AAR 001 - Map 22 - Americans vs Germans

For this first battle I'm using my own ruleset that I'm effectively 'inventing on the fly' in true Kriegsspiel fashion. It's was literally thrown together randomly, a random map, random units(both type and quantity), and randomly chosen victory conditions. 

The purpose of fighting this battle in the first place was to invent a set of wargaming rules as I played. I had a few ideas of what I wanted and what I didn't right from the outset such as, no charts, playability over realism and the copious use of dice(to encourage unpredictability) which I see as an essential element in solo play.

So in this battle, the Germans are defending the large multi-story, stone building on the far left of the map while the Americans are attacking and attempting to take it. It was an open-ended battle with no set number of turns to achieve the VC. The Americans have the first turn.

Position at start of battle

The two bridges are obviously key to both sides achieving their aims. For the Americans, taking out the MMGs were going to be a priority while the Germans would be looking to simply hold the line and attempt to halt any advances across the river before any potential trickle of Americans across the bridges became a torrent.

American tank immobilised

The broken German MMG you see here managed to immobilise the American tank(highlighted). It might have destroyed it completely but this was one of my on the fly rules inventions and I decided an infantry unit with a MMG shouldn't be able to totally destroy a tank, at least not so easily anyway. I've since thought about the tank situation and will be playing with more thought-out rules for them in future. A MMG will still not be able to completely destroy a tank though. Infantry with AT weapons will of course be able to do so, and they can also assault tanks, which is something they try later on in the battle when they're just outside the VC building(they fail the assault by the way). So even with the tank rule going forward, the resultant immobilisation would still have happened. Really, tank on tank or infantry properly equipped with AT weapons are the most likely and sensible methods of destroying tanks outright rather than simply immobilising them or taking out their guns(which will be one of the possible results in future).

The ongoing melee isn't going the German's way

The melee above has been going on for at least three turns at this point and the Germans have been trounced. The last remaining German unit there eventually manages to withdraw from the melee and attempts to make a run for it into the VC building. I'm pretty sure it gets broken just before it reaches it though. Note the tank is now a wreck. This was just me trying to decide whether the MMG attack on it  previously should have destroyed it or simply immobilised it. In a later turn I finally decide I was right to simply immobilise it and return it to it's previously immobilised state. The tank rules are more or less fully formed in my mind now and I'll highlight them as I play them out in future.

  

Broken MMG(red) & lots of broken Americans(blue)

Well, who'd have though it? The broken German MMG breaks on a box-cars roll(double sixes) and is repaired on a roll of 6(on a 1d6), or is eliminated completely on a roll of 1(which is what eventually happens). I don't think I've had a broken and eliminated MMG before now no matter what rules I've been playing. Fun stuff. I've highlighted all the broken Americans in blue. Not fun. They really seem to be in dire straights here and it looks just about as bad as it can get. I think this is around turn 12 now. The game goes on for 17 turns before the Americans finally admit defeat and surrender. The trouble is this is a stone building and not easy to get into without coming under heavy fire from the MMG and multiple units inside. It doesn't help that the MMG is on the 2nd floor and so has LOS over most of the map. It can just sit there picking off the Americans as they advance. It has quite a range after all.

Americans surrender

I thought I'd switched that tank back to it's immobilised state, but apparently not. Still, I know what I'm doing with the tank rules now so it'll all run more smoothly from now on. Now, even though the Americans managed to get inside the VC building, all the squads you see there are actually only half squads at this point and given the fact that the Germans still have not only their MMG but also their tank, the Americans don't really stand a chance now. Note that there's also two full German squads still in the VC building too. The Americans did well to even get into the building in the end I think so their final surrender wasn't a surprise.

n.b. Just a final note on the rules. I'm purposely playing fast-and-loose with the rules at the moment to see what works and what doesn't. The core mechanic is an opposed roll +/- modifiers along with morale checks(as per SL/ASL). This is a universal mechanic and seems to work just as well no matter what units are involved. I've used it for Infantry, Support Weapons as well as Tanks. Next time we'll bring some OBA(Off Board Artillery) into play and maybe give the Infantry some AT(Anti-Tank) weapons to play with.

This game was soo much fun to play that I unintentionally ended up playing for 8-9 hours straight through by the time the Americans surrendered. It's unheard of for a game to hold my intention to that degree. The rules stay right out of the way while the battle rages and the dice make for some very unexpected incidents. All this is exactly what it should be. Great fun. 

Because the rules are quite straightforward, due in no small part I think to that lovely core mechanic(opposed rolls for the win), it won't be long at all before I'm ready to look into playing a full campaign. Really looking forward to it. Might just throw in some weird, strange stuff too. Watch this space...