Blogger Pel is taking his British Paras to a Flames comp at GenCon this year so we had a bit of a test game to see how they went.
We rolled up "Killing Ground" as a mission and I put the objectives as far apart as I could. Pel wasn't really in a position to make use of the flank deployment zones as that would have left the objectives underdefended against my fairly quick armour! One objective was held by a Para platoon and the 6pdrs and the other by a mortar platoon and 2 17pdrs with a second Para platoon and a Carrier platoon in a position to move one way or the other. His Bofors platoon was in ambush - it's a feared weapon against all my FA3!
I pushed the objective defended by the minefields with my L6s, M14s and a Paracadutisti platoon with Lancia da 90s and Semovente 75/34s providing overwatch. I realised that the Semoventes were basically not going to be much chop as an AT weapon so they settled in to bombard the Brit infantry. I started the game failing to get any successful Elite rolls and failing every 2+ Avanti roll I made bar one in the first two turns!
This next pic was turn 2/3 after Pel sprung the Bofors ambush and, mercifully, only popped a could of L6s and brought on his Churchills from reserve in the right place (chagrin!)
I'd managed to pop one of the 17pdrs with a Semovente bombardment and the second Semovente bombardment kept the mortars pinned, allowing my Paracadutisti platoon to advance largely safely. The Churchills unsuccessfully engaged the M14s and in the exchange of fire between the remaining 17pdr and the Lancia da 90s the 17pdrs emerged victorious killing one and the other failing it's Last Man Standing test.
Meantime, in hilarious times, Pel's armoured cars arrived in completely the wrong place so decided to see what a 15mm Besa could do to a Semovente. Short answer, not a great deal. The 17pdr passed a Last Man Standing Test.
I set up for the final shove on the objective here - over the next turn I set about clearing a minefield, removing the Carriers with my CO, flamethrowering the Bofors off the board and machinegunning a lot of the Para Platoon. Pel made 11 3+ infantry saves. Out of 11 as I tried to sort them out. In the end, the Semoventes did the heavy lifting, destroying both the mortars and a lot of the Parachute platoon. The second Parachute platoon arrived in the centre of the table and, after killing my CO in assault, set about trying to prove they were better paras than the Italians. The 17pdr passed a Last Man Standing Test.
The photo below is, I think, turn four or five where I decided to ignore the Churchills and break through the little gap between the minefield and the wood and drive onto the objective. Pel made sure my Paras were definitely toast by then but incoming fire on the M14s was lacklustre, killing only one. But the 17pdr passed a Last Man Standing Test.
The game finished up with my last three M14/41s on the objective and Pel's first unit of Paras and his CO wiped out. His response was to bail all three of the M14s (!) with the infernal 17pdr and the Churchills and move up his second para platoon to retake the objective.
I had one turn to see if a bombardment from the Semoventes and the last couple of L6 tanks could wipe out that second Para platoon and break the army but no such luck. I got a few of them, but not enough to do the job.
It was a good match and while I doubted that attacking the objective protected by the mines a couple of times, not having to drive into 6pdrs AND the ambushing Bofors guns seemed like the right choice. Genuinely, I think if that 17pdr had run, it was a whole different game - when there are Churchills on one side, honestly it feels like if you get the big guns out of the way, in this case my Lancia da 90s, it made for more of an uphill struggle.
Still, I'm happy with the list and will definitely run it again. If I was playing at a round 100 points, it would be slightly different (I'd be running Engineers instead of Paras I think) but the concept is sound.
Next Time
I'll be doing some painting over the next week. Who knows what you'll get!
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