April 15th Game Day at Emerald Knights AAR

We had nine members, plus a cameo from Dave Rosner, for the April edition of our ASL Game Day at Emerald Knights in Burbank.

Dave Franco's Germans fell to Sal Palaez' Brits in “Monty's Gamble”.

In an intense, all-day struggle that came down to the last CC phase, James Quinn's Romanian's squeezed out a win over Ed Esparza's Hungarians in the Bounding Fire scenario “Rebounded Spirit”.

Dan Plachta's Italians defeated Dave Lewis' Mutineers and Dave Nicholas' South Africans in the 3 player scenario “Aiding the Local Constabulary”.

And Eric Visnowski took the Germans against my Russians in “In Deadly Combat” from the most recent Journal. The ROAR shows this 8/3 pro-German, but I thought I had played this one before, and offered to take the Russians straight up. Turns out I hadn't played it before, and I really could have used the balance. The Russians have to capture 4 of 7 victory buildings, and get a 18 x 4-4-7's and 6 x 6-2-8's, backed by 4 x T28's and two KV's to get the job done. The Germans get 10 x 4-6-7's and some conscripts, plus 3 StuG B's. They also get a couple of 37L AT Guns and a 105 ART. Later in the scenario, they also get a platoon of 5-4-8's as reinforcements. I brought my attack in on a broad front, since there was a lot of open ground to cover, and held my 3 leaders back (with sniper protection) to rally broken squads. I set my tanks up for a turn 2 volley of Smoke that would cover my advance past the Germans MG's.

My plan was to go straight up the middle under the cover of Smoke, from there I could shift to the right or left as the attack progressed. I think Eric and I have played too many games together, because his set-up perfectly anticipated this plan, and he set up all three guns in a kill zone that my tanks blundered straight into. One of the weak spots in the Russian OB is a 2 ELR, and as my troops broke, most of them ELR'ed. I had 5 ELR failures in a row in just one fire phase. By turn 3, with 3 of my tanks knocked out and fully 1/3 of my squads down to conscripts, it was obvious my force was too badly depleted to gain any more ground, and I threw this one in. Eric had a great set-up and played a great game. Though my dice kind of sucked, it was my unimaginative plan that did me in. I definitely earned the loss. I have to remember to think outside of the box when I'm up against EV on the defense. We both liked this scen ario, though the Russians need the balance.

And because we had some time, we set up “A Real Barn Burner” from the most recent Journal. This is a small, all-infantry scenario that I've heard good things about. The situation is what I call the 'tactical doughnut'; a small, fanatic French platoon is trapped in a farm complex, surrounded by a company of Germans. The French have a relief company that needs to break through into the complex. The dice gave EV the French, and I took the Germans. I decided to ignore the farm complex, since the VC's require the French to get a squad of the relief force in, I just had to concentrate on keeping them out. The terrain is mostly open, which makes it tough for both sides.

Eric had some shitty luck early, when I took an 8+1 and got an MC against a French stack. The leader boxed and bled out, all 3 squads failed and then one failed again for the LLMC. I slipped a squad into the French backfield and managed to keep the survivors DM for a couple of turns. With only 4.5 turns, the French really don't have time to chase down Germans in their backfield, or loose the use of 3 squads for half the game. In the end, though EV made a good try, but his troops got cut up badly in the press forward and ran out of time.

This scenario is fun, quick and challenging. We both thought it was balanced and well worth the effort. I'd take either side straight up.

We adjourned for our usual chili dog lunch at Larry's Hot Dogs, served by the ever-lovely Veronica. We wrapped up around 10:30, and the survivors had their traditional late dinner at Bob's Big Boy. It was a great day all around!