Cristot, a Squad Leader scenario played with 5core Company Commander.

It is been a while since my latest AAR and even longer since one with Nordic Weasel's Five Core Company Command; a ruleset that I love for my WWII casual solo gaming. This is a first scenario taken from Squad Leader of more to come, although it is hard to find scenarios of German vs British or Canadians with just a few units and buildings. I am also playing with a new scale, 1/100 or 15mm which I have been painting since last Summer.

Special rules for this scenario: at the beginning of their turn, British must choose whether to activate the tanks of the infantry.

The PIAT and the 3 LMGs are not teams but attached specialists to other squads. Same with the sniper.

Map 55. Hill 102 is at the bottom right.

An approximation to the map 55 above with the forces already deployed except for the two Panthers that enter at the end of turn 1. All the hedges in the map are bocage and that supposes a serious delay for the British infantry during the game according to the rules as it takes three move phases to cross one bocage.

British activate first and choose to move the infantry with a very handy Scurry action. Germans where hiding (blue markers) and could not react.

Germans had a MG team and a heavy squad with officer in the ruined house with excellent fire lines but on their first shot they missed and the Brits answered them scoring 1s and 6s, sending in panic all the troops inside the building to the woods (on turn 3 I remembered that all SS troops were elite and could re-roll firing).

Deployed LMG specialists rushed forward up to 6" from their parent squads and that supposed a great advantage for the British. The rules do not say a word about how to destroy a deployed specialist who is firing 1S dice so I took them as any other squad but that made them very powerful. Next time they will be all attached to their parent squads.

Next turn British moved their tanks with four activation as they were 13 units in total. The German 50mm AT that was hiding fired and the tank but missed (unlikely shot).

Actually, Germans missed their three fire actions and panicked in return (yellow counters).

Panthers entering on East border scared the Shermans who tried to hide behind the buildings.

As the Panther in the road had fired before and could not fire in reaction, the Firefly turned around and tried to knock it out but it could not penetrate the armour. The crew got damaged (red marker) though. 

Then I remembered Germans were all elite and could re-roll rally as well so the the Panther immediately recovered and fired at the Firefly, vaporizing it (overkill). The other Panther on the hill also killed another Sherman. The rest of the Shermans did not know where to hide away.

The Sherman did not dare to face the Panthers and shoot at the German infantry instead, killing one squad and suppressing others but the Panther kept closing.

The MG team recovered the building and was in good position again to help the last one resisting German squad on the road trapped between the British infantry and the Shermans.

After failing for three times, the AT crew finally hit and destroyed the Sherman that was threatening that flank.

The game ended at turn six and the British lost as they could not reach the hill or clear the area. I should have deployed all the British infantry on the two parallel roads and flood the German in close combat assault whereas the Sherman should be looking East towards the Panthers and closer to the hill. I had fun but next time I hope the game will be smoother.

There is a second chance for the British in a following up scenario called Cristot, 2 but there are also a Jagdpanther and a Marder III in it that I need to paint first and now I am very busy painting other stuff so I probably leave that scenario for later and play a different one next time.
 

Cats and mice

Here is a new lot of painted 15 mil WWII vehicles, all 3D printed.

Panthers

Kubelwagens and Puma

Universal Carriers. The one on the right is got radio.

I still have to paint infantry artillery, flak, trucks, halftracks and a few more tanks before I am able to play Rapid Fire Reloaded, but with what I got so far I have enough to play Company Commander.

DBA 3.0 II/12 Alexandrian Macedonian army

This is the 15 mm Alexandrian Macedonian army from Cromarty miniatures, which with a few add ons could be converted into Imperial Alexander, Later Macedonian, Early Successors and even Pyrrhic army. 

Cromarty models are great and I had lots of fun painting them but I missed artillery and Asiatic light cavalry in its Alexander's army.

Macedonian Pezetairoi phalangites.

Hypaspists and Agrianian Auxilia and Psiloi (it is the only light infantry that comes with this army).

Alexander and his Heitarois with Thessalian armoured cavalry.

