Combat Commander After Action Report – Supplemental No. 5 – Tito’s Trick

At the end of December, between Christmas and New Year’s, I was off of work (that’s one of the lucky perks of my job).

Seemed like a perfect time to get some extra Combat Commander games in!

Ladder Rules Guru Noel graciously agreed to play a couple of games with me on Friday and Monday morning and we decided to try to predict what January’s ladder scenario would be.

That meant playing two Partisan scenarios from the Resistance expansion pack!

Of course, if we guessed right, I’m not posting that AAR this month because I don’t want to do two AARs of the same scenario in the same month.

That would be boring for you, my dear readers.

So we’ll have to see when this gets posted! It may be later in 2025.

Or not…I guess you’ll know because if you’re seeing it in January, it’s not this month’s scenario!

If it is, I should probably edit all of that stuff out for later posting.

Or maybe not?

Anyway, the first (or actually second, but I’m writing this one up first) scenario Noel suggested was Tito’s Trick, a scenario between the Partisans (me) and the Italians (Noel) in Yugoslavia.

The Partisans are trying to break out of an encircled pocket, moving through an Italian strongpoint.

I wasn’t going to write up this game because it went so badly, but then decided it might make good comedy so decided to do so.

Here is our initial setup.

(Don’t forget you can click on the picture to blow it up)

Gracefully (and because this is a practice game anyway), Noel let me switch around some of the weapons and leaders for a couple of reasons: the cliffs (meaning you can only Advance up them and you can’t take support weapons with you) and the one Smoke Grenades card in the Partisan deck (only one leader can actually use it!).

But we finally started, though let me go through a couple of the special rules first.

The Partisans can only set up in the Level 0 Brush hexes, meaning there are 13 hexes to put 16 units and 3 leaders. Thus, some doubling up is required and the only choice you have is where each type of unit goes (Troops and Sections, along with the three leaders).

The Sighting markers can go on any other Brush hexes. I was hoping to bring some guys in behind Noel’s lines, so those all set up near the top of the board.

The Partisans can destroy the Italian radio, but because it represents intensive German bombardment of the railway, all that does is put the radio on the next Time marker, ready to come out again if it’s destroyed.

The Partisans are the Attacker, but since their hand size is one less than normal, they only get 5 cards. The Italians are Defenders, getting 4 cards.

The first thing you’ll notice if you look at all the units is that the firepower range on both sides is shit.

So it was time to get up close and personal!

I started moving and put out some Smoke Grenades to help cover it.

And got an 8 smoke!

That would provide some hindrance.

Of course, when you come out of the smoke, you’re fair game.

And yes, Josef was fair game, though I did take Objective 2 (all objectives are worth 3 points, so each one is a 6-point swing. Except Objective 5, which is actually worth 8 points for a 16-point swing).

First Josef and his troop stumbled into some Wire in the building.

Then Sgt. Ottolini opened up on them!

(not to mention that a Breeze quickly dissipated the smoke before I could move anybody else).

Thankfully, Josef and his men stayed steady.

Sadly, not everybody did.

Have I mentioned that the Partisan morale (especially broken) is shit as well?

Not only that, but in one of the few pieces of bad luck Noel had, his fire broke the LMG Ottolini’s men had.

I Advanced most of the guys on the right side as well.

(Note to self for Ladder game: Put Satchel Charges on the left side because throwing them up cliffs is hard and you definitely want to use them)

Ottolini opened fire again, and a German Sniper actually caused the LMG to be eliminated!

I managed to Recover one of the two units, but remember this…because it was the last Recover card I would see for a while.

One of the cool things about the Partisans is their “Infiltrate” cards, which can let you put a new unit (and maybe a weapon) on the Time track and they’ll come out as reinforcements after the next Time trigger, as long as you have a Sighting marker for them (I start with 4).

It costs the points that are listed on the card, but some of the orders are “Infiltrate – 0,” which means it doesn’t cost any points.

So a Crew and LMG quickly went on the time track.

One thing I’ve learned after playing a couple of Partisan scenarios is that you can’t be afraid to discard your hand.

The Partisans can only discard their entire hand as a discard action. They can’t just discard one or two cards.

I spent too much time this scenario doing one action because I wanted to hold on to a couple of Ambushes (or other useful cards) and I would lose them if I discarded.

Meanwhile, I was looking for a Move or Recover or something.

Drawing one card each turn is not going to get that for you unless you get really lucky.

