Silly After Action Report - Poland Gets Somewhat Charred

Scenario Two of Ivan Kent's and my journey through Poland in Flames.  After singeing Poland in the previous scenario the Slovaks were eager to capitalise on this success.  To do so apparently involved scattering their forces thinly across a number of buildings and waiting for a larger Polish force to counterattack.  This the Poles, apparently filled with a burning desire to recapture this tiny sliver of their rapidly disintegrating country, obligingly did.

With Ivan and I alternating attack and defence I was given charge of the Slovaks once again in Scenario BFP-117 - Silent Bayonets (you know as opposed to the noisy kind we're all familiar with).  I hold a bunch of stone buildings at the beginning of the scenario and have to have retained hold of at least six of them at scenario's end.  I start with eight squads (half elite and half first line) guided by a lowly 8-0 officer with a medium machine gun and a light machine gun for support.  Scenario rules say I can't set up in woods, brush or orchards and can only have one multiman counter per hex.  This means I effectively have to set up either in buildings or out in the open.  There is a graveyard but I don't like setting up troops there as I'm afraid of the effect it will have on morale.  In turn two I get another eight squads (again four elite and four first line) herded towards the front by three officers the best of which is an 8-1.  The rescue team brings a pair of light machine guns and another medium along with them.

Ivan's force consisted of twelve first line squads, a trio of officers, a pair of medium machine guns and fourteen concealment counters.  He could stack his troops and set up pretty much on top of me.  Ivan's job was clear, he had to use his superior (in numbers and quality) force to smash my on board troops, seize the buildings and then hold off my reinforcements coming to the rescue.  Somehow I had to cling on to enough of my position to give my reinforcements something to aim at.

My plan was to set up an arc of largely expendable troops forward (although not so far forward that everyone of them could be killed in the first fire phase) and hopefully cost Ivan casualties as he bulled forwards.  The officer, mmg and a squad or two sat back in the south hopefully protecting my reinforcement route.  The remnants of my forward force would pull back to support these rear area heroes.

I was on the record as not being very keen on this scenario; the scattered Slovak set up, the shortness of the scenario (five turns) and the fact that the Poles had plenty of opportunities to plaster my boys with fire from the outset meant that I envisaged that the scenario would be lopsided, brutal and short.  I was absolutely correct, the only thing I got wrong was which side got brutalised.

At start, I've tried to avoid setting up in areas where Ivan can kill me immediately but it hasn't really worked in the north

From the start nothing went right for Ivan.  His dice didn't just desert him, they sneaked back in the middle of the night and cut his throat.  His very first shot was a 16+3 prep fire attempt in the north which resulted in absolutely nothing.  My 6+1 return fire was enough to break a squad.  This set the scene for how the scenario unfolded.  Ivan's dice weren't flamboyantly appalling, they were just bad enough.  Mine (with a couple of exceptions) weren't staggeringly great but coupled with Ivan's rolls in response they were good enough.

To win Ivan had to push forward aggressively, that meant taking risks and he needed some strong prep fire to help him get there.  He didn't get the strong prep fire and his first line Polish troops wilted under normal morale checks left and right.  On the occasions that they didn't break they pinned slowing his progress even more.

I didn't have the strength to defend all the buildings and Ivan captured a number of them in the centre but I was hanging on to enough to achieve the victory conditions.  In the north every single unit he had there eventually broke except for the ones that outright died.  Casualties to me in the north?  One 6+1 leader which I had previously generated by rolling snakes in close combat.  That's right close combat, normally my mortal enemy, decided to kiss and make up with me for this scenario.  Odds of two to one, three to one, four to one?  Who cares, my Slovaks went in hand to hand and more often than not emerged out the other side covered in glory and little bits of  Polish soldier.

End of turn 1, doesn't look too bad for Ivan you might think.  This is about as good as it got for him

As stated Ivan managed to edge forward in the centre and capture some forward buildings but the cost was murderous and every attempt to improve on the situation cost him more casualties as his troops proved unable of standing up to the most lowly of morale checks.  The principal casualty I suffered was a half squad in close combat and a squad which I killed myself through ineffective attempts at rallying.  Meanwhile my troops in the south had swept away the forces Ivan had there just in time for my reinforcements to pile in.  I barely needed them but they probably shortened the game by a turn or two as, with the tattered remnants of his force effectively surrounded Ivan conceded. 

Towards the end.  Slovaks everywhere.  The few remaining Poles are soon to die.

Ivan's calm and good temper as fate hung him up by his thumbs and beat him until he was soggy was a shaming comparison to my own hysterical raving when the same thing happens to me.  So, a victory to me but not one I'm inclined to boast about.