My intent was to set out a WW2 invasion scenario… Americans landing in France, with the Germans defending. I set up the terrain, and discovered that I didn’t have enough 20mm American troops… that’s OK… the Brits could help out. But then I found out my German contingent fell far short of what was required, and so I switched Russians for Germans… sort of a what-if scenario… hence the magnificent piece of poetry to introduce this article. An American landing near Vladivostok, when the Russkis provoked Eisenhower by moving too far west in Europe. There were some 8 people at tableside… I took the job of umpiring. Digression Tony Figlia was one of the Russian commanders. For the first hour of the game (it started around 7:30 PM), Tony’s cellular phone kept ringing and ringing. What sort of business calls would Tony be plagued with late Friday night? Tony had told us he worked at Fort Meade, and headed the Special Services Department, and I thought that his duties would be confined to something like the following: Captain Gransk comes up and says “Tony, my company is having a football game.” And Tony would say: “OK. Here’s two footballs and a goal post. Sign here.” Or Major Grunsk would come up and say: “Tony, my battalion is having an intramural softball tournament.” And Tony would say “OK. Here’s two gloves, one softball, one bat, and a catcher’s mask. Sign here.” But the bits and pieces of conversation that we caught of Tony’s cellular phone conversations didn’t follow this at all. We heard things like: “… and Delta Force will move out around 0550…” “… The A-bomb fuse shouldn’t be activated until…” “… Let’s not wake the President yet…” “… We’ll put the Sixth Fleet on full alert…” Finally, Tony got fed up with the continual interruptions, and he shouted into the phone: “Look Secretary Cohen, if you guys have to invade Majorca to protect Hilary Clinton’s condominium, you’ll have to do it without me. I’m playing an important wargame, and I have important decisions to make, and important dice to toss.” And he hung up. And wasn’t bothered again. End of digression. On the field, I set out 8 defending battalions. Each battalion was composed of two stands: Infantry battalion 2 infantry stands Armor batallion 2 tank stands Reinforced battalion 1 infantry stand, 1 tank stand. Landing on the shores near Vladivostok were 12 Allied battalions, 4 at a time. I only had 4 large landing craft (LC), and this put a crimp in the Allied landing efforts. Each LC carried a full 2-stand battalion. The first LC touched the beach on the western side of the field, and off came a reinforced battalion, immediately entering the sea-side town of Roosk. And greeting them, entrenched in Roosk, was a Russian infantry unit. With the Allies as the Active Side (AS) moving all its forces, the next phase was one for the Non-Active Side (NAS), permitting them defensive fire. And fire they did, causing casualties to the invaders of Roosk. The Allied unit took a morale test (it had to toss percentage dice under 80), failed, and it ran back to the beach 10 inches, into its LC. Here’s Where I Goofed In my umpiring efforts, I made several goofs during the battle… nothing major, just minor goofettes. Goofette 1 When the Allied unit was driven back by Russian fire and retreated to the beach , it should have suffered many more losses than it did. But I took mercy on the Allied force (being of the Allied persuasion myself) and let it escape relatively unharmed. In the early action phases, as the Allied battalions moved inland and discovered lots of Russians waiting for them, they close assaulted several Russian-held areas, and lost every one of the melees, and were driven back to the beach area. Goofette 2 Here, too, I was too easy on the Allies. Even when their required 10-inch fall-back drove them into the water, I permitted them to run along the beach area, instead of losing men to the undertow. The sequence contained 8 phases… in the description below, following every movement phase which allowed a unit to contact an enemy, there was a defensive fire phase prior to the resolution of close assault. Phase #1. Here, the AS moved all its troops, regardless of type, a distance of 10 inches. Phase #2. Defensive ‘opportunity fire’ for the NAS. A ‘clock die’ (10 sided) was tossed, and the number noted. The first NAS unit fired, and the die tossed again. The second unit fired, and the die tossed again. When the cumulative total of the die rolls exceeded 12, the opportunity fire phase ceased. Usually, the NAS had 3 or 4 units able to fire before the clock die ended the phase. Immediately after the firing stopped, we resolved combat for all units that had made contact during Phase #1. The casualties suffered by the AS units from defensive fire, counted against the attacking Allied units in resolving the melees. Phase #3. Here is another movement phase. The NAS moves each of its armor and reinforced infantry battalions, 10 inches. These moves could result in a contact. Phase #4. Here, the AS gets its own round of opportunity fire, after which any melees produced by the contacts are adjudicated. Phase #5. This is a ‘free fire’ phase for all NAS units. There’s no restriction on firing, other than that the concerned units must have sufficient ammunition to blast away. Each battalion tracked its ammunition supply… every time