The afternoon/early evening Connections UK 2019 game was played with one defender and three attackers. The attackers being a mixture of old wargaming Grognards (from Wargames Developments) and a newbie DSTL wargamer C-in-C, with the defender being a newly civilianised DSTL military man who clearly knew his way around wargames. You may have guessed that with his astute interlocking defence [without clumping two units adjacent to each other] and good deployment in rather problematic terrain set-up for the defender (see below, the defender it always made to think hard about whether to occupy exposed hills [with the disadvantage of potentially defending too far forward] or sit back in the "lee" [defending on the baseline] risking being overrun, it is always a compromise of sorts. Another sensible choice was a simplicity of choice in that the two German infantry companies defended separate areas of the board and were not "layered" in a confusing manner [that did not help the defender in the first game Connections UK 2019 game]):
The British came in "across the board", using three out of four companies represented from the get go, plus sticking the Vickers HMG platoon in the first turn [the middle seemed to be a safe bet]. Of note is the use of the cover afforded by the wood on the second row in. The Green company commander was able to place his full company in its "protective lee" outside of German LOS. However, the notion of an overall "plan" seemed to be missing for this set-up, but all players "were on the board," great for playability but the consequences could be somewhat fatal for the troops involved (see below, the question the British player should ask is where do I use my support assets - the Vickers HMG and 3" mortar - to best effect? It looks like they will continuously be "haggled" over, too many cooks perhaps will spoil this broth):
Turn 2: The British Grognards see Blue company advance unsupported by the Vickers HMG because of LOS problems and the mortar was "haggled over" and taken to the other end of the table, to what purpose I am still not exactly sure. The Blue attack looks promising as there is a local British superiority of 3:1 and the potential of an additional 3" mortar support on later rounds that means there is a very good chance of suppressing the defender and getting a close assault in (see below, Red company at the top of table has a covered approach [it will take some long range fire initially], then there is an awful "show yourself over the top" moment at the end):
Turn 3: The British make a big push or rather two big pushes at two separate ends of the table. The British re-sight their mortar (taking precious time and still leaving Blue company unsupported in its continued attack) and provide the German Purple Company some "target practice" on Green company's platoon as it enters the woods. Blue company has moved a platoon to a close assault position but has rather rashly has opened itself up to more defensive fire than is healthy for the British assaulting troops liking! All depends on Lady Luck and the dice (see below, Blue company has missed a classic fire-fire-move tactic, with a 50% and 33.3% chance of suppressing the defender - one thing the British have forgotten about LOS is that you don't block LOS if you are in the same friendly hex firing, they have swung their assaulting platoon too far left and got into trouble):
Turn 4: There is a withering hail of German defensive fire with seven "fire for effects" being rolled for. The German defending platoon in peril of being close assaulted is opting to fire for a single hit on two British platoons to make them both "spent" and inactive until their rally phase rather than hurting one with three hits. As it stands with accumulated casualties the British player is very near to withdrawing one for platoon with KIAs and also one platoon for ammunition expenditure (see below, the dice rolls will be "make or break" for the southern British attack):
To the horror of the British players, Blue Company evaporates under withering fire and logistic depletion (loosing two platoons, but the Germans gaining only 1 VP for the KIA platoon). The reserve Yellow company is now thrown on - in the middle of the battlefield, which is literally the teeth of the German defence presenting themselves as bunches targets (a German platoon firing can hit two adjacent hexes, remember also the Germans do not have to worry about ammunition depletion and the only way you can cause hits on an entrenched German platoon is to close assault them). This looks an increasingly hard task for the British players to pull off and now depends on the main attack in the North going well for them - but again it is into well sited German entrenched platoons (see below, the surviving Blue platoon it providing distant covering fire for the Yellow company, which really should have been following like avenging demons in the tracks of their brave Blue infantry compatriots [route one down the middle is "not open"]):
The British again have to pay the butcher's bill from the German defensive fire and again, because they fired so many units - the ammunition depletion rule hurts them. Blue company is no more (ammunition depletion) and both Yellow and Green company have removed KIA platoons. What also does not seem to help the British is the fact that the supporting mortar and Vickers HMG seem to be supporting in the wrong places (see below, the British are now looking very thin on the ground thanks to some costly human wave tactics against entrenched Germans):
The German defensive fire has left the Northern attack "pinned under the guns" and they are likely to be stuck there for some time. The British Green company loses another assaulting British infantry platoon and the attrition is going to be only one way from point in (see below, the battle is called at this point, the British will not be able to destroy a single German platoon, let alone get to the baseline [therefore zero VPs, whereas the German player has at least 4VP]):
The British have attacked in what amounted to piecemeal "Human Waves" (I don't think alternative "all-in-charge" would have done any better though) and have been comprehensively beaten. I believe in the South they did have an "in" [an isolated German platoon] with Blue company but mismanaged it, but could have reworked it with Yellow following it up, In the North there was a terrain problem to work out, domination of the ridgeline which would have been a protracted firefight (with correct positioning of "supports" - keeping a company off table would have pinned the German platoons "in position" in the middle as the flanks were attacked. This one was a hard nut to crack, in fact a win in VP terms needed very patient play (see below, the Grognards did use it very much as a "learning the rules2 experience and game away thinking how they would do it next time, after many games the nuisances of the rules only come out after several play-throughs):
The laurels for this play-test definitely lay with the defender, but with terrain generated randomly it means that any two games are highly unlikely to ever play the same.
