Battle Report: Conflict of Heroes: Price of Honour, Scenario 2- Cavalry Charge!

The first game Rob and I brought out at PrezCon was Conflict of Heroes: Price of Honour.  I had received this for Christmas, and I was really excited to put it on the table.  After realizing I didn't have the trucks handy to do Scenario 1, we decided to play Scenario 2, called Cavalry Charge!  It depicts the Charge at Krojanty, where the 18th Pomeranian Uhlans Regiment bravely slowed the advance of a German infantry regiment which was supported by some armored vehicles.

In the scenario, a forward German force is pounced upon by a numerically superior Polish force with significant cavalry support, with another small German force 'behind the lines' coming in as reinforcements.  The Germans get an armored car coming on mid-game for support, which should be a little problematic for the Polish, who don't have too much in the way of anti-tank support here.

I played the Germans, Rob took the Polish.  Conflict of Heroes is an interesting game, as we'll see, because the turns are very integrated- there's no 'I go- you go' mechanic going on here.  Both players' units are moving and acting one right after the other, and interrupting each other's actions.  It means that the battle report here will actually have several things going on at once, so it should be... well, interesting.

Turn 1:
The Polish cavalry comes on board, and I turn the nearest squad around to face them, hoping to make them more cautious about coming in at me.  Rob, to try to draw off my activations, used CPs to bring on some other units adjacent to the cavalry, and I oblige by shooting at them, but don't do anything.  He uses a Dual Attack card to unload into a Rifle Squad, killing it, and I return fire, damaging one of his AT Rifles.  Rob's cavalry decides to charge into my LMG unit....



And kills it pretty easily.

I use the card I drew to put a Hasty Defense on top of another LMG, hoping to use the unit to buy some time for my guys to back up and link up with my reinforcements.



Rob responds by moving his cavalry into the building, claiming the objective, and putting a lot of pressure on my guys who are still in the open.



I fire a few ineffective shots, and Rob's cavalry reinforcements come on and get behind my advance force, making a retreat a bit more difficult.  They get there pretty much untouched, despite some shooting by another of my Rifle Squads.  I manage to put some small damage on one of them, I believe.



With nowhere to go, I have my squads continue taking shots at the Polish forces surrounding them, causing a hit on one of the Horses in the building, but not really doing a whole lot else.  My first group of reinforcements gets in position in one of the other buildings (out of the picture).

Turn 2:
I continue into the second turn by shooting, but I don't get any effect out of it, primarily due to some poor shooting die rolls.  Rob's HMG comes on the board and starts moving towards the south-western objective.  My reinforcements work to get into position for the inevitable Polish advance on the other objectives, and I try to get some results up on the front, but my shooting just can't seem to do anything.  Rob eventually rolls over my front German lines, and I'm left only with the reinforcements to fight the Polish tide.


German reinforcements almost in position.


And on the east side, the Polish have cleared out the German units.

Turn 3:
Rob and I start the turn by dancing around the southern objective.  Rob uses his HMG to advance towards the objective, and I counter by having my Rifles move onto the objective.  Rob moves his HMG and a supporting Uhlan, I believe around the objective, trying to get an opening to shoot at the Rifle without taking a shot in return.  The Uhlan moves into line of sight of my supporting LMG and takes a hit from CP shooting, but thankfully the HMG decides to back off, and the objective is fairly safe. 



The LMG finishes off the Uhlan and my LMG helping defend the northwestern objective moves forward a bit and starts taking pot shots at the Polish stacks, doing some significant damage (I think I ended up putting hits on 4 out of 6 counters in one stack in a single shot).  Rob works to rally them to begin the late-game push, but doesn't get too many of them back quickly.


German situation in the west.


Polish situation in the East.

Turn 4:
This is a helpful turn for the Germans, since a SdKfz 231 (an armored car) comes on the board as a reinforcement.  Just as happened historically, the Polish really don't have a lot of tools with them handy which can easily take it down- those Anti-Tank Rifles need an 11 on 2d6 to put a hit on it if they aren't point blank (and don't have help).

My LMG starts the turn out by shooting some more at those vulnerable Polish stacks, continuing to do a bunch of damage, and giving me some VPs (I'm pretty far behind at this point).  Rob focuses his efforts on the bottom objective, finally clearing it out, and claiming it, depriving me of 5 VPs, and gaining 2 for himself.

My armored car comes on, moves into a supporting position, but doesn't manage to deal any damage on the Polish attackers.

Rob ends the turn by running an ATR right behind the Armored Car- a certain way to have me sweating starting next turn.



Turn 5:
I win the initiative, and turn, preparing to get the vehicle to safety.  Rob happily fires his ATR, getting a hit, but thankfully the damage draw is damage to the gun... meaning I can't fire at vehicles.  No loss there. 

The vehicle gets free, and I start putting the pressure on the southern objective, shrugging off the ATR fire in the meantime, and taking a pot shot at the ATR, putting a hit on it.  I charge in and start unloading on the unit there, but don't manage to do anything worthwhile.  Rob and I trade shots, but nothing much is done, and the game ends with me impotent to get anything done to change the result.



Conclusion:
We calculated the Victory Points.  Rob had killed 8 of my units, and had taken 2 of the objectives, giving him 12 VPs.  I killed 9 units (mostly horses), and didn't control both B11 and G17 (just one), meaning I ended with 9 VPs, a Polish victory!

I'm guessing, the next time I play, that I shouldn't bother trying to fight with those front units- just get them running to the back objectives, and work harder to hold them.  Holding both the back objectives is worth 5 VPs to the Germans, which is pretty significant.  Combined with a few casualties as the Polish advanced past the first guys, that would probably be enough to win.

I haven't played this game since Awakening the Bear, and it's undergone some pretty serious changes.  I really like the new version however, a lot more than the previous one.  The components are still beautiful, but the basic game mechanic is so involved that you never feel like you have down time, even horridly outnumbered there's still a lot you need to do every turn.

We finished our first day at PrezCon by playing a game of Dust Tactics, but I'll throw some pictures of that when I'm done with my wargame battle reports.