A Walk in the Sun

 Our latest Fistful of Lead trip was to sunny Vietnam, inspired by our various playings of Decision Games 'Khe San'. This particular scenario is set during Operation Apache Snow in May 1969.

The usual gang of reprobates assembled, the heroic NVA defending their homeland from the colonialist invaders were myself, Jerry, Simon and Mark with Pete in command. The US Imperialists were John, Micheal (both resplendant in their tin hats with covers), Jim and Russell. At least it was an excuse to wear my VC boonie and fighters scarf, some of the surviving bits of my old re-enactment gear.

We were the 29th NVA Regiment and the Americans were B Company, 3/187th Regiment.

As ever, this was a 54mm skirmish game with individual figures, using the modern variant of Fistful of Lead.

The action opened with the NVA out of sight and dug in, with the US point team cautiously marching up the track. We had a fireteam (me with four NVA troopers), two RPG teams (Simon and Mark) and a sniper (Jerry) with an SKS. Our job was to stop the US getting three or more troops off the far edge and controlling both the road junctions.  

Our guys were all dug into spider holes, apart from Jerry who was up a tree. We also had a Claymore covering the far road junction. My team was dug in across the track at the first junction, the RPG teams were echeloned further back and Jerry was covering the left track.

The US were virtually on top of our positions and I couldn't take the chance they would spot us first so two of my guys popped up and gunned down the US point men. Personally I would have put my team to the side of the track, not across it, and waited until the US were fully committed, but orders are orders.

Undeterred by the fate of their pals (they are both down wounded), more US troops appeared. In FFoL, figures activate individually, based on playing cards by the owning player. The black blob on one of my guys shows he is out of ammo, having emptied a whole magazine into the US point.

More Americans appeared, so the rest of my team popped up and shot at them. Less effective this time the yellow blobs show their targets are shocked, but not hit.

Even more Americans roll up and return fire, nearly all my guys are shocked. At least their foxholes are giving them some cover. I am now fighting all the Americans on my own, which strikes me as a really silly idea.

My guys bug out and leg it into the jungle back down the track. The US mill around sorting themselves out, their medic deals with the wounded and they  put an M60 team around the left flank. Visibility in the jungle is short, so my guys have a chance to sort themselves out too, they remove the shock markers.

Some of the US push forward aggressively, leaving a bunch of wounded and shocked troops behind. My team are still all bunched up around the junction, and one of the RPG gunners pops up and fires ineffectively at the US column. It is becoming increasing hard to see what is going on with all the trees in the way, all very atmospheric!

Just how many Americans are there! I'm glad my guys disengaged. I've just got one lightly wounded man now and we are starting to spread out across both tracks.

To cover our redeployment, one of my chaps throws two grenades into the middle of the great mass of US troops on the road. Ouch! Jerry also manages to shoot the M60 gunner, but a US blooper guy bags one of our RPG gunners.

Even more Americans arrive! Another fireteam deploys on the right flank, but at least Jerry has stopped the M60 team on the left. The US fire M79 grenades to try and dislodge him but miss. My chaps have melted back into the trees and are taking cover, so are now invisible again.

We broke for the night at that point.

The US on the main track are still all pretty shook up, and the latest fireteam to arrive moves across to the left flank (you can see them in the foreground of the picture). Jerry is still taking potshots from his tree and apparently leading a charmed life.

As the left flanking US team sweeps forward, the central column gets going again. Nicely bunched up, they get a shower of grenades from my guys concealed among the trees.

The US point man finds where we have deployed the Claymore. Yes, that is a Party Popper. He is blown to pieces in the blast.

My guys now keep up a steady fire on the US and they return the complement, both sides mainly suffering shock results so the sea of yellow counters extends. The US occupy both the junctions and there isn't any way to shift them, but as time runs out, they haven't a hope of getting anyone off our base edge either, so it is an honourable draw.

Despite the large volume of small arms fire and all the pyrotechnics, when the smoke cleared, the total losses for all sides were just 2 KIA, 4 WIA and the rest just shocked/suppressed, which seems pretty realistic really.

The was good fun and very atmospheric, beautiful toys too. Hopefully we will be going back 'up country' at some point.

Back to Khe San

 Our scheduled game was postponed due to illness, so Tim put Khe San on again, as it works well as a team game.  We played this a few weeks ago, so we're a bit more familiar with what works and what doesn't from a tactical pov.

