Bolt Action in the desert day

Chris's DAK

On Sunday I travelled up to Hyde just outside Manchester to play in Tim & Garys Bolt Action Africa Day with the Indian force that I've been painting these last few months.

Each player would need a 600pt force and a 1000pt force. I thought I should use the Operation Lightfoot theatre list. For my 600pt I chose:

Second Lieutenant with SMG, Platoon Sergeant with SMG (Regular) 60pts
Unarmed medic (Regular) 23pts
Artillery Forward Observer with SMG, Radioman with Rifle (Regular) 10pts
NCO with SMG, 8 Riflemen, Bren Gunner (Regular) 123pts
NCO with SMG, 8 Riflemen, Bren Gunner (Regular) 123pts
NCO with Rifle, 8 Riflemen, Bren Gunner (Regular) 120pts
2 men with Anti-tank Rifle (Regular) 30pts
Sniper with Sniper Rifle, spotter with Pistol (Regular) 50pts
3 men with 3" Mortar (Regular) 50pts
Spotter (Regular) 10pts

For the dizzy heights of 1000pts I took:

First Lieutenant with SMG, Platoon Sergeant with SMG (Regular) 85pts
Unarmed medic with unarmed assistant (Regular) 33pts
Artillery Forward Observer with SMG Radioman with Rifle (Regular) 10pts
NCO with SMG, 8 Riflemen, Bren Gunner (Regular) 123pts
NCO with SMG, 8 Riflemen, Bren Gunner (Regular) 123pts
NCO with Rifle, 8 Riflemen, Bren Gunner (Regular) 120pts
NCO with Rifle, 8 Riflemen, Bren Gunner (Regular) 120pts
Sniper with Sniper Rifle, spotter with Pistol (Regular) 50pts
2 men with 2" Mortar (Regular) 50pts
3 men with Vickers MMG (Regular) 50pts
3 men with 2-pdr AT Gun (Regular) 50pts
Recce Carrier with extra pintle LMG (Regular) 70pts
M3 'Honey' Stuart III (Regular) 115pts

I chose Vengeance as my British special rule.

The first game was to be a doubles game, each player would use their 600pt list and the game would be played on a 8ft x 6ft table. There was though a slight lack of allied players, so Keith and Stuart woudl each use their 600pt lists and I added 200pts in the form of a NCO with Rifle, 8 Riflemen, Bren Gunner (12pts), 3 men with Vickers MMG (50pts) and 2 men with Anti-tank Rifle (30pts) to my initial 1000pt list.

IIRC Stuart had a Lieutenant in Kubelwagen, two eight man Veteran sections with SMG's and LMG, one eight man Regular section with LMG, an MMG, an Anti-tank Rifle and a SdKfz222.

Keith had 'one of those lists'  a Lieutenant, two 5 man Veteran sections, four five man Regular sections, a 120mm Mortar, two MMG, a Medium Howitzer and an Anti-tank rifle.

We would be playing Point Defence and I was the attacker. As we were playing on 6ft deep tables, the game was increased by one turn and the objectives would be placed 1ft from the enemy base edge - 5ft is still a long way to go even in seven turns!

My preliminary bombardment started well though, killing Keiths spotter and one of his MMG teams and placing quite a bit it of Shock - sorry slipping into Chain of Command there - among the Hun.

I started my advance and the Germans rushed to counter. I was able to neutralise a lot of the five man German sections quite early, but a hit by the howitzer put a lot of shock on the Stuart. My artillery was called in but I rolled a one and it fell amongst the Indians fortunately not putting more than two shock on anything. My flank attacks mopped up a lot more Germans and by turn seven had troops in the vicinity of all the objectives but not quite close enough. All we needed was an eighth turn, but that was not to be.

A good game, but if event organisers are going to play on enlarged tables then they need to think about the consequences of doing that. It realistically would have needed eight or nine turns.

After this game it was lunch time, they had kindly provided a ASDA Spinach & Ricotta Cannelloni that I promptly ate and threw back up - something did not agree with me!

Indians attack

On to the next round, this would be 1000pts Maximum Attrition against Steve with his FallschirmJäger.

Steve had a Leiutenant, four squads of eight with three SMG, four rifles and a LMG, a squad of seven Pioneers with a Flame thrower, a Mortar, MMG and a Light Howitzer. I was using my standard 1000pt list without additions.

Steve chose the table edge with a building and packed two of his squads in there and put another on the flank. A beautiful roll by my artillery took out both the Leiutenant, Mortar and the Light Howizer and the MMG was soon shot up too. My Stuart and Carrier poured fire into the house and at one stage one of the FallschirmJäger squads was on six pins which it rallied off, before being on four pins which it rallied off before finally succumbing.

On my left Steve launched an attack with a FallschirmJäger section who came very close to overrunning my defending section, by now down to four men, but by changing direction of one attack and committing a unit in reserve on that flank I shot them up.

On my right Steves FallschirmJäger Pioneers arrived and toasted the Vickers and then went on to toast the 2-pdr, but the damage was done, Steve had lost six sections to my two. A victory for the Indians.

The final game was against Chris with his DAK. this was using 600pts and playing the Demolition scenario, unfortunately, this was the only game I managed to photograph during the day and only took two photos at that.

Chris had (I think); Leiutenant, three Sections of 8 Veterans, an MMG, an Anti-tank Rifle and a SdKfz222 in his 600pt force.

I played this very much like the second game, using my superior numbers to rack up pin markers on the Veterans and take advantage of their having to rally them off. The artillery again killed the opponents Leiutenant very early on. I was worried about the armoured car as a road ran the length of the table and it could have quite easily bagged the objective, so I countered by getting a load of pins on in and leaving it to inaction.

At the bayonet, my Indians swept across the table and bagged the objective only losing a single section. Barring the SdKfz222 the DAK were wiped out to a man, although that was more to do with Chris's dice rather than any Rommel like qualities on my part.

A great weekend and although I am sworn off tournaments, I'll certainly give another campaign day a go.