Capturing Caesar's Camp: Action 04 - La Ferme de Caubert

The next action in this TooFatLardies' pint-szied campaign, Capturing Caesar's Camp, features the attempt to capture Caubert's Farm, the jump-off point for a subsequent assault on Mont Caubert. It features the same platoon from B/4/Cameron Highlanders as in the last action...

 

This time the platoon has the support from its trusty FOO and his mortar men, a Vickers team from 1/Princess Louise’s Kensington Regiment, a scout car from 1/Lothian & Border Horse, and, most importantly, another French Char B1 bis.

When I played this game, the real weather conditions changed a lot, so some of the lighting/appearance of the game changes quite a lot also. For this, my apologies! Hopefully the narrative can guide you through.

The Set-Up:

The overall battlefield. The Scots are advancing from the South.

 

A slightly closer look at the farm and its environs

Another perspective

The Battle:

The advance begins, two sections up.

Hopefully you can spot the Scout Car advancing through the gap? And then the Germans in the treeline beyond?

A wider view - the other section is working around the right using the cover of the treelines

A better view of the German squad behind the treeline

As the British section moves up to engage - the Germans had gotten the worst of the initial exchange and pulled back - when they see a flamethrower team set up in ambush!

A wider view - note that the French armour support (another Char!) has turned up

The flamethrower team is eliminated, but not before they had destroyed the British platoon's mortar team!

A wider view - note the scout car by the junction (left) and the pulled back German squad can be seen at the second treeline (just!)

Okay, whilst the action is happening on the left flank, maybe the right-hand section can get up to the farm.

The British left section also goes flanking, preceded by the scout car and supported by the Char. It is taking the Vickers MG team with them too.

A wider shot, so you can see the British Pl comd controlling the final section and the platoon support weapons as a base of fire, if needed.

A bunch of Engineers are helping out the German section

Ouch! the right-flanking section walks into a well-concealed German ambush!! (It is well concealed too - you can just make the German squad out at edge of the hedgerow, top)

Okay, the fight by the farm got a bit weird - the British section managed to get close enough to launch their own ambush on the first German squad and eliminate a rifle group and the engineer group. But it turns out there was another squad concealed at the top tree line, in some kind of all around defence. The British have the firepower advantage with that Vickers though.

A few minutes later: about half the Germans are casualties, a few are still in the fight, a few have escaped back into the farm.

The wider perspective

King Kong arrives. Wait, what?

The French tanks have outflanked the Germans and are adding their firepower (top, by crossroads)

Over on the other flank, the British are heavily suppressed by the Germans. Unfortunately for the Germans, this is where they had sited their AT gun though...(right)

Okay, sensing the moment has come, with ony a couple of MG34 teams still holding off the British, the remainder of the British platoon advances a bit (bottom)

The British call in 3" mortar fire onto the farm complex

The British platoon suffers a couple more casualties in the advance, but the Germans have pretty much shot their bolt in the centre; more of their troops have become casaulties as some of the farm buildings are hit (note the fire in the near building)

Some of the reserve section go to help out the isolated British right-hand section

The stalemate has persisted on the othe flank - seeing the game is up, the Germans withdraw

The withdrawal carried out successfully.

The British advance on the farmhouse - all goes very quiet

Game Notes:

A fun and interesting game, although the British seemed to get the upper hand quite early and the Germans were never quite able to wrest any real initiative back. Their deployment against the British Right was in a very dangerous spot, but on the Left they kept on getting outflanked - the position just wasn't that great and probably needed to be held a little further forward...although against a French tank, that probably wasn't going to work either. And then the final German squad was activated in a really annoying place (for the Germans) - they ended up being in a horrible, enfiladed position.  OTOH, a more straightforward British attack up the centre might well have ended in a horrible defeat as they would have ended up in the enfiladed killing zone instead. But with the British superiority in firepower and support, the Germans were always going to struggle here, despite putting up a decent fight. The British lost 2 KIA, 6 WIA, the Germans rather more: 5 KIA, 5 WIA, 6 POW (although half of these were not part of the platoon core, so this platoon is still reasonably operationally effective).

 

As always in this campaign, rules used were Wargames Rules for Armour and Infantry 1925-1950. Most of the infantry was from Baccus, with a smattering of GHQ; the vehicles were from Heroics and Ros. the buildings are from Leven.

 

 

 

Capturing Ceasar's Camp: Action 01 - Attack on Hedgehog Wood

Two first's today - the first battle of the Too Fat Lardies' Capturing Caesar's Camp pint-sized campaign, and also the first game using the published version of 'The Farquhar Version' - John D Salt's creation of the 'missing link' in WRG WW2 company-battalion level tactical rules, to match the 1979 'Modern' set.