As before, the VC setup is pre-determined, although the units are allocated randomly. A couple of stacks in trenches next to Khe San, big stacks in Laos and the DMZ, and a couple of units along Route 9. We had half a dozen units to start with, most of which weren't great, although in the last game we found the USMC Tank Company very useful as it was quite mobile. 

We had to put the SF unit at Long Bai near Laos, otherwise we put two units in Khe San and the Rock Quarry, with an outpost on one of the nearby hills (the triangle). As we found in the previous game, the US have to attack to win, they can't just hide in their Firebases, and it is important to clear the VC trenches next to Khe San. Losing Khe San is an automatic loss.

Unlike the previous game, we were allowed to choose the US action cards this time, so we plumped for a Reinforcement card - which we used to pick more Marines, some AirCav (who apparently have integral choppers now) and some helicopter gunships.

We stonked one VC stack with B52s, while we assaulted the trenches with our other units, supported by the Skyraiders.

Well, that went well! The VC are pushed back away from the Firebase.

The VC responded with a Major Attack action card, and those big stacks rolled forwards.

One of our positions was completely overrun!

And we were driven out in confusion from another. Well, that could have gone better.

Time to counterattack. Our guys roll out again to take on those big stacks, supported by all available air.

Our guys are repulsed in the north, and in the south, discover a huge concentration of VC.... I'm not sure even the Marines can take on all those guys. 

Another disaster. We are defeated and take heavy losses. The survivors fall back.

The VC follow up with a direct assault on Khe San and the trenches next to the Rock Quarry. Clever this game AI isn't it?

Fortunately the assault on Khe San is (just) repulsed, but the ARVN are overrun. As Mr Springsteen sang "Had a brother at Khe San, fighting off the Vietcong. They're still there, but he's all gone. Gone, gone away maan". 

Fortunately we managed to whistle up some more reinforcements, so it was time to attack again. We concentrated all our spare stuff against one VC stack near Long Bai, taking advantage of the special Firebase Support card which gives a combat bonus.

At least that worked, and the VC were driven off. There is still that huge VC stack top left though. 

More VC assaults near Khe San in the trenches. 

We managed to beat that attack off as well, and the dead VC pile was pleasing high. However the US had by now lost no less than six ground units, and there was no coming back from that as we simply couldn't kill enough stuff and take enough ground to offset the big VP penalty for all those destroyed units. We called it at that point, US Tactical Defeat, the worst result so far.

What a clever game, with endless replay value.  

Khe San

 Decision Games have published a number of solo games, and one particular series are the 'Cold War Blitz' games which share a common rules framework but have scenario specific rules and unit ratings bolted on. Tim brought the game covering Khe San along to one of our Zoom sessions to play as a 'collective' solo game.

It is an area movement map, with various types of terrain box - clear, Firebase, mountain, jungle, entrenched and VC staging areas in the DMZ and Laos. The routes linking the boxes represent various trails and roads including Highway 9.

The VC units are all inverted, only being revealed when they are in combat (and then they are inverted again) and the flow of the acton is driven by event cards which are very similar to those found in Quartermaster General, being based in historical events, but thy are used to determine each sides allowable actions and the run the 'AI' for the VC as well.

The player gets VPs for killing VC units and occupying key terrain (firebases, VC entrenchments and hills). An interesting wrinkle is you have no idea how long the game will last, as the 'end game' marker moves back and forth depending on the card draws, although losing Khe San itself is an immediate loss.

The US player starts with six units, one SF unit is placed in the Firebase near Laos, and the rest can deploy pretty well anywhere not occupied by VC, but obviously defending Khe San is important! The initial forces are a bit of a mix, an airfield garrison unit and an ARVN Regiment, niether of which are much good, an SF battalion and Marine Tank Company, and a Marine Regiment. The garrison unit is immobile so we put that on Khe San along with the Marines. The tanks and SF went in the Rock Quarry (another Firebase) and the poor old ARVN went up into the hills near that big stack of VC. The tanks can move 2 areas, everyone else only 1, which makes them a useful reinforcement, but being only a company, they aren't that powerful. 

On our first turn we drew a reinforcement card and opted for an Aircav Regiment, another Marine Regiment and some more transport helicopters (we had one already). We used the choppers to fly the Marines into Khe San, the Aircav onto ARVN Hill, so we could use the ARVN to occupy another hilltop.

