North Africa (FOW)

Earlier in the year the Flames of War group in Auburn, AL got together for a mid war battle royale in the desert. We are mainly a late war group but I've been encouraging others to expand into mid war, there has been no luck getting people on the early war train.

On the Allied Side we had two American Players and one British Player. The three Allied tank companies were heavy on Shermans. The Axis side saw two German players and one Italian. The Germans were both Tank companies while the Italian was an infantry company, they were a little outnumbered in the tank department.

We made a custom mission with a central object and one in each sides deployment zone, to win one side had to control all the objectives. For this game at least the mission worked great, we also continued to battle if one company broke.

The battlefield a railroad track leading to a small desert town.

Crusaders by the "Compound"

Italian Artillery and the armored line

The line of Glorious Mid War Shermans

The two forces facing off

The Afrika Korps surges forward

Stuka G's have an irresistible target, three Crusaders burned

With no Allied templates the armor bunches up before the assualt

Its kill or be killed as the tank forces clash in the center

Using what little terrain is available

The trained Allies began to take losses

The Stuarts hunt for something their own weight class

Crusaders rush forward after the Shermans fell to the Panzer IV longs

Losses were high for the German armor but the Panzer IVs press their attack

They then cut off and destroy the last of the Allied armor, taking all three objectives

 The Italians, while lacking in picture, dug in around the Axis objective and held it against the British for the entire game. Although the Sherman has a good armor and armament in mid war, the Panzer IV F2's fired and stormtroopered behind cover time and time again, slowly whittling away at them. A fun game and with a failed stormtrooper move or two the result might have been very different.

The Allied Commanders

The Axis Commanders