it fired, one ‘ammo box’ (AB) was crossed out. All units started with 3 AB. Goofette 3 It turned out that 3 AB, i.e., 3 shots, were too few to keep the fire phases going. On one side of the table, as umpire, one of my duties was to track the supply trucks zipping along to each battalion on the field. Each battalion had its own truck. When a truck reached a battalion, it brought 3 AB for the unit. A battalion was permitted to store a maximum of 5 AB. Goofette 4 The supply track looked like this: Supply Depot to Point 1 to Point 2 to Battalion As the trucks went from point to point, the sides tossed percentage dice to note the progress of the supply vehicles: 01 to 33 All but 1 vehicle moves 34 to 66 All but 2 vehicles move 67 to 100 All but 3 vehicles move The sides had to decide which trucks had to hang back. But the supply progress proved way too slow, and so I coalesced Point #1 and Point #2 into one central point. This helped the flow of ammunition to the units on the field. Phase #6 This was a ‘reaction cycle’ initiated by the AS. He could expend Reaction Points (RP) for additional fire and movement. After the AS went, the NAS took its turn to expend 2 RP. And then it was back to the AS, and so on, until both sides passed. Since movement was possible, contacts could be made, and any melees that occurred were adjudicated immediately. Phase #7. AS can now issue ‘field orders’. These are composed of a listing of 5 possibilities. AS dices to see if he can select either 2,3, or 4 field orders, such as: Repair one unit Remove a casualty figure Call on an artillery barrage for the next fire phase. Call on an airstrike for the next fire phase. Receive 2 Coordinative Fire Tokens. Goofette 5 Field orders were precious items, and instead of permitting both sides to issue them each half-bound, only the AS could do so. I should have allowed both sides to issue them, which would have opened up the game a wee bit. Phase #8. This was an administrative phase in which, for both sides, three things were accomplished. First, each unit which had taken one or more casualty figures from the previous 7 phases, now tested to see the actual extent of the damage done. Each unit went to the following chart to see the effect on its Efficiency Level (EL): 01 to 33 Unit loses 1 EL 34 to 66 Unit loses 2 ELs 67 to 100 Unit loses 3 ELs Over 100 Unit loses 4 ELs An infantry battalion could lose only 6 ELs before it was destroyed. A reinforced battalion could lose 8, while an armored unit could lose 10. The “over 100” category in the above chart came about because each casualty figure added 5 points to the dice throw. Note that in Phase #7, field orders, casualty figures could be removed to make the impact on the above chart less severe. Second, the sides diced for the progress of their supply vehicles as previously discussed. And third, each side received 5 new Reaction Points. The town of Roosk, on the beach on the western side of the field, proved fairly hard to crack. Bob Liebl was in command of the defending Russian troops, and his men, it seemed, couldn’t lose a melee. And when they were finally driven out of town, Bob immediately rushed another battalion into the town, attacking the Allied invaders. Some 8 of the Allied battalions landed on the western side of the beach… there were so many of them, they eventually broke through, causing the defenders to fall back. Goofette 6 Around this time, I noted that in the melee calculations, I had allowed no ‘plus’ for a unit defending a town. For some reason, no one called me to task for this omission. Infantry stands each fired for a distance of 10 inches at 25 percent per stand, hence an infantry battalion of 2 stands, had a probability of hit (POH) of 50 percent. An armored battalion had a POH of 60 percent and fired for 15 inches. These distance were, perhaps, way too large for the effective firing ranges of a 2-stand battalion, but it made for a more fluid game. The ammunition record keeping tasks didn’t seem to weigh anyone down. And even when a unit ran out of ammo, I permitted it to fire at half-effect… again, just to keep the game fluid. Finally, around the fourth bound, the Allies landed a couple of armor battalions on the eastern side of the field. John Shirey commanded these units, and they immediately drove up-field toward three towns on the Russian baseline, which I had indicated were the ultimate Allied objectives. John used his side’s regular movement phase (Phase #1), his side’s vehicle movement phase (Phase #3), and the reaction phase (Phase 6) to keep his tanks going. Seeing the non-stop Allied tank force approaching, the Russians drew back for a last stand. An Allied armor battalion smashed into one of the key towns. It was met by effective defensive fire, took a morale test, failed and retreated. John tried it again. Two more Allied tank units bashed away at the town. Goofette 7 I had poorly defined exactly what an ‘attacking unit’ was. These were critical times and there was a wee bit of heated discussion as to who was attacking whom. But all was soon settled, and the Allied flag flew bravely on the field at Vladivostok. Back to PW Review September 2000 Table of Contents Back to PW Review List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2000 Wally Simon This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com