We decided to find out what was in the trenches around Khe San with airpower, we had a Wing of B52s, four Wings of Sky Raiders and a Wing of C47 Spooks available. The B52s plastered the trenches next to Khe San and revealed two VC infantry units. While the Skyraiders uncovered VC elite Sappers and 37mm AA! The AA downed some of our planes and although we didn't inflict any losses, at least we knew what was there.

The VC response was fairly passive (I can't recall what cards they drew).

This isn't Dien Bien Phu, the US can't win by hiding in their Firebases, they have to attack to take terrain and destroy VC. The Marines sallied forth to assault the VC trenches next to Khe San, supported by Skyraiders.

We overcame the VC fairly easily, which was a real morale booster. I think some of my colleagues had been a bit nervous about attacking. One Marine unit was forced back but we stormed the trenches and eliminated the VC.

The VC responded with a big attack from Laos. Three units, including sappers, against a lone SF battalion! If the C47s hadn't been used for offensive air, they can be used as defensive support, so we threw them in.

We just managed to throw the VC back thanks to the air support, although the SF lost a step (our units could take 2 hits). The surviving VC were forced to retreat and we bombed them with the B52s.

After the success of our last attack, we took on the VC in the trenches next to the Quarry, throwing in the marine tank company to support the 1st Marine Regt and supported by Skyraiders. If you use B52s on a hex, you can't assault it as well.

That was another successful attack. Ooorah! Clearing out the areas next to our main objectives seemed to be a good idea, and then we could start looking at choke points on the communications network.

The VC had other ideas however, and a great mass of enemy units piled towards our base, making contact in the two hill 'triangles'.

We managed to hang on to one hill, but the ARVN were driven back to the Rock Quarry.

Time to counterattack. We did a mass ground/air cav assault on the captured hill, and bombed the heck out of the VC on the major road junction just north of Khe San (the map is upside down). The ARVN were parked out of harms way.

Our counter attack just kept rolling, and we launched a mass assault on the trenches near the DMZ.

It was all looking pretty peachy by now, piles of dead VC and everything secure.

Well, all peachy apart from this huge stack of VC who rolled down from the DMZ, while our guys were busy running around miles away. The airforce was sent to bomb them while we hastily redeployed our ground troops to meet the threat.

We massed all our Marines and Air Cav to take them on, and succeeded in destroying half of them and driving the rest back into the jungle. The ARVN and REMFs were left holding Khe San.

Which proved to be a mistake as VC units popped up in the trenches again. The ARVN were overrun and once more we had to charge back and try and restore the situation, this time the only units which could reach were the Air Cav in helicopters and the Marine tankers. Combined with air attacks, we managed to restore the situation.

Phew, we got away with it. We needed to avoid overextended ourselves again, so pulled back to a tighter perimeter. VC units started to build up menacingly again around the DMZ.

We had to call it a night at that point, and I've got no idea how close we are to the siege actually ending as the game end track is quite variable, going both up and down with different events. The US score points for areas currently occupied (not last controlled) and the current heap of dead VC units (from which new ones are generated) so both these totals go up and down. The only constant are the deductions for destroyed US units, although some events allow step losses to be restored.

The others played on the follwing evening, and eventually the game ended with a score of 25, a 'tactical victory', which is pretty much a draw. One more (26+) and it would have been an actual victory. Tims previous solo efforts had netted 15 VP, just enough to get in the 'Tactical Victory' band.

I was really impressed, what a clever game system, particularly the amount of fog of war it produced and critical decision making every turn. The ability of the system run VC to generate 'surprise' was very impressive, and it worked well as a team game too. Highly recommended. 

Year Zero

 In our long running series of various polmil games about the 1970s, John B rather bravely put a game about goings on in Cambodia in the years 1970-79. Now this sort of thing isn't to everyones taste, but we usually try and keep the treatment of the subject matter respectful.

The time period was deliberately chosen to span both the latter stages of the Vietnam War and the Vietnamese intervention in Cambodia itself in the late 1970s, as it put the Cambodian Civil War into a greater strategic context.

As is usual in committee type games, we had various maps and things. This one was quite useful as it showed the major communications routes. A key communication route is that most of the trade and supplies for Phnom Pen go up and down the Mekong, rather than inland from the coast. Fine as long as Saigon is in US/ARVN hands, but otherwise...

