Force on Force- How I stopped worrying and learned to love close assault....

Adam and I had our first crack at playing Force on Force last night, He was in charge of most of a squad of marines, whereas I was using some Gerbigsjager which I had freshly painted.

My 6 man team was made up of...

A Junior Officer with MP40

A Three man team, one with MG42, two with Rifles

A two man team one with a rifle, one with an MP40, who will be joined by the Officer.

So, how did it go?

Well, both Adam and I thought we had a good handle on the rules before the game began, only to find that we really didn't know what we were talking about! So our first play through was very, very stop/start with much looking in rulebooks to find out what we were actually meant to be doing!

The first match up was 8 D8/D8 Marines against 6 D10/D8 Gerbigsjager. We put down what we thought was a reasonable amount of terrain, and we spent a fair bit of time shooting each other from it! Adam had his force in two fireteams (not that the term existed in WW2 like it does now), one with a Rifle Grenade and a BAR, the other with an NCO with a combat shotgun. Very quickly, we found the superior trained Germans were able to counter act their poor numbers and poorer firepower by rolling a 9 or a 10! So that kept his support team pinned, leaving his assault platoon to hit my picket without damage. Close Assault in FoF is very, very vicious (as referenced in the title...) Simply, it removes one aspect of the game, first aid. If you become a casualty and your side loses the combat; you are either dead, or a POW. And there is not a high chance of being a POW.

The second and third match ups were based around both sides having equal training, but the marines having to attack a fortified position. Which sounds like it could be good to be German, except that in turn one of game 2, one of Adams fire teams slaughtered my entire force! I had one private with an MG42 left at the end of turn 1! Moral of the story for game 2? Cover is good, but rolling a successful initiative test to fire first is better.

Game 3 was much more interesting. I changed my squads to having a Weapons Team with an MG42 and 2 men, and a fire team of 4 men with the 2 MP40s. This game was much more even, the MG42 team was pumping out 6 dice per turn (2 men, 3 for the weapon, 1 for optimum range) at the enemy, and through successful initiative rolls, was doing it as soon as the Marines hit the treeline. The Weapons team did eventually fall to a vicious assault, but they were avenged by the squad, who cut through the enemy marines with their 2 MP40s in close assault (learn to love it).

Force on Force was fun, for Adam's report head here. Also, Jason I did do some research on your Type 99 LMG, and the bayonet lug is historical. And ridiculous.

"I stab you with my machinegun!". It's the sort of thing out of a Commando Comic....

As for what next? Well there is 3 days left in the Analogue Painting Challenge. So, I will get a SAGA Dark Ages army done and more Greeks so I can use them for Impetvs. If you particularly want to see my take on a hero of the Trojan War, tell me who you want to see in the comments!

At any rate,if I finish all of that it will be a miracle!

CP