1762 - The Combat at Pumpernickel - what if Zar Peter III survived the coup ...

... not much apparently, as my last battle of this year was a sweet Seven Years War (my rules), 28mm, Russians vs Austro-Saxons, me and Alisdair playing a new division pushing through Poland, while Bart grabbed the last palast guards of Saxons and some Saxon deserters from Silesian garrisons as well as 2 Horse brigades hastily put together from the Austrians to stop that corps entering Silesia at the pituresque but entirely fictional village of Pumpernikeln (dark rye bread hamlet). Who can blame me the Russian uniforms (of that era) look so pretty and they are so many!!!

The plan was, that there wasn't one, we just proceeded to advance in the hope of grinding Barts Saxons to dust with our legions.  Maybe the odd pincer movement after our first clash of the light cavalry in the centre.

We had the first turn and clashed in the middle and achieved nothing and then moved on. Slowly our forces were drifting apart into two battles, Bart kept the middle BUA aka Pumpernikeln and positioned his Austrian sharpshooting guns. On our right Alisdair did very well, almost dashing, destroyed one of Barts Dragoons! And moved forward...

I just spread out and forward and hit nothing, for the rest of the game. Then Barts Austrian Gunnery came to bear down on Alisdair and unit after unit melted down......... this is were we had to end the game, not much of a pincer with our cavalry in shreds and our vast legions nothing better than cannon fodder - clear victory for the Austro - Saxons (one casualty vs  two!) ! Bravo, Bart! 

As Commander in Chief, I probably are responsible for the lack lustre advance of my troops, but I will blame Alisdair (even though he preformed very well) as I am his senior-general, haha! 

Initial set up

The Russian are legion....

Fewer Saxons

The Russian centre

The Russian Hussars hold the hill, but shaken .. a realiability

The Saxon centre

we send their dragoons home, but could not exploit

Alisdair preps a textbook cavalry charge

and does it! wins!!!

The Russians move forward

The Austrian horse is subdued

The Austrian Hussars try to advance but are being blocked

My line has a dent, but it is a line!

The Centre village is a bastion of guns

Alisdairs second charge fails desaterously

I move further forward and shoot ... to no avail

The fire fights are starting ... but I never hit

I advance further .... and hit nothing

but Bart does ....

I couldn't hit and elephant in Saxonian uniform ...

1943 - Small boats and big boasts! Azzurro ...

Or at the end of the WW2 the Italians, played by me obviously, had enough and wanted to escape the German fleet, played by Bart,  to find refuge in the arms of the British/US Navy.  I had a Mine-sweeper, super fast Groceries boxes and a "big ship" all equipped with super thin pasta torpedoes that would disolve with contact on water, while Bart had 2 Schnell-Boote and two Torpedo-Boote armed to the teeth and equipped with real torpedos. On top of that I had the Italian Adriatic coast behind me (long edge) which decreased my manoeuvrability while Bart was coming straight towards me on the other long side. Campbell was the umpire. And what I didn‘t know was that he had also 2 Stukas coming for me... what could possibly go wrong?

I went full speed ahead directly towards the Germans. Now I could boast that was my master plan from the beginning, but it wasn‘t. I just rationalised that, if I was amongst my enemies thy could shoot me, but not send thy wrath against me. Wrong! Bart send the first off and hit my big ship and destroyed the (only) big gun and wrecked my engine, but did not sink me. The Umpire the mentioned that I should acquaint myself with the WW2 naval basics. Bart smelled blood and I shot back ... with a lot of 1s ... duh!

Everybody was smiling and telling me I should not moan etc... so I decided to leave the big ship and send all my small boats straight through the middle full power ahead. That they didn‘t expect - or liked it at all. You cannot leave the big ship with the commander behind, surely?  Ma Certo! What an italian hero! 

Then they send their 2 Stukas to dive bomb my wooden ships of the Adria, but ... Bart did not hit. In fact I shot one of his planes off damaged back to Italy - pronto! That was the last time my 4 small boats were seen by the Germans.

Now Bart encircled my big ship and tried to hit it with all he got. The ship was just at half speed and the front was cleaned of any guns, seconds later the back as well - but again it didn't blow up. Rather the two Schnell Boote were too eager to come too near, so I shot them to oblivion with five 6s in a row!!!. One to return werecked and the other wrecked and with a fire on board.

Now just imagine a slow Italian big ship with two Torpedo-Boote encircling around and not hitting much apart from metal and armour. Clink-Clank- Clunk .... It could go on for ever, so Bart did rolled out his last 3 torpedoes, which my boat was too slow and cumbersome to evade ... but what should I say it didn‘t blow up, it just didn‘t. They couldn‘t hit an elephant in red and white pyjamas!

So all the German Hochseeflotte could do was chewing their caps and hats while even my Big Ship escaped! Ecco Fatto!

Naturalmente, due to the absolute non–biased umpiring, it was a clearly only a "minor Italian victory" - riuscite a crederci! But, boy did I had fun - my smile could envelope a spaghetti sideways - easily!

For a real victory, I should have evoked a heart attack in the Germans with my pasta torpedoes or just sung them to death! Everybody: Azzurro, il pomeriggio a troppo azzurro e lungo ...

https://youtu.be/ckWLcTrKzaw

The Germans on turkey shooting with Italian targets ...

And the main target is the BIG BOAT!

Already damaged and silenced

 .... from relentless German fire ...

then on the horizont 2 Stukas arriving ....

Heading for the my small boats ...

The first torpedo hit on my Big Ship!

... whiped out the big gun - basta!

while my small ones look that they reach the horizont ...

A German boot comes too near to my big boat for comfort

the last thing you saw of the Italian small marine - good bye, Mussolini!

The victims of my Italian sharp shooting ...

Then the second ship had to turn home (FIVE 6s made her set on fire!)

The last German torpedo attack ...

went straight through ... they couldn‘t hit an elephant in red and white pyjamas!