For player roles, we had:

Prince Sihanouk, John A

General Lon Nol, Tim G

Pol Pot, Jim R

Le Duan, Micheal

The PRC, Pete

and finally the good guys, those loveable spooks of the CIA, me

My job was threefold: 

1. to save Southeast Asia from being overrun by Communists and bring Cambodia into the western fold 2. disrupt and and ideally halt the transit of supplies from North Vietnam

3. avoid the use of significant US conventional forces and instead rely on mercenaries and SF

The game was run using the modern version of Matrix Games, so a structured committee game where each participant could basically try and do one 'big' thing per game phase, in this case, once per year.

They don't tend to be terribly photogenic, this is mainly what we were looking at for two evenings:

At least Tim and I hade an effort on the hats. I've got my 'The Quiet Man' CIA hat on and Tim has a French para cap with Cambodian badges - the Cambodian Army, such as it was, was very heavily influenced by the French.

The game then proceeded as what, quite frankly, was a monumental shitshow due to the conflicting objectives of all the participants.

This 1970 dated map of the provincial divisions of Cambodia was very handy.

My 'forces' were two brigades of Cambodia mercenaries, who were actually pretty good, plus a Cambodian Special Forces team, who were also pretty good. These units had all been recruited from Cambodians living in Vietnam and were excellent at blending in.

Pol Pot and his gang of thugs were up in Districts V and VI, while Sihanouk had a couple of loyal Militia Regiments and the National Police, and Lon Nol had all the better Army units, of which there weren't many - Armoured Brigade, Paras and Marines plus a Riverene unit holding the Mekong LOC open.

1970 opened with my mercs heading into districts V and VI to set up bases to interdict the Ho Chi Minh trail. This was partially successful but needed more direct support. I had one battalion detached keeping an eye on VC interdiction of the Mekong route to Phnom Pen. Meanwhile the PRC was piling supplies into the Khmer Rouge and Le Duan was busily pushing stuff down the trail into Vietnam. Lon Nol received some US military aid to beef up the Cambodian Army.

1971 saw a much more determined effort on the trail, my mercs started calling in air strikes flown from Vietnam, which worked really well and caused significant disruption. This coincided with a major US ground operation from Vietnam into Cambodia, which went down a real storm back in the US and Congress reined back heavily on direct military interventions. Meanwhile in Cambodia, all hell broke loose as Sihanouk tried to arrest Lon Nol on charges of corruption, supported by Pol Pot! The arrest attempt failed. 

1972 presented a real problem, Lon Nol was hanging on by the skin of his teeth, and it seemed Sihanouk was some sort of communist sympathiser. I had to switch CIA resources to support Lon Nol, who duly conducted a coup, siezed Phnom Pen and became President for Life. In the chaos, Pol Pots reinforced Khmer Rouge fanatics began to march southwest towards the capital.

1973 saw the Khmer Rouge on the outskirts of Phnom Pen, conducting uncoordinated attacks alongside Sihanouk, who was trying to retake the capital. These attacks failed and Pol Pot resorted to a blockade of Phnom Pen, running a campaign of terror against ship captains and their families to block river traffic on the Mekong.

By 1974, it was clear that South Vietnam was lost and I had to focus on saving Cambodia instead. I pondered assassinating Sihanouk to unify the Cambodian leadership, and even wrote the mission brief, but in the end opted to put all my forces into breaking the blockade of Phnom Pen, which was close to starving. Fortunately this succeeded.

In 1975, Lon Nol felt strong enough to mount a counter offensive against Pol Pots blockade, and suceeded in defeating the Khmer Rouge, thanks to the surprise intervention of Sihanouk on Lon Nols side. Taking advantage the chaos of defeat, I hastily rewrote the SF mission and they tried to assassinate Pol Pot instead. They nearly got him, but he escaped wounded. Damn! Meanhwhile Le Duans final offensive overran South Vietnam and Saigon fell. The river route down the Mekong wasn't much use now.

In 1976 Lon Nol and Sihanouk came to agreement that the Prince would be crowned King and take over as head of state, while Lon Nol became Prime Minister. This was eminently satisfactory and I did what I could support the new regime. Pol Pots forces fell back to their stronghold to regroup and try again later. I headed back to Langley for Medals and Champagne, having saved Cambodia, for now, at least.

We called it a day there as it would obviously be a few turns before the Khmer Rouge tried again, and John wanted to have  a washup/feedback session instead.

