Silly After Action Report Part 2 Steel Garden of Agony

This could well be the shortest second part of an AAR ever written.  Those of you with a retentive memory may recall that Ivan was poised like a vulture on a branch over the mangled carcass of my force waiting to swoop down and eviscerate the still living victim.  Ivan had two turns to do the eviscerating, he only needed one.  Over on the left hope flared briefly when I rolled snake eyes while attempting to rally a DM'ed, disrupted conscript halfsquad.  Naturally the gutless rats surrendered.  There are almost as many Polish prisoners as there are surviving troops.  Over on the right my mmg crew refused to rally but still things looked ominous but not necessarily terminal.

Ivan had a mass of infantry poised to take the centre victory buildings but a heroic FT17 stood in the way, threatening all who wanted to pass with machine gun fire.  Sadly Ivan had a counter to this.  He had captured my 75mm gun in a previous turn and opened fire.  Missing with the first shot Ivan then intensive fired the gun.  That is he intensive fired a captured gun being manned by inexperienced troops.  His breakdown number was eight and he needed a four to hit me at all.  He rolled a four and shocked the FT17. 

I nearly burst a blood vessel at that point, I'm pretty sure that Ivan was glad he was in another building at that point.  After a brief period of swearing and minor self harm I was ready to continue.  I still had a leader led mmg dominating the open ground, something which I demonstrated when Ivan ran a squad out into the open.  It was drawing fire of course but you can't ignore a squad and an 8-3 shot vapourised it while maintaining rate which probably wasn't quite what Ivan intended.  After that Ivan got sensible and rolled a pair of tanks up to lock my guys up in VBM sleaze.  This helped his infantry charge across the now completely safe open ground and ready for close combat.

Over on the left Ivan reinforced his troops in the remaining victory building by the simple expedient of wandering out into the open.  A 4-3 shot proved incapable of stopping him.  With his tanks now unchallenged he used a pair of them to ruin my day on the left as well.  One dropped smoke which allowed a squad to sidle up to my squad and 7-1 leader clinging to a stone building and nursing fond (and as it turned out totally vain) hopes of sneaking back into the victory building.  In the advance phase he charged in there and into victory building in the centre.

I challenge you to find a Polish counter

I had at first greeted the idea of close combat on the left with a certain amount of calm, I had a 7-1 leader to guide my troops and mitigate their green status and I felt they would give as good as they got.  Sadly the leader was pinned by a burst of Ivan's advancing fire before his troops went in.  Still despite the poor modifiers there was no ambush and I dared to hope.  Despite the pinned leader simply possessing it meant I outnumbered Ivan.  He would attack me at 1-2 odds whereas I would be at 1-1.

I rolled a four which was enough to kill Ivan's squad.  Ivan rolled snake eyes which was enough to generate a leader, adjust the odds, invalidate my result and kill everything I had in the hex.  I did manage to casualty reduce his squad but frankly by this time there was little point.  One tiny flicker of hope still flared.  Over in the centre I had managed to ambush Ivans two squads plus 9-1 leader and I promptly withdrew upstairs.  This didn't solve any of my problems but it did prolong my agony another half a turn or so.

On my turn six I had two squads over on the left reasonably well placed to take back the victory building there if they could survive and in the centre I had one upstairs squad who was, frankly, doomed unless a miracle happened.  A miracle didn't happen.  I fired some prepatory shots which produced no result, Ivan fired some defensive shots which obliterated my remaining forces, what was left of my personal morale collapsed and I surrendered.

In retrospect my faulty set up killed me.  I think the Poles have to set up a bit further forward to challenge the Germans as they advance with their defensive positions anchored by the tanks.  My disjointed tank set up and rearward infantry killed me.  Ivan also diced the crap out of me but actually apart from the effect it had on my personal morale I don't think that was the difference.  With even average dice Ivan would have been able to punch through my set up and seize the necessary buildings.

I'm on the attack next time and Ivan is teasing me with promises of lavish equipment and heavy support for my German troops.  I know what that means, they're going to be asked to do the impossible.  I can't wait.