Norway WW2 : the Battles of Dombaas 16th/17th April 1940

After the hot dusty weather in the Peninsular I cleared the table off for some snow. Norway 1940…..

We have played a number of scenarios from this excellent book. A couple of the scenarios based around the activity of the 324th Fallschirmjager Regiment are quite small, with a small number of German Paratroopers attempting to capture and hold the strategically important Dombaas Crossroads. There are two scenarios as the battle lasted over two days. We thought it would be fun to played the two scenarios as a linked pair in the same session.

We modified the forces to work with Bolt Action and set to…..

The central key objective is a Barn located close to the road junction. Some light woods but also a lot of open ground. A small ruined building can be seen to the left of the barn which will provide cover if needed. 

The small Fallschirmjager  force deploys from the light woods beyond the ruined building. The Norwegian troops arrive from three other directions , this includes at least one unit of Norwegian ski troops seen here coming over the low hill.

As expected the Germans dash for the bar and the strong defensive position it will 

provide.

With the Germans in the barn, Norwegian infantry approach from several direction opening fire, but ultimately they only have six turns to get into the barn which will require them to assault.

Norwegians closing in on the backyard of the barn, but with limited cover they get pinned down.

The Norwegian HQ crosses the road to lead the attack

The first infantry unit, carries out the first assault on the building, they wipe out the first unit in the building but as we agreed the building could hold two units they can push in yet.

After several tough rounds of hand to hand combat and right in the last turn the Norwegians are able to secure the Barn and a win in the first battle.

Now they must hold the area against a German counterattack

Both sides have some additional reserves for this scenario. The Norwegians setup in and around the barn.

The Fallschirmjager attack from two sides using the light woods and the hills as cover for their advance

The defenders dug is as best as they can, they keep their ski troops in reserve in case the Germans break cover

Germans can be seen assaulting the barn through the ruined building but they have also broken cover from the woods the elite ski troops swoop in to finish them off.

They only need some 5’s …arghhhhhh !

The paratroopers win and cross into the yard. From the left you can see some ‘French’  reserves arriving (don’t look too closely as they are actually Polish infantry 🙂)

The Germans force there way into the barn from the back

So it is upto the French to clear them out, after several further tough rounds of combat

The last of the Germans are driven out but it has literally taken all of the Norwegian force to complete the objective.

Two excellent and fun battles/skirmishes very close and brutal with nowhere to hide for either side. I’m sure we will be returning to Norway some time later in the year. But I do need to paint some French for the Battles around Narvik.

Thanks as always for taking the time to checkout the blog. More to come soon…..

Matt ❤️

Norway 1940 : Defence of Tretten

Looking for a quick setup battle this weekend I dug back into my Norway Skirmish scenarios book. This battle is loosely based on the Defense of Trenton. The Germans are forcing the allies back, after the collapse at Lillehammer. We played the scenario with the basic ‘breakthrough’ scenario from the Bolt Action rule book (yes I’m still playing version 1).

Elements of the 163rd Infantry Division are supported by Gebirgsjager and some suitable armoured support. Their objective is to break through the defence line held by the 15th Infantry Brigade and the Norwegian Torkildsen Battalion. The river is only crossable on foot and the woods will slow movement. I didn’t take too many photos as we were having too much fun.

The start of the battle, the Norwegians and British dug in on the right, the German preliminary bombardment pinned nearly every unit and killed one of the 2LB gunners by the small White House. The green markers indicate the location of a hidden Norwegian sniper team. Which would only be revealed when it was overrun.

German infantry Gebirgsjager  come on through the woods using the high ground as cover.

A second 7nit heads for the bridge again using cover, German tanks can be seen advancing slowly through the woods in the distance.

First ‘blood’ to the Norwegian though when their medium mortar hits a German MG first shot behind the logs completely knocking it out. The infantry push on up the hill

Elite Norwegian ski troops come on in reserve and look to cover the bridge. In the distance a lone antitank rifle team and machine gun team are left to cover the woods but are dismayed to see the advancing German armour !