That was a fascinating slice of history of which I was very aware of some of the major events, but only dimly aware of others. I'd never realised that Sihanouk and Pol Pot were allies for quite some time. I've been to Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia but the game actually put a lot of what happened in the region in the 1970s into perspective. It is a tough subject to make a wargame out of, but I think John had succeeded admirably. We suggested a couple of minor tweaks, but for a development session it went swimmingly well.

 

 

Vietnam Crossfire - re learning an old favourite

 I was chatting to Pete at one of our Friday f2f games and it transpired we are both fans of Crossfire. He hadn't played it since before lockdown, and I haven't played it for years, not since we were at the Polish Club in Sheffield, probably 15 years ago, maybe longer.

I still reckon it is one of the best tactical infantry games I've every played. Although I've only ever played at soldiers, it is the closest I've ever come to recreating the experience of being outflanked or surprised or those sudden, rapid movements which take advantage of an opportunity. As Rommel observed, the infantrymen requires supreme caution, but supreme dash at the correct moment.

Anyway, we arranged for me to go up to Huddersfield and push some toys around. I had a dig around for some scenarios and came across Dick Bryants six introductory Crossfire scenarios. They are small, designed to be played fast, but cover most of the significant aspects of the infantry rules including indirect fire, snipers, minefields, hidden deployment, bunkers etc.  

I took my WW2 stuff along but Pete had a pile of Vietnam figures and terrain which were suitable, so we used those (the original scenarios are based on the 250th Spanish 'Blue' Division in the Volkhov Pocket in 1942). 

The first scenario we played was 'The Hill'. The US have to take the big hill in the middle and hold it for two initiatives within one hour (real time) to win. The VC set up hidden (left half of table) and have to stop them.

Experienced CF players will no doubt be horrified by the long lines of sight, but in fact it worked very well.

All the scenarios use the same forces. The defenders (VC) in this case have one Platoon Commander (PC), three rifle squads, an MG squad, a sniper, an onboard 60mm mortar, an offboard 82mm mortar and a minefield.

I set up a single squad on the hill to hold it, then put the PC, MG, another squad and the 82mm FO in the bottom left wood, with the 60mm and another squad in the top left wood. Between them they covered most of the table with interlocked arcs of fire. I completely forgot about the sniper, which we both forgot in ensuing games...

The attackers (US) have two rifle platoons each of three squads and a PC, an MG squad, engineer squad, onboard 60mm mortar and offboard 75mm gun.

The US put one platoon in each of two woods on the baseline, the MG off to one side to act as a base of fire with the 75mm observer and the 60mm off with the second platoon.

The US started with Recon by Fire (RBF) to try and spot the VC positions. While they did this I dropped mortar fire on their start positions. Lots of mortar fire, which killed one squad, suppressed another and pinned a third.

Eventually they spotted the lone VC squad on the hill, who by now were ground hugging as protection from mortar fire. They were first pinned then finally suppressed by a Firegroup from 1st Platoon.

The 75mms laid a smoke screen to shield them from my top left position and the platoon charged. Reactive fire from the covering positions pinned two US squads on the way in (they could only be fired at in the cover of the hill), but the third made it and easily overran the suppressed VC squad.

My covering group blazed away to little effect. My plan was to drop 82mm mortar fire all over the hill then charge to suppressed US troops.

Sadly the MG managed to miss completely and the Americans plastered my positions with HE. The MG was destroyed and the other squad suppressed.

By now the US platoon on the hill was dug in and I was unable to assault, so the US won, having held the hill for two complete initiatives.

It took us nearly a full hour to get to that point, with a lot of thumbing through the rules, and 45 minutes of it was the US firing without achieving much. The winning assault happened in the last few minutes of the hour. 

Having done that, we swapped sides and did it again, having got something of a better grasp of the rules again.

I took the US this time. I attached the MG to one of the platoons to act as a base of fire (a four base Firegroup is quite nasty) and massed on the left. The plan was to move the firebase up the woods on the left, RBF the enemy positions and then assault with the other platoon having suppressed the enemy. 

That didn't quite work out as plan. 1st Platoon made it onto the hill behind a smoke screen (defended by a VC squad and the HMG), but were all suppressed or pinned by flanking fire so their assault failed.

I then sent in the 2nd platoon minus the MG, which made it onto the hill and all of the remaining defenders missed, so went 'no fire'. That led to a complete mop up. My assaulting platoon overran the suppressed units on the hill. 

