From: Markus Stumptner Subject: [consim-l] Replay Landships scenario 4 Last Friday we finally played Landships scenario 4 (Gorringe's flotilla) in ftf mode. To recapitulate, the British task (actually, the troops are Indian) is to sail past an ART gun on the first map, take a town on the second map, also watched by a gun, and then take the town on the third map (in this case an ART gun is located on the waterfront inside the town, with a good field of fire down the river). Ironically I found that in my solitaire game last month I had set up the first gun on the wrong side of the river - it had a much better field of fire in this game. This did not matter though as it failed to score a hit in its first salvo and was promptly destroyed by the British gunboats. The flotilla then sailed on, gunboats in the van. It was relatively slow going due to all the river bends. Instead of opening fire at long range, the gun on the second map waited until the gunboats had almost reached the town. It opened fire at range 5. The first hit sank one of the gunboats, whereupon the gun switched targets and damaged some of the other gunboat's weapons. This impressive display was to no avail though as the second gunboat returned fire accurately and convinced the gun crew to abandon their post. (On the next turn they changed their mind and started to return, but were caught out in the open and killed.) One of the steamers unloaded its troops next to the town. This resulted in a fusillade from the troops in the town, who were all facing the waterfront, and pinned half the invaders. However, the return fire was worse. Last time I played I had not used the rule that platoons on steamers can also fire to its fullest. This, together with the machinegun fire from the second gunboat, immediately cleared out the machinegun nest in the town, and proceeded to empty the rest of the place. The ships eventually went around the bend in the river out of sight, but resistance had been broken and the last platoon remaining in the town was eliminated by the attacking troops with no problem. In the meantime the gunboat had gone ahead and with accurate spotting from the observing plane, was creating havoc in the second town. The first barrage eliminated the ART, which never even laid sights on the gunboat, and further salvoes continued to do damage. The steamers proceeded unmolested up the river and by the time the troops landed, there were only two enemy platoons remaining in the town, all the others had been spied out and eliminated by the observer plane/gunboat combination. I do suspect that this performance is a bit better than would have been possible historically. Anyway, with time pressing and no machineguns around any more (at this point Brian McCue would remark that this scenario should best be played double blind refereed with some simple sighting rules, and he'd be right, too, because then you couldn't be sure), the troops from the two steamers debarked in two humongous assault columns, all four from each steamer in one hex. These proceeded to display their mastery of the Second Foot Troop Movement Phase Trick. One succeeded in quickly eliminating its counterpart while the other caused them to bolt from the town. At this time, with one turn to go, it was clear the outcome would be a British win and we ended. At this point we are considering a houserule to eliminate said Second Foot Troop Movement Phase Trick, which consists of moving adjacent to an enemy who is hiding out of sight (e.g., inside a town) in that phase, and then firing in the Small Arms Defensive Fire Phase. What this means is that if the defenders retreat into the interior of, say, a town, to avoid your murderous artillery fire directed by FO's half a kilometer away, your infantry can use this trick to get adjacent to them and be guaranteed to fire first. There is nothing the other side can do except retreat further into the town and then move back into place in its own 2nd FTMP, thereby missing its own chance to fire offensive fire. Which is just weird. (Doesn't ASL have something like this, too?) At the moment, the simplest way to handle that I can come up with is to say that you can only fire Defensive SAFAs at targets that either moved in the preceding 1st FTMP, or that have fired at you, but we have to try this out first to find the ramifications. Such a rule could also give a better chance to the Turks in the above scenario, which now has a 2:0 record for the British (with different players on the Turkish side). Victory for the Turks seems to hinge mostly on the question of whether they manage to take both gunboats out of the fight (which removes British fire support and also offers the chance of savaging the steamers) before all their ART guns are taken out. Even going for a steamer first does not seem to offer great chances at victory as the British seem to be easily able to take each town with a single steamer's troop complement. Anybody who has played this scenario and won as the Turks, please let me know what happened in your game. Markus Last games played: Seven Seas to Victory, The Aleutian Campaign, Landships ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Tanks...show why a handful of Israelis have managed to defeat a horde of enemies. Israeli tanks have several advantages, like superior attack factors, defense factors and range, and doubled attacks out to six hexes" -- "The Pieces of AIW", GENERAL 24(3) From: Markus Stumptner Subject: [consim-l] Replay Landships scenario 5 Having gotten through Scenario 4 within not much more than 2 hours, we then started Scenario 5 (A New Excaliber ). This one has a British tank-supported assault