marcdhanna
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Joined: 3/29/2016
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Battle of the Lastekodumägi AAR
First play, very difficult, FoW.
No graphics for this one because it's time consuming, more so for larger scenarios like this. 33 Russian squads attacking a gaggle of gunned-up SS troops entrenched on a hill. Russians need to capture a bunch of objectives on the hill and will die trying, no doubt.
ASL players will frown, but there isn't much choice but a flanking strategy using board edges for security. As is often the case in these early scenarios, the scenario designer has chosen the setup – at least for the Russians. I'm starting not to like this; I prefer to make my own plans. However, it is certainly easier for new players to just jump right in without having the annoyance of a setup time.
What is going to happen (and did) is a sacrifice of the central Russian squads in order to draw enemy fire from the MG on the hill, so that the flanker squads north and south can move relatively unimpeded on the objectives and overwhelm the units that are in front of them – with tank support. They are to (and did) secure the flank objectives before curling behind the Germans in the front line, in order to grab the objectives higher on the hill in the final turns. It worked, barely, and the human cost was tremendous – 16 / 33 squads KIA. I think two German squads, a leader, and a gun crew were the only Axis losses. Seems very realistic outcome for human wave type tactics.
To start: so excited was I, that the two batteries of OBA were neglected on GT1. I was moving before I noticed two leaders were carrying radios! Glupyy!
I never forgot those assets again – but their effectiveness was nil. I think I broke and wounded one leader. The enemy OBA was even less effective, missed every time.
[something could please be done about overly random OBA; does not represent WW2 artillery accuracy; right now, it's too much of a crap shoot. The other thing – already mentioned somewhere – is that the screen does not shift to where the OBA is falling, so the player just sits there. One more thing – I think the animation should speed up on this OBA (a lot). Hearing 4-5 seconds each of plunging fire sound effects – on 7 hexes and tapping fingers as yet more empty hexes are shelled --- well you get the idea]
The tanks were effective, bombarding key points, using machine guns to keep B+ status. Silly tank commanders forgot they were in restricted slow turrets and went CE – and were told they could not fire in DFPh RT1. Since they would be CE anyway on turn 2 for Prep Fire, I decided to move them up, which was a good idea because it took them both out of the CA of the 75mm ATG. Which never did much, anyway. It broke early on, then when it finally repaired, it shocked and immobilized one tank in the rear. But that tank continued effective fire. I did lose one tank to a long range PF shot, which was annoying. The ATG I somhow managed to get into CC/Melee even though it was in the center of the board, and neutralized it, though I finally had to send in more squads on the last turn (from the flank victors) to take it out.
So on the last turn, I was able to take enough victory hexes for a minor win. But it was brutal. Once again, the AI could have advanced some troops into some victory hexes he had driven me out of. But didn't do it. Could have tipped the balance.
By the way, although the scenario info says it's 7 turns, it's really only 6.5 turns, which may be why I won, the enemy did not get one last counterattack.
Overall, exciting scenario, highly recommended.
Points
1) see above about OBA
2) AI has got to follow up on it's counterattack successes
3) altogether many SW and MA are breaking. Esp Russian MG.
4) Seemed to me one of my guys in an OG trench was eliminated for failure to rout?? Such units disappear quickly from the screen, so it was hard to tell.
5) Graphically I am not seeing the broken units highlighted in the rout phase as was mentioned somewhere in the manual?
6) Again, why have a pregame setup phase when nothing can be set up? Unless I am missing something...same for empty reinforcements segments, of course these are less of a nuisance because you can check the OOB to find out if there are really any coming.
7) Some issues of AI squads failing to shoot at all, esp inherent firepower, when they should. Usually, though, it never forgets the MG units!
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Prajñāpāramitā
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