Combat Commander After Action Report – Scenario #46 – Pegasus Bridge

I must have done some really bad things in a previous life.

Maybe I held an entire disco hostage, forcing them to listen to the long-forgotten Blues album by Gilbert Gottfried.

This week’s Combat Commander ladder game is a testament that I must have done something truly evil.

Because the gods just hated me.

This wasn’t the typical “oh, you’ve offended the Combat Commander gods, haha you” type of result.

This was “you are a terrible person, or at least you were” type of result.

What am I talking about?

Welcome to another tale of adventure from the Combat Commander ladder.

The ladder is a monthly tournament run by the nonpareil Patrick Pence, he of Patrick’s Tactics & Tutorials fame.

Really, it is fame, too. I heard Vin Diesel speak highly of him.

Anyway, December’s scenario is from the Normandy battle pack of scenarios and has some intrepid British paratroops facing off against German conscripts (followed by some regular line units) to try and take the very important Pegasus Bridge.

My opponent this month was Nathan F, a guy I played before back in February 2023 when my German tanks just ran roughshod over his French “1-discarders”.

Yes, Nathan, revenge is sweet.

The Germans (Grey – Nathan) have a small conscript force in the trenches around the bridge while the British (Tan – Me) have a few airborne troops that have to be set up in and around the two glider spaces.

There’s also some Wire along with the trenches, and it’s all preset. The Germans don’t get any choice.

Here is our ultimate setup.

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

There are a few special rules for this scenario.

First, Normandy rules are in effect, which means (for this scenario at least) that the hedges are bocage (harder to move through and better cover) and that’s actually it!

The rest of the Normandy rules don’t come into play.

However, the Night rules are also in effect, which means there is a +1 hindrance for each hex between firer and target as well as the ability to use starshells to eliminate that hindrance.

Movement also costs one extra MP if not along a road, which became annoying.

Finally, and the most annoying, if you discard on your turn, you have to discard your entire hand (like the Partisans). No “let’s discard these two cards to see if I can get something to go with these two Ambush cards”.

Scenario-specific special rules are the reinforcements that you can see on the Time Track (the Germans get a bunch fairly early while the Brits get a few later).

Also, the Infantry Gun on the bridge can never be destroyed.

If the crew manning it (who must set up there) is eliminated or leaves, the gun stays there for anybody else who happens into the hex.

It can jam, however, and it did in this game.

Finally, the German player does a Sniper check at the end of each Time trigger.

Thankfully (and one of the few thankful things), that didn’t have much effect in our game.

How’d it go?

Well, you obviously know by now, but let’s be entertained and actually see it happened!

Sadly, to start with the British drew 3 Command Confusion cards (two with Marksmanship, which would be awesome if I had a Fire card!), a Recover (nobody’s fired at us yet!) and an Advance. So the Brits advanced closer to the Germans.

Nathan seemed to always have a Fire card, and of course he had one this time.

The Night hindrance can make firepower less effective, but it can still pack a punch sometimes.

And it did, breaking one of the Airborne squads first thing!

You remember that I said I started with a Recover card, right?

In the first of three of these incidents, the German fire caused an event, which was an Interrogation, allowing Nathan to look at my hand and have me discard a card.

Yep, that Recover card was no longer in my hand.

Did I mention that the British gliders landed in totally open ground?

I went ahead and fired, using both of my Marksmanship cards, and in what became a normal thing in this game, I rolled really low anyway.

A 3!

The Germans just shrugged that off.

I did try to throw some smoke on the German fire group and also block the Infantry Gun, but also to no avail (thankfully his gun had missed too).

Only having one card left, you’d think I would draw a Recover, right?

Nope!

The Germans fired again (look, just assume he fired at me unless I say otherwise, ok?)

Nathan rolled really low too (thankfully at the beginning of the game, his fire attack rolls were low too), but Lt. Botheridge still managed to cower out in the open due to all of that lead flying nowhere near him.

I fired and got some smoke on the stack, and then moved out some of my other Airborne guys.

A British morale check brought one of the few pieces of luck in the night, getting me a Hero who walked by, encouraged my broken squad with inspirational words to rally them, then rode off into the sunset (i.e. he was overstacked in the hex and eliminated).

But Thornton panicked (because of course he did).

He only needed a 5 or higher to be safe.

He rolled a 4.

I threw out a starshell over the river, illuminating a bunch of the German force.

But since I had placed a 4 smoke on Hickman’s hex, there was still a major hindrance.

Oops.

I did finally have a Recover card.

And Thornton decided he liked cowering in the open, refusing to rally.

But the subsequent sniper ended up breaking one of the few Germans I ever broke in this one, the team on the other side of the river.

Nathan quickly got rid of the Starshell and then promptly fired again!

I had drawn another Recover card!

So you know what happened.

Yep, everybody broke in Thornton’s hex and Thornton died.

That’s what counting sunflowers in the open (even at night) will get you!

Thankfully I did manage to rally the two units that Thornton had been guiding, and they were still in command range of Brotheridge so they weren’t on their own.

Here’s the situation at Time trigger 2 (the British deck had run out).

Not much change!

The German Infantry Gun (IG) fired and hit, but rolled a Jammed trigger so it broke down with a really low firepower.

My Airborne squad managed to still be suppressed though, thinking the shots going way over their head were actually aliens preparing to land and they’d better hunker down.