Then they just ran around the table assaulting the 'no fire' defending units and wiping out the FOOs etc as they went. Each assault had a chance of failure of course, but at +2, I was in with a good shot to win on opposed D6, and after charging around a bit I destroyed every VC unit. One of those Crossfire things that some players don't like, but tbh, with every defender suppressed or ineffective, the game was over at that point.

Onto the next scenario, 'The Farm'. The VC have to defend the farm building (the old Airfix bamboo hut). The terrain layout is a bit different for this, with a hedge running down the middle of the battlefield and a couple of paddy fields.

Terrain, US right, VC left. The paddy fields block LOS and give cover from direct fire, but not indirect fire. 

The US set up in terrain on the baseline, and I dropped mortar fire on them while they tried to RBF the VC positions. Moving past or assaulting concealed defenders might expose them to the horror of ambush fire (+1 dice, which makes a big difference).

Eventually I realised that all the VC could fire as one huge Crossfire as they were all in LOS of their commander, and coupled with mortar fire, they proceeded to kill or suppress most of the US forces.

Time for a counterattack. Covered by smoke, two VC squads and the PC ran around the US positions assaulting the suppressed US units until they were all wiped out. A decisive victory to the VC.

US casualties. Ouch! The VC didn't lose a squad.

We swapped sides and ran it again. This time I took the US.

I set up a huge firebase with the MG attached to one platoon and both mortars in there as well.

The other platoon waited to assault while the Firebase plastered the VC positions. My prep fire was very successful and a number of VC squads were identified and suppressed. The MG wasn't suppressed, but we knew where it was....

Sadly the MG  flank protection squad was one of the suppressed units, so my assault platoon ran around out of the arc for fire of the MG and under cover of a smokescreen against another covering squad, and then assaulted the building from behind.

Close combat in buildings is handled a bit differently to elsewhere in that every squad has to fight every other squad until only one side is left. This required some reading of the rules and then multiple rounds of combat. Even though the MG was outflanked, with infantry support it fought as normal and I lost one of the pair combats, losing two squads, but the remaining squad+PC finally managed to overcome the defenders, leaving the US in sole possession.

That was pretty quick so we set it up again.

The US went right flanking in a big way.

Whereas I'd gone for an indirect approach with most of my platoon in the woods to the northwest, covering the house from there. The building only had one squad and the 82mm FOO in it. That will fool him I thought.

Sadly not. My guys were revealed by RBF, and then both the infantry squads were suppressed by a torrent of US mortar and artillery fire. Pete pulled the same trick that I had, and ran his assault platoon in behind the arc of fire of the MG. My one covering squad in the building pinned one of the attackers, but then missed and went 'no fire'.

The two unpinned US squads easily overran the suppressed VC, then took out the MG from behind.

Then kept on going and stormed the building. The defending squad had already blown its defensive fire, and went down to a +2 close combat. Another US victory, well within 30 minutes.

After those five games, we were definitely getting the hang of it again. The scenarios were extremely small so one bit of bad luck (like a missed defensive shot) could effectively decide the game, otoh they were very quick to play so we could just pick it up and start again. In all there are six of the 2x2 scenarios and they make an excellent revision set as they cover a number of tactical situations, and they are also useful as a guide to CF scenario design.

Just reflecting more broadly on infantry tactics, in the game we tended to operate as platoons and not run individual squads around, and also put a lot of effort into large fire bases with small assault teams, so rather like Squad Leader.  This was because winning the firefight was crucial, or at least suppressing or masking enough of the defence to pick it apart, as otherwise even a single defender had the potential shoot down large numbers of attackers. 

Once a crucial breach in the defence had been made, it was quite easy to mop the whole thing up, in the absence of meaningful reserves or defence in depth, which was a feature of these small games. One thing which was notable was that the only VC victory came when they counterattacked, which implies that the usual wargames approach of a static 'sit and shoot' defence doesn't work here, the defender needs to move around, or they will be picked apart. This chimes far more with both my reading on the subject, and running around the woods, where defenders positively benefit from both changing firing positions and also mounting counterattacks. This particularly applies in BUAs, where holding unfortified buildings is quite hard, but counterattacking them is quite easy as there are so many covered approach routes and so much terrain.

That was very enjoyable and worth doing again, perhaps a larger scenario and with more terrain so it isn't quite so unforgiving.