A Stiff Fight (J9) by Sam Belcher

Mark Robbins and I played J9 "A Stiff Fight" Friday night. It was not a
"typical" playing, so I'm not sure how useful this will be, but here's a
short AAR anyway. :)

We diced for sides, and I got the Brits. I took a few minutes to select
positions for my wire, most of which was on hex away from the "front" edge
of the jungle (Wire in U5, U6, V7 and W5 IIRC). I setup about half my squads
in the edge of the Jungle, intending to use their defensive fire to inflict
some casualties, and fall back before the Japs closed for CC. I set one
squad and a LMG out on the flank in T9. About 4 squads are setup with my two
leaders in the jungle behind my front line.

Turn 1
Mark's Japanese enter on turn one. His first move is a crew with a MMG that
enters the board on P7. My squad / LMG immediately fire (because he has
setup the rest of his forces off board in such a way that it seems unlikely
this flanking unit would get any other shots. I roll 3! and the result after
the dust clears is the crew is reduced.

Now he moves the main body of his troops. I first fire, subsequent first
fire and use final protective fire. My guys in the front line are awesome.
They inflict casualties with 2, 4, and 6 factor attacks. I roll "3" twice
more during defensive first fire. I get a KIA on an elite squad!! (As I
said, this is probably not a "typical" game) In total during defensive
fire, I kill the squad and reduce a crew, and step-reduce 2 additional
squads. Mark never got an effective sniper attack, but my sniper was
activated and pinned the reduced crew.

Somewere in here, I realized that Mark is still very much a "newbie". Not
that he's making obvious mistakes, but he has a sheet printed with the
phases in sequence to remind him (RPh, PFPh, MPh, etc). I choose to
voluntarily break two of my squads, and when I see the puzzled look on his
face, I explain that one of them can rout to a handy leader, the other can
attempt self rally in my turn, and that I want to avoid CC at this time. (I
still have a second line of concealed defenders who haven't yet fired.)
From now on, we talk pretty freely about the game, tactics, etc.

On this particular night, everything works for me. One of my two broken
squads rallies. The other will self rally in another turn. I deside to fire
(Point Blank) at Japanese adjacent to my new front line in the jungle. I
have a 458 with a LMG and a 648 in adjacent hexes. My "rule of thumb" is to
usually roll separate attacks - combining into larger attacks only if there
is +3 terrain. So, I role on the 12 column (even). First attack: DR=11 No
effect. Second attack: DR=2 I get a 2KIA on a 9-1 and an elite Japanese
squad.

Turn one ends, and Mark's Japs are bleeding all over the map. I'm just glad
we're not using my boards!

Turn 2.
In the first player turn, Mark manages to kill 1.5 of my squads in CC, while
losing only a HS. My main line of resistance moves back near row X.



At the end of three turns, I am still blocking the road at row X, and I have
lost only the 1.5 squads killed in CC. ALL of my units are in good order -
about half of them are concealed.

Mark started with 8 squads, 2 crews, and 2 leaders. He has left 4 HS, 1
reduces squad, 2 crews (1 reduced) and one leader. We end the game here.

I suspect you need a better plan than to just roll low during defensive
fire. :) I'll have to try this one again after I have a go at "In the Old
Tradition".

Sam