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so it goes... I used to like Lars!

not no more!:mad:

whats your favorite ride Mr. Lars?

M4 Jess kills another!:mad:

Well, I ride cannonballs for fun, Herr M4!

And so do me brave warriors in Normandy...

And for the reader, here are the stats:

U.S. (M4 Jess) against Germany (me!)

6/44 random large map

Visiblity 14 (so no 88mm slaughter at long range, too bad )

7200 Pts, rarity off.

The terrain:

Left sides edge (M4´s) is rather swampy and sports a creek and some marshes, moblity across is provided by numerous bridges (~half a dozen).
Three roads run in a east-west direction through pretty dense woods with only occasional corridors of lesser vegetation between them. Hills are all over the place. The landscape becomes more open when approaching my edge of the map, there are even several buildings located near the roads.

The troops:

As if I would tell... I´ll post some semi-fiction here once I get my turn and remember to look up the names of my Oberst and other key officers.


A final word to the Yankees:

Get out of Normandy now! You are interfering with our Crusade against Bolshevism, and we do not take kindly on this.
It is, however, quite nice that you have grown beyond cowardly carpet bombing our cities and have put yourself in front of our mighty armies. Italy will look like a vacation compared to what awaits you here! You will long for Cassino and Anzio when we are finished with you. So say your prayers now: There will be no opportunity later...
:rolleyes:

I eat Panthers fir lunch!:mad:

1st turn...not much...Scharfschütze (as most Germans do) thought a nice on-board Neb shower would be fun...that is until I countered with 12 count'um 12 150mmSPAs and if those Nebs are not dead or routed I will eat my GI issue m356.983 class b helmet...

Back to you Lars!

Quite a hail of 155mm. Worse than expected. And I didn´t get to see my prep fire, so I don´t even know whether it was worthwhile.


I´ll do a story anyways:

Oberst Schweitzer gazed through his Scherenfernrohr at the inferno in disbelief. When the Amis had been reported behind the hills he had signalled Lt. Stumpf, his Vorgeschobener Beobachter, to trigger the Nebelwerfer battery his force had been assigned. The 15cm rockets had barely impacted in the designated zones with satisfying crashes when the Amis began dropping large calibre shells on the projectors postions. That smelled of treachery!
:mad::mad:

In the distance, he heard the sharp crack of AT guns. The reports came in immediately: Two Shermans destroyed, another under fire. Good. That would buy him time for a slight alteration of plans!

"Gefreiter Müller, holen sie mir sofort die Leutnants ans Rohr!" he barked at the radio operator. He had to act decisevly at once.

Hey M4, they call those Shermans "Ronsons" for a reason!

Yep those 155s are nasty huh..dont worrie I have more;)

sniff...sniff...dang..someone change that litter box!

Oh Oh let me let me!

M4 Jess....loves cleaning out litter boxs

The enemy barrage had ended at last, while their own light field guns were bombarding the enemy artillery. That should make the Amis think twice before they shelled his positions again! Apparantly, his barrage was working. Great.

Oberst Schweitzer poured himself a glass of the excellent Calvados he had acquired on the march. Normandy was much better the Russia, especially when bad weather kept the allied planes away.

The Hauptkampflinie was still forming. Little contact had been made, and his mortars had put up some smoke between the two forces. He sipped on the Calvados. He could wait.



M4 has fielded at least a dozen 155mm GMC12 SPA guns!

Still, someone will have to come out and look for targets. I´ll stab ´em in the eyes!

Scharfschütze sure likes those 75mm ATs! oh well I guess I can handle them LOL :p

little action this turn..I lost a scout car to a 105RCL:(

and I am still down 2 shermans....

My 155s RAINED DOWN ON THAT 105RCL! Oh Yeah Baby!

back to you hERR Scharfschütze!

As I promised, I used M4´s absence to play tricks in his backyard. Precisely, I snuck some Spec Ops squads to where they would count:

"Herr Oberst, this is Stoßtrupp Hummel. Have reached postion."
Another messahge came in almost simutaneously:
"This is Stoßtrupp Schurz. Zielgebiet reached. American artillery is heading our way! We engage! Over and out!"

Oberst Schweitzer gazed at the AT position the Americans had been shelling. The fire was dwindling, stopping completely in zones that had been heavily bombarded just seconds ago.

In the dense woods more then three kilometres away, the infiltrators closed in on the american M12 self-propelleds. The artillerymen did not notice them, being completetly absorbed with their task of firing and reloading the huge 155mm guns.

