Cangames - Flames of War - Battle Report

Howdy folk,

As my previous posts have shown, yes Cangames was back this year!! I’ve already shared a few random pics of the various tables and a few games that Mike was running. For the first year back, my buddy Serge  set himself the Herculean task of running 4 different games…and, not having played Flames of War for quite some time, I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was one of Serge’s games - by this time I had already filled in fora few dice rolls in Serge’s Kursk game, but this one I had intentionally signed up for in advance.

So, Serge brought us Juno Beach with scratch built beach and sea wall terrain. It was a great looking table and well laid out. Serge really tried to maximize a simple approach to the game and make it as easy as possible for the players. We had a few that had low or no gaming experience (one of the players was attending their first Cangames!!). So, the setup - Juno Beach…

The attackers: Canadian infantry and tanks rolling in hard with special rule of recycling infantry platoons to emulate the waves of assaulters. There were a few specials in the form of Churchill flame tanks and I think there was a preparatory bombardment as well.

The defenders: German infantry with panzerfaust/shrek, attached mortars, and armoured cars and Tigers in  reserve…no special rules, but there were elements of the Atlantic wall - 4 x Tobruk mg nests, and 2 anti-tank bunkers (5cm AT guns) and an AT nest (8.8cm Pak43) along with some trench line for the soldats and  a few minefields/barbed wire that had to be cleared. 

Now I can’t remember exactly the comings and goings of the entire action…there were about 7 rounds with German reinforcements coming in late and having fairly low impact overall. The AT bunkers fell quicker than expected and the attackers bunched up, a lot, at the sea wall and took a surprising amount of time to consolidate and get past the wall.

All in all, a very enjoyable game and great reintroduction into Flames of War…now, the pics.

The lay of the land, looking inland…landing craft and attacking force on parade.

The Canucks storm the beach, making for the wall, throwing smoke down to disrupt the LOS of the bunkers and nests. Shermans take station near the beach road and wait for orders and targets. The first AT bunker goes up quickly following a skilled assault by our new gamer…

The Canadians press their attack, keeping pressure on the bunkers. The Tobruk nests do a good job of keeping them on their toes, several teams fall and are recycled by platoon…so more for the grinder. The attackers do a great job of rolling for landing craft placement, minimal disruptions from the surf - and practically no delay for the DD tanks

In spite of some good rolls on the German side, the Canucks keep stuff moving and the Churchill beasts are making their way past the wall to finish off the bunker and lay some hurt on the trench lines.

Puma’s with 5cm main guns roar in, but admittedly have little effect on the attackers.

You can see the Canadians making their way on the German left, clearing mines and barbed wire…the German right had some relative success keeping the attackers at bay, but the Canucks started going heavy on the other side. 

In the distance, you can see the Tigers coming on the field…great models, but little impact on the field and really not much shock effect overall…

A Canadian parking lot at the sea wall as forces consolidated their for the leap inland. Great game, good opponents, and a Canadian victory at Juno. Game well run!