Last Sunday Dave and I played Gavin Take as part of the Ladder challenge and it was fun! The scenario pitted American paratroopers against a German garrison in a small village. The American’s objectives were to exit two or more half squads and a leader off the board on an exit point on the other side of the village, in order to secure the Chef-Du-Pont bridge, a D-Day objective. The American paratroopers were split into two separate groups with six squads on their right led by Gavin himself (a 10-3 leader) and a 8-0 leader. The left flank would consist of 4 squads led by Ostberg (10-2 leader). The opposing Germans had three leaders (9-1, 8-1, 8-0), two MMG and a mixture of first and second line troops (seven squads in all). Dave deployed them in the front and rear of the village with one MMG on either side.
On the first turn Gavin and Ostberg both advanced to engage the Germans on the village front while the 8-0 leader double timed it across open ground to get to behind a left hill flanking the town. I made the mistake of moving in the open instead of using a hedge as cover which made for a 8 FP shot at -3 (yikes!) from a German machine gun nest who opened up from a second story window in the village. And……..Dave rolls a 12, malfing his MMG. We couldn’t believe it! The lucky paratroopers scampered around the hill and circled in behind where they were met by stubborn resistance by the Germans who moved in to plug the gap with the other MMG.
Meanwhile Gavin’s forces assaulted the Germans on the left flank, across the street under the cover of smoke and Dave’s defensive fire at point blank resulted in another 12. Close combat took care of that unlucky squad and Gavin then moved into the village to engage the rest. Meanwhile Ostberg was finally able to move into the village as the Germans fell back.
The end game saw that 8-0 troop having a hard time getting close to that rear MMG nest positioned at the exit point but finally, one lone squad, manage to engage it in close combat and keep it occupied. That is all the rest of the paratroopers needed as they then ran through the exit point to secure the win.