The 158th Regimental Combat Team landed at Arare on the north coast of New Guinea with orders to capture Sarmi and its valuable airfields. Attacking westward, the RCT made modest gains against stiffer than anticipated resistance. The plan for the next morning was to lay in an artillery preparation, then have the 3rd Battalion capture the tiny village dubbed Maffin #1 and seize a bridgehead over the diminutive Tirfoam River. But a massive banzai charge and a manhandled 37 mm gun at the jungle’s edge made the day a bloody affair. . .
Attacker: American (3rd Battalion, 158th Regimental Combay Team / 603rd Separate Tank Company / 27th Engineer Combat Battalion)
Defender: Japanese (224th Infantry Regiment / 223rd Infantry Regiment)
10.5 turns
Players: 2 OBA: American Night: No
Unit Counts:
Squads: A:26.0 D:28.0
AFVs: A:6
M4A1 x 6
AFVs: D:0
Guns: A:0 D:1
Type 94 Rapid-Fire Gun Type 89 Heavy Grenade-Launcher x 3 Type 97 20mm Automatic Gun
Dan and I found this scenario to be a wild and fun one. The challenging VC for the Americans are represented by the near 2:1 Japanese-American win-loss ration; however, I really cannot see how the Americans have not won more games. The Japanese have the benefit of high morale, a good selection of SWs (including two HMGs), quite a few HIP units, tank-hunter heroes (generally only really useful to draw fire), and fortifications. The Americans have over-the-top high firepower (multiple, 20-30 firepower attacks each player turn are not out of the question), two FTs, and some decent tanks (although those tanks don't have any real smoke capability - I'm not counting the SM5s...). In our scenario, I searched in, around, and through the village to ensure there were no hidden Japanese nearby that could run and capture multiple huts in the end-game. My Turn 2 reinforcements methodically moved down the road, then off to the side to avoid the space of open ground in the middle of Board 37. Dan had positioned a couple squads on Board 35 past the village and near the stream. He placed one of his pillboxes there as well. My Americans were able to reduce these positions by Turn 4/5, and this allowed all those American forces to add their weight against the attack on the bridge area. My Turn 2 troops were slowed down by several Japanese squads as they moved across the kunai in the center of Board 37, and were surprised by a HIP unit in a place I did not expect and by one of his HMGs and a leader in another HIP pillbox. His HIP unit KIA'd one of my 7-4-7s carrying a FT and the 7-0 leader with them (ouch! why would I think its okay to lead with those guys...). In a stroke of luck for me, on a simple 1MC vs. the crew+HMG and leader in the pillbox, Dan rolled a '12' for the crew and that was the end of that. Although the leader took possession of the HMG, he immediately malf'd it. As I neared the bridge area, Dan's banzai reinforcements arrived (on the second turn possible). I thought I had positioned my Americans and their supporting four tanks on Board 37 to annihilate them... During the next three turns, Dan's banzai troops got into my Americans (somehow surviving all my 12-1s, 20-1s, etc.). Turns out it's moderately hard to reduce a banzai'ing Japanese 4-4-7 stacked with a 10-1 leader.... However, in the resulting melees, Dan's Japanese got ambushed a couple times and failed to kill the Americans in a couple other hexes. He lost several squads in melee the first banzai turn and several more the second turn. At the end of Turn 7, 15 of the 18 banzai squads were dead and one other was broken as two HS; this at the cost of two American tanks, and several American squads. I moved tanks into the stream and chanced Bog checks to cross it and into hexes adjacent to swamps vice attempting the no-small-chance bridge collapse (the wooden bridge collapses on a 7 or above...). Dan's last pillbox was placed in one of the bridge area VC hexes; it contained the 10-2 and the other HMG+crew). I was able to get a 20+5 vs it and caused an NMC. Again, Dan rolled a '12' for his crew (killing this one as well). At this point Dan conceded. I had four remaining tanks and over 20 EVP of infantry either across the stream and/or about to cross the stream, with three turns to go. He had one good order squad, his 10-2, and his AT gun, (and two remaining good order squads from the banzai force), but did not feel he would be able to hold. On a side note, my two OBA modules did a little bit (causing a total of two Japanese squads to stripe and one broken HS to die), but not much; one radio malf'd and X'd before I could even get one fire mission out of it (must have been the crystals). We both had fun with this one.
2019-06-21
(D) Will Willow
vs
Roy Connelly
Japanese win
TT
2018-09-15
(D) Christian Knudsen
vs
Neil Andrews
American win
This one is going to go down to the wire, but mostly because my setup was tailored to stop a completely different attack than actually occurred, and Neil is a really good player. Even then, I have about a 50-50 chance of denying him the win as we head into the last full turn. Updated - I did lose, mostly because Neil played really well, and had a couple of good DR at critical moments. I'll be honest, this scenario is still, even in the RS edition, fairly pro-Japanese. But I did, through trial and error, learn a lot about PTO and Japanese, and how to handle Americans in the attack, so I guess it was time well spent!
2018-01-27
(A) Christian Knudsen
vs
Neil Andrews
Japanese win
Yikes, what a stinker. I am not a solid attacker, especially with Americans, and Neil is an excellent defender, especially with Japanese. But I didn't like this one. It felt that the Americans had too much to do, and we played (contrary to the Q&A), that the banzai could start split up, so long as they were in groups of 2+ adjacent hexes. Didn't help that I couldn't pass a rally to save my life. We are currently playing the flip side of this one, and Neil, who is a much better attacker than I, might pull it off, but even so, it's going to be really close. Once that one is done, I won't be playing this scenario again.
2015-08-28
(D) Ralph Shoukry
vs
SB
Japanese win
Japanese able to hold onto the victory even with a poor setup and many malf'd guns. The Banzai charge came early and really gave the Japanese a huge advantage.
