Battlezones for TacWWII

So here's another post on converting scenarios to play with the TacWWII rules. This time I'm adapting one from Battlezones - Scenarios for Ultra-Modern Period by the late Bruce Rea-Taylor. I lent my copy to someone years ago but fortunately I was able to find a pdf copy on line.

This scenario book was designed for the Challenger II rules, which operate at one-model-equals-one-vehicle level, so the forces will be a little small for TacWWII. We may need to scale them up in some cases.

I'm going to have a go at converting the first scenario in the book, Tel Al Fal - The Road To Jerusalem, 6th June 1967. This Six Day War action has Israeli forces encountering a Jordanian tank battalion on the Ramallah-Jerusalem road.

First up we need to consider the map. The Challenger ground scale is half that of TacWWII (1cm = 20m rather than 1cm = 40m) so we need to halve dimensions; Bruce's 8'x6' table becomes a 4'x3' for TacWWII.

Each contour is supposed to be half a vehicle high but we have no single contour hills here so normal hills or ridge lines will work. I've suggested with brown lines where I think ridge-lines could go if you don't have suitably shaped hills.

The woods are keyed as "Open orchard/olive grove" and a look at Google Maps shows that although the area is now far more built-up, the olive trees are quite widely spaced. They'll be Open Woods in Tac. The fields are lined with low stone walls.

The Israeli forces consist of a tank battalion with some attached paratroops. The full order of battle is given but we need to remember that one model here represents one real-world tank. So long as the number of vehicles per platoon isn't too divergent between the opposing sides we should be OK to just say, "One platoon equals one TacWWII element".

In this case, the Battalion HQ could be an M3 or a Sherman. I'd be inclined to go with the latter given its superior survivability in battle.

The organisation of the para company is given separately:

We can ignore the company HQ; it's deemed to be included in our overall company strength. I would include a Jeep platoon with RCLs even though it represents only two real-world vehicles. It adds interest to the game and won't make a huge difference to scenario balance. The rest of the formation can be converted over on a one-platoon-equals-one-element basis. This gives us overall:

82nd Tank Battalion

• Bn HQ                  1x Sherman Mk50
• A Coy                   3x Sherman Mk50
• B Coy                   3x Sherman Mk50
• C Coy                   3x Sherman M1 
• Para Coy               3x SMG platoon, 1x 81mm mortar, 4x M3, 1x Jeep+RCL  

Rules for SMG-armed infantry are given in version 1.6 of TacWWII. Basically, treat them as High Firepower infantry at 5cm range and Low Firepower infantry at longer ranges. Each SMG platoon will be treated as having bazooka.

The Jordanian force is similar in size:

This is an interesting case in that the battalion HQ is technically too small even to register as an element in TacWWII terms. If I was building this unit for Cold War Commander I'd have an HQ base with a Saracen and a quad AAMG model. 

If we are to represent the battalion HQ on the table we could just give them a Saracen model. This would be vulnerable and would add nothing to the formation's firepower. However, TacWWII doesn't actually require the presence of a battalion HQ element - there are no command radii or suchlike to measure from a headquarters model. As such I'm inclined to just ignore the single Saracen. 

The Jordanian infantry company looks like this:

Again we can fold this HQ into the overall strength of its company. Light mortars and LMGS are assumed to be reflected in the firepower rating of the rifle platoons. The two sustained-fire machineguns are a challenge. You know what? I'm going to fold them into the rifle platoons too, rating them as high firepower. That just leaves to two Landrovers and the two AA machine-guns. With no aircraft in the scenario I'll ignore the guns and represent the Landies as a single model just like we did with the Israeli Jeeps.

So the Jordanian force is:

2nd Battalion, 60th Armoured Brigade

• A Coy                   4x M47
• B Coy                   4x M47
• Inf Coy                 3x Rifle platoon, 3x Saracen, 1x 3" mortar, 1x Truck, 1x LR+RCL

Overall, then, we have a nice little scenario that will play comfortably on a smallish table and should provide for a leisurely evening's solo or face-to-face gaming.