Bulge 16.01s alt

Plain Ian · 07-06-2015, 01:38 AM,

Turn 47 German Spa - Monschau

Last German move and then I'll try to zip through my moves. Not much to see.

At Monschau the 12th SS made one assault with his Panthers (Company?) and knocked the 535th back taking one more AAA vehicle.
He then moved up rest of 12th SS and was happy to use artillery on 2-393rd and 324th Combat Engineers.

At Sourbrodt the unhappy 3-9th got hit by 3 Werfers barrages which took out 20+ each time (29/20/24) then got shot up by his Assault Gun group.

The 2-18th didn't have a great time either as its luck ran out against the 3rd FJD group. The German Assault Gun group also added in some fire plus there was some artillery.

At Spa not much happened really? There was some artillery and ground fire but losses were lighter than expected? Darth will not be happy.....the Force is weak???

North of Franchorchamps he now has 2 Bn's of 62nd VGD in place.

Plain Ian · 07-06-2015, 02:09 AM,

Turn 47 Allied

Totals

Losses

Well a good turn. The Germans lost more men AND tanks/guns than the US. However Spa will probably fall and its going to be a long road back if and when I fo onto the offensive properly.

Plain Ian · (This post was last modified: 07-06-2015, 03:16 AM by Plain Ian.)

Turn 47 US north

I have continued my withdrawal into the Hoes Venn. The 535th leads a charmed life so I withdrew it north to block the road. I’ve also moved the 1-394th so its ZOC blocks the road hex which is also Swamp so he won’t be able to leave T mode. Michael has shown no interest in exploiting up here.

I have 3 Regimental HQ’s and a FA Bn trapped in Marsh hexes so I will try defend this area. The 23rd/38th belong to 2nd Division and the 39th is a 9th Division HQ. The Divisional HQ for the 9th is not on the map at the moment? I’m not 100% sure if it appears?

At Sourbrodt I continue to juggle forces.

The 3-9th (30 men) are pulled back.
The 3-18th (fresh 750 man unit) edges closer to the battlefield and swaps places with 3-26th.
The 2-16th moves up to support the 2-18th.
The 1st/2nd Combat Engineers are pulled back. The 1st are in a Marsh hex which is not a great area to defend. The 62nd FA Bn (M7 Priests) are stuck here. However if Michael moves forward he will be in Clear (Improved +10%) so I was happy to defend back here rather than stay put.

The 1-26th is recovering well and will be ready for use soon. The problem will be finding space to deploy it. This is a terrible area to defend now that the Mud has turned the Clear terrain to Marsh, and I am watching stacking limits to ensure that I can retreat if I lose any assaults.

If things get too hot I will pull back to the yellow line marked and use the Marsh for defense. Unfortunatley I have yet another stuck HQ (9th of 2nd Division) which would be vulnerable.

Lastly some good news. The 703th TD Bn (33xM36’s) shot up the adjacent Assault guns of 3rd PGD. I then used the M4’s of the 745th Tank Bn against his infantry. He has another group advancing up the road from Sourbrodt though.

Plain Ian · 07-06-2015, 08:37 AM,

Turn 47 Allied Spa - La Gleize

The 3-517th spotted artillery against the two 62nd VGD Bn's and (-7/-16) and also the KG Knittel unit. (-5) Then I pulled it back.

At Spa I tried using heavy artillery on his Panthers but only managed 4 Fatigue hits. I did take -7 from the KG Hansen Motorised Inf unit.
I pushed out the 1-32nd Tank Bn of 3rd Armoured and it bumped into 3rd FJD/150th Pz Bde units south of Spa.

The 2-120th did some damage to KG Sandig and was lucky not to receive much back in return fire.

The 31st Tank Bn (CCB 7th AD) was badly placed and had to withdraw sw. This has left it adjacent to his armour so its going to get mauled.

The 740th Tank Bn took on 116th Motorised Infantry and lost 2 tanks to Werfer fire.

I've fallen back from his 116th panzers on Basse-Bodeaux road and also from the 560th VGD unit at Rarmont.

Plain Ian · 07-06-2015, 08:42 AM,

Turn 47 Allied La Roche - Rarmont

Not much to see. The 2-335th attacked the 560th VGD Bn and its 75mm Anti tank unit. The 333rd got into position at Samree. C/32 Cav has pulled back. The 80th AAA unit has stayed in place just now but the Engineer unit should have plenty time to cross the bridge at La Roche.

