Thursday, 17 April 2025

Wargames Wednesday Solo Game - AND Some Impulse Purchasing!

Taking on Bens suggestion from his comment on the post before last, yesterday evening I played the Red Army counterattack after the successful defence of their village. Given my lack of any Barbarossa era Russian kit in 28mm, I reduced the scale to 15mm - which also allowed the playing area to expand slightly. I placed the vehicles and infantry in roughly their finishing positions from the previous game, including the hits they were carrying. 

A pack of 26 activation cards, 14 red and 12 black, including an ace and king of both colours. Russians got 3 x KV1 when the ace turned up and extra infantry for the king - the Germans got 4 x PzKfw III and an air attack respectively. (They started the game with a PzKfw III on the table. The Russians started with 3 x T34 to lead the advance)

As the Russians had the initiative, being the attackers, they went first and had 4 extra turns in total. They had 26 turns to drive off the Wehrmacht and make it to the far side of the table.

But before we move on the game report - a quick break for my impulse purchase!


Feeling like a break from the "excitement" of work yesterday, I sloped off to do some work-related visiting, but a tad earlier that technically necessary - and dropped into our local Hobby Event Centre for a bit of a browse, with nothing specific in mind.


After putting the world to rights in conversation with Andy one of the owners, I noticed a few neoprene mats I had not seen there previously, including a 3' x 3' one. Having asked the price of the guy at the till, I thought it over for a minute - but then went with "he who hesitates, is lost" and bought it!


A perfect size for my 29" square table, I had it in use within a few hours!


Table layout, with the Russians at the bottom. Most of the stuff seen here was removed before the game commenced


View from the German side - infantry, SdKfz 251 and PzKfw III in positions they ended the previous game in.


End of turn one, the T34's approach the ford where the destroyed halftrack from game one is still burning merrily!


Turn two, and hits have been made on both sides


On turn three, the right most Russian infantry unit is up to 4 hits and forced to do a rally next turn, but the Panzer has been knocked out by the leading T34. Not really a fair fight - the Panzer III versus the T34 armour is rolling at -2 modifier, whilst the 76mm gun of the T34 is +2!


The Russian T34 barges the wrecked SdKfz 251 out of the way and rumbles across the ford in the river.


The Russians get a third turn in a row, and it's the red ace - so the KV1's arrive at a randomly generated (by dice roll) entry point! Meanwhile, the adjacent infantrymen have succeeded in rallying off one of their hit markers.


The surviving halftrack is beating a hasty retreat ahead of the Russian armour - and who could blame them?!


The Russian advance rolls inexorably forwards


Tanks are now targeting the single remaining Germa infantry unit on the table......


...... and succeed in getting them up to 4 hits.


The Germans finally get a break when the ace is revealed, and their armoured reinforcements arrive - but there are 6 superior Russian tanks in the battle space now ......


Next turn, the black king comes up, and the Luftwaffe makes an appearance. Rolling with a +3 on the dice roll AND hitting all units within 10cm of the designated target, the bomber only manages one hit on the T34 but succeeds in destroying the KV1 behind it and putting hits on the adjacent infantry!


One of the arriving panzers takes a shot at a T34, the shell slides harmlessly off the Russians sloped armour, but return fire from the 76mm guns destroys the German tank!


With the river crossing blocked by the burning KV1, the last of the three Soviet reinforcements moves along the far bank of the stream, whilst his colleague puts a hit on another of the German tanks


With the Russian infantry in full control of the village and all their German counterparts withdrawn, the Russian tanks knock out another Panzer III


I decided to call a halt here. With ten turns to go, the Russians had certainly won, and the remaining panzers would be well advised to retire and possibly fight again another day! Checking the cards afterwards, there was only a solitary black card left, the remaining nine were all red!


A few close ups to finish off.



I didn't mention the two recce vehicles that had arrived on the other flank earlier. They actually succeeded in putting one of the Russian infantry units back up to 4 hits, but then pulled back, before inevitable destruction at the hands of the Soviet tankists!




So, another small solo game in the bag and another enjoyable one from my perspective. A hard game for the Germans and they didn't have much luck with the cards; if the panzers had arrived before the KV1's, they might have had a half chance, but as it was, they were pushing you know what up hill really. The Germans also got a lot of their cards early on, when all they could really do was attempt to rally (which generally they failed to do) and fire at the opposing infantry.

Its Easter here now so looking forward to four days of not doing very much at all - although I am off to Julians place tomorrow evening for the first time in about a month - so, another game report should appear here in a day or two ...... until then, thanks for your visit!