Then the Stoßtruppmen struck: A Satchel Charge was heaved into the gun carriage, and a M12 detonated in an almighty explosion. SMG fire pinned the ammo truck drivers while stick grenades were thrown into the stacked ammunitions. Two trucks burst into flames while the second squad assaulted another SPA with Satchel Charges. Another huge explosion tore through the woods.

Again the Radio crackled:

"Stoßtrupp Hummel reports two large SPA´s taken out! Two Ammo trucks destroyed! We caught them pants down!"

Stoßtrupp Schurz soon reported a similiar success: Two M12´s taken out, one ammo truck heavily damaged and another taken out.

Oberst Schweitzer was pouring several glasses Calvados for the officers in his command post.
"Meine Herren, a toast to our Stoßtrupps! This should teach those Amis a lesson!":D :p


I got very lucky on this one. My counterbattery with puny 75mm FH guns had convinced M4 Jess to relocate his artillery. Unfortunately for him he moved them right into the arms of several Spec Ops squads that had just infiltrated!

As a sidenote, one of my AT guns shot another nosy Sherman. :p



How will you deal with my AT guns when your artillery is scrap metal and your ammo is blazing Mr. M4?:D

(Yeah I know, you got at least eight other M12´s, but I am trying to see things postive!:rolleyes: )

Ouch!

Lars comes alive yet again...

My M4s are all over the place... where are Lares MkIVs?

the battle is going per plan.. I am down a few M4s



M4 Jess

The infantry has made contact. My recon troops are slugging it out with a couple of Rangers near the northern objective... they even sent one squad running!:eek:

Got another M4.

My infiltrator Stoßtrupps are still alive, although the southern platoon was in heavy combat with a M3 command car, which has been disabled by a lucky grenade. A total of five M12 SPA´s have been destroyed so far, more than I could have hoped for.



Oberst Schweitzer listened to the reports coming in. After losing several tanks and scout cars, the Amis were now leading with infantry. In the north, they were contesting a strategically important valley. He had his Nebelwerfer rocket projectors blast the hill on the american side, but the Rangers had apparantly gotten off fast enough.

The enemy artillery pieces had once more engaged in counterbattery fire, although the volume of fire had dropped significiantly.

Schweitzer relaxed in his chair. No situations he didn´t like. Good!:D

-----Oberst Schweitzer looks around...where are my men....??

Knock......Knock.....come in Sgt......................

Sir.....our Spec.Ops units are gone...................

.........WHAT??!!............................................

Sir......the last message was.........."1000 Years!!!!".............

heehee

:rolleyes:

" This is Stoßtrupp Schurz. The Amis have destroyed Müller´s unit, but seem to have lost sight of us. One of their Shermans is guarding the area. We will take it out now!":mad:

The young soldiers moved silently through the underbrush towards the american tank. A satchel charge was prepared while the MG42 was trained on the tank commander leaning out of his hatch, smoking a cigarette in celebration of his victory.

Hands signalled readiness.
A nod, then the machinegun spat lead. SMG´s joined in while the satchel charge was hurled at the turret. A ball of fire engulfed the Sherman. The Waffen-SS men waited for survivors to crawl out of the wreck, but none were coming.

On the northern front the Rangers were firing at a 75mm PaK, with the remaining 155mm SPA in support. The germans retaliated with sniper fire, and used a brief lull to extract the ATG with a halftrack. A SPAA appeared on a nearby hill, and strafed the Rangers with 3,7cm shells before withdrawing.

Then, a familiar sound was heard all over the battlefield, drawing cheers from the Germans and shouts of fear and warning among the US troops:
Nebelwerfer!:eek:

Carefully chosen postions were bombarded, causing grievous casualties among the Americans. The Rangers attacking the PaK were hit, as were the troops wrestling with german recon for possession northern objective. Whole squads perished:D

In the command post, Oberst Schweitzer reviewed the american tactics. They had scouted with tanks, scout cars and infantry. All of these formations had been bloodied in their attempts. The Abwehrstellung in the north had to be abandoned, the enemy artillery would have rendered it useless very soon, and there was no sense in losing his valuable 75mm´s in a hopeless position. The american artillery was quite dangerous, and he was very relieved that his insertion Stoßtrupps had taken care of some of these.

One of the objectives in the south had been taken early in the battle, the northern was contested while the central one laid on the western half of a barren hill and was still unclaimed by either side. The Amis had lost infantry, tanks and artillery while his forces were basically intact, except for a few scouts, several of the Spec Ops and some crewmen.

