Scot asked me to write this for a General's Staff Report... I'm not as eloquent as of the other some Generals... And you definitely won't need a dictionary (BFG)...
Rommels last Ramble, and Captain Kev's addition to it, are pretty much what I subscribe to; wait for your fire, if you can, to be able to maximize your hit/kill potential... The only thing I could add, is that I always check all my units for LOS when firing, and if there is a unit that can only fire on one target, I'll take that shot first... Sometimes it can help if it gets lucky, thereby saving another unit for a different shot...
I also subscribe to Kev's LT/ACMG theory, just without as many ACMG's... I may only use about 6 or so to mop up the infantry type units... I am also a big endorser of airpower, though some may say it isn't worth the risk in points lost... You can select targets farther away than with HA, more accurate ( 66% chance, but right on target ), and it can clear away some of nuisance arty in front of your advance...
Now that you know my basic premise, I'll get on with what I was asked to write about... For my buy points I picked;
I left the BZ and 2 LT in the town for defense... I put 3 planes on the front strip and left the rest at the back two strips for replacement... The HA went in the woods in front of the airstrip, along the road, with 2 ACMG for transport... One HT went on each road gate and the other 2 were spaced out in the forts on top... The LT I scattered around to fill the rest of the forts, and then fortified in woods... The remaining 4 ACMG's I put as far forward to be used for recon and taking out those pesky infantry type units... With the mine placement, I tried to mine as many roads as possible, and make it the most difficult for Earl to move... On the first I started to shell and strafe the bridges and roads, again to add to movement difficulty... I got pretty lucky in that in the first four turns of this, I got about 90% accuracy and made it very slow for Earl... I believe that this was an important factor in my defense, slow him down enough and you only have to deal with a small number of enemy at a time... I started my withdrawal to the city on turn 10, and by the end of 14, I was completely fortified in the city with 2 HA,1 MA, 1 HT, 2 ACMG, 2 Planes, and half of my original LT's left...
When I got the reinforce on 15, my two engineers started with a row of mines around the entire back of the city... I bought 2 LA, and mved them to the forts at the back of the city... The rest of the reinforcements I took in LT's... Earls planes started on me around the 20th turn, and my AA couldn't hit a fly with a barn door... My aircraft were taken out on the 24th turn, from an errant AC that got lucky and snuck in behind my lines, mapped out the array of mines to my rear, and started out to the front of the city... From then on, 'til I died on the 33rd turn, it was a game of biding my time and targeting the units most dangerous to my defensive line... I was finally wiped by an HT that came in and assaulted my remaining unit, one lone HA that called his last fire on my location... It took out a few units, but not enough, and the game ended...
| Final score: | CoKE 320 - Brig Gen |
| Earl 80 - 1st Leut |
I think Ron did an excellent job on this scenario... And the terrain couldn't have been done any better... If it wasn't for that fact that the scenario was made so we couldn't win, you could hold out for a very long time given even 1:3 odds in Earls favour... As it was, I enjoyed it very much, even though I knew I was going to get my ass waxed... My original goal was to make it to at least turn 21, so that Earl just could not win on VP... As it turned out, I was elated to make it as long as I did, butt kicked on turn 33... It would make an interesting twist to get Ron to tweak this puppy and turn the roles around to see how long it would take us to overun Earl...
This turned out a little bit longer than I first thought, and a bit off the topic I was asked to write about, but with this crowd it seems to be the norm ( if there really is one )... Thanx for taking the time to read this... Any questions or comments will be dealt with in a highly violent manner
The Old Brigadier
CoKE
Even though you're the attacker, you are actually the potentially overwhelmed defender. The only difference between playing the actual defender and defender as attacker is that you have the advantage of moving first. That said, your defense can be highly mobile and devastating.
In my initial purchase, I bought 4 planes, 6 HAs, enough LTs to leave them fortified in the forts in front of the city, and a couple more for armored recon (they didn't last long), 1 HT which I left fortified at the gates of the city, several ACMGs for dragging the HAs around and for recon, a smattering of MGs for protecting the guns and for forward recon, a smattering of BZs for same, but posted with good lines of fire, and in the woods next to the forward airstrip, and a couple of engineers which I did not use wisely in the first purchase.
(I'm wondering were Jim got the Engineers from? I didn't get any option of purchasing them in my play of the game until the turn 15 reinforcements, which is another story. Makes me wonder if Jim didn't edit the scenario, I doubt it, I think that he's just a little confused, or what I like to call Pensed. - Scot)
Mo (Never use engineers simply to scout artillery. They are much too valuable. Yes, they are harder to kill, but they can be doing far more defensive type stuff. I can be a real dummy sometimes...)Over the course of the first few turns I had three objectives:
By turn four or five there were no bridges left over the center of the map. The only ingress the enemy had was to the north or south, and these were protected by heavy artillery. I then moved two aircraft to the forward strip and began to rip up bridges in his backyard, along with one HA of his that I found. This slowed him to a crawl and gave me a major advantage.
Right up to the point where the volume of units he was attacking with began to overwhelm my forward positions. He paid a heavy price for every inch of ground, however. My big guns on either side of the map shredded his first four or five waves of units, and the smaller ones that made it through were dealt with by the line of fortified tanks waiting in the forts and in the city.
