ANZAC day game, Operation Lightfoot

We had a beautiful sunny day in Tasman yesterday for ANZAC day. It was a happy-busy day for me - dropping the lady of the house at the airport at 5am for her trip to Japan; coming home for a two-hour nap (which turned into a four-hour nap, meaning that I missed the local wreath-laying service!); a large pot of coffee and some guitar strumming in the sun; a walk; a trip to the local store with my son; a phone call to mum; dinner prep; and finally a game with SP from 7 (well, 8:30 once we'd caught up on all the news).

As our friends across the ditch say, how good!

We hadn't played Memoir '44 for a while, and the ANZAC day weekend seemed a good time to play out a battle that the 2nd NZEF had a role in. I went with 2nd Alamein: the scenario is Operation Lightfoot from the Through Jungle to Desert expansion, using the Overlord (double-sized board) rules. 

A Wikipedia map of the situation:

By Noclador - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2547277

And a view of the Memoir 44 map, looking south from behind El Alamein itself.

Commanding the Commonwealth forces my aim was to clear a route through the minefields, attack Miteiriya Ridge (in the centre of the battlefield), drive through, and claim victory. We needed 14 banners to win, these coming from unit kills and by achieving terrain objectives.

For SP, it was hold us off, deny us objectives, and score banners from delaying the allied advance.

As with most Memoir games, too much happens to relate it in detail. In broad terms we pushed in the centre and on the right. There were messy scenes as engineers clearing minefields were attacked by entrenched infantry and marauding armour. 

Drive on Miteiriya Ridge

But the advance through the centre and right seemed to reach a critical mass.

Strength in numbers on our right.

Yet each turn SP would find some way to give us a bloody nose. Our infantry was chewed up on the advance; Armour Assault cards were used to great effect on the counter-attack; Ambush cards were used to pre-empt our close assaults.

Looking north from Ruweisat Ridge.

Ground being taken in the centre.

Suddenly, the battle was on the line. Over two turns SP makes a clear scoring break to come within two banners of victory. This is achieved by repeated armoured assaults picking off exposed units and judicious counter-attacking play.

With five banners needed for victory and just one chance to do it, the Allied army plays the 'Their Finest Hour' card, allowing us to activate units all along the line.

We come agonisingly close - two units killed; two terrain objectives achieved; but the crucial final kill eludes us.

SP storms to victory!

The front denuded!

It was an excellent game. SP did Rommel proud with a masterful display of disciplined defence and devastatingly-timed counter-attacks.

While not a great game to blog about for various reasons (it looks too toy-ish; units are representative rather than exact; it's too busy to photograph well), Memoir '44 is a great game to play. It was an excellent evening of good company, the kinds of jokes that you can only enjoy with an old friend, and a gripping ANZAC battle. 

We really do need to play this more often.

Thanks to SP for a great evening of gaming. 

Edit: while my material here is light, I would encourage any readers to look at this wonderful post from Craig at Craig's Wargaming about a family connection to ANZAC day. In the Antipodes we all have our family stories to bring out in their own time, and Craig has done so here. Well worth reading.