What follows is a quick report on the SCW 'bash' we had. I won't go into too much detail as we used one of the scenarios in 'Rompan el Fuego' and I don't want to give away any of the surprises in the scenario for those yet to play it.

So, Dave had the Republican Thaelmann Battalion with supports of an additional MMG from Andre Marty Bn and a couple of T26's. They advance along the road, passing through a steep-sided gully, towards their objective, a treescreened University of Madrid building. There are other buildings about the board, some belonging to the University, some not. Ian had the Nationalist forces, comprising a tabor (battalion) of Moors and a company of Spanish Foreign Legion. Both sides have off-table artillery support but no specifed OP teams, so that task was designated to the respective battalion HQ's to call in. 

The game began with the T26's probing the buildings and uncovering some Moors who, having no anti-tank capability of their own (molotov cocktails and petrol-soaked blankets thrown onto engine decks being the order of the day in Spain!), relied on the o-t artillery to rid them of the tanks. At this point, it's worth mentioning that, despite being called in pretty much every turn by both sides, the artillery did squat to help!

Anyway, the Moors rifle and MMG fire against the approaching Thaelmanns was much more telling. They took cover in a nearby building and a few turns went by with the Nationalists and Republicans exchanging desultory fire before the tanks got bored with being able to do little with their 6pt HE and went roaming the table, looking for other targets. However, while this gun battle was going on, both sides used the engagement to move up reserves - Ian's Moors sent a company to scale the top of the gully to fire down on the HQ and MMG and succeeded, after a few rounds of firing, in getting the HQ to bolt towards the buildings.

In hot pursuit, his Moors managed to take down the Bn CO. By this time, the Thaelmann's had broken into the building occupied by the rest of the Moors (who had lost their MMG and a couple of HQ figures) and a firefight continued there. The Thaelmann reserve had moved up to a jump-off point amongst the trees, ready to assault the target buildings held by the SFL but, disaster!, a 1 was rolled for the morale of the Battalion! With them being under artillery fire and having lost their CO, even having a company in buildings was no good and they fled, leaving Ian's Nationalist force battered but triumphant!

A good game, enjoyed by both players and fought to a conclusion in just over two hours, leaving plenty of time for tea and biccies and the post-game, "If I'd moved that there instead of..." style discussions.