All,
0930 on 6 Aug 1990
Mini-Campaign Fight #26
TF Bowie vs FLA 4th Company
Captain Madre-Animral
Commander, TF Bowie
Navy Cross, Bronze Star w/V, War of Liberation and South Leon campaigns
1st Lt Peria
Executive Officer, TF Bowie
Medal of Honor, Navy Cross, Silver Star x 2, battlefield commission to 2nd Lieutenant, meritorious promotion to 1st Lieutenant
Captain Madre-Animral leads his TF Bowie against the FLA's 4th Company. The FLA 4th Company was in a reserve position at H-Hour, but was thrust into TF Hammer's path. The Cubans of the the mechanized task force quickly pushed them aside, where they halted to lick their wounds, before being called forward to attempt to halt TF Bowie at the River Shalabi.
This is a simple attack-defend scenario: the Cubans are seeking to eliminate the FLA's 4th Company as an effective fighting force, while the Communists are simply hoping to survive the onslaught of these crazy Cuban Marines!
The opposing forces, allies on left and Communists on right.
The figures are all 10mm from Pendraken, Minifigs UK, and Butler's Printed Models. I'm using Ivan's "5Core Company Command," playing on a 3' x 2' surface with simple terrain to speed up the process. The hootches are from Jimmi at Flashpoint Minis, the roads are from Fat Frank, the hills are from Warzone, the fences are from Sarissa, the fields are from Hotzmats, the trees are cake toppers, and when you see the rivers, they're from Wargamers Terrain. I'm playing solo and will randomize enemy deployment using a system of blinds borrowed from Joe Legan's "Platoon Forward."
In terms of caliber of forces, the SLA, FSNL, and FLA troops will all be treated equally, except for the fact the FLA troops will be treated as fanatics, in terms of their willingness to advance into close combat. The Cubans are more tactically and technically proficient, and so they will receive extra firing dice, better rallying capability, bonus in close combat, and sometimes will have a second command stand on the table.
Captain Madre-Animral's force consists of: a command stand, six rifle teams, an LAV-25, a machine gun team, and an 81mm mortar team. These troops are Minifigs' Modern US with a BPM LAV.
*There is also now a separate command figure for Lt Peria, who was the Bowie 03 Team Leader but has now been promoted to Executive Officer.
TF Bowie also has some heroes amongst its ranks:
-CO Captain Madre-Animral was awarded the Navy Cross and a Bronze Star w/V
-XO Lt Peria was awarded the Medal of Honor, the Navy Cross, and two Silver Stars, and was provided a battlefield commission to 2nd Lieutenant then meritoriously promoted to 1st Lieutenant
-Bowie 01 Team Leader was awarded the Bronze Star w/V
The Task Force Bowie Executive Officer, hero extraordinaire, and now living legend, 1st Lieutenant Ray Peria.
So, what do I say? I could apologize; that fight was 99% close combat, and if that's getting a bit stale, I feel ya, me too, I suppose it's kinda inevitable when you're 26 fights into a campaign and still have another 4 to 6 fights to play. As I mentioned in the previous batrep, some of it is my fault; I've relaxed a lot of the game rules, to the point that close combat is too easy to get into. Another facet to the 'close combat is too easy and it's my fault' vein is that my random deployment is not helping, it's actually hurting the games, as the two sides are starting off too close together, making close combat inevitable. Thing about it; the start of this fight was one mortar bombardment to suppress one rifle team, and then the CO and a rifle team started on the right flank and rolled it all the way up to the left flank without firing a shot (in terms of a 'shooting' activation), it was all melee combat and enemy reaction fire to try to halt them.
In terms of 'other' aspects of the fight, well, I really should have had the last enemy rifle team and Technical surrender to Captain Madre-Animral and his command group, rather than allow them to keep fighting after they'd already lost their commander, five rifle teams, and a Technical, but... Well, I wanted to see if the good Captain could do it all in close combat (he couldn't), I wanted to reflect that the bad guys were in an all-or nothing fight to stop the Cuban Marines from getting across the river, I wanted to reflect that this was it for them (very quickly they'd taken too many casualties in this fight and would have to be eliminated from the campaign map), and it just didn't feel right for the Cubans to win all those close combats without taking any casualties, then have the last two units surrender to end the fight.