Lars! Im having a run of really good asskicking!! you sir are next..turn comming by tomorrow!

Jess

well.. my string of arsekicking might be over:(

Lars is playing a hell of a battle here.. and me with M4s and all;)

keep it Lars and you might win..as I have nothing left..really I dont.. really... :p

Back to you Oberst Schweitzer

Thanks Jess!

I saw those two platoons of Shermans you have brought up as reinforcements, and despite the damage done to your artillery park there is still A LOT of stuff unaccounted for... I expect the worst, at least there won´t be any ugly surprises this way:D


Back to the front...

"Stoßtrupp Schurz hier. We are surrounded! Enemy line seems weakest in the north, only two Shermans. :rolleyes: We will break out there"

The men moved quickly amongst the trees. The first Sherman was lurking on the woods edge, gun trained towards them.

"Its do or die, Kameraden. Zum Angriff!" Lt. Schurz ordered.

As one, the soldiers rose and charged the enemy tank. The surprised crew couldn´t fire a shot before the satchel charge detonated beneath the tank, completely destroying it.

Then, the second Sherman opened fire. Schurz was amongst the first to fall in the hail while his squad charged past him towards the enemy.

They almost made it.

Stoßtrupp Schurz has stopped transmitting.

Before losing contact, the troop reported two enemy M12 SPA´s, two ammo trucks, and two M4 Sherman tanks destroyed in exemplary actions.

Other units were still reporting, however. Stoßtrupp Hummel had finished off an ammo truck immobilized earlier, while Spähtrupps Dittrich and Riedmüller reported contact with Ranger infantry.

The Americans seemed to have recovered from the disaster some of their artillery had met and were counterbatterying once more.

Gawd.. I hope Lars's spec ops are all dead now.. Im down some arty!:mad:

the main battle is just starting and I already miss them!:mad:

M4 Jess is fighting mad at Lars!:mad:

Bad news M4: The remnants of Untersturmführer Schurz´ platoon are still alive: Another M4/75 takes a satchel charge and once more the fleeing crewmen are gunned down:D

In the bushes near the northern objective, scouts and Panzerschreck AT-teams immobilize another Sherman(** hull damaged twice, should be dead!!!), while Ranger infantry in the south and center are running to the hills after seeing their mates fall to german counterattacks. No sneaking into my positions there, no sir!;)

A seemingly bulletproof M4 crew takes a hailstorm of everything from 75mm HE to 3,7cm FlaK, 7,92mm MG42 and rifle bullets, with only a single casualty.

More of my mortar fire falls all over the front.


In his command post, Oberst Schweitzer is thinking of the apples he saw ripening in the orchards on his way. Soon, the Amis will be ripe for plucking... :p :p

*%!!@$%^&*(*)) Ahhhhhhhhhhhh~~~~~~:mad:

sniff sniff

Im okay....really!

LARS!!!!! IM GONNA GET YOU!!!!

**** those spec ops! I keep losing tanks to them..him..those whatever he has in my arse rear! WAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!:mad:

my whole battle plan is shot....

M4-an M4 is losing!

All contact with Stoßtrupp Schurz had been lost after several heavy explosions were heard in the enemy´s rear. Oberst Schweitzer sincerely hoped that these were more american tanks being blown up by the brave lads of Stoßtrupp Schurz, his heart felt that they had met their fate.

Untersturmführer Schurz´platoon had destroyed three heavy artillery pieces, two ammo trucks and two Sherman tanks. Especially the destruction of the enemy self-propelled guns had taken a lot of pressure form his troops. The deaths of the Spec Ops must not be in vain, Oberst Schweitzer assured himself.

The Rangers attacking in the south had been driven away for the moment. Shermans had moved onto a nearby hill to cover them, but had come under PaK fire there. More Rangers laid a smoke screen, and had come under heavy fire in the process.

Reports from the north were more alarming: His PaK guns had been unable to destroy several advancing Shermans despite direct hits, while the enemy tanks had claimed a SdKfz6/2 SPAA and a Kübelwagen. In the contested valley, Rangers and more tanks were advancing, destroying a counterattacking Panzerschreck team. The enemy had committed a lot of forces in the sector, forcing his SS and recon troops backwards. They would pay for this soon ...

WOW:D Panzers do burn!

in the form of 3 PzJg IVs

my counter attack up the middle ran into more of Scharfschütze's
75mmPaks but my 155s put short order to them..

even if I still feel I am loosing.. I had a great turn!

M4 Jess~~is there hope after all?