A côté d'un PBEM avec Vince Hughes, je joue des scénarios à une carte d'Elsenborn Ridge. Dans la série CrossRoads, celui-ci est plus intéressant que le précédent joué (le 13). Il y a beaucoup plus d'unités, et le scénario se joue de jour, ce qui simplifie les détections et spottings des unités. Par contre, pas trop de stratégie ; les allemands attaquent sur deux axes et peuvent être très vite au contact. Seule petite finesse, utiliser les champs pour l'attaque par l'est pour se rapprocher à couvert de la ville.

La victoire allemande semble assez assurée : dans ma partie, les US finissent avec deux unités d'infanterie réduites, sur un hex de ville ! Mais je comprends qu'on puisse avoir un nul avec une défense plus habile.

This is the last in the series on the battles for Dom Butgenbach. This time the Hilter Youth bring Panthers to cover their attack, but it failed to get them into the manor. They were able to get a draw out of the game with the American losses, but their losses was just too much.

To start the Germans have the armor advantage with the Panthers as well as a good amount of OBA. The leaders were OK with on X-2-1 officer. The Americans have the setup and good OBA support. The American leaders are good with all leaders having either morale or combat bonuses, but nothing higher than one. The Americans deploy around the towns positioning armor in the towns anhidingng the AT guns in the towns and fields. Infantry are dugin in the fields and in front of the towns. A slight change from the last scenario is that the Americans are defending the town hex to the west of the board.

The Germans look to use the cover of the morning mist to position on the Americans. A change is that the Americans are defending the western most town, so the Germans cannot sweep to the northwest. But this time the Germans will us the eastern troops to swing north while the southern force will try to pin the Americans.

The first couple of turns have the Germans positioning for the attack. The eastern force moves to the north and positions tanks to fire on the American armor once the mist rises and the GREN's engage them at close range. The first shots are in the south with the GREN's engaging the INFs, but American OBA shot the first kill on a HMG unit. Panthers open fire on the dugin troops and they demorallowingllowng the GREN's and ENG's to closassaultssualt the hex. American OP fire disrupt some, but a GREN and ENG get into the disrupted hex and kill the defending INF. German OBA start to hit the southern town trying to disrupt the M36 in the town. The next turn starts with American initiative and they fire on the German Panthers scoring a kill. The other Panthers open up and kill the M36.

To the noassault assualt starts with the GREN's closing but American OP fire is on target and a full GREN is killed. German Panther cover fire but miss their targets. American M4/76's scores two kills on the Panthers leaving one to return fire, but misses. German OBA comes in and demoralizes some of the dug in the Americans. Continuing to close assault assualt the Germans get into the American trenches an win the close combat.

Half way through the Germans are making progress toward taking the towns but heavy losses to German armor keeps the VC count close. The Americans have lost there M36 and a M4/76 and sevebutINF's biut still control all towns. The southern German attack looks to isolate the western town and a company of GREN's with HMG support look to take the town held by INF and a 57mm. American OBA hits and slows the progress of the company bu eventually they make it next to theassaultnd assualt. Heavy combat occurs and the Germans lose a GREN for the price of the town. The American INF and 57mm are destroyed. Now the Germans have one town hex, but the others don't look promising.

An engineer attack goes bad and the Americans pin a ENG assaultn an assualt. American OBA demoralize reinforcements and isolate the unit. Panthers are sent forward to help but American bazooka teams score a hit. The ENG and reduce Panthers are able to flee but the southern attack stalls. To the north the attack cannot get any disruptions or demoralization given the morale bonuses of the American leaders. The Germans try assaultrate assualt on the town but it fails and the Germans pull back.

In the end the game was a draw. The casualty count was high on both sides and neither could get the required 5 or more VP's to win.

Elsenborn Ridge: scenario # 21, Crossroads: The Last Gasp

I really like the scenarios from Battle of the Bulge 2: Elsenborn Ridge and haven’t played one for years but yesterday I returned to this game and used the winter maps and the upgraded Sherman tanks.

One mess up in my game play for the first turn only as I used the visibility chart on turn one assuming turn one of 2 hex visibility until I saw the first turn starts on 0630 which is 4 hexes of visibility. I am not sure why the Germans would use trucks to bring their infantry on for their southern group but on the eastern group it would help to bring on your infantry undercover of the lack of visibility and unload right before you got into the American’s range of fire.

This was bloody battle, both sides have about the same amount of off-board artillery but the Germans have about twice the Infantry force and their 3 platoons of Panthers and 4 platoons of Pz IVH are better than the American’s 2 M4/76, 1 M18 and 1 M36 platoons. The American rolled terrible with their armor and lost all of them, in fact the Germans only lost one step of armor to an American AT Gun. The Infantry loses were bloody on both sides but the Germans with numbers, engineers and armor prevailed in conquering the towns on map 22 with a major victory but at a cost to their Infantry.