"CoC Operation Martlet Scenario 4 St Nicholas" Topic

We now reach scenario 4 of our Operation Martlet campaign for Chain of Command. The fighting here is around the of St Nicholas. Historically this is a far as the attack got, can my British do any better and try to evict the Germans? It's a tough looking table for an attacker with a lot of open ground and few covered approaches. The full AAR is here Scenario 4: Striking at St Nicholas

TP, Top-Notch again!

One thing I really like that I've not seen much before, except in Desert scenarios, is the use of your vehicle dust here.

This really conveys a sense of movement and helps to also focus the viewer's eye on the armor.

So Cool >>>

+1 FlyxWire. Played a Tamai battle yesterday, and the host had dust plumes to mark moving units. Really adds to the ambiance!

My thing is the Firefly Vc with the gun only netted up to the edge of a conventional 75mm. That is superb attention to detail in any scale.

I will bet there was more cotton wool out of the engine deck than the soil, but I will admit that Normandy did either bake or drown in June/July 44.

Any Firefly would sit it out quietly. That is its only job. It was a very mobile (but stayed immobile when actually needed), very very powerful, reasonably armoured (our spelling) A/T gun. For any other purpose the various M4s/Shermans won hands down every time.

One thing I really like that I've not seen much before, except in Desert scenarios, is the use of your vehicle dust here.

This really conveys a sense of movement and helps to also focus the viewer's eye on the armor.

Thanks. We use them as a marker to indicate when a tank went ‘flat out' in the previous phase. That makes them slightly harder to hit if fired on in the subsequent phase and given much can happen in between it's a useful reminder for us. On occasions it's invariably more dust than is needed but it looks good!

Absolutely – form and function all-in-one – a nice ++

Thanks for the stellar report, beautiful minis & terrain, & great write up!
What strikes me regarding the game is that yiou exploited beautifully the potentialities offered by this open & seemingly forbidding left flank. Big guns are the way to crack that nut. Since your opponent spent so much on fixed defences, he had little left for AT stuff. A problem compounded by the deployment of the Pz IV on the wrong side IMO : placing it there nealy guaranteed your armour was safe on the left flank, barring some unfortunate combination of circumstances (excessive move of that M4, and too slow infantry). I'm gaming the same campaign (very loose schedule!) and I was thinking along these lines to tackle that map… Nice to see it works!

This looks fantastic.

Since your opponent spent so much on fixed defences, he had little left for AT stuff. A problem compounded by the deployment of the Pz IV on the wrong side IMO : placing it there nealy guaranteed your armour was safe on the left flank, barring some unfortunate combination of circumstances (excessive move of that M4, and too slow infantry).

A quick glance at the map strongly suggests the only viable approach is through the orchards and I think Dave assumed it was the only way I would come so chose his supports accordingly. He compounded the error by deploying so early and, as you point out, putting the PzIV on the wrong side.

As the Germans I'd have been very tempted to have a Pak40 to cover that open flank. The short range of the Churchill AVRE and the poor HE of the Firefly would have made it difficult to deal with.