Death in the Desert! Squirmer (Good Guys) vs Gary Tatro (Bad Guys)

[Squirmer]

I told you I'd be squirming when those Katz turned up

Remaining Firefly is now hiding. Air and artillery are concentrating on slowing the panzers down.

Only real action this time was in the south where a platoon of British infantry got bored and decided to take on the entire Russian contigent on their own. Did amazingly well considering but they will probably not last long ...

Got a boatload of reinforcements this turn, there are still more to come looking at the roster!

[Gary Tatro]

Down South we crush you pathetic attempt at breaking through.

In the middle we find your British company in the rocks and riddle every single man with a bullet.

Up north we place some smoke in front of your ATG's and proceed to give your M4's Kongstiger lovin.

That is all for now.

On a side note, the battle is really huge, I am having trouble negotiating the hole battlefield and making cohesive attacks, there are just to many opponents and to much terrain.
I agree with Squirmer also if you wanted this to be a hide and seek battle it is more turning into a slug fest with the winner being who ever can turn a flank. There are two things affecting this. One the visibility-it is totally going for tanks with high penatration and high targeting. Also because it is so high you leave dust trails everywhere. This allows the opponent to have a general idea where you are. I have been trying to nullify this by moving over all the hexes in my backfield putting up dust everywhere thus limiting his recon, but with the planes he is fielding it is hard (imposible) for me to keep my forces hidden.

[Squirmer]

My word there are a lot of Germans about! We are now most definitely in defend stance ... No idea how I'm going to stop those Koenigstigers, haven't seen any Kongstigers ... :rolleyes:

Very little happened this turn. Just a lot of artillery and now diminishing airstrikes trying to slow things down.

Notes:

An awful lot of units now. Tons of HT-mounted infantry mostly. Need more tanks really. Or even better a bunch of 17 pdr ATGs with APCR ...

[Gary Tatro]

British infantry die this turn along with a platoon of americans. They got to close AT infantry and were suppressed so he blasted them out of their halftracks and SS came in to finish them off. Saw a whole bunch of USA reinforcements coming in. Sent some aircraft their way. That is about it.

[Squirmer]

Not much action this turn. Mainly just trying to get into good defensive positions, which is not easy. Those elements which have foolishly moved forward (couple of mech inf platoons) are fighting where they stand.

My air is almost kaput. Lost another P51 to the darned Ostwinds. Almost a guaranteed kill when that 37mm hits ...

[Gary Tatro]

Along with a M4 and about 2 platoons of halftracks. But down south is beginning to look ugly. Pershings and M4's by the dozeen. Getting hot in the desert for sure. Now if I could just shot down the rest of that air I would be happy.

[Squirmer]

The last few turns show how Gary likes his infantry An endless stream of HTs, dismounting and assaults. Tanks only appear right at the end if my vehicles are still standing. Very effective stuff. I can only hope that at some point the German grunts run out of smoke so that I can shoot at them on my turn.

Things are not looking good for the allies except possibly in the south, where our forces are concentrated for some reason. We are now attempting a deep flanking manouver right on the bottom edge of the map. Panthers, StuGs and flak wagons oppose us. It will be interesting to see how this turns out ...

Note:

The turns are so long now that I do not get to see the whole VCR replay. Cuts out about 3/4 of the way through. The .REC files are now getting to be 8-10mb in size.

[Gary Tatro]

Without much to show for it. Pershings are nasty got one with an op fire and the other was kiled by US artillary. I also had two aircraft shot down.

[Squirmer]

Our defense line did pretty well that go. Forces are now lined up on opposing ridges in most places, it's difficult to cross the valley between.

Allies continue to make their mad flanking manouver in the south. One HT down, lots more still going.

Note:

Air has been pretty ineffective for both sides. Lots of planes getting shot down. Maybe less flak?

[Gary Tatro]

I think he should rename the the senario Vallies of Death instead of death in the desert. It seems when either one of us trys to cross a valley we end up being "buzzard food".

This turn up north I get within one hex of that 3 inch ATG and am stopped. I managed to take the other one out.

In the middle and south more half tracks and infantry perish but no pershings.

Way Way down south you get pummled by my overwatching units and artillary and aircraft.

My aircraft did a decent job this time racked up 2 tanks and a halftrack. I see you still have a lot of units back there.