Anyway, time rolled on and my deck ran out (the Partisan deck is only 36 cards instead of 72, but they don’t have any Time triggers in it).

Sadly, that happened on some Italian fire that ended up killing my broken unit, but my reinforcements came out right next to an empty objective, so that was good!

I quickly mustered that Crew into a Section so they have more firepower.

I had drawn some Smoke Grenades, so it was time to play one card a turn trying to find that Move card!

Sigh.

Maybe I’d get lucky with a sniper at least?

Nope…none of my snipers hit all game.

Funnily enough, the one major bit of bad luck for Noel this game was his artillery.

Ottolini’s first attempt to call in some fire only 5 hexes away resulted in a major miss that drifted back onto two of his own units.

Thankfully for him, it only suppressed one squad, but it did bring back my eliminated Section with a Walking Wounded event!

Not that they’d do much.

Noel quickly removed that Suppression, but I had also drawn a Recover card! And now that I had a broken unit, it was time to use it.

Here comes Dave’s Stupid Move Number 1.

Of course, I had broken Cardinal Combat Commander Rule, playing the Recover before actually moving.

I know!

But at least my Section would rally.

They refused to rally.

It was time to move with the Smoke Grenades because I had drawn that Movement card.

Josef would move and then deploy the smoke to give the rest of the guys cover for their move.

Yeah, the turn sequence in Combat Commander kind of squashed that like a bug.

I wanted it in a good position to cover everybody else, which meant that Josef had to move first before throwing it.

Opportunity Fire happens before Actions.

And Josef broke before he could throw the smoke.

After that happened, the rest of the guys decided to stay put, out of range of those nasty Italians.

Dave’s Stupid Move Number 2: Activating Josef, I could actually have activated all of the non-leaders on the right side of the board, except for a couple of them who he couldn’t see.

Many of those on the right could have moved as well.

I didn’t think to do that.

It would have cost Noel another Fire card to activate his other guys to fire. Maybe he had it?

I don’t know.

But we’ll never find out.

Sigh Sigh.

I finally decided to discard my hand, but ended up drawing three Advance cards, a Fire card and a Move.

No Recover!

I played one of those Advances and made some major headway!

This is also where Noel reminded me that I could activate pretty much everyone, or at least everybody that Nikolai could see (except other leaders, of course).

Here’s my position after all that.

Noel started doing some low-firepower, multiple attacks that would deplete my deck (as all good Defenders should do), and actually ended up suppressing two Partisans and breaking one.

What the hell?

These were supposed to be nuisance attacks.

I decided to give it back by firing my newest section and LMG at the Italians next to him.

Piss-poor firepower and then the Italian morale check caused an Air Support event that ended up breaking him.

That’s when I knew my luck was turning sour.

I decided to start bringing more troops out, even if it did cost me VP. During this next Time, I infiltrated twice, bring in a new leader (Yuri) who could also use Smoke Grenades, and later on a Section.

Carboni on the Italian right kept raining fire down on my poor Partisans trying to climb the hill.

Notice I haven’t mentioned a Recover card in a while?

Yep.

Josef was regretting me not waiting to play that one later.

That’s when I decided to make use of at least one of these Molotov Cocktails I had!

A Move plus Assault Fire could very easily break that Italian in the foxholes at the top of the cliff.

Of course, the Partisans would have to survive the inevitable fire from above (did Noel ever not have a Fire card handy? Oh yeah, only when it didn’t matter).

They didn’t survive.

Since every Italian unit who could see it was activated to fire, I decided not to move everybody else.

Not having a Recover card really sucked.

More Italian artillery resulted in one broken Partisan, but the Partisan with the Molotov Cocktail rallied with a Patriotism event! (I just realized I forgot to make him Veteran).

It also resulted in my destroyed Demolition Charge coming back to my guys on the left!

If I could get close enough.

I didn’t.

Another Partisan Advance moved me closer to the cliffs and maybe some glory!

Yeah, it’s me, so you know that wasn’t happening.

Of course, doing that put my guys on the Partisan left in range of even more Italians.

That can’t be good.

At least they were only suppressed.

One unit broke, but the Italian deck ran out, causing Yuri and his Section to come onto the board.

Right next to Carboni’s men!

I had plans…

With their first action, Yuri jumped into intense melee with the Italian squad!

I was hoping to draw an Ambush or Knife or something, but didn’t.

After calculating the odds, it was a bit dicier than I thought it would be.

I only had a 6-4 advantage!

Thankfully, I managed to succeed and eliminate the Italian squad.

