Monday, June 26, 2017

Bolt Action Battle Report - Partisan vs Germans - Retreat through the Mons Pocket scenario

In the last days of the occupation, a group of Belgian try to stop a force of German to escape their fate.

Last Friday saw the Germans trying to sneak a truck full of loot (Belgian beer) through Resistance infested area.
What happened, happened, the Belgians could not let the beer reaching Munich for the Beer fest and had to intercept the truck. Beer is holy stuff in Belgium.

Short story long, or long story short (depending how much interested you are in the subject).
My company let people carrying over day off from one year to the next. Issue is, by July 1st, it's all gone, wiped out, made disappeared. So, by mid-June I realised I had a day available, and took it on a Friday.
Bad news was it was not the most convenient day for the family, good news was that I could play Bolt Action.

We met with Von Evan, a German player that has always bad experience facing the Resistance.
750 pts army.
Belgian partisans
Leaders:
  • Second Lt x2
Infantry squads:
  • 5 Regular partisans with SMG
  • 11 Inexperienced partisans with pistols
  • 9 Inexperienced partisans with 5x pistols, 4x rifles
  • 9 Inexperienced partisans with pistols
  • 9 Inexperienced partisans with 6x pistols, 3x rifles
  • 5 Regular partisans, NCO with SMG, 4 rifles with one carrying a panzerfaust
  • 7 Regular partisans, 6x rifles, 1x LMG
Special teams:
  • 1 MMG
  • 1 bazooka
  • Snipers x2 


 Germans
 Leader:
  • First Lt x1
  • MP,  4x soldiers
Infantry squads:
  • 3x 7 Strafbattalion (Inex), 5x SMG including 1 panzerfaust, 1x LMG team
  • 7 pionners, 5x SMG, 1 Flamethrower team
Special teams:
  • 1x Flamethrower 
  • 1x Medium mortar
  • 1x Nebelwerfer 41




The German mission: escape with the truck and as many squads as possible.
The Resistance mission: Capture the truck, kill some Germans and escape.
All partisan squad starts hidden and in ambush.


The loot truck

German deny their left flank, but 2 bombs from the resistance have been placed in front of them.

Partisan plan a strong push to hold the German for 2 turns as they have no real transport

few units of the Belgian resistance are held in reserve
The game starts with the partisan deciding 1 German unit to explode. Standard partisan bomb:
1-3, nothing happen
4-5, bomb does not explode but remain potentially active
6: explosion, 1d6 pin, HE 3d6, pen+4
The German tank was moving on top of the hill, unaware of the partisan ambush. The partisan trigger the bomb, fingers crossed..... Boom! the bomb exploded, disabling the crew, destroying the tank for good.
Start of the game, and a nice Boom! The Panzer Jager is blown into pieces by a nicely crafted bomb

Resistance is hiding in the woods (front the sniper Jean Paul and his hunting rifle). Behind, one of the resistance officer. A dog is here to help the German player to visualise partisan's officers)

The second partisan officer with his bulldog

The partisans raised their rifles and pistols and attacked with passion the stunned Germans. They took the nebelwerfer in close combat, while another team moved toward the strafbattalion but never reached the target. The German leader took control of his men and mauled down the inexperienced partisans.


People are ready to kill some nazis.... But the front team will never make it.
Shots were exchanged between units. partisans were hit hard, however they kept the German from moving forward. Even with better equipped units, the Germans took heavy casualties.
When you need a 3 to kill...
One Strafbattalion was destroyed while the other squads were hit.
Germans are dancing around the cross road, undecided which way to take
The partisans started redeploy frontline units to the back, fearing a strong move forward from the Germans.
Another group of resistance's sniper. Comtesse Leonore, who learned to shoot in Congo
the partisan MMG kept on firing and keeping the German in check, despite being targeted by the German mortar. That will prove fatal to the MMG as the mortar was getting more accurate shot after shot.
Deserters are assisting the partisans

Partisan MMG
2 partisan teams appeared at the rear, ready to intercept the truck.
Partisan reinforcement. A bazooka to stop that truck. If needed
the German start to ready the truck for a push
The Germans are pinned down and the truck try to escape

The truck pass in front of embushed SMGs. However, they won't activate on time to stop it

The truck passed through the resistance net and escaped toward the 3rd Reich

Turn 4: We called it.
by that time, The Germans had 3 VP (for the truck escaping), the resistance 3 (3 German units destroyed), 
However, the Resistance had 3 units ready to leave, out of German sight, giving them 3 more points by escaping, while the Germans could not breakthrough with any units. 

Resistance victory for holding the Germans.



8 comments:

  1. Great stuff...lovely figs and table!

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    1. A game with painted mini and terrain goes a long way to make it enjoyful.

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  2. Gosh how busy was that with all them troops. Well done, neat batrep. Thanks.

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    1. 750 pts was not that many, but there was more infantry and little tanks, that is for sure.

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  3. Nice report some right characters in the Resistance :)

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    1. Resistance has more variety and no uniform. I can also take pulp miniatures without shame.

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  4. The truck may have escaped, but if the German soldiers didn't then who will drink all the beer? Will the truck driver claim all of it now :-) ?

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    1. I think the truck driver ploy was to escape alone from the beginning.

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