And I'm glad I didn't, allowing the bad guys to keep fighting, knocking out the Cuban commander, the LAV, and two rifle teams, kind of 'evened' things up a bit, made it seem a bit more interesting, at least to me. The good news for the Cubans is that Captain Madre-Animral only received a flesh wound, not dead, doesn't require evacuation.
But it was still fun for me, and real quick, and if you enjoyed the batrep and I'm ruining it for you with my post battle analysis, my most humble apologies to you, that is not my intent. I am speaking to the guys that are thinking, "jeez, there goes Jack on another tear with his super-Marines in close combat." Suffice to say, my intent is to get back to you the origins of the rules as written for the last few games of this campaign, making it harder to get into close combat. No more firing then charging into close combat (the rules forbid this, you're allowed to move and fire/fire and move, but if you're heading into melee you're not supposed to shoot), no more command stands acting alone (nope, only attached to a rifle stand to give a positive modifier), no more charging in 'scurries' (not supposed to have any combat in a 'scurry'), no more starting with the opposing forces on top of each other, probably some others I'm forgetting right now. My only concern is how much time this will add to the games, and if it will make the games much less dramatic (a lot of ineffectual fire back and forth). We shall see...
In terms of 'other' aspects of the fight, well, I really should have had the last enemy rifle team and Technical surrender to Captain Madre-Animral and his command group, rather than allow them to keep fighting after they'd already lost their commander, five rifle teams, and a Technical, but... Well, I wanted to see if the good Captain could do it all in close combat (he couldn't), I wanted to reflect that the bad guys were in an all-or nothing fight to stop the Cuban Marines from getting across the river, I wanted to reflect that this was it for them (very quickly they'd taken too many casualties in this fight and would have to be eliminated from the campaign map), and it just didn't feel right for the Cubans to win all those close combats without taking any casualties, then have the last two units surrender to end the fight.
And I'm glad I didn't, allowing the bad guys to keep fighting, knocking out the Cuban commander, the LAV, and two rifle teams, kind of 'evened' things up a bit, made it seem a bit more interesting, at least to me. The good news for the Cubans is that Captain Madre-Animral only received a flesh wound, not dead, doesn't require evacuation.
But it was still fun for me, and real quick, and if you enjoyed the batrep and I'm ruining it for you with my post battle analysis, my most humble apologies to you, that is not my intent. I am speaking to the guys that are thinking, "jeez, there goes Jack on another tear with his super-Marines in close combat." Suffice to say, my intent is to get back to you the origins of the rules as written for the last few games of this campaign, making it harder to get into close combat. No more firing then charging into close combat (the rules forbid this, you're allowed to move and fire/fire and move, but if you're heading into melee you're not supposed to shoot), no more command stands acting alone (nope, only attached to a rifle stand to give a positive modifier), no more charging in 'scurries' (not supposed to have any combat in a 'scurry'), no more starting with the opposing forces on top of each other, probably some others I'm forgetting right now. My only concern is how much time this will add to the games, and if it will make the games much less dramatic (a lot of ineffectual fire back and forth). We shall see...
Casualties:
Cuban: ~20 men, one LAV-25 destroyed
Communist: ~45 men and two 12.7mm HMG-armed Technicals destroyed
Decorations:
Captain Madre-Animral, TF Bowie's CO, was awarded the Navy Cross for leading the assault on the Communist defensive line on the River Shalabi. Beginning on enemy's southern flank and working all the way to their north flank, Captain Madre-Animral nearly single-handedly defeated the enemy defense, knocking out the Communist commander, five rifle teams, and an HMG-armed 'Technical,' before being wounded in close combat with a sixth enemy rifle team.
Captain Madre-Animral, TF Bowie's CO, was awarded the Navy Cross for leading the assault on the Communist defensive line on the River Shalabi. Beginning on enemy's southern flank and working all the way to their north flank, Captain Madre-Animral nearly single-handedly defeated the enemy defense, knocking out the Communist commander, five rifle teams, and an HMG-armed 'Technical,' before being wounded in close combat with a sixth enemy rifle team.
Team Leader, Bowie 03, was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star w/V for participating in close assaults of enemy positions that resulted in the destruction of an HMG-armed 'Technical' and two Communist rifle teams, before being killed in action during a later close combat.
Next up we have the other Marine battlegroup, Lieutenant Ordonez' TF Redleg, attempting to force their own river crossing further north, against the Free Leon Army's 6th Company.
V/R,
Jack
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