We played our third game of Square Bashing Thursday evening, using the full pre-game mini campaign. Tom got the Turks and I had the British Empire. Ken observed the game.
Tom rolled well and got three additions to his assets, +6 shock (crates of grenades?), +5 point barrage (German ammo) and Ataturk – no retreat from one lost fight. I got an addition to upgrade two of my infantry battalions, and another that increased my rolling barrage. Using the first gave me 5 professional battalions, very nice indeed. All this good die-rolling doomed Tom to the offensive, an attack in force.
I set up the terrain and ended up doing the same as the others – I gave up one objective (a wooded area) deep in enemy territory so that the other three (crossroads, ruined farm, rough hill) were in my defensive line. I had all the rough terrain in my defensive line but Tom managed to move two wooded areas in front of my left center to provide cover for his advance. Between having mostly professional infantry and machine guns in my front line, I survived the opening depletion pretty well, I lost 4 stands of infantry. One battalion, a machine gun company and a field battery were transferred to my reserves. We've seen a lot worse.
Away we went. I summoned a suppression barrage. Most of it didn't land on his troops but it still held up his attack as much of it drifted closer to my lines and kept him from advancing for a turn. He tried to summon the Turkish air force but it must have been carrying the army CO's personal baggage. It didn't show up. The Turkish infantry – great mobs of poorly trained troops – surged up to the British line and firing broke out. I put a point barrage down on some Turks. Some of it drifted and I only landed on one square with enemy troops. I rolled two for hits, but the reservist Turkish infantry failed both saves. On the next Turkish turn, the problem became apparent. I had only considered how many hits the barrage caused. But the Turks had to take a morale check with two casualties and three barrage markers. Taking a test with 5 dice is chancy indeed. They failed three dice, which saw a battalion and a machine gun company rout off the table. It was quite impressive.
Tom then laid a point barrage down on my right center and got two squares of troops. He rolled some hits but my professional infantry, seeking available cover saved all of them and no morale test resulted. I then laid a rolling barrage on his left flank and sent a couple battalions back a square when they failed morale.
As the Turks closed on my right flank I tried to build some hasty works on the hill with my field guns, but it seems the supply corps sent dinner spoons instead of shovels. The Turks assault two objectives, the cross roads on my extreme left (which had hasty works) and the rough hill on my right center (also festooned with hasty works). The attack on the hill was seen off with serious losses. The attack on the crossroads poured over the hasty works and sent my professional battalion back. I had forgot to move reinforcements after placing them and needed to spend my next turn grouping a counter-attack. Meanwhile I summoned the RAF. Biggles appeared in a Sopwith Snipe and strafed Turkish field guns, getting three hits. But the Turkish gunners must have taken cover under their gun carriages – they saved every hit. But my other firing saw a cluster of hits on the force which had just been repulsed from the hill. On their next morale test some units routed and others fell back a square.
Tom tried to build hasty works on the captured crossroads but his supply train must have been out of shovels too. I put in a counter-attack that recaptured the crossroads and rolled the 3 I needed to end the game. We played 7 turns in 2 hours 30 minutes, not counting set-up time, the dinner break and general shooting the bull.
The British won a definite victory by some 38 points. Turkish losses were some 2100 infantry, 3 machine gun companies and a field gun battery. British losses were some 300 infantry and a machine gun company. If I were to play the Turks, I would be trying to lose most of the pre-game thing to avoid having to attack. 20/20 hindsight helps. With just a point barrage available, the only other thing the Turks have for attacking is mobs of semi-trained infantry. At least on the defense they can field a lot of machine guns.