British infantry also moves up to cover the bridge, the second ski unit can be seen heading off into the woods where they got into heavy hand to hand combat driving the Germans in that area back.

 The Gebirgsjager make a bid to cross the bridge and take heavy fire they hit the deck, but they may have only been a diversion for the main assault.

Which is coming over the high ground.

The Norwegians batter away at the attackers but they are out numbered with too many of their troops cover their right flank. The German armour chooses to sweep through in the distance and with the infantry on this flank reaching the stream the battle is over. A good win for the Germans who cleverly kept their armour away form the British artillery.

A fun battle played in fine spirits. Hopefully we can return to Norway again soon, it reminds me I have a couple of french units I need to get painted and some Germans I was going to do in greatcoats.

Keith I think mentioned on one of my previous posts how many trains I have for the model railway, so I thought I would come clean, here is the current train storage case. I doubt very much this will be the end of collecting so I’m going to need to build some more shelves soon….and yes I have quite a lot of stock for them to pull :)

More games planned next week and likely some painting, well why not !

Thanks for popping in

Matt♥️

Norway 1940 : Bolt Action

Another jolly week visiting relatives and squeezing hobby time in around other stuff. Jonathan was visiting from over in Canada and we were looking for a fun game so time to roll out my Norwegian collection. Not a historical encounter but a basic Bolt Action breakthrough scenario.

The Norwegians will be advancing from the left supported by two Polish Infantry squads. The Germans are dug in on the high ground on the right and around the small building where the road heads of the table

The Germans have half their small force dug in on the hill, the Norwegians fail to call in a preliminary barrage so the Germans hold their position in ambush

They also have a 75mm gun as support

The Norwegian commander pushes the Polish infantry to the right and sets up their mortar in the cover of the small wooded hill

A wider shot of the German start position

The Norwegians have two units of elite ski mounted troops who advance across the road and fields, the Germans having moved up into the copse come under heavy fire and are pinned down

On the left the Poles are hit really hard as they cross the road and as soon as they break cover

The Norwegians start to advance knowing they need to break through in six turns

They are supported by a single French R35

After several failed attempts German reserves arrive and head towards the second wooded hill

The first unit of ski troops have been nearly wiped out but the second now sweeps up the hill to combat the defenders, who are cut to pieces

The ski troops then cleverly pull back down the hill awaiting the next turn before sweeping into the victory zone

The German machine gun is knocked out by mortar fire

We are now at six turns and the Norwegians have broken through for a pretty clear win, the Germans just couldn’t stop the tide, although they put up a pretty good fight. Almost all the Poles have been wiped out as have the leading ski troops. A fun game and great to get something different on the table.

Painting this week, after the game last week I realised we didn’t have enough wound markers and I had six more in the box

That should be enough ?

I’ve also finished my Tallarn Captain

Recently I also picked up a couple of rather poorly painted but cheap Spanish units off eBay. I was hoping these would need fairly limited work to get them table ready, here is the first unit. A new flag and a general reworking. They don’t look too bad and certainly good enough, my plan isn’t to create a whole Spanish army rather collection enough for a single Brigade to support the British. So perhaps 3 or 4 units plus some cavalry and an artillery piece ?

Finally Martin was having a clear out and gifted me some 28mm trucks, these are really cheap plastic models but actually look pretty good. He originally thought they were Opal Blitz but after me spending loads of time on the internet, I think I have them identified as Russian Zis-150 trucks. They look very close to American dodge trucks though so some will be painted for Sicily and some generic.

Here is one with some Germans in the back

Finally we’ve been out and about again, a trip to the very interesting Jodrel Bank in Cheshire

…and Appleby Castle where the Norman Keep was renovated about 3 years ago

It has a really interesting history, and a good collection of helmets to try on 

It took me ages to try them all on 😂

Phew busy at the moment, thanks as always for checking in.

A couple of days in London at the end of this week then hopefully some more gaming 

Matt😀