Remember that…it was a rare occurrance.

Because Ottolini is cross-eyed or something, Carboni called down some artillery instead. And while it caused a Shell Shock event that broke one of Noel’s other units, the artillery landed right on Josef’s head.

The broken Troop died (not managing to even just be reduced!), the Troop under Josef died too (what the fuck???? No reduction?)

Josef managed to survive, though, but only because Noel gave up Initiative and I rolled just enough to be suppressed instead.

Time was moving way too quickly and I wasn’t making much headway.

Yuri managed to throw some smoke to let the unbroken units on the left move up into the brush with him (of course, Noel admitted he didn’t have a Fire card anyway, so what was the point?).

See all those broken Partisans in that picture, and notice how I haven’t mentioned having a Recover card?

Yeah, this was getting bad.

The only thing saving me was apparently Noel wasn’t drawing Rout cards, because have I mentioned that the Partisan broken morale is shit?

I did manage to successfully throw that Molotov Cocktail up the cliff onto the Italian squad as originally planned, and broke him!

But he quickly rallied.

And my LMG broke down in that attack, but it was fixed later.

Then Noel finally drew a Rout.

The first one managed to Rout the broken guy on the left right off the map.

I finally discarded my hand, and lo and behold, a Recover card!

Josef rallied, another Section (that was in danger of being Routed off the board) rallied, but nobody else did.

I did manage to Infiltrate (for free!) a Crew and an LMG though. They’d come out next Time.

My new hand also had an Ambush and Knife.

And an Advance!

Time to Advance up the cliff and take out that Italian squad.

Before I could do that, Carboni and his men jumped into Yuri’s hex!

The Partisans do get the chance to move out of the hex before melee happens.

But I had an Ambush and a Knife!

Dave’s Stupid Move Number 3…if your opponent is moving into melee at an Even strength, knowing you might have an Ambush or two, and he’s not desperate yet because Time is against him, he probably has at least two Ambushes.

But I didn’t think about that, and stayed in the hex.

I played my Ambush…broke the Blackshirt squad.

Then Noel played one Ambush…and two Ambushes…and three Ambushes…

Yep, Yuri died and the Partisan unit was broken.

It was still only a 4-1 Italian advantage, so maybe I could pull it out?

Especially with the Knife, which made it a 4-3 Italian advantage!

I drew a 6.

I gave Noel the Initiative card for a re-roll…and drew a 5.

I had an 8 strength. But maybe Noel would draw bad?

Nope. He drew an 8, killing my guys.

Thus the tumbling boulder of luck rolled into me.

But I had an Advance card! And a full-strength Troop!

So I advanced into the hex and it would be a 5-4 advantage for me.

Maybe I would draw an Ambush or Knife as well.

Nope.

Before that, though, I gave Noel 2 more points to Infiltrate a Band along with the Crew and LMG that were ready to come out.

In the melee, I drew a 7, meaning I had a 12 strength.

Noel drew…a 9, giving him 13 and the win.

In hindsight, I could have activated Josef down the hill, which meant that both units could Advance, and I would have won!

Sigh. Sigh. Sigh.

But one of the rolls caused a sniper that, while it didn’t do anything, moved a Sighting marker right on top of one of the Italian units in the centre!

And I only had 5 cards left in my deck.

Revenge would be mine…

But first, Ottolini tried some more close-range artillery and managed to miss badly, having it go off the board.

I moved Josef up to hopefully help out the suddenly-leaderless guys up by Carboni, all the while shouting “why weren’t you listening to me?????”

Noel also managed to Rout another Partisan off the cliff.

Have I mentioned that I haven’t seen a Recover card in a while?

Have I mentioned that Partisan broken morale is shit?

I discarded my entire hand, causing another Time event.

And my reinforcements to come out.

Just as planned…hehehehehehehe

Noel had the Initiative, but I had a 9-4 advantage, so I shouldn’t need it, right?

Then I drew a 3.

Ok! Well, that’s only a 12, but he would have to draw an 8 to even get mutual annihilation and a 9 to kill me, right?

Oh look, Noel drew a 9.

Sigh. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh.

Two more Partisans gone.

I had finally drawn a Recover card, though!

Sadly, only one broken unit was left (the others had died) and they failed to rally.

In fact, I had drawn three Recover cards.

How timely!

And it took three Recover cards to finally rally that one unit.

It would have been nice to keep one of those.

To add insult to injury?

The event that I drew on the successful Recover attempt?

