Fire and Fury Games' Battlefront WWII Coldwars 2005

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There were a lot of good BF:WW2 games at this year's Cold Wars, and Rich tried out his Regimental Fire and Fury with an ambitious Antietam Game. In addition to the Burma games put on by Mark Hayes and several desert games put on by Rich H., there was a Tunisian Longstop Hill by Michael Panzer, a Polish attack and Saipan invasion Pete Landry, the next Kokoda installment by Steven Lee, a game featuring Hungarians and early war Russians by Steve Keyer, and big Utah Beach game by Al Gaspar (if I missed anyone, I apologize-I was manning the booth). Unfortunately I didn't get pictures of everything, but I did get a representative sample.

Burma Counter-Attack

Mark Hayes put on a scenario involving an attack on a fortified position in Burma. The first time he ran it, the Japanese were easily driven back. He did some research and found out that the attack started at night, so the second time he ran it, they were able to get through the wire.
First Game:

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Burma 1/1	An overview of the battlefield. Some Japanese start to emerge from the left.
Burma 1/2	Japanese emerge from the woods.
Burma 1/3	The lead Japanese forces start to take casualties.
Burma 1/4	Measuring Fire - Much easier in the day.
Burma 1/5	A second Japanese force emerges.
Burma 1/6	The First Japanese force is driven away.
Burma 1/7	A second Japanese force gets hung up in the wire.

Second Game:

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Burma 2/1	The same setup, but this time night rules allow the Japanese to get to the wire relatively intact.
Burma 2/2	Japanese move up.
Burma 2/3	Just as in the first game, both attacks aim at the same areas.
Burma 2/4	Going through the wire.
Burma 2/5	Closeup.
Burma 2/6	The other side also penetrates.
Burma 2/7	To help the lead forces, the Japanese drops smoke on them as the breach the wire.

Battleaxe

Richard put on two desert scenarios, the first of which involved hordes of British armor assaulting the usual combined arms German Defense.

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Battleaxe Photo 1	A horde of British Tanks comes on the board.
Rich Presides	Rich Hasenauer running the game. The British hit the front line of German positions.
Flank Move	The British send a large contingent down their left flank.
Closeup	A closeup of the British advance - Photo by Steven Lee.
The flanking move	Another view of the flanking move.
Frontal Assault	While the flanking move continues, the rest of the British force takes on the German positions head-on.
Counterattack	A German armored force wends its way through various gaming equipment to take on the British flank attack.

Fort Capuzzo

The second game by Rich was the battle for Fort Capuzzo. The dug in Matildas were not as easy to kill as the Crusaders in Battleaxe.

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Capuzzo Photo 1	Germans move up to the line of waiting Matildas.
Capuzzo Photo 2	A view of the British defenses.
Capuzzo Photo 3	German wrecks mark the advance.
Capuzzo Photo 4	Another picture of the German Advance.

Marines on Saipan

Pete Landry and Mike Sincavage had the players hitting the beaches on Saipan. They also put on a Polish-German scenario earlier in the day. My thanks to Pete and Steven Lee for most of the photos.

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Saipan 2nd Wave	The Marines come ashore.
Close up	A Closer view.
Another View	From above.
Another View	From the side.
Another View	From the Japanese perspective.
Japanese Defending	Japanese positions defending their side of the tracks.
Moving Inland	Marines Move Inland
Moving Inland	Another view of the advance
Close Air Support	Navy Corsair bombing Japanese positions.
Armor Support	Amtank LVT(A)4 and Sherman support the infantry spearhead.
Japanese Armor	As the Marines finally advance across the tracks they are greeted by Japanese armor.
Japanese Armor Alone	Only Japanese armor and a lone company commander hold this sector of the line...
More Air Support	Another pass by the Navy takes out a 37mm ATG, disables a Shinoto and suppresses a Chi Ha.

Kokoda Trail-Brigade Hill

Steve Lee put on another installment of the Kokoda campaign. This one involved a Japanese assault on a defended hill. The Japanese were favored by the Gods of chance and crushed one flank.

