to overspray some colour variation. My Belgian basing also need some work, another spray of mat as well as some flock to the bases.

Greg advanced an infantry squad, as well as placing his IG on his left flank in response to me placing a group de combat in one of the houses and the trees on their right flank. I felt that I needed to have control of the high ground.

The Germans rain down both HE and small arms fire on the Chasseurs but a a 16 man section get take quite a bit of shock, so I was not that concerned. My goal was to get the attacker to focus on the infantry while my demolition team got to work on blowing the culverts. I had also brought in m D.B.T section at the base of the hill to cover my left flank.

Greg advances a PzI up the paved road while advancing another infantry squad to take position in one of the houses. He had also advanced another squad up his right flank. I was able to whittle these down from the Group de Combat on the hill. The pregame barrage made it very difficult for me to bring on my ATG, I believe I failed the 4 times. Unfortunately no photos were taken. You can not see it but a Belgian JOP is just behind the house and Greg rapidly advanced the Panzer on top of it and ended the turn. His squad on his right flank had already taken significant attrition and his FM was down to 5. I lost 2 FM

Ending the turn however allowed me to bring on my ATG in the next phase. First shot, the PzI was gone and the German's FM took another hit. I believe they were down to 3 by now while the Belgians still had a FM of 8. In the photo you can see the Belgian demolition team working on the 1st culvert , the marker dice show a 12 so they are all set to withdraw and blow it. A CoC dice is utilised and up goes the culvert. They adavnce around the house and place charges on the 2nd culvert.

My 1st group de combat has taken some hits but I am able to withdraw them and as noted above the 2nd group de combat deploys and fires at the decimated Geram infantry squad attempting to advance up their right flank. They are able to generate 22d6! and although at only effective range they finish off the rifle team and kill a JL, German morale hits zero, game over.

It was a pretty quick game, I wish it had gone on a little longer. I had a good patrol phase and secured the high ground quickly. I think we only had 3-4 double phases in a game which only went 2 turns, but certainly a decisive Belgian victory.

Blitzkrieg 1940 source book was well worth the wait and I look forward to getting in more games with my Belgian force. I have a game planned with Mike this Saturday I suspect he will be interested to get his Germans on the table.