Caen Turn 1

Yesterday was a club Sunday and it was booked for the first turn of my Caen Campaign. Of the 5 Canadian squads only 2 were due to fight. This was due to the moves being carried out on the campaign map. All the squads were moved, one squad moved into a minefield and stopped and then withdrew, 2 squads advanced into empty grid squares while the other two "discovered" the Germans players.

Relf on the Left and Dave on the right.

One battle was between Relfie and Dave, with Relfie, as German defending. As the defender I allowed Relfie to start the game hidden which he took full advantage of. Dave moved the Canadians up along a broad front and Relfies Germans opened fire. With typical club luck Relfie managed to run out of ammo on 3 of the five figures who fired and would need to let them spend an action reloading before they could fire again. Despite that the shots were quite effective and a couple of Canadians fell. Relfie's squad also had a mortar which he managed to use to some purpose. Given the 10cm blast radius Dave had little real choice but to have a couple of figures as a target each turn. The mortar was able to keep at least 2 figures pinned and did eventually manage to get a succession of wounds on Dave's bren team and take the assistant out of the game. It was a good battle but given the Germans had about double the points of the Canadians, Dave's forces did eventually crumble.

The other battle between Tim (Germans) and Graham (Canadians) highlighted Grahams tactical skills and Tim's mad (low) dice rolling. Graham advanced in a very narrow front and soon realised that Tim's dice were up to his normal standard (which is to say less than good). Graham was able to concentrate his actions/reactions and firepower into a very small are of Tim's thin camouflaged line. As such Graham poured fire onto Tim's MG34 with sufficient force to wound the gunner who did not have  an assistant (His second MG34 did have an assistant). From that moment on Tim was always on the back foot and despite moving his sniper asset to a better position was not able to turn the tide. When in position the sniper was claiming a Canadian each turn but as the rest of Tim's troops crawled wounded to their fellow squad members. Unfortunately it was too little too late and Time German squad conceded that grid square to the Canadians. Graham did admit afterwards that he was on the verge of withdrawing when confronted with the sniper but as Tim's squad was badly shot up Tim failed the morale check (from Grahams point of view) just at the critical moment. Overall another good battle but with a surprise result.

Campaign wise I need to  send out the maps for the next turn and tell the players where they stand with regards to casualties, replacements and other issues. I will also need to apply the effects of things like preplanned artillery, air strikes and similar events. These are dealt with very simply I roll d6 for each event, German artillery, Canadian Artillery etc and if they roll lower that the dice I roll for the battles they happen before the battles and if equal or higher after the battles. As this turn I rolled a 1 for the battles everything happens after the games are fought.

We also had a little time for a very brief excursion into Full Thrust. Ian and Relfie are now looking to possibly start fleets. As GZG do two starter fleets for £30 I would suggest this would be a place for them both to start.

I think the real high point of the day was the arrival of John Lambshead (http://johnstoysoldiers.blogspot.co.uk/) who used to be a club member and whom we all hope will return. Overall a very good club day very enjoyable and the campaign has taken it's first real steps.