Testing Brigade Panthers

 So with ValleyCon25 a mere two weeks away, I booked in a couple of practice games to make sure that my proposed Brigade Panther Company was as bad as I thought. Here's my advanced secret tech (as I am wont to do every time this rolls around) for our Flames of War event: 

Core

• HQ Brigade Panther (Late)
• 3 Brigade Panther (Late)
• 3 Brigade Panther (Late)
• 3 Brigade Panzer IV/70 
• 4 Brigade Wirbelwind

Support

• 4 Volkshetzer
• Full Ardennes Assault Platoon
•  SdKfz 250 Recce Platoon
• Lucky
  

I'm musing on swapping out the Hetzers and the 250 Recce for 4 Panzer IVs but I do love a Hetzer and the rare occasions where a Spearhead move would come in handy will be pretty awesome. Hard to know right now...

Anyway, I played a game of Scouts Out with McBeth Jr Sr running a French tank company with no infantry and 13 as the best AT. This felt like a game where sending my Panthers up the guts was the right answer since I should be able to facetank AT 12 76mm guns... 

So we shall start with a photo of my first save of the game:

My COs Panther blown to bits by some M18 Hellcats. Because I can facetank 76mm guns right? I popped a Hellcat in reply but ho boy what a trade that wasn't.

He jumped into a new tank and promptly bailed out the following round to more Hellcat shots. From there, I pushed my remaining Panthers forward supported by the 250s (!) who removed the M18s from consideration from the game. The French HQ exchanged ineffective fire with my Volkshetzers.

Having seen off the M18s, I sent the 250s to distract the remaining Sherman 76s before any French reserves arrived. I also pushed my reserve Panthers forward, getting ready to shove Panthers onto both objectives - they're just on the left of the photo below:

This next pic was taken about turn 6 when the game fell apart for me. The HQ Shermans sold themselves to pop a pair of Panthers (four shots, two hits, two ones for saves, two successful firepowers) before my Panzer IV/70s sent them to the shadow realm exposing the front objective.

At the top of this photo you can also see my response to the arrival of French reinforcements where I retreated slightly after I lost another Panther to rolling ones. After I destroyed the 76mm Sherman in response, a couple of 75mm Shermans made the brave run through a forest onto the flanks of those two Panthers and the result can be seen in the picture below - two bailed out Panthers...!

The last photo is me making a cheeky shove to grab the objective, relying on range and smoky wrecks to keep that Wirbelwind alive:

 

But McBeth Jr Sr managed to get enough shots to hit it and break my company. I probably could have pushed on another turn but my Volkshetzers were about to get 76mmed and my IV/70s were too far back to really impact the game. 

So it mostly worked as intended, except for my staggering ability to roll ones when I really didn't need or want to. It was a useful reminder that I shouldn't trust my dice either... I think I like the idea of having this many Panthers. It is a lot of fun to be cruising around with arguably the best tank in the game but with some of the most hamstringing crews that Germans can field. It's a really good challenge. Playing it well is really rewarding.

My second game, with McBeth Jr Jr, went according to the plan suggested by McBeth Jr Sr - where it was Panther v. Panther, playing more conservatively was the go. McBeth Jr Jr was running a Mixed Panzer Company with Panthers and Jagdpanzer IV/70s and the realisation was whichever one of us started to collapse first would probably go down. We played Scouts Out again and this time it was McBeth Jr Jr whose armour saves were not where they needed to be. My firepower rolls weren't good either but they were made up for by a series of failing 5+ Remount and Last Stand rolls that meant my Panthers emerged victorious. 

It was a useful series of lessons. Am I prepared for how wildly swingy Brigade is going to be? Not really, but I am looking forward to it!

Next Time

I'll be working on finishing my Sororitas squad and kicking into a new/old project - repainting my Panzer Is and Panzer IIs for Early War...