The artillary is quite tremendous and devistating. I am having a real problem with all the Americain super halftracks that have a 50 cal and 2 30 cals. Where the vast majority of my halftracks have one 30 cal. I really have to worry about his halftracks shoting mine which forces me to use my tanks on his halftracks. Which is ok but he has really good tanks also and can use them to concentrate on my tanks. Over all it appears to be ballancing itself out.

[Squirmer]

This scenario might also be sub-titled "Halftrack Arena" Loads of the things on both sides. It is nice to have .50 cals but as Gary says this is somewhat balanced by the German armour superiority.

Fireflys back in action this turn. Won vs a StuG but lost vs a Kingtiger.

Nice to see a ME-262 fly over even it did take out a Jackson

[Gary Tatro]

Talk about brutal, the battle had turned from mean to nasty with air, armor and artillary everywhere. I keep pounding the southern flank and only two halftracks and a Jeep managed to get through. The rest are all along the bottom beaten up and getting hit with heavy artillary and air, started to see units disappear down there this turn. Must be getting hard to do anything. Still there are at least 2 Firefly's, 6 Pershings, and 2 M4's left down there not to mention about 15 halftracks. Someday my artillary will hit them. If I could just get them to come in close so my infantry could have a crack at them.

The US artillary is very devistating. Not sure how to deal with it. Good game so far.

[Squirmer]

Yes the guys on the southern flanking movement are not feeling too well. Still it is causing Gary to divert a substantial amount of his forces that would otherwise be beating me up elsewhere

Just trying to hold the line otherwise. Several Germans have made it across the central valley so far. Most have not survived but it's still worrying.

Note:

It seems like the MG42 Lafette is about 5 times more powerful than the US .30 Cal MG. Causing casualties from great distances. I know this is an OOB issue not a scenario design one though ...

[Gary Tatro]

Destoyed a tank, shot up a bunch of halftracks and continue to pound the southern flankers. Back to you.

Note: I am not sure if this is a H2H problem or not but it appears that once a air unit has flown over the map you can see all units on the map no matter where they are or if they were hidden. This includes when bombardment lands. Very weird???

[Squirmer]

We continue to nibble at the Germans and their allies. Small contigents continue to make it across the central valley. We pop out of hiding and send them packing

The American arty is devastating. In H2H you don't see the casualties on the bombardment but I checked the unit data screens One battery has 7 kills

P.S. I think that air showing all units thing happens when you have any changes to the OOB.

[Gary Tatro]

Are starting to take a beating. Two more tanks go down on the good guys side and a few more halftracks. Way down south I managed to rally a few troops and made a big whole in the flank attack. One sure thing about H2H it sure is a lot more difficult to get rid of infantry. Also much more difficult to see smaller units even when unsupressed.

New name for the senario, Valley of artillary. The American artillary has made it very difficult to do any sort of offensive menuvers. The combo of the American artillary and the better halftracks is countering the streangth of the German armor.

[Squirmer]

More nibbling. Germans are making a big push in the north which is probably going to become a problem.

US heavy arty completely on strike this turn (first time). May make pressing the R key more fruitful ...

[Gary Tatro]

Allied forces take a devistating blow up North this turn as German froces cross the gap and concentrat artillary, tanks and infantry. Destoying 2 Pershings 2 Dusters and a halftrack and successfully crossing the Valley of doom. In the Center another Pershing is taken out by a Panther and Kongtiger. In the south allied infantry are dieing everywhere the Southern Flank has been copletely stoped and should be cleaned up soon.

Note: The game has been brutal and fun. I few thing that I think might improve the mechanics would be to bring the reinforcements in faster and to have some VH in the central Vally of death that are valuable Per turn VH say 4 - 50 point per turn hexs in the north, middle, and south. Maybe make them appear like on round 5. That would be really cool and add more to the dynamic. I was able to push the good guys back originally but then I got stoped but his big tanks in overwatch and they just sat there. The per turns would map him do something.

Another thing would be to scale back the amount of Air Craft and provide more support tanks for each side. M4's for the Americans and Pz-IIIJ's for the Axis.

The way it is shaking out is that even if I do extreamly well and take the rest of the VH available I would not have enough points to get a minor victory. I think the way the scenario is designed will lend itself to Draws-This is why I suggested the Per Turn hexes in the middle.

What do you think Squirmer? PS you are leaving you tanks stationary again. Lets me target them with artillary. Just move them one or two hexes each turn and you can avoid this.