State of Play: Undaunted: Normandy (4/6)

 

Monday night T and I continued with my 6x6 play roster, knocking over my eight game out of the 36 total. We played Undaunted: Normandy, scenario 5: Crossing the Vere. We started a little later and usual, and playing at T’s, I had to set up when I arrived. I carelessly skipped scenario 4 by mistake and didn't realise until I'd completely set this one up, but this one was an interesting choice, so we weren’t too fussed.

Scenario 5 saw the introduction (for us) of snipers and a heavier support weapon, the German's mortar. T, as per our usual practice, played the Germans. The pressure is really on the American player to perform. The Germans have freedom of movement, their scouts having covered an entire half of the playing area (at the cost of only one extra Fog of War card in their starting deck, where the Americans start with only their spawning tile scouted).

Achtung! Scharfschütze!

I used my NCOs to bolster as many unit cards as I could into my deck as they appeared. I was a little cocky when I noticed had both my Platoon Sergeant and Squad A leader in my opening hand. The Americans also had their Platoon Guide for the first time (the Germans didn’t need theirs, but it may have thinned their more martial options a little more if he’s been included), and I was able to get some extra milage form my scouts with his help. T after a slower start, T got his Riflemen up into a wooded tile overlooking the bridge om my right, and his machine gunners set up where he spawned. From there he was able to lay suppression fire and immobilise my Riflemen and pick them off with his Riflemen, Mortar rounds and one lucky shot from a scout.

B Squad was the first to be pinned. I managed to secure the bridge on my left but couldn’t get my surviving Riflemen over to the second bridge before they too were mowed down. A solid win to the Germans.

I’m still amazed how well the Undaunted mechanics simulate squad-level operations. It seems counterintuitive that a deck-building mechanic could so accurately model the staggered, back-and-forth, attritional nature of the Western front at this scale, but it does. T commented over the table, “This must have been just what it was like. So much of the time you can’t get where you need to go, or you can’t accomplish what you need to when you get there.”

While we’re on the subject, Liz Davidson hosted a really interesting forum on the development of the Undaunted series on Fred Serval’s Homo Ludens YouTube channel just recently. I recommend you check it out if your interested in the game(s), how it came to be, or generally how games get produced these days. Well worth the hours’ time-investment.