I moved the airplanes back to safe haven when it was clear that it was only a matter of a move that he would have a unit in the forward airstrip. This was after he had killed all of my scouts. But not all of the units I had on the mountain in the middle, specifically, the ones right next to the airstrip.
Then I made two mistakes, both having to do with forgetting about fortified units during the move phase. I did not move the MGs I had tasked to protect the guns in the south to their posts on the mountain, and I did not move the BZ or the E I had fortified in the woods right next to the forward airstrip onto it once he placed his first plane there.
Those two boners eventually cost me all three southern guns over the next few turns. Until that happened, his attack had been stymied on all fronts. He was losing units at an incredible rate, and I wasn't losing anybody.
By turns 11 or 12, I'd sprung a leak on my southern flank. Without the guns to stop him in the bottleneck, I was forced to use at least one of the northern guns to slow his southern advance. His northern advance was decimated at this point. I was also forced to lay down fire on the airport on the mountain, and actually succeeded in destroying a number of his planes. This is not an effective use of a weapon, however.
His fifth or sixth wave of tanks and light mobiles broke through the southern bottleneck around turn 13 or 14. Since the north was still well pockmarked, and since he had no more units there, save for a few engineers doing something remarkable, which Rommel noticed too, building and repairing bridges, I concentrated my three remaining HAs to the south and stopped him again. The few units that made it onto the killing field in front of the city died there.
By turn fifteen, I had no units forward, but I still had units in the hills to the north and to the south to spot artillery. By now I was firing at least one artillery shot per turn onto his airport. Very costly, but I was getting lucky in hitting a plane per shot 2 out of 3 times.
Then came a generous reinforcement. I bought a bunch of aircraft, 2 LAs to lay down fire in front of the city, MGs to protect them, 2 engineers to lay a minefield around my airports (should have done that much earlier), a few LTs to replace the few I'd lost and complete the line inside the forts protecting the city, and a few BZs to spot artillery and take pot shots at light units and wounded stragglers.
Then the real bloodbath began. He just kept coming.
Over the next several turns, after stopping again, wave after wave of mobile attackers, including taking out all of his mobile artillery to the south with my airforce, his airforce whittled my artillery down to nothing by turn 22 or so. And at a great cost to him. He lost more than a plane per gun that he took out. Took him a while at that rate of attrition.
But, one those guns were gone, it was only a matter of time.
He just kept coming...and I had no longer the means to slow him down. My last unit, an engineer, died in the woods behind my airport on turn 26.
And I felt good.
Nobody in their right mind would have attacked my position. It was suicide for the defender (attacking). For every point I lost, he lost 4 or 5. And I was able to pinpoint the critical errors I made. Another of which, that I haven't mentioned yet, was that I anticipated he would be knocking on my door a lot sooner than he actually did. I had the ability to slow him even further.
Post-opt synopsis:
I would not change the mix of units that I initially purchased, except for one thing: I would mine the front of the city. I would protect the southern guns the same way I protected the northern ones...those MGs fell asleep fortified in their forts just north of where they were supposed to move to. Lesson learned: DON'T FORGET ABOUT YOUR FORTIFIED UNITS!!!
Same lesson applies to the guys who were sleeping fortified in the trees just to the east of the forward runway. They could have killed at least 3 or 4 planes between them...nooooo...zzzzzzz....die.
When you dictate where he has to move by using your planes to drop bridges and your artillery to stymie then destroy his advance, the advantage goes to you. The hard part is keeping those units alive, or, at the very least, extracting a price for their demise. I didn't do that with my southern artillery and it cost me the game.
Perhaps the most entertaining moment came when Earl figured out, at a great cost to him in units, that he had no bridges to cross in the middle of the board. And there he was. All kinds of heavy units trapped. Artillery fodder. By the time he squeezed them into the southern approach, he'd lost half. By the time they were all across the rivers and into my territory, he lost the rest. That was fun... Right up until the next wave...he just kept coming....
Overall, Death Stand is a great deal of fun. A smart player, playing as attacker, but really setting up the defense from hell, is going to enjoy slaughtering Earl en mass. A fatal mistake in this scenario is to actually play it as attacker and attack. You will die before you're tenth birthday if you spread yourself that thin. This game is a great example of the Wait for Earl mode of defense. He's going to come, you've been told he's going to come, you know where he's coming from, wait for him. And you have more than enough time to not only prepare for his arrival, but to shore up your defense in a really healthy way.
While I've never really been a believer in the LT, ACMG line of thought, it doesn't apply here either. You must purchase an intricate mix of units, all working in unison, to be successful.
I won't play this again. The point of the exercise was to see how well one could do on the first try, just as in war. I must commend Ron on his design. This scenario is an excellent litmus test for any general or general wanna be. I am proud of myself for lasting the 26 turns that I did. And smarter for it. I know I could last much longer now, and possibly even beat it, or outlast it at any rate, using the same strategy with a couple of refinements. But, in war, you only get your first shot.
And this scenario shines a spotlight on the fact that your first shot better be your best shot.
Reporting from Valhalla:
The ghost of Lt. Colonel "Ya, But We Gave'm A Face Full, Lads" Girard