DAR - Clickie-Chasing Coil Contests the Colonel

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 3 Action

I think I would be vearing that group of vehicles hard right in behind the smoke and trees and houses,

That is pretty much what I am doing.

Turn three was like one of those wild west movies where everybody is shooting but nobody gets killed. That was a good piece of luck by me, because the below pic shows a partial penetration but no damage. Didnt even knock my riders off.

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 5 Orders

Not going to be too much action on my part for a while. He isnt keeping his tanks in a very tight group, so I am going to try to engange him with heavy odds in my favor.

What I am setting up first is to engage his tanks circled on his back left. In two or three turns I should have two guns setup with LOS (yellow lines). I have a crack sniper (in blue in middle of pick) that should be able to target a TC. And I should be able to get all four of my M10s into the fight. Plus I will put my M8s into LOS just to offer lower quality targets.



All this assumes that he will keep his tanks in that general location. And I cant imagine where else he would go. However, if he would charge forward right now, he could wipe me out of the middle and all but clinch the game. However that will take a lot of guts, and I would be really surprised if he does it. But if he waits two more turns for my guns to get set, it will be too late for him.

Two other notes of tactical interest.
1) the brown platoon I am going to load on my transports and try to circle behind him.
2) the two pink circles are a piat and a MG that got into position, but now I am going to move. I only note it because it is hard (at least for me) to move units backwards, but they arent doing any good where they are so I have to pull back and look for a good way to get them in the fight.

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 6 Action



My conscript M8 snipes a PzIV as Coils infantry pushes forward. If his inf pushes too much forward, they will go right into the sights of my M8s and M10s hiding behind that hill. I need to unload some HE before I do some tank combat.

Note my burning green M8 in the background - I lost him on turn 4. parked him there thinking he would be out of LOS. mostly insignificant at this point.

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 7 Orders
email from Coil:
This is getting to be an interesting one. Please tell me that wasn't actually a Stuart that plinked my tank, right after I sniffed so contemptuously at them...

Mostly just wanted to show an overhead view of the pounding the Coil has given those woods on the hill I am hiding behind. But I have kept my troops back - no reason to let them get blasted to smitherines.



Also am shifting my AFVs slightly to the right to give a little better LOS to the scattered trees. And I am sending a platoon forward to protect my gun and piat from german FJs.

I feel like the Coil is kind of pressing looking for the knockout blow* - which is probably going to cost him. From what I can tell, at this point he is in a really good position. He should probably just consolidate and wait for me to come after him since he has a big flag and can push the other big one very easily, where I only have a small flag. Of course just sitting there is likely going to cost him also, since (I think) I have the ability to maneuver and get some favorable odds. So he should keep moving his tanks here and there, and keep me guessing as to whether he is going to attack or going to wait. He should try to spot my inf and blast them with his huge HE count he has.

*note - above I said if he attacked hard now in the middle he could wipe me out and finish me. I am talking about a full tank rush with inf support. That isnt what he is doing.

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 7 Action
email from Coil
Just watched the last turn. I am...disheartened. Not so much by the results, but by the idiot, stupid, dumb, dumb, dumb, bonehead mistake I made with my tanks. Check out the sweet turret orientation on my panzers on your right, when you get a chance...

If I get a chance I will post some screen shots later, but basically:
- Coil pushes a full platoon of inf into the edge of the middle woods
- His tanks advance on my right and left and the far left, but they are an unorganized, uncoordinated mess. The lead tank on the right gets a piat round into his turret on second number 60 (dont know if it is a KO yet)
- a squad split in two on my right advances pretty far and get pinned/eliminated

There is a decent chance Coil could lose 5 tanks in turn 8.

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 8 Action
email from Coil
I suspect my little panzers won't make it out of there. *snif*



Coil lost two tanks for sure (red Xs), and the screen shot shows a full penetration from an M10 on another - so I am counting him dead. I bounced a piat round of another (not having too much luck with piats/zooks lately), and my gun (selected) stayed at 26 secs til setup the entire turn - hmmmmmmm. So if the gun has gone active, I am sure I would have gotten another.

the turn ends with Coils lead Pziv on my far left and my reg M10 targeting each other. My M10 spotted and stopped rotating first, so I should get first shot there.

