AAR - A Clearing Somewhere in the Ardennes

Now that I’ve unpacked and figured out where to put everything I'm able to start gaming again and Ashley kindly invited me down to his casa for a spot of FoW Panzer bashing. He's recently finished up his Panthers with his newly acquired airbrush (and rather nice they are too!) and wanted to give them a go. So both of us threw together lists from the Bulge books and had at it!

So will the rule of "newly painted tanks die first" apply here or will Ash be able to break the curse? To find out read on.......

Ash took some crazy list from Forces of War which had Confident Veteran Panthers (x30 CiC & 2iC in Panthers, Stug G’s (x3), a Mounted GPG Platoon, Wirbelwinds (x2) and an ME262 (Sporadic)

I had a 4^th US Tanks from BGG, Sherman Platoon (2x 76mm, 1x 75mm), Sherman Platoon (2x 75mm & 1x 105mm), CiC 76mm, 2iC 75mm, Para Platoon (x6 stands), Stuarts (x3) and M10’s (x4).

We ended up playing free for all as we’re both a little rusty on the rules (even after I played a full weekend tournament!), with me as the attacker. Ash had laid out a nice balanced table, quite heavily terrained however not many areas that blocked line of sight.

I had first turn and immediately did something that most FoW players consider stupid (unless you’re Paul and I at Panzerschreck vs Scott and Bryan. Go check out Scott or Pauls blogs to see how well that turned out!), I double timed my Stuarts up the flank. It was a risky manoeuvre as there were 3 Stugs, 1 Panther and two Wirbelwinds within range however I managed to cluster them safely behind a wood. The only way Ash was getting them was with his Panther or Stugs and moving into position would expose his side armour to my 76’s so they were pretty safe.

Meanwhile Ash went for the pincer approach, massing his Panther platoon and CiC on my right flank. I was in trouble as I only had my CiC 76mm and the Sherman platoon with 2x 75mm’s and the 105mm holding that side.

Two turns later and our ineffectual shooting had managed to bail a couple of tanks on both sides, not really much had happened although Ash makes a pretty good cup of tea, and his missus brought in some brownies (things were looking up).

Then it all turned to custard (as they say down here in NZ), at least for Ash it did. He’d had very little success with his Me262 as it tried to bomb my Para’s who were dug in on an objective (never gonna happen) and failed miserably to cannon any of my tanks (including my lone 2iC who was lingering as my mobile reserve!). 




Then I popped my TD’s slap bang in the middle of the board and proceeded to blast the heck out of the Panther Platoon. The curse of the newly painted tanks continues as they vapourised.

Where once there Panthers, there now are none!

I then proceeded to batter the GPG’s who were following up, and his CiC, even trying to take it out with a direct shot from the Sherman 105mm in the side armour (didn’t work, but it sure looked good). My CiC then got a bead on the CiC Panther and lit it up with his 76mm.

Meanwhile over on the other side of the board Ash finally managed to toast a 75mm Sherman however by now I was pouring fire into its side armour from my flanking Stuarts, my 2iC moved up onto the road running through the centre of the board and got a lucky side shot to seal the deal.

Are the Stuarts in a good position, what do you think?

Even Stuarts will make a mess of a Panther from the side!

The he leisurely cruised down the road to claim one of the objectives, pretty much sealing Ash’s fate.

Game to me, however it was by no means a certain thing. My TD ambush was really devastating on the Panther platoon and then the GPG. If I had had a bad round of shooting Ash would have battered the Shermans holding the objective and it would have turned into a slugfest between the Para’s and GPG’s.

Rushing my Stuart’s up the Flank really screwed with Ash’s plans to have a long range duel as he couldn’t afford to have them hitting his Panther in the side. Unfortunately no matter which way he cut it I had side shots from either the Stuarts or the Shermans.

(Note: All the US were mine apart from the Stuarts which were Ash's)

Once again a really fun game, however we do want to break the curse, maybe its only a Panther curse in which case the next game I plan on taking reluctant trained Panthers! Yes that’s right, its going to be awful, but I’ll have millions of tanks (so at least it’ll be fun).