Hull Down

The Japanese sweep forward. Hopefully.. otherwise I will have lost the game. This has a great scenario title and without context I instantly think of teenage attempts to 'date' 'the time of humiliations' fits perfectly...Or perhaps the amount of games you lose when learning the system...And erm after learning the system. Actually this references a bad period for the Vichy French Army in Indochina though to be frank I am a little at a loss for anything that would not be a bad period for the Vichy French. Perhaps when they prevented British raids in the Middle East. Anyway, my lack of knowledge about this particular armies World War Two's history aside, this sees a large force of decent Vichy French (the 3rd Battalion 9th Colonial Infantry) holding either a village or preventing exit of a third larger force of Japanese - 5th Canton Infantry Division (quality wise the Japanese are an even mix of 1st and 2nd line troops). Both sides have tanks. Well the Japanese have so...

The Rules are (sometimes) a terrifying prospect for beginners in ASL and early games can often be spent desperately trying to find what, where and how they should be applied to very diverse situations. As a positive the most common scenarios are quickly picked up (and are easily learnt in the starter kits) but every player is forever learning various situations that are not, perhaps, immediately apparent. These Rules Deep Dives are therefore intended to cover very specific rules which can sometimes be misunderstood.  The ITT Critical Hit This particular post covers how to check if you have a Critical Hit if using the Infantry target type. The first thing to remember about ITT critical hits is that they are much much easier to get than vehicular critical hits. The reason (to me) seems quite simple. When shooting ITT then you are shooting at flesh and bone and not armour therefore any hit 'close' can do damage but the chances of the blast, shrapnel, other such destruction is much...

We are continuing our early war Croix de Guerre scenarios with this fun mashup set 14th May 1940. The Germans are refuelling their armour by a large Chateu so the Panzer's crew have temporarily abandoned their vehicles protected by a small group of infantry. Considering the huge masses of French infantry about to arrive you might consider this as a defensive scenario for the Germans but it is anything but. The Germans are not amazing quality but the French are appallingly bad and as the game goes on the Germans get continuing reinforcements so that by  the end of the scenario they should have almost numerical equality. When you consider that the French are all Green so will be shedding soldiers throughout the scenario with very little chance of rallying and this gets much harder for the soldats. The map is also cunningly chosen. The Orchards are in season and the German start formation must set up within 2 hexes of the Chateau. This means that a lot of the approach paths...

Next up we have another CdG scenario early in 1940. A large force of Spahis (originally light cavalry recruited from Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco) are pushing towards a bridge on the outskirts of Aessan. This is defended by a mixed group of elite German Glider troops and some regular army anti-tank formations commanded by a Luftlanekommando Werner Hedderich. I have the German defenders so have several elite paratrooper squads along with a door-knocker anti-tank gun a medium machine gun and some 1st line regular infantry. Standard excellent German leadership will be needed as there are a lot of decent quality Elite French coming our way along with three H35 tanks. Setup I decided I really didn't want the French sweeping in from the right so setup my defence to nudge them in a more central direction. Machine guns commanded the roads and a sacrificial half squad sat on the edge to prevent anyone sneaking around the flank. My intention is that the 2nd row troops will hold back ...