Also notice the SP gun that pulled up over the ridge in back. I already have a stuart racing to get behind him (I didnt know he was there, and was just trying to get my stuart out of harms way). I will be so excited if I can back the gun with the stuart.

Note - if Coil would have had his pzivs on my far left in this position when he attacked with his other two pziv groups, I would have really been in trouble.

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 9 Orders
email from Coil:
This is not going as I scripted it, but it could be going a whole lot worse. Time to rethink plan A...

When this game ends I really want to know how it could be going a lot worse for him. From my point of view his plan - which hasnt been a bad one - hasnt come together in the nifty way he would have liked it to (I dont mean that in a bad way). And he has definitely been on the wrong side of the luck pendulum so far.


It looks like this Vet M10 is entering into his last turn. the pziv has him in his sights. Maybe I can squeese out some more luck, but I doubt it. If the reg M10 right next to him can pull the trigger first and hit, then the Vet might live another day. I'm not counting on it.

The yellow highlight is my gun that "hopefully" will deside to fight this turn. If so, those two pzivs should be toast (1 probably already is)

In the middle of the screen in the green circle is a crack squad out of command in panic state. In the green square is a green FJ squad that is down to 8 men, but is surely broken. i find it funny that they are both just laying there 10m from each other too scared to do anything.
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Highlighted in this pic is another gun that will come active this turn. He has good LOS to those three Pzivs, and I am counting on him killing one this turn, and hopefully one more the next.

At the bottom of the screen, two M10s are changing direction and going to be ready to pop over the hill next turn.

The brown highlight is the king of the battlefield - a 3" mortar that has 55 secs left to setup. He has LOS to route Coils platoon in the middle trees. Inf will break from a 3" mortar.


So right now I am feeling really good. 3 tanks KO'd for sure. 3, possibly 4, more this turn. And I am about to start fighting the uneven fights that allow you to win - guns vs tanks. mortars vs infantry.

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 9 Action
email from Coil
It is bad mojo indeed to have some sort of idea of whether things went well or poorly. I hate even the "well, that turn had to hurt for you" kind of thing.

Accordingly, I shall say nothing...

I read that and thought - this turn was really bad for me.

But

I KOd two tanks right out of the shoot. And one of his 150 rounds landed next to his men and broke them. So I thought maybe things would continue going my way.

Until I saw this - and after watching over and over, I still dont know exactly what happened - other than I lost 4 AFVs from one explosion:

How quickly the bad luck pendulum can swing back into your corner. It is so bad, I cant help but laugh. My best guess is that there is a HQ with one/maybe two 81mm mortars in the yellow circle on the first pick. Got a tree burst that set off an explosion in an M8 (I'm still waiting to hear from Battlefront how falling splinters set off howitzer shells) which knocked out three other vehicles.
___________

The turn ends with my vet M10 deciding to drive away from his dead friends and running face to face with two charging Pzivs who swiftly end his life. And the 150 gets on target and immobilizes my mg in a really lousy position. And my guns continue to not be able to do anything, but I am still hoping that changes.


__________

obviously not as happy as I was before this turn, but right now still feeling good about my chances. He has 5 pzivs left, and I have all 5 of them in my sights with good hit and kill chances. 3 of those are from piats - which doesnt thrill me too much - but his force is still an unorganized mess. If he can consolidate this sudden advantage, I will be in trouble. Hopefully he cannot.

[Colonel Talvela]

Turn 10 action

KO'd three more Pzivs - 1 with a piat - woo hoo!!!!! Another piat gets a side turrent penetration, but the little beast just rolls forward. he did stop shooting, so I assume I killed the commander and he is shocked. the center of the map is an armored junk-yard.

I was quite disturbed that my 3in mortar changed his target orders and started firing on a pziv. Stuff like that really pisses me off.

[Ratzki]

Yes, just when I thought things were going to wind down before they really were able to get going, that large explosion with your armour in the middle made this thread interesting again :eek1:. Nothing like a full on frontal clash to spruce things up a bit.