on German trenches. British infantry starts in no-mans land in front of the German wire, supported by four tanks (three male and one female MkI, with one tank leader, Lt Storey, in the female tank). Ironically, in my tenth game, it was the first Landships scenario I played that actually had tanks. (Which has more to do with the fact that I approached the scenarios in a linear fashion, as all 15 scenarios that follow later in the scenario book do have tanks.) The Germans only have a partial trench system, but a wire barrier across the map. They also have some onboard guns, and a number of machine guns (which the MkI's are vulnerable to). Special rules preclude mechanical breakdowns for the MkI's (wonder why). The British victory conditions specify that they have to hold the village in the center of the German lines for three turns without any Germans entering it. Since the scenario is only nine turns long that means they have to get in there fast. Playing with optional rules made quite a difference here as the male tanks had a significantly tougher time hurting the infantry. (Under optional rules, where the HE firepower of tank guns is more differentiated, their 57mm guns are worth only 4 strength points instead of 10.) Also, the MkI's are so slow that the male tanks need several turns to reach the village. On the other hand, the Germans suffer from Tank Fright. Gas is forbidden by the scenario rules, both sides rolled 'D' on the AFMT, and the British rolled Destructive on the BAT and had to fire Shrapnel (which put their artillery at a distinct disadvantage, as with the exception of one ART, no German unit sets up in the open, and none will move out into the open if the German player can help it). In play, German artillery fire was fiendishly effective (lots of luck on the FOT table), the FO got a salvo in on each of the first three turns. (This did, however, merely counteract the fact that the German player forgot to fire his on-map ART on the first three turns, relying completely on OBM's, despite the fact that the restriction that on-map ART can only fire directly only applies to Infernal Machines scenarios. The on-map ART is not in LOS to any interesting places in this scenario so indirect fire is in fact all they can do.) Anyway, as a result, the British infantry found it quite hard to get across the wire. One of the first German salvoes caused one MG (Pinned by artillery) to skedaddle back to safety. A two-platoon stack with the British FO was killed by artillery on turn 3 (note to self: remember not to stack a FO with anything), and one of the German flank guard platoons was close assaulted by two British ones, which resulted in everybody being eliminated. Overall the British infantry suffered 50% losses by turn 4. The tanks did OK however, only Lt Storey's female tank had suffered a temporary breakdown as a result of MG fire after moving adjacent to the town. Also, the German FO had retreated from Lt Storey's tank to a part of the town where his field of fire was restricted as far as the tanks were concerned (although he could still see half the surviving British infantry). So we concluded that at this time, it was more than likely that the British would achieve at least a draw. They don't have to kill the Germans, just get them out eventually. It being very late and both our brains turning to mush we adjourned. I decided to finish solitaire on the next day so we can get on with getting through the scenarios. The Salmson CS aircraft, working as artillery observer, had already placed one effective barrage that caused the one ART crew in the open to run, and on turn 4 landed another one that killed one of the ARTs in the woods (due to the shrapnel that means rolling a '1' to hit). (It was not the one aimed for, but the barrage scattered into an adjacent gun.) With hindsight, it might have been more useful to have this aircraft go for the German FO all of the time as it would also have been able to then immediately try to fight the German reinforcements as they approach the village. I briefly thought about moving one of the MkI's across the bridge to attack the other ART's but decided that that only placed it at a higher risk and taking out the FO would be more effective (the Germans get no observer aircraft). The male tanks laboriously approached the village. To illustrate how laboriously, in our last turn at night, one had been lined up to face a woods hex. Moving the hard-to-steer MkI one hexrow over so it had a clear path to the village took 4 extra MPs. With a total crosscountry speed of 3, one has to plan their moves very carefully. This move still carried all the tanks out of sight of half of the four German MGs for now, as the woods got in the way. Lt Storey managed to repair his tank. The Aircraft Phase saw all aircraft swooping to the hex from which the Salmson was directing the barrage. The second Fokker manages to shoot down the Gunbus (as John had remarked earlier, "there is a reason we have never heard of the Gunbus Scourge"), and the Salmson is also downed. No more artillery spotting for the British. The Fokkers swoop off to engage in some strafing by the optional rule. Two British MGs reach the village in the 2FTMP. In the Offensive Fire Phase, two of the male tanks fire to eliminate one of the German MGs covering the town from the nearby woods. The German FO fails to place any barrages this turn. The British MGs Pin the FO and platoon stacked with him. The Fokkers swoop down to strafe the two platoons in the open, one aborts to avoid AA fire (it's in the field of fire of no less than 2 inf and 2 MGs) and the other one comes in but misses. One more go for each