Stoof and Tiny do WWII (Bolt Action)

[Stoof]

Since I'm down in the land vowels forgot, @Tiny and I met up for a couple of games of Bolt Action once I'd obtained a permission slip to flee the Yakwife and Yaklings for the day.

Tiny brought his late war European SS with fun little units he hadn't used before, I brought my early war North Africa 8th Army - so lots of assault rifles, SMGs and a Nebelwerfer vs Bren Guns, SMLEs and stiff upper lips.

The battlefield - somewhere in Russia/Eastern Europe going by the table set up for us at Firestorm Games in Cardiff.

(More to follow shortly)

 

[Stoof]

The first game was a retrieval mission - an injured down pilot had information that the Germans mustn't get. He was sheltering by the church in the centre, I approached from one side, @Tiny from the other.

Both of our forces started fully in reserve - we needed to pass an order test to bring any unit we wanted on. Simple enough, unless your units are remarkably resistant to turning up. One of Tiny's trucks missed the whole game.

Not keen.

The slightly more enthusiastic truck delivered a team of engineers right to the middle, despite my Boyes AT rifle putting an AP round though the driver (RIP Hans), where a section of my infantry rushed in to try and collect the pilot.

Despite taking some incoming fire, the German engineers managed to unleash their flamethrower into the oncoming British, ultimately wiping them out

The German medium mortar team then dropped a round right onto their opposite number before they were able to do a thing in classic Bolt Action need-a-six-to-hit-*boom* style.

Other British sections were closing in though, and delays bringing on the German reserves meant a small number of troops had to try and fight off the majority of my forces. An artillery barrage called in to my right flank put the fear of God into a German machine gun section and blew their armoured car to bits, whilst on my left flank their not-a-StuG (forgot what it actually was) and a section of panzerfaust equipped Veterans repeatedly failed to destroy the little Daimler armoured car. Not-a-StuG was hesitant to advance due to a 6 pounder Anti Tank gun positioned on a nearby hill, and a Matilda II plinking rounds into its side armour from across the board.

Then came the Nebelwerfer! Getting sick of waiting for their transport truck to tow it on, the crew wheeled in onto the field by hand. They proceeded to aim in the general direction of my right flank and all but obliterate an infantry section, machine gun team, the Boyes AT rifle team, and artillery observer (through not until he'd already called in the aforementioned strike).

Under the weight of incoming fire, the German engineers faltered and fled, leaving their incoming team of fanatical SS to try and capture the pilot.

Unfortunately for the German forces, my officer managed to drag the pilot on board a Universal Carrier, which promptly whisked them both off the table at full pelt right before the fanatics rounded the church to charge in with assault rifles and SMGs.

Game 1 - British victory!

 

[Stoof]

Game 2 - the Germans, having learned of my officer holding the information the pilot had passed on before, ehm, passing on, decided to attack my forces as they regrouped in a village. @Tiny had to capture my officer alive (beat him in close combat), I had to stop him for about 6 turns.

This was a "confused fight", with only half of each force starting on the board and the rest coming in as reserves from anywhere.

I placed my officer, two infantry sections, AT gun, artillery observer and machine gun team in the little village in the centre of the board. @Tiny then hit them with a preliminary bombardment, killing the observer but otherwise only putting a pin or two on others.

Keen to get stuck in, German squads in trucks were whisked up to my perimeter, the terrifying flamethrower engineers immediately toasting a full infantry section again as a machine gun section came up behind in support.

However, due to the confused nature of the fight, my reserve infantry charged right into the rear of this group, wiping out the machine gunners with cold steel and making the Veterans turn to defend themselves. This went poorly for my section, who were wiped out by the Veterans in short order.

My Matilda II trundled onto the board behind the German mortar to my left flank, but despite machine gunning them at short range failed to put them out of action.

In the middle, my second infantry section tried to leap from the house they were sheltering in to assault the oncoming SS, unfortunately they didn't count on the number or SMGs present or experienced, fanatical nature of the foe. It didn't end well for my chaps.

Then the Nebelwerfer was wheeled on, and in a frankly non-Germanic utter disregard for mission parameters, it blew the everloving buggery out of everything in one end of the village, including the "must capture alive" officer. Whoops.

That mission was therefore a default draw.

And that's all we had time for!

It was good fun to be playing a proper wargame with two nicely painted armies on a decent table after such a long time.

Things I've learned: flamethrowers are awesome/horrible.
Nebelwerfers are a fricking liability, but spectacular.
Veterans are totally worth their points.

 

[Tiny]

Great write up. Had a lot of fun. Can’t wait for a Tribe Bolt Meet sometime soon.

And the “not a StuG” was an StuH. (Haubitze instead of Geschutze). Silly thing achieved pretty much zero for two whole games, including sitting out the entire second game. Looked pretty while doing it though. As pretty as a house brick can look anyway.

 

[SuboptimusPrime]

Welp, all of this is making me wish the Bolt Action scene in my town wasn't divided between people who take the rules way too seriously, people who are suspiciously enthusiastic about playing Germans, and that one guy I went to school with who I really dislike.

Nice battle report (s), well done on the action shots, especially love the utter professionalism of the special effects.

 

[Stoof]

People who take the rules way too seriously,

Definitely not us. It wasn't until today that @Tiny noticed that there's a -1 to hit per pin marker for units that have taken fire. We've both played before these games and neither of us had ever noticed

 

[Tiny]

These games were my 7th and 8th games played. My brother even pointed out that I’d noticed that same error after our last game. Turns out my memory is just terrible.