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[Plain Ian]

Turn 59 results/Turn 60 results

I sent back my turn to Cesar on Friday night .....and it came winging back to me this morning...sigh. So here is the VP's for both.



Turn losses are below


So I lost only 229 men during his turn but 13 guns and 5 tanks. The guns are a blow. More so because when I looked at the turn I saw that 12 of them were from artillery units I had deliberately not fired!!! As I said earlier this must mean that the stupid counterbattery system takes into account opportunity fire during his turn which players do not have any control over. And of course the icing on the cake is that because its dusk, I can see exactly ZERO spotted enemy units.

Edit: Thats 1,375 Allied men losses for Turn 59. I'm using Excel 2007 and can't find a way to open up the columns in the stupid graph tables.......

[Plain Ian]

Turn 65 Dec 23rd 8am - the north

Sorry for not posting maps. Have been busy playing. Situation in the north below. V Corps still hiding in the woods. I think he has moved 12th SS out of this area. However he has left a strong armour group of King Tigers and Tigers (Army level units) which is causing me problems. I've slowly moved all Divisional armour (1st/2nd/9th) to support 1st Div but the Mud has turned the area into a no go area for arnour.

VII Corps still battling for Spa. 60th Rgt (9th Div V Corps) has been fed into the line and 29th Ind Rgt is now main reserve. He continues to dig in so I assume he is happy with what he has got. He pulled out his King Tigers from Spa and replaced them with infantry. 3 hex visibility shows what he has......

[Plain Ian]

Turn 65 Dec 23rd 8am - Werbomont area

I've lost some ground here against 116th Pz and his VG units. A British Division is arriving.......yep not very historical and Cesar not happy about this. However I need them to hold the line and let 7th Arm rest. Plus I need their 72 25 pounders as I'm a bit light on artillery.

[Plain Ian]

Turn 65 Dec 23rd 8am - Baraque - La Roche

Quite a bit of action still going on here. 9th SS armour continues to press the 84th. Cesar has said that his 9th SS infantry have taken 4 days to get here as they are non motorised.......historically 5 Bn's were motorised and only one non motorised. I am starting to feel dorry for him......until I get hit by counterbattery and lots of werfers.

I've pushed him back at Samree and advanced along the Nadrin road. 

75th Div arriving but its a D rated unit. However artillery and tanks are always welcome. Battlefield crowded and road network not great. Welcome to the Ardennes. 

82nd and 26th VGD are resting.

[Plain Ian]

Turn 65 Dec 23rd 8am -Magerotte

Well most of the action is here now that his 2nd SS has arrived in force. He has made a strong push south at Hollange with his Panther Bn. The good news is I managed to destroy one when it smashed into a Bn of the 84th. He's now down to ....47.
At Magerotte his PzIV's and Jagdpanzers of 2nd SS have joined the FBB armour and are determined to push me out out of here. I've lost quite a few tanks/TD's tryiing to hold.
Between these two points he's pushed out with 2nd SS infantry. 26th Div is not a great unit and I've stiffened it with 101st and the remnants of the 28th Div. I don't think his aim is to take ground but just to cause casualties. I had been advancing on Surre and he is probably trying to cut them off by pushing down to Warnach?

[Plain Ian]

Turn 65 Dec 23rd 8am - the south

Not much happening here in the south. Pz Lehr is now operating from Grevils and seems to be happy with the territory it has. 5th FJD has halted just west of Pratz. South of the river has been quiet. 

I've pulled out the 80th's TD unit and one infantry Bn to send north to Hollange. I will also send north some 9th AD units but they are all pretty weak. The roads and medium bridges in this will make this a long business. I really need an Engineer unit and a bridge NE of Attert and also one at Ell. Unfortuantely all the Engineer reinforcements are for VII Corps. 

I'm going to need to build bridges here or else the 4th Armoured is stuck down here. The only way out otherwise is to drive east via Mersch.

Anyway here is the last map. I'll go and update the spreadsheet so you can see casualty figures.

[Plain Ian]

Turn 69 Dec 23rd 4pm Dusk - weather Mud



Status of game is still Draw and points are still hovering at just over 12,000. 



Turn losses are starting to even out apart from Turn 67 where the Germans' suffered badly in men. US air has been available all through the 23rd December but has not had a real significant effect. US tanks and artillery has been the main killers.

[Plain Ian]

Turn 69 Dec 23rd 4pm Dusk - weather Mud - the north 



Map showing V and VII Corps. I forgot to put map labels on but the German 1000 VP label is Spa and the German Pioneer unit in the bottom left is just NW of Stoumont.

V Corps (1st/2nd/9th/99th) has spent most of the day recovering. The Germans were using a large stack of armour for attacks (A/B) however after I collected all the Divisional armour and brought it down (A/B/C) this has had the effect i wanted and he has pulled back. I belive he has 18-20 King Tigers and 5 Tigers in stack B. They are however at 100%. Although I have 6 armoured units and almost 150 tanks only two units (634th/703rd) are over 70%. The rest are averaging 50%. However Cesar is keen to keep his armour intact and not risk any of it which suits me. 
Edit: ignore my talk on 70%. This only applies to infantry effectiveness. Tanks are different. It does not make any difference to them how understrength they are.......but obviously the number of tanks determines the results of their firing.

60th Rgt of 9th Div was diverted to Spa. I've started to collect the rest of 9th Division (cerise colur) so that I can either send them to join the 60th Rgt OR push south with 1st Div. This leaves 2nd and 99th to try to slog west....oops correction thats east''' on their own.

I'll do a map of SPA next.

[Plain Ian]

Turn 69 Dec 23rd 4pm Dusk - weather Mud -Spa



Fighting at Spa continues. Dusk hides most of his units. Front line units are shown. Spa is now occupied by a large infantry group (Group D) and his King Tigers (Group C) had moved off to fight allied armour. I've tried to keep allied armour away from them. 

The main news in the last few turns was the appearance of 12th SS armour. (Group F) I've concentrated 9th/30th arour and also a 3rd Armoured Bn to meet this. 12th SS infantry are probably massed at Franchorchamps? If he is massing them behind his forces at Spa then this possibly explains his optomism. The 3rd PzGr Div was also operating here so maybe this is holding south of Franchorchamps?

30th Div plus 3rd Armoured have spent 2 days in this area contesting Peiper and 1st SS and I've tried my best to rotate units. 29th Rgt (Ind) has just been fed in and will help. 

I don't have the strength to push him out of Spa and he is still suggesting that he has the strength to push me back further. My only option is still to apply pressure on his wings. His 3rd FJD units (B) appear fragile and disrupt quite easily. He also had a small Pionner unit (A) which I pushed back this turn.

[Plain Ian]

Turn 69 Dec 23rd 4pm Dusk - weather Mud -Spa



Same area but 3D. I don'rt use this much but I'd like to. I got caught out when visibility jumped to 3 hexes and I realised that he had a lot of high ground and could see far too much of me.....
 I really like the 3D units and information displayed on them. Pity tank type couldn't be squeezed in as well. 
Not a great fan of the terrain but I'm sure this can be modded. If the 3D map is just used for planning and not actually moving and fighting with units, then I'd be happy with simplified terrain representation. eg stick wood effects and other terrain types. I might try this myself and also see if I can make the colours less dayglo....I think the term is desaturise?

Anyway I've highlighted the Rgt HQ's and the two main Divisional HQ's. I've started stacking AA units on top of my artillery.

A. to reduce German air attacks...I get 2-3 per turn....yes its amazing.
B. To deflect german counterbattery away from my artillery....HQ's seem to work better?