Italy, 1944

[ochoin]

I'm planning for a WW2 game in early July.

The German players' briefing:

.
You have a well balanced & experienced force at your disposal but you will be heavily outnumbered by the attacking British.

This will not be a conventional battle. There are no Victory Points or tangible objectives as such.
The game will be fought down the length of the table with you starting not too far from one edge. There will be a central spine of high ground, running the length of the table, no BUAs but the odd building, ruin etc. Woods etc to cut down the line of sight. The landscape would favour you. Outflanking you is impossible. Map attached.

Your objective will be to slow the British down & chew up as much British stuff as possible. The British will obviously aim to get as far as possible & keep casualties on some sort of comparative scale with their opponents. This is much like the real campaign. Whilst hasty & fixed defences will be a large part of your efforts, it is suggested you aim to keep the battle pretty fluid: a dynamic struggle of movement & fighting. However, you need not pull back unless the British assemble & use overwhelming force, forcing you to withdraw to previously prepared positions . Counter-attacks are to be encouraged, if practical. Naturally, every asset you have will be concealed ( use numbered markers) to help hide them from air strike (which, BTW, would be very limited due to weather scarcity of fuel etc conditions).

The game ends by the time we run out of time (4-5 hours?). There won’t be a traditional “winner” but both sides will have experienced some tactical master strokes…and some tactical disasters.


.....OK, too nebulous? Comments & suggestions are welcome.

donald

[Norman D. Landings]

Sounds exciting. I’m excited.
Reconnaissance-by-fire seems like the way to go for the Tommies.

[ochoin]

As one of the British commanders, I'm thinking my poor Dingos & Bren carriers (& a couple of Honeys) might bear the brunt.

My newly finished Sextons (3 of 'em) could follow up within range & sight & hammer anything too awful ("Tiger, tiger burning bright...."). I do know my opponents are amazingly aggressive & much like their German counterparts, love a good counter-attack so a bit of caution with the SPAs may be wise. Cromwells around the sides & Churchills over the top. It's a plan.....

donald

[Etranger]

In terrain suiting the defence, then a measured approach is necessary. Break down the battlefield into defined, compartmentalised areas (eg Hill 101, the town of of Sans Souci), and work out how to isolate each compartment from other supporting positions. Use preplanned fire against obvious staging areas or strong points, and mark approach routes. Counterbattery fire is also useful if you can identify a target.

The next trick is to get the defenders to reveal their positions early, preferably without incurring excessive casualties, then absolutely hammer that position with artillery, air support, NGS, (HMS Warspite Vs panzers is amusing for the British https://ww2today.com/7-june-1944-the-ro ... -artillery), mortars etc. Probes by recce units often draw out this information without too many casualties, at least unless your opponents show good fire discipline.

The allies should have a lot of Artillery FO's, at least down to company level, and often up with the leading platoons; & a lot of flexibility in calling in fire missions. Have preplanned fire against obvious staging areas or strong points, and approach routes. Artillery is the British superweapon, & often gets neglected, but an AGRA shoot will ruins anyone's day. http://nigelef.tripod.com/p_massfire.htm

Use lots of smoke to mask other positions, that's what smoke is for. (In BKC at least, smoke is very effective). There's a reason why AFVs have smoke dischargers & why the 2" mortar in every infantry platoon came with a lot of smoke rounds. Again, it's compartmentalising the battlefield, maximising your advantages, superior numbers, good artillery, good infantry; & minimising the German's: long range direct fire from ATG's/AFV's, fortified defences, support fire from overwatch positions.

If your opponents are aggressive, they're often impatient too, so use that against them. If they don't have good targets to shoot, they may well come looking for them. Then they're vulnerable to your own guns. A counterattack at the right time can be devastating but one launched prematurely, or too late, will only weaken the defence.

Get the infantry up close & get personal with the bayonet/grenade. Shoot them in with your support weapons. Don't leave them in exposed positions.