Tuesday, 15 April 2025

Some New Arrivals

 Fresh from Adam at Adrahlabs in Australia, a small addition to the 10mm EIR collection - possibly my last Romans? I have not quite decided. I may also consider other ancient armies from the Cromarty Forge range - they have Greeks, Carthagians, Republican Romans, Gauls and Germans, to name a few - and all look just as nice as the figures below.


The small package of excitement

Two units of legionaries in Testudo formation



Two additional units of auxiliary infantry. Annoyingly, the one on the right has a broken off standard - but it's in the plastic bag the figures were all packed in, so shouldn't be too hard to super glue back into place.



Six "Scorpion" bolt throwers



Two Onagers


Finally, we had a night away this past Saturday, staying in a very nice hotel, the Sebel, in central Auckland


Location of the hotel


Arrow indicates approximate position of our suite


Our "balcony"!


View of Viaduct Harbour from said balcony


The expansive balcony from our room


A very relaxing weekend - headed into Auckland around 3pm on the Saturday, checked in, had a drink, met friends at "White and Wongs" Asian fusion restaurant about a three-minute walk away for dinner, returned to the room around 930pm, I had a bath (!) - not something we do often nowadays, as showers are the common means of washing - retired to bed around 1030 and woke up in pitch darkness (thanks to very efficient curtains) at around 845am Sunday! Popped next door to "Giraffe" cafe for a leisurely breakfast then headed home around 11am. I probably could have bought a small army for what the one night away cost, but man cannot live by war alone, can he?!

Sunday, 13 April 2025

Mid-week Solo - Back to Barbarossa

 This game took place a few days ago but I am only now getting around to posting a report. 


Initial layout, the Germans will enter from the bottom table edge


The Germans had a Stuka strike, an artillery strike and reinforcement by a PzKfw III, the Russians only had a couple of "partisan assassins" (mainly so I could use a couple of the female Pulp figures that have been sitting on my painting desk for 12-18 months!)


Turn two saw a Russian card turned and one infantry unit appear randomly by dice roll right next to the advancing Wehrmacht!


The leading carrier continued to advance, whilst the second one dismounted its infantry to confront the ambush.


On turn four, the second Russian unit appeared, directly ahead of the leading Germans - a well-executed ambush, even if it was all just a random fluke of dice rolling!


The MG34 gunner immediately engaged "targets front" 


The Luftwaffe arrived and scored two hits on the enemy, which resulted in the Russians pulling back into the woods, out of sight of the deadly MG


To the rear, the Germans put one hit on the other Russian unit


The leading half-track advanced over the small stream and then dismounted its infantry.


The Russians had managed to rally off a hit and decided to charge forward - but rolled a very low movement score!


The next turn, they got into contact, but neither side could gain an advantage (three or four turns of no hits by either of them!)


An impressive exchange of small arms fire at the original ambush site - unfortunately for the Russians, cover reduced the double 6 to 11, so only one hit was scored.


Meanwhile, at the ford, the evenly balanced melee continued - I think I rolled double matching scores like the above several times.


Finally, a decision, the Russians put a hit on the German infantry, and they had to fall back.


The first partisan appeared in just the right place and put TWO more hits on the leading German infantry unit!



Next, the Russian infantry scored a killer hit on the SdKfz 251 with a grenade or Molotov cocktail!


And by great good fortune, the second partisan appeared from the same building, and put the Wehrmacht unit up to four hits!



The Germans failed to rally and fell back 10cm (dice roll). Meanwhile, the other Russian unit was falling back to consolidate the defence (to the right above)


The retiring Germans again failed both rally attempts (one in the rally phase at the start of the turn and again in the movement phase) and were within spitting distance of exiting the table. The other unit advanced warily up the flank, whilst their carrier rolled forward to add the support of its MG34.


Buoyed by their success thus far, both Russian units now rallied off all the hits they had been carrying


Another turn, another failed rally, and the retreating German unit left the table. The Germans fired at the Russians to their front but failed to score any hits.


FINALLY, the PzKfw III arrived, but it was too late, with the game scheduled for 26 turns (the Russians had 12, the Germans 14.


The tank put one hit on the Russians across the river in each of the last two turns of the game, but it wasn't enough to change the outcome. The Russians had successfully defended their village, and the Germans would have to commit more resources to dislodging them.


A few eye candy shots to finish off with.



Finally, I have ordered up some more Ostfront reading courtesy of Auckland Public Library service - I am currently halfway through "A Writer at War".



Th...th..th....th...tahts all folks! Thanks for visiting and special thanks for all comments!