Southern Front: AAR: Battegroup: 1st Polish Armor Versus German 12th SS

    Earlier in the week, I was solo playing some Battlegroup for a scenario to run for a convention game. Now, I have not finished all of the forces to run it exactly. It was going to be a rather large game in general. This was based off the scenario in the Normandy Book for the Assault on Saint Sylvania, France during Operation Totalize on August 7th, 1944. I ended up playing this game at Southern Front after Kalissa and I ran some demos for Cruel Seas and Black Seas. I brought this game up is a kind of wing-it affair. It worked out, since my friend, Matt played as the Germans against me as the Polish. Since I am half Polish, it makes sense. There were five capture points along on the board. Two crossroads, two exit points in the south, and one exit point in town. The Germans held the southern side. I came in on the opposite corner in the north. 

    What the Polish had in this game:

• One infantry platoon of Regular troops
• One infantry squad (Reg.)
• Five Troops of Sherman tanks with one Firefly (Reg)
• One Sherman HQ (Reg)

   This was able fifteen Allied tanks for the Germans to deal with spaced out with turns. First turn had two Sherman Troop and infantry squad and the Command Tank. Turn two, same with an HQ Sherman. Turn three, two more tank and infantry. Fourth, everything else.

    What the Germans had to fight back with:

• One HQ Panther Tank
• One Regular Infantry Platoon
• One Reg. Infantry squad
• One Reg. heavy MG42 
• 4 shots from off table Flak 88's off the southern table edge.
• Two Panzer IV H Reg. Troops
• Three Tiger I E Tanks Reg.

     Ten tanks were to counterattack the incoming Polish forces. The infantry and the HQ Panther start on the table. The second turn would receive six Panzer IV H's. The Fourth turn, the Tigers would arrive. Keeping in mind, I have a different set up in mind on the forces, but this was what I have built for the moment.

  The game kicked off with captures everywhere with a Polish Blitz down the road to town. It was apparent that there was going to be a race to the crossroads with both armored divisions. This is strongly encouraged in this game, though I tink Matt missed me saying he could have German infantry deployed in town. Around the corner, the tank battle began. Nearly all of the shots were at close range exchanging fire with punishing results to both sides. One the southern section, Fireflies were exchanging shots at long ranges. This was nowhere near as intense at the town action. We decided to call the town "The trapping of Tigers" with all of the burning wrecks. In the end, the Poles won buy morale, since I was never pooled a single chit out of the bag that was higher than 2. I got a airstrike of Typhoons firing rockets killing the HQ Panther and a Tiger just calling the game. And the infantry were just about to fully involved! Oh well!

     

    

Southern Front Wargaming Convention

 

 

  Southern Front 2021 has come and past! This is one of the smaller conventions that Kalissa and I try to attend. As silly as it sounds, this convention tends to be one of the harder conventions to get to, despite being only and hour and a half drive. Yes, this is held in Raleigh, NC, which in pretty close to us. However, the amount of events that interrupt this convention of the years was amazing. Most of them were hurricanes, so this one is the third on we have been to after knowing about it for ten years. We were have to be there!

    I like to think of Southern Front as the spiked punch bowl of historical wargaming. It is small with around about 60 to 80 people, but it is blessed with some grand historical gaming. It was about 90% historical games with some (I think) heavy hitters of the hobby in eastern U.S. There were a lot these guys I see running games at other major conventions, own miniature companies or write rules. I find it really cool to ask rules question to the writers themselves. Though, we only showed up for the Saturday part of the show. I was told I missed out of some awesome games on Friday. It was pretty full for a Friday. Saturday had a lot going on. I only shot a few photos and forgot most of the evenings games. I regret that, since there were some interesting medieval games going on. Anyway, here was what I took.

Bolt Action Demo Day at the Mighty Meeple, Concord, NC

 

 These are pictures of a previous Saturday, Sept. 11th for a Bolt Action Day. The owners of the Mighty Meeple wanted to expand their footprint in Historical Games like Bolt Action for sales and just for miniatures games in general. They asked my wife and I to come visit for suggestions and to demo the game last time. Since then, there was not that much advertising on their end about Bolt Action, though Kalissa chose a time to run demos for a Saturday. We know the response to the area, because of what we post in facebook groups. There are a lot of people who want to play, but do not have connections. In other words, there are too many groups online who do not know about each other in the same area. We were not sure want to expect, since we only heard of three people interested right before we took our three hour trek to Concord.

    Kalissa and I drove up with forces for three game and three tables worth to play on. When we got there, we had tables reserved for us to set up. I thought that was nice of them. That does not always happen for other places. So, no cutthroat table grabs! A few people we knew strolled in along with two people who were there for our demo. As the hours past, more and more people showed up. Sixteen people came directly for the demo day! We had several others stop by to watch. We had three other games running from people who just came to play their own Bolt Action games. And we ran four full games, ourselves. More importantly, we had kids playing and having fun! I always will pass on hobbies to younger generations. I swear that the young girl playing against her brother was like a clone of my wife playing. The owners were really happy with the turn out, especially seeing that locals who play there weekly also play historical games. There were talks about Black Powder and Hail Caesar. 

    Overall, it was a great trip with great success. My father use to always state after a project was done, "And yet, another success story!" We will plan for another day in the future with them.  Below are some more pictures. Enjoy!