The final throes

So, when we got back to the game we realised that we'd done more than we thought and we had only got two of my turns and 1 of Dave's to go! This was going to be close.

We started with my reserves rolls.... And I'm not sure why I bothered. One 6 out of 8 dice meant I had rolled a grand total of two 6s in 36 dice. I only needed 4 to have got all my reserves on as well! So sadly, this left my 4 Panzer IVs off the table just when I needed them most.... Undeterred, my lone platoon rushed towards the objective as the luftwaffe infantry platoon (too late to get near the objective now) sauntered on the edge of the table. The heroic observer called down a bombardment on the infantry platoon who were rushing towards the objective and killed one stand and more importantly, pinning them down......



After getting close enough to the infantry platoon defending the objective, they shot and assaulted.... And missed. The British swung back.... and missed. More Germans from the platoon piled in and assaulted and forced the British to fall back, but they passed their break test and so would be there to try to force the Germans off the objective next turn (pic below).

There were going to be some huge rolls this turn, starting with the pinned platoon rolling to unpin themselves on a 4+...... which they did! They then moved forward to get good firing positions on the Germans holding the objective. The British observer called in the Priests on the plucky platoon and spotted first time, hitting three. I then rolled my saves needing a 3+...... and got triple 1! There then followed a fusilade of shots from all the British, and making only 1 save out of 5 (again, on a 3+) the platoon was destroyed, leaving on the HQ to contest the objective. 3 shots from the AVRE later, only 1 hit and needing a 3+ to save.......I rolled a 1. I could see this turn wasn't going to go my way!

With the furthest objective taken, all eyes turned to the strongpoint Cod objective. Woud the plucky observer be enough to repel the might of the British army?

The pioneers managed to unpin themselves and storm towards the objective as fast as they could (bottom platoon). One British base from the infantry platoons trying to get into Cod managed to fight his way over the barbed wire and get into combat with the observer who was contesting the objective. We reckoned the Pioneers were probably out of claiming range of the objective and so this one base needed to kill the observer and occupy the house to get it.

My defensive fire hit... but the team saved it. This was it then, Dave's chance to get the win and all he needed was a 4+...... and rolled a 3! As he hadn't hit, my observer automatically counter-attacked and needed a 3+ to finish it...... and you won't be surprised to hear that I rolled a 1..... The British team then surged into the house again..... and rolled another 3! They must have over stretched themselves as the Observer then rolled a 5 to finish them in close combat and finish the game holding the objective!

............

.........Or so we thought...... I then thought I'd check the rules given we hadn't played in a while and there it was, independent teams could neither claim nor contest objectives and an observer was an independent team. So it all came down to how close the pioneer team at the bottom of the picture was from the objective!

After measuring it, they were in that area where there was only millimetres in it one way or the other, so we agreed that the British had shown enough pluck, vim and vigour to win the day and so the beach head was established and the kettles were put on for a brew by exhausted British infantry all along the beach....

A great game all told that really re-invigorated our interest in Flames of War and should catapault us nicely into the next stage of the landings - the battle for Caen and surroundings with a lot of the more esoteric stuff that we have in our collections for this very purpose.

Dave also has the US landing forces and so is keen to give Omaha beach a run, along with a couple of other beach landing scenarios from the books. There's also the chance to run a "what if" battle with the German operation Sea Lion not stopped by the weather this time around.....