Sturm Uber Der Nationen Full Results

Below are the results from this year's Early War competition:

 

Best Painted Allied - Steve Charlton
Best Painted Axis - Matt McVeigh
Best Sport - Simon Monks

Our next event is Mid War, 1700 points from the book 'North Africa'. 6th & 7th June 2015 at Wilsthorpe Community School

Art of War - Day Two

So we resume on Sunday morning:

Game Four

Round four I played Dave Wengraf, who had a British infantry company. The mission was 'Cauldron'. He would be defending.

Dave had 3 Infantry platoons, 6 pdrs (late), 17 pdrs, 25 pdrs, Universal Carriers, Wasp Carriers, Bofors and 3 Churchills.

I don't have pictures of the first game, as I managed to lose it in the first two turns. With little terrain to hide in, my Tigers took one round of shots at the British lines, failed their Stormtrooper moves,  before they were torn apart by 17 pdr shots, and I failed Company Morale. We redeployed, and played again, and that is the game shown below.

The table was light on terrain, with small woods dotted over the table

Dave's forces dug in on both objectives, with 17 pdrs trying to cover both flanks

Art of War - Day One

This past weekend, 4 of the Reluctant Conscripts (Mick, Tommy, Owen and myself) attended 'The Art of War', a 1750 LW tournament held at Sanctuary Gaming in Sutton-in-Ashfield. Organised by Steve Charlton, and fellow Conscript Tim Harris, this was a tournament with a twist. The top 32 ranked players had to play with tank or mechanised lists, or face a points penalty.

Photo's of Sturm Uber Dunkirchen 2014

Best Painted Allied - Steve Charlton

Best Painted Axis - Mark Mainwaring

Third place, most sporting and destroyer of Somua's! - Roger Whittam

Second Place - Jon Hopwood

First Place - Mark Palin

Alex's trip to Corrivalry - game five and conclusions

The last game of the weekend for me was Encounter against Matt Haywood, who was also running Kampgruppe Pieper. Matt's list was very different to Laurence's.

 

He had only two platoons: 1iC King Tiger, 2iC King Tiger, Pieper in his Panther, Limited Sturmvogels, 2 Skozeny Commando teams and a platoon of Panzer IVs. The Panzer IVs were in reserve.

 

Initial deployment. As I had the first turn, I dug in my artillery and advanced my infantry up the flanks. As it was a meeting engagement, I could not bombard.

Turn two, I destroy the platoon King Tiger with artillery. At the start of his turn three Matt takes and fails a company morale test. 6-1 to me.

As we were barely 10 minutes into the round, we noted our result, and kept playing on. Matt's planes come in to harass the infantry heading for that objective.

The other infantry move up the other flank towards Pieper

105mm artillery arrives from reserve

The 155mm guns are pinned for the rest of the game

The infantry move up and takes the objective, but we keep going

The other infantry moves up and uses its flamethrower on Pieper

Whilst the 90mm guns try and open up on him too

Panzer IVs arrive from reserve..

...And take out the infantry on the objective

Stuarts and Cannons arrive from reserve

The infantry assault Pieper

Killing him, and we eventually call the game here.

This was unlucky for Matt, but part of the risk he takes with his version of the list. Only putting one tank on the right hand objective, but three on the left, and if it were me, I would have had the Panzer IVs on the table, as they would have been harder for me to kill, and probably caused me more problems.

So 2 big wins (both against KG Pieper it turns out), 2 minor losses and a blowout at the hands of the Canadians leaves me at the end of the weekend exactly where I was after day one, 38th out of 84, which I am very happy with.

Road to Rome should be out in March, and I am hoping the cost of the support platoons will come down to match the other Late War books. This could go some way to getting a third infantry platoon into the list, which I think I need if I am to attack with it properly.

Alex's trip to Corrivalry - game four

Day Two. I would be playing John Hopwood and his Canadian Rifle Company in Hasty Attack. John is one of the best players in the country, and the only member of the Lancashire Hotpots I had not played in 5 years of Flames of War tournaments. Knowing one of John's lists included Breaching Groups (which would make him Auto Attack), I decided to try and defend, taking my 'B' list again. That was a mistake, as he also took his 'B' list, and ended up defending. A strategic bombardment could have really helped pin John's forces down.

 

John had 2 platoons of infantry, 6pdrs, Mattress launchers, M10 Achilles and several patrols of Universal Carriers.

 

We pick up the action after John has destroyed both my infantry platoons (who doubled) and Typhoons have taken out the Stuarts.

Things are not looking good for the Americans.

We get some reinforcements in the form of 90mm AA, hoping to protect the artillery from further excursions by the RAF

My best hope of getting some victory points and making a play for the objective was taking out the Mattress Launchers. Despite being ranged in on the platoon with both lots of artillery for the entire game, I only managed to kill one. 2+ firepower tests failed me in this game.

The Cannon platoon arrives, hoping to take out some Mattress Launchers

The Mattress Launchers take out a 155mm gun and a 90mm gun.

The 1iC runs for cover behind a building

The Cannon platoon moves up, but is unable to cause any damage. I must have a platoon in his half of the table from turn 6, so they were also keeping me in the game.

John starts moving his infantry up on my left flank

M10s arrive from ambush and gut the Cannon platoon

And his infantry come up and capture the bailed out vehicles. 6-1 to John.

This game was difficult. I made multiple mistakes in this game, that really took away my ability to fight. Doubling both my infantry platoons on turn one was hubris, I had become too confident in their abilities after day one, but they are still trained, and die in droves to mass firepower. My dice rolling was also atrocious, but that is a return to normal for me. I am looking forward to getting a rematch against him at one of the Sturm Uber events later in the year, and hopefully I can acquit myself better then.