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Brigade Hill Battlefield	The Brigade Hill Battlefield, best characterized as a heap of green with a trail down the middle of it. This probably is a good description of it in real life. The Australians start hidden (in the game it was sometimes hard to find them in the shrubbery :-)).
Japanese Appear	Using their usual flank march the Japanese arrive unannounced from the side of the board.
Contact	Moving up the hill, the Japanese hit the entrenched Australians.
Moving Up	Japanese on the right flank go farther before making contact.
Battle on the Left	A view of the battle on the left. At first the Australians inflict heavy casualties, but Japanese numbers start to tell.
More on the Left	The frontal assault is not doing well, but note the relatively intact unit moving up on the far left. One of the characteristics of the battle was the terrain, if a unit panicked down the hill, it would take it several turns of movement to get back into the battle.
Taking the forward positions	Japanese troops swarm into the forward positions.
Fight on the Right	The right flank battle starts to heat up.
General picture	A view of the whole battle, I think this pic was from Pete Landry.
Breaking In	The Japanese break into the forward positions, aided by a few fortuitous 10s.

Kokoda Trail-Eora Creek

I was unable to get pictures of Fall-in 2004 because of a computer failure. Steve Lee sent me some photos of that game. As one of the Australian players, your humble webmaster learned how NOT to conduct a fighting withdrawal.

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Eora Creek Battlefield	The battlefield as seen from the Japanese side.
Flank March	As usual, the Japanese come in from the side.
Scattered Defenders	Australian troops try to defend and retreat at the same time.
HQ Defends	The Australian HQ defends a roadblock.
Closing In	The Japanese close in on the last escape route over the creek.

Hungary for more

Steve Keyer of Two Tin Soldiers is developing a line of Axis Allies and early war Russians called "Legions East". To show them off, he put on a scenario where early war Russians with Cossacks, a variety of weird tanks (unfortunately the T-35 did not make it on the board), and assorted infantry attempted to break through a combined Hungarian/German force.

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Cossacks	The Cossacks and a light armored car move up to the woods - Photo by Steven Lee.
Hungary Photo 1	Steve Keyer gleefully sends in an I16 to strafe the Axis positions.
Hungary Photo 2	The Rata conducts its attack.
Hungary Photo 3	At the top of the photo a Russian Infantry Company finally reaches a hill after charging across an open field. In the center, a T34 moves up, showing just how superior it was in the early war. A troop of Cossacks lurks on the hill to the lower left.
Hungary Photo 4	Russian infantry moves around in large clumps. Fortunately for them, the Germans did not have indirect fire capability.
Hungary Photo 5	Urrah! The Cossacks charge, accompanied by some light Russian vehicles. The T34 duels with a big infantry gun in the center.
Hungary Photo 6	Another view of the same time showing the left flank infantry attack being repulse, while the Cossacks take the forward position.

Utah Beach

A beautifully made board had U.S. paratroopers attempting to disrupt the German defensive artillery positions while their compatriots stormed ashore on the beaches to fight their way inland. Despite the large size of the board, the force density was small, leaving lots of room for maneuver.

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Utah Photo 1	The battlefield from the West end, showing the town and fields.
Utah Photo 2	The battlefield from the Eest end, showing the beach and causeway.
Utah Photo 3	The beach, with U.S. forces preparing to land.
Utah Photo 4	A group of U.S. paratroopers heads for the town.
Utah Photo 5	Another view of the paratrooper assault. The grey blocks are used as a summary of the unit cards and also for hidden units.
Utah Photo 6	The U.S. forces hit the beaches.
Utah Photo 7	More paratroopers show up (upper right). German forces start to coalesce around the town.
Utah Photo 8	Artillery hits the paratroopers. There was some controversy about this attack, and I think the templates were placed inside the minimum range of the guns. However, the attack did not do any damage. While they were shooting at the paratroopers, they were not firing on the beaches, so this gave the U.S. players a short break.
Utah Photo 9	Back on the beach, U.S. troops move up.
Utah Photo 10	One last view of the whole battle.

Antietam

Richard tried out his regimental rules on the battle of Antietam.

Click on the Thumbnail for a full-size photo	Description
Antietam Photo 1	Union forces emerge from the cornfield and approach the sunken road.
Antietam Photo 2	The same situation from the Confederate point of view.
Antietam Photo 3	The assault goes in.
Antietam Photo 4	The Confederate Right has held but massive forces assault the left.
Antietam Photo 5	The Confederate left collapses and they fall back to the next line.

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