Blackhorse - 2 Sqn 11 ACR

[MikeJ19]

Things have settled down a bit...

[MikeJ19]

It has slowed down for a bit...

[MikeJ19]

It has been quiet...

[MikeJ19]

The victory conditions are a contested battle at the moment, but if I can recapture Stetten and/or Willmars that should change.

[Jagger2002]

What is going on with the enemy helicopters? In my game, my recce company had their entire complement of Bradleys chopped to shreds, very quickly I might add, by the helicopters which suffered no losses to my return fire. Have they had any impact in your game?

[MikeJ19]

Jagger2002,

The soviet Hinds did not do much damage to my forces - there were 2 Hinds and they each were created for 2 kills. A HMMWV took one out and artillery damaged the other one. So, I got lucky and they were not much of a factor.

I'm happy that they did not try to push past Nordheim - which limited their ability to affect my forces.

[MikeJ19]

Getting close...

[MikeJ19]

Another game over...

[MikeJ19]

AAR

What did I do right?

I kept my patience – they were many times that I wanted to push forward into with Willmars or Stetten, but I think in both cases waiting was the right option. Around Willmars that allowed me to get rid of the soviet TB. As for Stetten, I think that the soviets had no idea I had forces in the area and were more concerned that I would push toward Nordheim.

I was flexible and moved off my plan as required. My initial plan was alright, but I could not move fast enough to get into place around either Nordheim or Willmars before the soviets got there in force. But, I was able to adapt my overall plan.

My use of the M109s was good – should be as I was a gunner for over 27 years. I was able to use them against the T-80s around Willmar and hit the soviet MRB around Nordheim hard – which may have lead the soviet commander to think I was about to drive onto the town.

Having the HMMWV recce section in the South was very important and helpful. It was a big bonus using it to take the VPs at Sondheim.

What could I improve on?

The use of Recce – there is a good discussion about recce at the following thread: tm.asp?m=4226568. I need to figure out how to keep them alive longer.

I talked in my planning about finding the soviets and then reacting. In this case I used my recce Bradleys more like Inf Bradleys. I think this helped – as the soviets focused a lot of their attention and assets on destroying all my recce elements in Nordheim.

I should have moved my M109s further forward, they could not reach the soviet HQs and guns in the South East corner – which would have been nice.

[MikeJ19]

Thoughts on the scenario

I enjoyed the challenge again and like that the soviets were able to get ahead of me into Nordheim and Willmars – as this added to the challenge and made me react.

I’m surprised by how large of force the soviets had in Nordheim and that they left the VP locations in the West uncovered, which made it easy for me to recapture them and get a strong final result.

I’m also surprised that the soviets did not push North out of Nordheim. I was expecting them to head North. This would have made my life more difficult as I’m not sure how I would have reacted. The same goes if the soviets near Willmars had headed North – they would have dislocated my Inf Company in Heurfurt.

I wish the gunner in the southern HMMWV had listened better during orders and not tried to take out a Hind!!


Overall, I enjoyed this one. It was nice to do some night fighting. I'm going to try a medium size scenario next - Origins 2016 Scenario #1 Contact - Grogheads Staff Exercise

[Jagger2002]

Good AAR. I enjoyed it.

[CapnDarwin]

Another great AAR! Thanks for posting these.

[Mad Russian]

This scenario is one of the ones that took the longest to balance. With the two separated US forces that have multiple routes of advance to cover this scenario offers the US commander a lot of different choices.

If you get impatient you will watch your forces slaughtered. You might anyway depending on where the AI advances and what position they catch US forces in.

Glad this scenario played well for you.

Good Hunting.

MR

[MikeJ19]

Hi Guys,

Thanks for the kind words. As you can no doubt see, I'm enjoying these.

Mad Russian, I agree with you about the importance of having lots of choices to players. It makes the game more fun.

Have a good day,

Mike

[IronMikeGolf]

MikeJ19:

You ask "how do I keep them (recon) alive longer?" Before getting to that, you need a definite plan and set of missions for them. "Find the enemy early" is not a recon task. That is a commander's intent statement.

Let's look at your mission planning. You plan seems to be stop them somewhere and then counter-attack. OK, good so far. But you need to decide where. Pick the terrain.

Next, game out enemy Courses of Action (COA). Come up with three. You did that out well. What you need to do at this point is rank each COA both in terms of most likely to least likely and again in terms of most dangerous (to your plan's success) to least dangerous. Each enemy COA needs to have a friendly contingency plan to counter it. For each enemy COA, you need to decide what it is that you see on the battlefield that will tell you that COA is being used.

Once you have all that, then you can formulate an R&S (Recon and Security) plan. You plan to use your recon elements to confirm or deny each enemy COA as early as possible. Some elements may be able to cover more than one enemy COA, either simultaneously or in succession.

Recon survivability becomes, first and foremost, a question of ensuring they survive to accomplish their mission. The tradeoff you have to wrestle with is speed vs risk to your recon elements. This can influence you choice of where on the map you want to fight.

When you are making your R&S plan, you may discover that you don't have enough recon elements to do all the work needed. You might have to task a line unit to do some recon work prior to them participating in a defense or an attack. I have done that as part of a line company while exercising, particularly in the counter-recon phase of a battle.

[MikeJ19]

Iron Mike Golf,

Thanks for the suggestion. I will try it out on my next scenario.

I worked with the Infantry for the most part as a forward observer and then as a Battery Commander - which in the Canadian context means I ran the FSCC at a Battalion HQ. I never had the opportunity to work with our recce forces.

Have a good day,

Mike