HG4 Cohort and the Phalanx

by on March 16, 2014 at 3:26 pm
Posted In: ASL

Patch came over yesterday for the first FtF gaming I’ve had in months. Naturally, we played ASL. However, Patch wanted to finally give a product he’s had for ages a try: Heat of Battle’s High Ground. I remember reading about it ages ago, and thought that a pair of boards that can be put together for one big hill, while still being geomorphic on three sides was a neat idea. Going through the scenarios a bit, we figured the fourth one was one we could easily do in a day.

It’s November ’40 and the Greeks are in the middle of counterattacking the invading Italians and driving them back into Albania. The Italians start with six 3-4-7 squads, some MGs and ATRs, and two 75mm ART on board, near the board 8 river. The first turn, six elite 4-4-7 squads enter on the edge of board I (that’s a Roman numeral 1), and then the Greeks enter with sixteen squads (split between elite 4-5-8s and 1st Line 4-5-7s) and some MGs and ATRs. The Italians have eight turns to get 18 VP worth of troops across the river (where board II is waiting), with any CVP they pick up adding to the total. The at-start force is guarding the bridge, and cannot start across until one of the entering Italians either gets across the river, or sets foot on the bridge. Oh, and there’s ground snow, so getting off the hill will take some extra effort.

Looking at it a little, I started coming up with a defense for the Italians, and so took the defenders. Sadly, a few things took a bunch of time, and I didn’t come up with a plan for the entering Italians ahead of time. I mostly anchored my defense on the area around the bridge, and a built-up area near the foot of the hillside. I probably should have kept the entering Italians in a tight little bunch, but I let them get scattered as I looked for easy/covered routes down the hill.

HG4 S
My initial setup, with boresighting. North is to the left.
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A50 …And Here We Damned Well Stay

by on March 13, 2014 at 10:15 pm
Posted In: ASL

At the moment, Patch and I seem to be alternating between Budapest and the desert for ASL scenarios. We decided to give ASL Annual ’92‘s “…And Here We Damned Well Stay” a spin. I had the Brits again, but at least I had a static defense this time. The scenario is a bit controversial, with a debate between playtest groups being printed in the Annual.

Certainly, with the British defense resting heavily on a number of ROF 3 guns vs a large number of German tanks, there is no way for it not to depend on the dice. The British are a small force of six squads (with a MTR, ATR and three MGs) and three 57mm ATGs directly in the path of an advance by fifteen PzIIIs (a mix of III Ls, III Js and III Hs; presumably because of counter limits) with two armor leaders. The Germans need to get past the British positions, and several patches of sand and sand dunes, and end a Game Turn with two operational tanks there per surviving British gun. Complicating the defense, the Brits are under Ammo Shortage and moderate dust is in effect, which adds an extra 1d3 DRM to each attack. On the other hand, all the infantry gets to set up in foxholes and HIP as long as they’re in sand hexes.

We both looked at the article, and my defense was largely patterned off of it—I reshuffled the troops, but left the three 57mm guns in place, as the positions are just so logical. I was generally thinking in terms of Patch taking a southerly route through what seemed the biggest gaps in the sand. The ATR went down there, with one of the ATG boresights at the entrance to that path, with another placed a bit south of the hillock. The third went just north of the hillock, with the MTR boresighted on the hillock to aid in getting smoke in there if anyone tried engaging Hull Down behind the hillock.

Naturally, Patch lined everyone up along the extreme north end of the board.

Once the initial wave was on, I decided to start taking ranging shots to try and get a lucky hit that would park a wreck in the middle of his line of advance. But my second shot malfunctioned the southernmost gun. Not only was this bad for me, but Patch suddenly was tempted to go for the south route, away from the still-functioning guns. This sent a tank right over the boresight for my northern gun, but even with that aid, I couldn’t hit with poor dice and lots of dust hindrance.

A50 1G
Situation, German Turn 1, full board. My HIP units and boresighting are visible to show the general defenses. The purple line is the German goal.
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A History of France

by on March 3, 2014 at 8:52 pm
Posted In: Books

This is another Lecturable book for Kindle that I had bought (for $2) before actually starting A History of the Babylonians and Assyrians, and finding out how abysmal the editing was on that volume. Thankfully, it is much better here. There’s still lots of OCR-derived problems, but not nearly as frequently. If most of their books are of this quality, I’d say they’re generally worth what I paid for this one, though no more.

This was intended as a guide to French history for American servicemen going over to France in WWI. However, the book was not actually completed until 1919, making it too late for that purpose. In general, it is a good survey of French history, though as it gets closer to the current (1919) day, it suffers from more and more bias, culminating with an entirely off-balance view of WWI (which given the original intended audience, is somewhat understandable…).

This is quite at odds with the generally even-handed tone of earlier parts of the book. Davis is not a Francophile it would seem, but a raving Third Republic-phile. Indeed, the creation of the Third Republic is the trigger that brings about this shift in tone, as can be seen the following quote: “The ‘Military Law of 1872’ was the foundation for that magnificent fighting engine which, under Joffre, Pétain, and Foch, was to stand between world-civilization and barbarism on so many desperate occasions from 1914 to 1918.”

