Wednesday 9 October 2013

Trench Foot

A Trench Assault scenario, acting as another refresher of the Great War rules, prior to Dave M kicking off his campaign some time in the near future. Played along the length of a 6' by 4' area, the trenches were the standard simple ones and not the enhanced entrenchments as described in 'Over the Top'

From Furness Wargamers in Trenches

Tel and Matt, each playing a company of Valiant Russians with support from artillery, were attempting to remove Tony's company of Germans from their dug in positions.




Due to some wild artillery fire from the German guns, the Russian command group took 3 direct hits over successive turns, but managed to survive all the incoming fire intact. Unfortunately the sections MG fared worse, being taken out of action from another errant shell in the first turn of the advance.

The Russians briefly halted the advance, and took cover in rough terrain and shell holes, to allow the Forward Observer to get in place and put down some fire on the trenches, from where the German machine gun had been putting down withering fire.

The Russians commenced the advance again, getting to the final row of barb wire, and engaging the Germans with rifle fire, to attempt to soften them up in advance. Once across the final strand of barbed wire the attackers would be within open sight range of the German artillery. The Russians remaining HMG commences firing on the troops in the trenches, pinning them in place.



The German Machine Gun, which had been dominating the middle and the right, was finally put out of action by the heroic charge of a platoons two surviving soldiers. After putting the gun out of action by chasing away it's operators, the sole surviving Russian decided enough was enough and retreated from the field.

One of the German rear guns were silenced by a breakthrough on the German's left flank, where the sole platoon defending the forward trench broke after being assaulted. One Russian platoon continued with the breakthrough into the rear area, while another took position in the trench.



At this point the Germans were willing to give in, but an agreement for both side to be reinforced let the game continue. The Germans effectively being given about another six turns to repel the trench invaders, before the Russian reinforcements could complete their slog across the table.

The counterattack retook the gun position, but Russian shelling on the concentrated troops left the Germans too weak to continue to the main trench line and they gave up the attempt.

2 comments:

  1. Very interesting.
    I lament the passing of Warhammer Historical - I was quite looking forward to further Great War works :(
    You say these are unofficial rules you're using for the Russians, et al? Any chance I might get a gander at them?

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    Replies
    1. The stats (and figures) were provided by Dave M at the club. He's given me a list of base statlines for Russians, A-H and Turks, but no formal army lists or points values. The Russians do include stats for Armoured Cars. Think the Turks were from a download of a Gallipoli scenario which you might be able to find..

      Given the delay in releasing 'Over the Top', how long would an official Eastern Theatre take to get out? Since that'll never happen now, I guess people just have to base them on comparsions of other units.

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