Camp Cromwell 11/11/2004

Soor 1745: Prussia (Mark) v. Austria (Jim)

The Prussian attack on the Austrian right was disrupted by a forlorn counterattack by the Saxon contingent. The Saxons were smeared, but they bought time for the ponderous Austrian command system to get a serious counterattack going. The Austrian cavalry won on both flanks. The first wave of the attack on the Prussian centre was beaten off, but the second wave against weakened opposition was scary enough for Mark to withdraw a brigade from the left. The Austrians then attacked the weakened right and broke it. The Prussians got out with what they could before the Austrian cavalry could reform & surround them.

The rules mods seemed to work pretty well. I’m still working on reforming the orders system & have a new scheme to try out next time.

FOW: Big Push 2000pts.

British (Jim & Barrie) defending
v.
Germans (Steve & Leigh) attacking.

A Reuters correspondent (Cameron) was present at the battle & will forward a detailed report in due course.

Briefly, it was a long slog.

The Brits had been digging furiously for a week and had a line of minefields plus 2 of wire then a line of entrenched infantry across the field. On the left 4/17pdrs and on the right 8/25pdrs deployed on ridges gave covering fire.

The Germans concentrated their attack on the Brit right.

The Brits got off pretty lightly on the preliminary Bombardment and the German Engineers only managed to make one hole in the minefield before being splattered. But the German artillery suppressed the 25pdrs & eventually destroyed them and the MkIIIs overran the front line infantry trench. But the German advance had been delayed long enough for some Brit armour to arrive & for the 17pdrs to be manhandled into a position to fire to the right. The MkIIIs & a Germ inf plat were destroyed but meanwhile 2 Pak40s had been put into a dominating position. They took out 2 Grants and scared the shit out of the rest of British armour which retreated out of range.

Finally the Brit reserve infantry counterattacked and destroyed the remaining German infantry to win the battle.

It’s an interesting scenario. The defenses look daunting, but the attackers start off with a Preliminary Bombardment and 2:1 odds so they have a good chance.