of them. In the German Offensive Fire Phase, a German platoon rolls snake eyes to eliminate the British platoon next to it in the woods. If only it had fired at the double MG stack! :-) The ART crew that ran away gets back to its gun now that the British spotter plane has been shot down. Lots of German reinforcements come on the map, the British MG shooting at them narrowly fails to hit any. Start of turn 5. If the village is not cleared now things will get tight for the British. One of the males and Lt Storey's tank get into town, and Germans run in all directions due to Tank Fright. One platoon remains, Pinned, on the other side of the village, but the flight of the troops in the village center allows the two MG platoons to approach. German defensive fire Pins the MG that covered the German approach, and concentrated fire from the MGs in the woods to the northeast causes one of the male tanks to break down (again, temporarily only). It comes to a rest next to another MG platoon which it sweeps with its guns, eliminating it. Again, one strafing Fokker is aborted, while the other achieves no hits. All aircraft are now out of the game. The most critical decision in the turn is whether the two British MGs will now enter Close Assault against the unit in the remaining village hex. (Hint: I played it wrong but since it's a solo game I got to try again.) Experience says Close Assault is very bloody. The tank they are stacked with (which does not get the "enter a Close Assault hex" bonus move) could not have reached the hex, so they will not get its support and firing may be preferable, given that 2 MGs can provide considerable firepower. At 8 FS with no modifier, however, they only have a 50% chance to get a hit, much less eliminate the Germans. There is another infantry platoon nearby, adding it would increase the chance to 2/3, but it would be very useful to fire at the nearby 4-unit stack with German reinforcements and retreating units. There is the tank stacked with the MG's but the target unit is dead ahead so only one of its MGs can fire, and it would increase the total modifier by +1 for having moved, doing more harm than good. It will instead try to spot one of the platoons that just fled from the town into the woods along the river. Close Assault would see the British attacking with a 0 differential (+1 differential but -1 for a town) and a 2/3 chance of slipping into the +1 column (the MGs have morale 5). The MGs provide a -2 DRM. Thus, if the +1 column happens, they are guaranteed to clear the hex, with a 1/6 chance of losing one of the MGs. If they end up on the 0 column, they have a 2/3 chance of winning, and a 1/3 chance of losing one platoon for no gain. Thus, overall odds are 8/9 for a favorable outcome, which is (somewhat to my surprise) clearly preferable to firing at the target hex. The British decide on Close Assault. They get the column shift and eliminate the Germans at no loss. A German victory is now out of the question. In their turn, the Germans move the first flamethrower stack adjacent to the British MGs. Defensive fire is ineffective, although the nearby infantry platoon manages to pin the second flamethrower stack out in the open. The FO moves into the open but is not spotted by the tanks (no infantry around to shoot at him right now). Now the Germans have to decide what to do. Their stack contains 3 platoons with a flamethrower, so a Close Assault against the MGs will happen on the +1 column (+1 differential, -1 for town, automatic +1 for MR 5 troops with firepower 21+). The modifier is 0 (-2 for the MGs, +2 for the flamethrower). This means a 1/3 chance of victory, 1/6 of damaging the enemy without losses, and 50% of both sides taking losses. If they fire, they have a 5/6 chance of doing some damage, but only a 1/6+(2/3*1/3) chance to eliminate the enemy (which would allow them to enter the hex in the 2 FTMP). This translates to 7/18 or about 40-45%. It would also be sufficient for the platoon with the flamethrower to fire, and the other two platoons could fire at the neighboring British infantry. I choose to fire and then in the 2FTMP simply spread out to reduce the effects of return fire. One platoon with flamethrower rolls 2 on both dice, resulting in elimination of the MGs, and enters the town in the 2FTMP. The other units fire separately at the adjacent infantry and Pin it. On turn 6 the British tanks move southwards, predictably sending the German troops running in all directions. One of the British Pinned infantry platoon dies from long range MG Defensive Fire. Tank fire from the village kills the German FO, and the incoming British reinforcement MG kills one of the fleeing German platoons blocking its way. Heavy defensive fire also Pins the second flamethrower stack, now adjacent to the town, as well as the sole surviving platoon of the first one, now trying to get into the woods next to the river. However, the Germans manage to run one platoon back into the village from the woods despite crossfire from two of the tanks. (It started in the woods, could move two hexes per FTMP along the road, and ends up in the hex that was vacated by the elimination of the British platoon in the Defensive Fire Phase.) Since it starts turn 7 in the town, the overall outcome is a draw. Markus Last games played: Seven Seas to Victory, The Aleutian Campaign, Landships ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Tanks...show why a handful of Israelis have managed to defeat a horde of enemies. Israeli tanks have several advantages, like superior attack factors, defense factors and range, and doubled attacks out to six hexes" -- "The Pieces of AIW", GENERAL 24(3)