“Medic,” which would rally any broken unit.

Which I didn’t have anymore, because he had finally rallied.

The Combat Commander gods hated me on this day.

Noel Advanced his unit that was in danger at the edge of the cliff away from me, just as I had an Advance and Ambush that I was going to use, so I just Advanced into the foxholes they had vacated.

It’s been a while, so here’s the map after my massive Advance.

I was putting pressure on Objective 5, but I just couldn’t draw the cards I needed.

And I also Infiltrated (giving Noel 2 points) another leader since I was suffering a bit in leadership.

At this point, with only two Time triggers before the first Sudden Death check, Noel started doing a bunch of low-firepower attacks to run me out of cards (since the Partisan deck is so small).

I was all set, though. Maybe to take Objective 1 back, or maybe do something else.

I had two Ambushes and an Advance!

What could go wrong?

How about one of those low-firepower attacks causing a Partisan “Inexperience” event that forced me to discard my entire hand.

Sigh. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh.

Then Noel got a bit cocky, thinking my luck was so terrible (he wasn’t wrong!).

The guys in the north decided to jump onto my Section with the LMG and try to melee them.

It was a 4-4 strength ratio, and I managed to draw an 8 and after my Time check (my deck ran out), Noel drew a 6.

It was like the Combat Commander gods said “ok, we’ve been pretty hard on you. Let’s throw you a bone.”)

The Italians died and I was temporarily relieved.

Ottolini then managed to actually successfully call a radio, though the minor drift made it so it didn’t affect an entire horde of Partisans.

Only a group of them.

It did cause the Italian deck to run out, but the Sudden Death draw kept the game going.

And it did break a bunch of Partisans as well.

It was time to be bold with the Partisans, with one Sudden Death check already passed!

I Advanced onto the Italian squad in the open next to Objective 5, along with Yevgeny, the new leader that had just come out.

Sadly, I hadn’t drawn an Ambush or a Knife, so it was a 7-4 advantage.

And the Combat Commander gods were merciful again. Like “you don’t have a chance anyway, so why not give you a little bit of Christmas cheer?”

One more dead Italian, and I was right next to Objective 5! If I could draw some Ambushes, maybe I could do something? That’s 16 points!

Nope. Ottolini let loose with a bunch more low-firepower attacks, ending up breaking Yevgeny, suppressing the Troop, and then breaking it.

The breaking happened after a Partisan Patriotism event which would have let me rally him, but instead I rallied Yevgeny to keep the stack unbroken.

Yes, great timing, Combat Commander gods!

Sigh. Sigh. Sigh.Sigh.Sigh.Sigh.

I discarded my entire hand and got two Recover cards!

And the Troop failed to rally.

Have I mentioned that Partisan broken morale is shit?

A couple of other units rallied, but they weren’t really in the close fight.

It also forced my deck to run out, and Sudden Death ended the game on Time Marker 8.

Noel won with 26 points, which means that I would have been hard-pressed to do something.

However, I was adjacent to Objective 1 (6 points) and taking Objective 5 (that would have required some luck) would have been 16 points.

Unfortunately, 22 points would still have left Noel with a 4-point victory, though taking Objective 5 would undoubtedly have involved killing some Italians, so it might have worked?

Here’s the final map situation.

Playing with Noel is always fun, and rules questions are never an issue (which I also love).

He’s a great guy, lots of laughs were had (in this scenario, much at my expense but in the previous scenario, it was just in general) and I love playing against him.

I’m starting to learn how to play the Partisans, which will hopefully help me with January’s matchup (watch, I’ll be the Axis and it won’t matter).

(Note: this entire AAR was written right after the game, and before the matchups were sent out. I actually am the Partisans this month, though in the scenario Noel and I played on Friday, not this one)

I really enjoyed these two games, and I will write up the other scenario soon (note: but it won’t be posted for a while due to it being this month’s scenario!).

Only one of them can be January’s scenario (and it may not be either), so you’ll see at least one of them!

Thanks, Noel, for some great camaraderie and some fun play.

If you enjoyed this report, or the other ones I’ve written, why not join us on the ladder? You get to play with a great group of guys and you get to play Combat Commander at least once a month.

You’ll always be able to get a game in if you really want to.

Tony is there for you.

Until next time, keep your ammo loaded and try not to piss off the Combat Commander gods.

I don’t know what I did, but they are really mad at me for some reason.

Combat Commander Ladder – After Action Reports

To see all of my Ladder After Action Reports since May 2021, go here!