The British fired another starshell to try and illuminate targets, but it went so far astray that it ended up in the northwest corner of the map, where nobody would ever go.

Eventually I used one of my otherwise useless Artillery Denied cards to get rid of it.

In one ironic bit regarding the Night “discard all” rule, I was going to fire on Nathan’s guys, then realized they had no chance of doing anything. But I didn’t have anything else in my hand and would have to discard everything.

Including a Dig In, and Nathan had 2 cards left in his hand.

Since I wanted my guys floundering in the open to get into some foxholes, I fired anyway to deplete his deck.

And he promptly drew a Time trigger anyway.

Situation after Time 3, with the German reinforcements deployed and the British still not having made any gains.

Nathan continued his morale checks from my fire, and brought out the German Hero, who rallied the broken team who was refusing to rally in the background.

Not that they were doing much anyway, but still!

While the German reinforcements moved forward, I decided it was time to try and force the bridge.

I had an Ambush card, some Smoke Grenades, and a Move card.

So Broadridge and company surged forward out of the foxholes, throwing some 7 strength smoke in front of them!

And I had a Recover card in case something bad happened.

Nathan, of course, had a Fire card and let loose.

A lowly 15, for which I didn’t need super high rolls to succeed.

Both units were fine, but Broadridge broke again, thinking that the frogs that were ribbiting off to the left actually represented German soldiers who had infiltrated the lines.

I kept moving the rest of my guys forward, getting fired at.

This included Thornton’s squad and crew jumping into the Wire, partially to advance and partially because I had a Demolitions card that would let me get rid of the Wire if Nathan would ever discard.

Which did happen!

Eventually.

Anyway, they both broke.

On the last group of British moving, Nathan drew a Fog of War event, which has both players randomly discard a card.

Nathan happened to choose…my Recover card!

Second time that’s happened this game.

Here’s the situation after all of that.

This is also when Nathan’s fire attacks became huge rather than small.

Not a good combination.

Almost everybody was broken! And I no longer had a Recover card.

Thankfully, Nathan only had one card left after all of that, so he had to discard and I was able to remove that Wire.

Since I no longer could recover, Broadridge advanced into the open trench next to the German fire group, to at least give them some cover from the fire that was raining down on them.

Another British Time trigger brought us one turn closer to the British reinforcements coming out.

Here’s the situation at that point.

More German fire killed Broadridge’s crew and brought out another British Time trigger!

It was time for the Brit reinforcements to come out.

They were going to come from the the north.

Another Interrogation event allowed Nathan to force me to discard one of the two Ambushes I had been saving for when Broadridge’s men rallied.

I don’t know why I was saving it when I couldn’t draw a Recover or an Advance anyway.

Nathan fired yet again, and I drew another Time!

I couldn’t have that with Sudden Death so close, so I gave him the Initiative.

And still survived the fire.

Finally, in a desperate attempt to get a Recover card, and since one of my two Ambushes was gone anyway, I discarded my hand to see what I could get.

Oh my god a Recover card!!!!

So you know what happened now, right?

Yep.

Nathan fired again, a massive attack that broke Broadridge’s squad and ended up killing him.

Not only that, one of the two units originally led by Thornton failed to rally on my next turn.

But a lucky Medic event rallied him because Nathan didn’t have any broken units!

The Brits in the north started moving forward, hoping to be able to do something.

They took fire but survived it.

More fire broke more Brits, and the Germans drew a Time trigger!

One away from Sudden Death.

Two broken British units, but I finally had drawn a Recover card!

Firing at one of the broken units, Nathan drew a 3 for a lowly 13 firepower.

Of course, I drew a 3 as well, so they died!

More fire just wreaked havoc on the northern troops, breaking Cpl Gray and his men.

But I had a Recover card!

Gray rallied, the squad didn’t.

I had to discard my hand, but thankfully I had drawn another Recover card.

But German Fire and another Interrogation event made me discard that one.

Again!

For the third time.

Gray promptly panicked during the fire, and then subsequent fire killed both the squad and Gray.

With no leaders left and Time ticking away, I failed my personal morale check and resigned.

Here’s the final situation.

Wow, I don’t think I’ve had a game where my luck was quite this bad.

Taking nothing away from Nathan, who took advantage of every opportunity he had.

Some people don’t.

He had a lot of advantages in this one, though.

Let me count…three Recover cards discarded just as I was about to use them, and twice my broken leader died right before I had the chance to Recover them.

Even with the dismal performance by the Brits, though, it was still a really fun game.

Nathan and I had a lot of laughs (mostly at my guys, but also at how the broken crew in the German backfield was integral to his defensive strategy) and he is a joy to talk to.

We thought we might have to split the game over two nights because of family obligations, but needless to say that wasn’t necessary.

With this loss, I’m now 29-26 overall in my ladder career.

I’m glad I built up that buffer.

Next month’s scenario is from the Resistance expansion, another fun scenario I’m sure because the Partisans are so interesting (and sometimes frustrating) to play with.

If you enjoyed this write-up, why not join us on the ladder?

It’s a great way to get a regular play in of a great game, and there are almost always pickup games available.

You just have to ask!

Until then, my advice to you is simple.

Find out what you did in a past life and atone!

Then maybe the gods won’t strike you down.

See you next month!

Combat Commander Ladder – After Action Reports

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