Use your AFVs as fire support. Leading with your tanks is going to be expensive and often futile. One KO'd tank in the wrong place can block your entire advance. (Got your ARVs's & dozer tanks behind the lead troop?) Going 1:1 against an Elefant is going to be painful so avoid doing so.

Your Sextons are lightly armoured artillery. In Indirect Fire mode they will cover the entire table. Don't waste them in shoot outs against armour, They'll lose.

Be prepared to move your axis of attack as the Keep a reserve as an exploitation/counterattack force. It doesn't have to be large, but it needs to be mobile. A platoon in the right place is more useful than a battalion on the wrong side of the battlefield. Make yoyur that your rear areas aren't so choked with troops that you can't move them.

To use an old maxim, 'Artillery kills, infantry occupies'.

[Wg Cdr Luddite]

To go properly historical the German player must be ordered to counterattack immediately when any ground is lost.
The British player in Sicilly should not have knowledge of this in his briefing.
You must, of course, have rules to reflect this doctrine. ie: troops on an objective recently captured are vulnerable to counterattack and counterattacking troops are vulnernable to artillery fire.
Ther Allies had worked this out by the time of Normandy, but in Sicilly they were still learning.

[ochoin]

ET, some good advice.
The Recce rules in BKC are quite reasonable. "Don't shoot, just scoot".
I think smoke will be invaluable. I'll have infantry in trucks as some sort of mobile reserve. I should also add that although I aim to keep the SPA to the rear-ish , I aim to to break up the terrain to make it difficult to get significant LOS for the British FAOs. I don't think a 'turkey shoot' would make a good game.
That's also why I'm limiting air capability & not having any off table gunnery.

"ARVs & dozer tanks"....hmmmm. Wish I had some.

WGL, I've set the date as November, 1944. So the Allies were around Bologna or the Montone River in Romagna (lovely spot for a holiday BTW) & by this time & really quite experienced in terms of German doctrine. As to whether my opponents will counter-attack, my briefing suggests the possibility but it's up to them.

donald

[BaronVonWreckedoften]

To go properly historical the German player must be ordered to counterattack immediately when any ground is lost.
The British player in Sicilly should not have knowledge of this in his briefing.
You must, of course, have rules to reflect this doctrine. ie: troops on an objective recently captured are vulnerable to counterattack and counterattacking troops are vulnernable to artillery fire.
Ther Allies had worked this out by the time of Normandy, but in Sicilly they were still learning.

Surely the British at least would know this, having been fighting the Germans for three years by then (and if not from France and North Africa, then certainly from WW1)?

[grizzlymc]

Standing orders in recce: go up that road till someone shoots at you, then report what it was.

[Wg Cdr Luddite]

To go properly historical the German player must be ordered to counterattack immediately when any ground is lost.
The British player in Sicilly should not have knowledge of this in his briefing.
You must, of course, have rules to reflect this doctrine. ie: troops on an objective recently captured are vulnerable to counterattack and counterattacking troops are vulnernable to artillery fire.
Ther Allies had worked this out by the time of Normandy, but in Sicilly they were still learning.

Surely the British at least would know this, having been fighting the Germans for three years by then (and if not from France and North Africa, then certainly from WW1)?

In the back end of the North Africa campaign the Germans were almost constantly retreating in the face of overwhelming force and open manouevre warfare with very little oppotunity to counterattack. In Sicily they were prepared and able to fight a proper defensive battle. Allies troops. particularly those from 1st Army and the US were facing a subtley different style of battle.

[FreddBloggs]

British doctrine of the whole war was that in attack, bite and hold, then let artillery pound them as they come to you, breaking up counter attacks at their start line. It worked for the whole war too. The other British, well Commonwealth doctrine, was that there was no such thing as n mans land, that land is yours right up to the edge of his pillbox or foxhole.

It was not unusual in an offensive battle for the 7.2" to be in front of the mediums and light artillery to give them maximum depth of fire, the others were much more mobile so were used to move and fire in support.