 

 

This first action features B Company, 4th Cameron Highlanders attack on an outpost of the German 217 Infantry Regiment. Each side must try and defeat the other and drive them from the field...

The British Force:

A Platoon, D Coy, 4 Cameron Highlanders

1 x Rifle Comd Gp

1 x 2" mortar team

1 x Boys ATR team

3 x Sections of 2 x Rifle Gp, 1 x LMG

Attached are:

1 x 2" mortar team

1 x FOO and 3" mortar section

1 x Bren carrier

The German Force:

A platoon from 217 Infantry Regiment, supplemented with two engineer groups, a 37mm anti-tank gun, a car with a rifle group, and a sniper.

Both sides are attempting to recover some documents and possibly some survivors from a disabled scout car on the road.

The British have already bombarded Hedgehog Wood. When any troops are activated in the wood, they are 'instantly' attacked to represent the effects of this.

The Set-Up:

Hedgehog Wood to the top-left, the Cameron Highlanders will approach from the bottom. Difficult to see, but the abandoned scout car is on the road (top-right)

Easier to see here

The Battle:

The action begins pretty much instantly - the leading section of the Camerons' is ambushed by a German squad (centre); the Camerons' 2 Section accompany the FOO through the wheatfield (left); incidentally the Bren carrier has already driven up the road to get to the scout car - the Germans clearly held their fire to avoid giving away their positions.

Six of the Camerons are cut down in an instant!

Luckily 2 Section (bottom) is in position to begin some enfilading fire to suppress that German squad but, if you look...

A second squad on the far side of the wood

The flanking suppression has allowed the Camerons' platoon commander to bring the remainder of the platoon up; and it has taken a little while, but the FOO is just about to bring down the fire of his mortar section onto the troops

It does little harm to the forward German squad, but the rear squad has been devastated by the 3" mortar fire.

This cues up the assault of the Camerons, which wipes out the first German squad. Note that the Bren carrier came back and forced the remainder of the rear squad to surrender too.

A weird cameo! A car with some Germans in turns up! (top)

The Bren carrier shoos it away with some pretty inaccurate fire

2 Section and the FOO advance somewhat gingerly through the wheatfield, whilst 3 Section and the Platoon command element (which has taken the remnants of 1 Section under command) go right flanking, covered from the wood by the hedges and trees

Eek! the Bren Carrier comes face-to-face with a German anti-tank gun!

The British actually get the drop on the German anti-tank gunners, but the fire from the Bren carrier is wildly inaccurate!

The German gunners make no such mistake and destroy the carrier; the crew is then killed or chased off by the British Lieutenant and his Sergeant

The German Platoon commander is at the edge of the wood, but no-one can quite see each other properly. He seems to have escaped the preliminary bombardment just fine,

The British Platoon sets up its base of fire in the hedgeline.

The German platoon commander has his own base of fire in the wood. But 3 Section is snurgling up behind the hedgeline.

There are a couple of photos that apparently didn't turn out too well. Essentially, there was a firefight which caused few casualties on either side - and then the 3" mortars arrived and caused lots of casualties amongst the Germans

The remaining Germans bug out. A few of them surrender to the advancing 3 Section.

Position at the end of the action

first game. for posterity!

Game Results:

A hard and well fought victory for the British. The Germans lost 34 (8 Killed, 26 POW, including 18 WIA) and the 37mm anti-tank gun. The British lost 3 killed, 6 wounded and the Bren Carrier.  The Cameron' platoon commander and platooon sergeant, and the attached FOO, really carried a lot of the battle. And as a plus, the British managed to recover the documents from the scout car too.

 

Game Notes:

Really good fun, with both the rules and the scenario. For solo play, I am using my system which had its roots in the 'The Threat Generation System'. In this case, it effectively generated a forward ambush on the Cameronians, which devastated 1 Section. Only the slightly fortuitous positioning of the FOO enabled the British force to concentrate direct and indirect fire and then turn the tables.

Obviously I have switched from playtesting John's other WW2 tactical rules back to this set. Happily, once I had played for about 10 minutes it was pretty easy to get back into the swing of it. It is very much of a fit with the two WRG WW2 sets designed for this level, slightly more complex than first edition but less complex than the second edition. The things you would expect to see are all there, and the basic systems are all very similar. But I will write a full review in due course.

Models mainly by Baccus 6mm, with a couple of the vehicles from Heroics and Ros and a couple of figures by GHQ in there.