A Bordurian force was very nearly destroyed at Stare Sztretum, but the cavalry (and air force) arrived in the nick of time!
The town of Stare Sztretum lies (right hand side of table) at a key branching point of major roads -one to the North, one to the sea (West), and one to the main port city of Szeszik (south - west).
In a repeat of the pattern so far, Syldavian forces set up defences in the town and neighbouring hamlets, and stopped the main frontal Bordurian thrust in its tracks (well strictly speaking, in its boots - Borduria has less armour than Syldavia).
And again the Bordurians were surprised to see Burgundian Italiian forces fighting with the Syldavians
However, a Bordurian Advanced Recce force of armoured cars and cavalry, with its horse artillery and machine gun Tchanka waggons., managed to work around the right flank
But it was hard going - firstly, the supporting BA-10 armoured cars were destroyed by Syldavian 25mm anti tank guns hidden in the woods, and the cavalry was then attacked by Burgundian tankettes and retired behind the hill while the horse artillery deployed and attempted to destroy the tankettes. (Above picture, bottom left).
A key to the battle - as with the 2 previous ones - was to call up the air support. The dreaded Polikarpov Po 2's of the Bordurian Air Force bombed the woods where the Syldavian forces were entrenched (below) and you can see the Syldavian tankettes are taking damage from the Bordurian horse artillery (which fortunately was very accurate - those tankettes were unstoppable by cavalry or tchanka MMGs, but a 75mm Schneider shell is a different matter),
(As an aside - did you know, in Russia, that when the KV-1s appeared the Germans had no effective anti tank to match it so rushed old French Schneiders up to the front as they could at least disable the Russian tanks at a decent range)
The Bordurian cavalry were then
able to advance behind the town, cutting communications and forcing the
Syldavians to retire again. Aircraft can reach parts of the table other troops can't.....
This was the first "real" Bordurian victory, we used points based on capturing enough on-field objectives and the Bordurians getting round the flank of the Syldavian forces was one way of achieving that.
The cavalry managed it, by the whiskers of Kurvi Tasch! (It was also the first use of a cavalry force in any of our games, apart from pure scouting.)
(In) Conclusion
Three battles into the Invasion, this has proved great fun so far. As with all good Imagi-Nations, the army structures, unifiorms etc are of our own devising. It is also an oppoprtunity to field all sorts of 1930's vehicles - a real rivet fest!
The Mysterious Burgundians are part of a developing Alt-Hustory story (as more players get involved and armies are produced
All of us have gone for large variety of different vehicles in our armies in (signifing the
rapid development of weapons, and the huge experimetation in the 1930's of course, nothing to with our desire to
field loads of interesting machines nonono :D ).
Borduria I imagine (using the Tintin books as reference) as fairly undeveloped and rural.and their military
is not very efficient. But it has a
larger population than the more advanced and mechanised Syldavian
forces.
Borduria starts the 1930's under Italian/German influence (Musstler) but after the failed invasion of Syldavia a Russian leaning Taschist regime putsches them out and takes power. Borduria thus has a collection of (mainly) German and Russian equipment. Borduria also has a much bigger reliance on horses in the military (the role of the horse in the 1930's was hugely disputed) and struggles with getting enough fuel for the limited number of trucks (another reason it wants Szeszik, it gains ots own port).
Syldavia (again from Tinitin) is seen as a typical 1930's Balkan country, with a hereditary king and aristocracy, and has invested heavily in modernising itself under its young King's reign. Syldavia threw in its lot with the victorious allies after WW1, and has a bias towards British and French equipment.
The broader Alt - History picture will unfold over the next, but for now it's worth knowing that Europe post WW1 was a very fractious place, and we imagine some fracture that could have occurred, actually did. Hence Italian troops of the Burgundian Commonwealth appearing in defence of Trans Syldavia.
Next to enter the stage will be the Austro-Bavarian Dual Kingdom...(see below). Austro-Bavaria and Burgundy will be fighting the next battle in the series.