I don't really want to blow this bridge unless he makes a serious effort against la Roche.

Plain Ian · 07-06-2015, 08:48 AM,

Turn 47 Allied Bastogne

The 106th Division unit from Compogne is now safe. Artillery killed 1 Panther and 2 AA guns.

The 2-504th attacked the 26th VGD Bn but received some return fire and quite a bit of artillery/werfer fire.....which is a bit ominous.
The 1-504th has moved up to support the 2-504th.

Plain Ian · 07-06-2015, 08:52 AM,

I'll finish the maps tomorrow night. Only the far south to do. No tank action after all. I broke contact and have pulled back.

Plain Ian · (This post was last modified: 07-07-2015, 07:56 AM by Plain Ian.)

Turn 47 Allied south

Last map tonight. I'll try to do over view maps tomorrow night but I think Mike will probably be sending me something soon. (He is in New Zealand 13 hours ahead of me)

Just artillery fire results to see mainly apart from one ground fire attack.

The 8th/37th Tank Bn's fired at his Pioneers. Two blasts killed almost 100 men and the unit Broke and ran. With hindsight I guess I should have advanced something to see if he had anything behind this unit? Who knows I may have been able to isolate his armour for a turn.

Anyway I have fallen back and will see what he does.

All 3 Tank Bn's from the 10th Armoured are in the south (3rd/10th/11th) with a reasonable amount of tanks. (28 each roughly) The Armoured Infantry Bn's of the Division are shot (54th/55th and 61st which is off map to west) but the 10th Arm Inf of 4th Division is there for support as is the 53rd. The armour of 4th Armoured is kept in the north.

I'm trying to withdraw CCA of 9th Armoured to send north to join rest of the Division.

As you can see 4th Infantry Division is pretty well used up. The 2-22nd being the best of the bunch. (Morale B too)

I have accidentally left an artillery unit the 423rd Arm FA Bn (M7 Priests) in the front line. If he spots it he will pound it. I should have fired it once and moved it.

The 90th Cav lost a tank, I think I put it into T Mode and it got hit when I pulled it back.

Plain Ian · (This post was last modified: 07-09-2015, 08:10 AM by Plain Ian.)

Just as a comparison to the Panzer Campaign Bulge game and map, here are a few snaps of maps of two boardgames that I'm reading up on in Consimworld.

Last Blitzkrieg by MMP games.

This game is still in design and these are play test maps and counters. Scale is 1km per hex (same as PzC) Units are Battalions with breakdown/company sized units. Turns are daily.

Interestingly in this test game to illustrate some of the rules, it starts on the 22nd December turn and shows the appearance of the 80th Division. In my PzC Bulge alt scenario _16.01s I am playing the 80th's arrival is 20th December 80%. Quite a difference?

The other intersting thing I notice in the map is that the Alzette River seems to be a minor river south of Ettelbruck and the rail line runs on the east side of the river rather than on the west? The rail line also takes a strange route north of Ettelbruck compared to how it is shown in PzC Bulge?
Rail lines are not much use for road movement in PzC Bulge by the way.
There is also some minor differences at Ettelbruck.
Map differences can easily be explained by differences in rules. This is a boardgame being developed and I don't have access to the rules.

PzC Bulge map

Heres another boardgame map of the same area. Its not quite the same scale as its 1 mile per hex (PzC is 1km) and again units are mainly Battalions with 3 'game' turns per day. (am/pm/night)

A Time for Trumpets by GMT games

Again its a playtest map and counters showing what I take to be the intial set up in the south. Map looks very similar in style and look to PzC Bulge but interestingly has two types of Woods. I assumed that the brown or Rough looking terrain shown north of Ettelbruck and elsewhere could be high ground, but this doesn't correspond with what I see in PzC.
No rail lines shown on the map? But then as I said rail lines are of dubious use for road movement and only limited use for crossing rivers except major ones I guess.
Plenty of minor trails shown as with the Last Blitzkrieg that don't appear in PzC. One thing I also note is that there are very useful looking bridge 2 hexes north of Ettelbruck which I cannot see in the PzC map or the Last Blitzkrieg map.