CanCon AAR

The journey to our national capital was a rather sombre affair.  Cows were depressingly few and far between and even those that presented themselves to my gaze were thin, scrubby and desperate looking.  Once in Canberra I discovered that a haze of smoke does not improve the city's appearance (although it does reduce the distance at which you can see it which is a plus).  A visit to the war memorial improved our spirits and I got the opportunity to see a captured L3 first hand.  As I admired its brittle, riveted armour and tiny, inoffensive appearance I felt myself uplifted.  I would go forth to CanCon and do mighty deeds in the name of this L3 and all its kind.

So how did that work out?  Better than expected to be honest.  Please enjoy the self serving revisionism below.

Hurricane Biak

The first scenario was Hurricane Biak (which sounds like a Pacific Rim pool hustler) which saw me commanding a bunch of American infantry of the elite and first line variety attempting to prevent (and by "prevent" I mean "kill") a group of Japanese commanded by Simon Spinetti who had decided that the shortest distance between two points involved trampling a bunch of Americans into the dust along the way. The Japanese and the Americans both have ten squads each at start but each side gets a few more as reinforcements partway through the game.

The Japanese need to exit 7CVP off the board and must plough through kunai, light jungle and what turned out to be a less than heroic American defence to do so.  I set up a skirmish line in the kunai to inflict early casualties while I deployed the bulk of my force further back in the jungle in the centre of the board as my main line of resistance.  My reinforcements would hover menacingly around the Japanese exit locations

It's fair to say things didn't work out quite the way I'd hoped.  Simon went around and occasionally through my skirmish line without really slowing down and things didn't really get better when he bumped into what I had (in a fit of outrageous optimism) designated my main line of resistance.  On my left his reinforcements charged towards my rear most defender.  On my right my forces out numbered Simon's two to one.  A turn or so later and they didn't.  In the centre the remainder of my force proved frighteningly mortal. 

Close combat was the American's friend (not quite the way its supposed to be) they died at an atrocious rate but at least took some Japanese with them.  At the end of the fifth turn (of six) Simon was yet to exit any troops.  Unfortunately functional American forces had been reduced to the equivalent of one and a half squads while half the Japanese army was jostling for position around the exit locations.  I conceded while some of my force was still alive.  L3s everywhere sobbed oily tears at their champions fall.  0-1

Checkmate Kaiapat

The second scenario kept us in the jungle as a bunch of frighteningly good Australians charged forwards to do battle with a group of terrifyingly inept Japanese.  I don't think I have to tell you which side I had.  This was a meeting engagement the Japanese weren't expecting and to simulate their lack of preparedness special rules dictated that they were not stealthy, couldn't deploy, couldn't HIP, had to set up and enter without concealment and didn't get their usual ambush bonus.  Pretty much the only thing left was to stuff the whole lot of them into a sack and beat them repeatedly with seal clubs before the scenario began.

My opponent Tim Reade and I both thought the Australians had it made in this scenario but only Tim had the courage to put his money where his mouth was and bid Allied 1.  This left me with the Japanese while Tim swapped out an 8-1 for an 8-0.

The Japanese force consists of a handful of squads and an equal number of halfsquads defending against a more powerful Australian attacker.  The Australian's had to capture a hill and a majority of huts in the village nestling behind it.  Both sides got a bunch of reinforcements, the Australians were good, the Japanese not so much (plus they entered CXed having used half their movement).

My set up was constrained by having to set up on or very near a path somewhat forward of the village I had to protect.  My first move consisted of fleeing as much of my force rearward to stick them behind the distinctly flimsy walls of the huts.  Simon's onboard force moved to outflank my defenders while his reinforcements charged straight for the handful of throwaway troops I had left on the hill so that he couldn't just waltz onto the victory locations.  Fortunately for me Simon got a little drunk on HtH CC.  Another special rule stated that the Australian's could declare hand to hand CC if they so chose.  Simon so chose as he attempted to sweep my defenders from the hill.  This in my view was a mistake as my expendables stepped up heroically and slaughtered Aussies by the bucketful.  I mean, they died as well of course but the body count was well in my favour.  This kept the hill in my hands for a turn longer than would otherwise have been the case and in my view was the difference between  defeat and victory.

The remainder of his force swung around to my left and started assaulting the village but my reinforcements puffed their way into the unoccupied huts before he could push through what was left of my at start force.  The remaining turns were a remorseless grind as the Australians slowly drove the Japanese back but when the final turn came Tim was still two huts short of his target.  He would have to lunge into two close combats and win them both or so it seemed.  The first CC resulted in mutual obliteration thus leaving the hut in my possession but it was adjacent to the other hut in dispute.  If Tim could ambush me here and kill me outright he could withdraw into the other hut for the win.  He didn't ambush me but did kill my boys in the ensuing CC.  He pointed out that if I rolled a boxcars on my return attack he could still infiltrate forward into the other hut.  I picked up my dice cup and rolled...eleven.  Has anybody ever won a scenario by rolling an eleven before?