It is a shame that the book becomes victimized by rhetoric for the last chapters, for it actually succeeds at its primary job until that point.

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A History of the Babylonians and Assyrians

by on February 11, 2014 at 9:48 pm
Posted In: Books

I picked up this book for free in the Kindle edition some time ago. Published in 1902, it is long out of copyright, and offered by Lecturable, who seems to specialize in Kindle editions of older historical works.

It is one of the first overview histories of ancient Mesopotamia written after archaeology efforts started in the region in the 19th century. This makes the scholarship well out of date, but accounting for that problem, it is a well done, and readable introduction to the subject, and certainly well worth the $2 it normally costs if you want to get at the root of scholarship on the subject.

Or, it would be if the text was in better shape. It is, of course, an OCR scan of the book, but it seems to have gotten minimal, if any, editing. Words breaking with a space in the middle (artifact of a word broken between lines, with a space inserted in place of the hyphen?) are an endemic problem, and garbled words (caused by the OCR picking the wrong letter) are not uncommon. In fact, I’d say the book as a whole averaged better than one error per page, except for one section 75% of the way through which was much worse. Any sort of minimal editing with a human pair of eyes would have found the bulk of the problems I saw.

I can’t really complain for free, and the vast majority of the errors were such that the book was quite readable (there was only one case where I was truly uncertain what a word was supposed to be). But, it has made me quite leery of Lecturable’s products, if this is going to be the usual quality.

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Two Rounds of Thermopylae (Middle Gate)

by on February 9, 2014 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: CC:Ancients

With “Came Tumbling After” winding up fast, Patch and I played the ‘Middle Gate‘ scenario from CC:A Expansion #6 over the last couple of Tuesdays. This is the ‘famous part’ of the battle, and features a special rule for three Persian units suddenly coming in behind the Spartan forces (through the pass) with the use of an appropriate Command card. Spartans have a great Hoplite-heavy army (mostly 5-block Spartan hoplites, with some allied hoplites on one wing) lined up on a rampart, against a mixed Persian army with bows, auxiliaries, Immortals (medium infantry with archery like an aux), cavalry, warriors and heavy chariots. The Persians can gain banners by occupying the ramparts and a camp behind the wall. It’s also a long scenario, going to ten banners.

I had the Persians the first time, who go first, but only have four cards to the Spartan’s six. I started with Line Command to start a missile bombardment with the forward line and got lucky enough to reduce one Spartan MH from 5 blocks to 2. After taking one more loss, Patch cycled that unit out of the line as I moved my cavalry up on that flank. Patch then came out in the center to eliminate one of my Auxes. I moved up the warriors and knocked out a Spartan MH at the cost of two blocks on another Aux. The warriors died right after that, but only after taking another three blocks with them.

The lines separated for a little bit after that, until I tried hitting his other flank, and got thrown back with heavy losses. I plugged the Immortals into the center of my line, which had opened up, and Patch rearranged his left flank, putting a 1-block Hoplite into the camp.

I finally had a Leadership any Section card, and sent my troops though the pass to knock out the MH and take the camp. Over the next couple turns, I drove off his left flank, and took down two hexes of rampart before things stabilized. I used another Line Command to re-engage the center and traded units. Patch reorganized and took out a unit of Immortals before I finally used an Order Mediums to re-engage and knock out a couple weakened units. 10-7

Thermopylae Middle 1

For round two, Patch attempted to lead off with archery, but I had Mounted Charge, and used it to try and sweep up his lighter units, planning to retire back to the ramparts as best I could afterwards. For the loss of three blocks, I killed two Auxilia, and drove two more off with losses, leaving a single Aux left on the Persian front line, which I drove off with losses on the next turn.

Patch came through the pass at that point on a Leadership any Section, but couldn’t knock me out of the camp on the first turn, and didn’t have the cards to follow it up quickly. I eventually pulled Demophilus back and took out the Immortals in that force, and got Hydarnes as well. Patch Ordered Mediums to counterattack there and in the center, and nearly killed the MH Leonidas was with, but lost more of his flanking force and nearly his warriors for his trouble.

I moved forward in the center again, and mopped up the warriors and an Aux, and Patch Double Timed the Immortals into the breech. He caused losses, and pushed me back, but lost another Aux in the process. I used Order Mounted to re-work my line a bit, pulling out a 2-block unit while going after the Immortals. I took heavy losses to two units, while almost getting his MC, and finishing off some weakened Immortals. Patch tried attacking that part of the line, and knocked a Spartan Hoplite down to one block, but lost his MC to a battle back after failing to kill a (different) 1-block Hoplite. 10-0

Thermopylae Middle 2

Afterword:
The second game featured really friendly dice. The first game was a long slog (2 hours on Vassal, as opposed to our usual 1 hour/game) that had me down 0-4 before I managed to get any banners at all, and I only won because of the bonus points for the camp and ramparts. The second one was a shorter game where nothing could go wrong for me. I knew I didn’t want to just sit and trade archery with him for the beginning of the game. The walls don’t help with that, and he can trade out wounded Aux for Immortals and then engage me at the wall when I’m down several blocks. So I charged, and never pulled more than a couple wounded units back.

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