Alexander on Bucephalus with his companions.

Thracian cavalry Prodromoi, and Asiatic Elephant for the Alexandrian Imperial army II/15.

Somebody asked me for a size comparison between Cromarty and Xyston.

De Bellis Velitum

 DBV is a set of skirmish rules based on DBA system and written in 1991 by the same author, Phil Barker. The rules were never published and are unfinished but as I was idle, I translated them for my own amusement into Spanish which is my mother tongue, and also added some ideas of my own to fill missed bits from the rules.

Below you can see three games I played in a row yesterday together with some thoughts, but there is a better review of DBV in this guy's blog than I could possibly write and that I mostly agree with so I won't bother to poorly repeat what he wrote.

Anyway, Phil recommends to play with 25mm miniatures mounted on individual bases but I only have 1/72 scale models on round bases, but the game can be played equally as well.

First game was with a band of Saxons with one blade, three spears, one bow, two peltasts and one skirmisher on the left versus a bad of Vikings on the right with three blades, three peltasts and one bowman. All groups with 24 army points each. 

I deployed them in two columns with the heavy infantry on the road and the fast shooters on one side next to forest and difficult hill.

The first game went slow as I had to check the charts a lot, and also the blades and spears moved very slow and took them four turns to clash.

While they were struggling forward, shooters exchanged a few shots and the Saxon skirmisher on the hill was the first blood in the encounter.

Then the Saxons disabled one Viking peltast and also forced their archer in the woods to move back.

Finally, the Vikings charged and the melee was fast and bloody. The result of the fight was quite random and anything could habe happened. After the clash, the Saxons were decimated and demoralized and the game was over.

So far I did not like the rules and I saw them a bit clunky and slow. Then I played a second game with the same Vikings versus a Norman band in which I included some cavalry. They were two knights, three spears and one crossbow for a 24 army points. 

Vikings chose the left side to deploy, hoping to defend the bank of the waterway with their blades while their peltasts and bowman shoot from the forest.

Norman cavalry marched to the opposite flank to avoid shooting and also to try to cross an undefended side of the stream. Norman spears again slowly crawled forward while a few shots were exchanged from both sides as bows have 48 paces range.

Norman knights didn't wait for the rest of his group and charged through the creek. Vikings defended the bank (+1 to combat) but one of the blades was disabled by a knight just because of the dice rolls.

Later, the Viking archer put down the Norman one and then I sent the three peltasts to help against the Norman knights as their spearmen will never get to reach them.

In the end, luck was on Norman side and they killed all the Viking blades including their leader, plus one peltast. 

Knowing the rules better, this game the game was much smoother, faster and fun.

In the third and last game I introduced more cavalry and also made two subunits on each side to give them more flexibility and try new concepts as well. This time were Normans facing cavalry from the Lord of the Rings, but let's pretend they were Bretons or something like that. They had a unit consisting of two knights and another one with three cavalrymen equipped with bows. Here, one of the rules I amended is that shooters on horse can shoot 360º and not only forward, just like war wagons in DBA.

Normans deployed on the right to defend from the fence (house rule +1 in combat) between the forest and the house. Both sides faced each other and exchanged shots without any effect for a couple of turns. Then the "Bretons" used a high roll to charge with the knights supported by one of the archers on horse while the other two tried to outflank and distract the Norman infantry. They could shot down the Norman crossbowman but their knights were stopped on their tracks.

Norman knights disabled one of the Breton knights and then their spears closed down and trapped the Breton archers on horse against the buildings.

Then, they killed the last Breton knight, who was their leader, plus the supporting archer on horse. Combat again was total random madness and Normans were luckier. Their spearmen also killed another horse archer and the last one bolted away.

The second game was better than the first, and the third even better than the second one. I think this ruleset can be played as it is and that it can be fun. However, I also think that nowadays are better and faster skirmish games than this one. I think it might be fun to play a multiplayer general melee with four players, each one with a group starting from one of the sides of the board, but I don't see the game suitable for campaigns or connected scenarios, just for an occasional beer and pretzel game with some friends.