So a victory to Neil.  L3s everywhere revved their engines in approbation.  Of course being L3s a number of them promptly broke down but there was approbation nonetheless. 1-1

42nd Street Boys

The next day with a not entirely undeserved win under my belt I sat down opposite Dave Wilson to play 42nd Street Boys.  This is another meeting engagement set on Crete where a bunch of German mountain troops pour onto the board and try and grab so many stone buildings that the bunch of Maori and Australians coming the other way can't snatch them all back.  By SSR the ANZAC troops can launch banzai attacks if they want.  As it turned out Dave wanted.

I had the Germans in this scenario played on half of board 42 (nothing to do with the scenario title).  I tried to snatch as many stone buildings as I could.  This spread me out but I had reinforcements coming on on the second and third turns to build a solid defensive platform while Dave's troops ploughed their way through my first boys.  Dave had eight squads of Maori divided between elite and first line coming on at start and another five squads of Australians hitting me in the flank from turn two.

Things didn't start off so well as Dave sneakily used mortars to drop smoke on my forward defenders who ran or died depending on their proclivities.  In return my mortar laminated one of his mortar crews across the forest.  Still Dave was off to a good start but I had used my reinforcements to build up a solid position while he was struggling through my outliers.  The the Australians turned up with blood in their eye and Banzai! on their lips.  Perhaps if they hadn't had so much blood in their eye they might have thought twice about the banzai.  It certainly carried them across the open ground to the heart of my defences without loss.  The problem came when they plunged into close combat with my defenders.  They died, a lot.  I don't think there was actually an Australian left by the end of the scenario.

Which left it all up to the Maori.  Sadly (for Dave, not so much for me) they came up short and I was left clinging to an ample supply of stone buildings.  L3s drove in circles, firing into the air and inadvertently surrendering to each other. 2-1

Jackpot Jones

The next scenario was from the Hatten in Flames CG and pitted a powerful force of Germans (commanded by me) against a pretty impressive bunch of Americans commanded by Dave Wallace.  He had troops, bazookas and M18 tank destroyers but it didn't matter.  The most important thing he had was a 60mm mortar which went on a rate tear in the second round and wiped out about a third of my force whether they were running in the open or hiding in stone buildings didn't matter, they were smashed and so was I.  There really isn't much more to say about this one.  Technically the Germans had to occupy certain building hexes.  They didn't even get close, with the casualties I'd suffered I could either be cautious and run out of time or be reckless and run out of troops.  I stumbled on for a turn or two until Dave let me concede out of kindness.  L3s raised a wailing cry of despair to the moon which looked embarrassed and tried to slip away under cover of darkness. 2-2

Barbarossa D-Day

And finally an old favourite.  A small group of Soviet soldiers attempt to hold a village from the ravening Germans.  To support them six T-26 tanks turn up on turn three.  The Germans have seven squads of motorcycle troops, led by a 9-1 and supported by an armoured car.  On turn three they get a trio of tanks of their own in case the Soviet ones feel lonely.

All the armour is incidental.  The Germans win by making sure there is no good order Soviet infantry in the village.  They also have to have at least one AFV intact themselves.  I got the Germans in this one and prepared to introduce blitzkrieg to my opponent Dave Shannon.  In turn he introduced a bullet to the head of my 9-1 on the very first movement turn of the game.  My leadership was reduced to a rather lonely 7-0.  He also managed to break two squads of my meagre seven.  I was wondering if turn 1 was a little early to concede.  There was one ray of light.  One of the roads circled all the way around to the rear of his village and with his forces busy raining hell down on the troops directly in front of them a pair of squads (and the 7-0) gunned their bikes and roared up to the village in the first turn.  Not completely without loss a half squad was shot off his bike along the way but the remainder jumped into a building occupied by one of his lmg squads.  From now on Dave would be looking both ways.

Which was good as my frontal troops spent the next turn or two squirming forwards one hex at a time while their comrades sobbed with terror among the trees.  Dave had set up a pair of squads (and his other lmg) forward of the village proper and these proved quite enough to slow me down.  In the back field my flankers proved their worth by killing a squad in CC when he tried to evict them but it was unlikely they could take out all of the garrison on their own.  Then everything happened at once.  I broke not one but both his forward squads just as my armour arrived.  A pair of PzIIIs were sent deep into the rear to cover the entry area of his own armour while the other added its firepower to the armoured car and such of my infantry as could be persuaded to stop hiding under logs and move forward.

Dave's armour rolled on and just for once I won an armour battle (it helped that he wasn't shooting back) with a combination of APCR and rate I took out three of his tanks before they could fire a shot and the remainder scurried towards the village where things had settled into stasis again.  His broken squads had fled back to what turned out to be a 9-0 commisar who rallied them immediately.  I was still short of infantry and the advance slowed to a halt.  But with four AFV only one of whom had to survive the battle I was ruthless and drove my armoured car right up to his newly minted death star and broke them all.  Getting very brave now that the enemy was down my remaining infantry pushed forward too.  When I broke his one remaining squad and forced them to rout away from the village Dave conceded.  3-2

So 3-2 for the tournament, my best result at CanCon which is not too displeasing.  Many thanks as always to Andy Rogers who organised the tournament, provided the scenarios and booked dinner at restaurants.

Serried ranks of L3s roll in a victory parade down the streets.  From somewhere the ghost of Mussolini looks on with a gaze of pride mingled with disbelief.

My inspiration (almost actual size).