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[Fishbreath]

About fifteen minutes later, the situation remains precarious: D/37 Company is attempting to surrender, but apparently incapable of actually doing so. The company of Panthers southeast of Breitfeld is joined by another, lurking in the forest along the track east of Breitfeld, and a company of Tigers.



This seems like a good place for some pontificating on how exactly to kill German heavy tanks with American weapons. This would be much easier if I were playing the British in this scenario. The storied Ordnance QF 17-pounder, armament of the Sherman Firefly, the M10 Achilles (another conversion of an American vehicle to add a better gun), and the curious home-grown Archer. All three were produced in decent numbers, and owing to their armament, all three served with distinction during the European campaigns.

Unfortunately, the American situation was a little more muddled. The standard Sherman mounted a medium-velocity 75mm gun, which was sufficient against early-war tanks in North Africa, and relatively evenly-matched with the Pzkw IV. Against late-war forces like I'm facing now, it's insufficient. A tank company (or at least a tank company at the strengths at which they've been provided to me) consists of five M4s with the 75mm gun, two M4s with the same gun and much heavier armor, and three M4s with the M1 76mm gun. This last was actually a reasonably capable gun—firing high-velocity AP ammunition at one kilometer, it had performance similar to the QF 17-pounder (firing armor-piercing capped ballistic capped ammunition; that is, an AP round with an armor-piercing cap, topped by a ballistic cap) at 915 meters. Unfortunately, with the more common (to my understanding) APCBC round, the M1 gun could only penetrate about 90mm to the Firefly's 130mm, and those 40mm made all the difference.

Now, the Americans do have another option: the 90mm gun mounted on M36 tank destroyer, which was roughly comparable to the fabled German 88. I do actually have three companies (possibly the whole?) 704th Tank Destroyer Battalion, all equipped with the M36 and the 90mm. Unfortunately, they're all attached to CCR, and I don't feel comfortable detaching them at this juncture.

Although I'm at least somewhat confident in the ability of the 35th Tank Battalion and the 51st Armored Infantry Battalion to handle a single company of Panthers between them (that's a decent number of Shermans with the 76mm gun), I'm not so comfortable with the ability of the 10th Armored Infantry Battalion, currently assigned to hold Breitfeld, to handle a company of Tigers and a company of Panthers. That leaves pretty much one solution, and I'm sure you'll agree it's a very American one: artillery. At my divisional artillery park south of the Steinebrück crossing, I have more than 80 guns, some the M1 155mm Long Tom, and some others 105mm self-propelled howitzers. They're currently engaged in a fire mission against about 20 tanks, and I think that's a pretty good ratio. Even if it doesn't actually kill the German tanks, it will go a long way toward keeping them buttoned up and disrupting their communications.



The bombardment knocks one tank company off its position, and the Panther company on the southeast road advances. That infantry company in the woods, which moved on the units recovering from routing south of Breitfeld, came under fire from the units which were not routing.



The Panther company is identified as part of the 1st SS Panzer Regiment, Joachim Peiper's command.



Six minutes later, the Panther company is routing with 50% casualties. I guess the Shermans were sufficient. Northwest of Breitfeld, B/8 Company runs into a Pioneer company, which has a lot of bulk for an infantry company. Fortunately, it's limited in AT capabilities.



I'm not letting up with the artillery bombardment on German positions east of Breitfeld.



Dusk arrives. The artillery continues to fire. B/8 Company got itself involved in a brief but intense firefight with the 3/1 Pioneers. The latter took about 40 casualties, but B/8 retreated as well. That put them under fire from the Tigers and Panthers to the east, and the loss of half their force turned the retreat into a rout.



To the west, CCR continues working its way north. The flak company to the northeast of the leading elements of the 37th Tank Battalion can't stand up to the combined weight of tank destroyers and tanks currently in contact with them.

CCR is taking the covered path to Galhausen, from where it can organize an assault on St. Vith tomorrow, along with elements from CCA and CCB; CCB now has orders to defend Breitfeld overnight. Once CCR has moved up to its new position, I'll organize the attack.



As night falls, here's the situation. The 35th Tanks and the 51st Armored Infantry are moving up toward Breitfeld, while CCR continues working its way up to Galhausen.



It does appear that I'm experiencing the halting bug. According to the official forums, it occurs whenever a unit comes under fire and wants to engage in response: the calculation for whether or not to make an attack is hitting a debug code path, wherein it's always assumed that the attack is across a river. This obviously makes the attack much less likely, and leads to tons of spurious halts, which really slows combat down. I'm not sure this is sufficient to explain away all of my failure to make progress, but I'll at least claim it's the cause of some of it.



That brings me to 8:00pm. CCR, no longer under fire or in sight of the enemy, has begun to move forward at something like a regular pace, and the reinforced CCB has the 51st and 35th up into Breitfeld.

[Sheb]

I really expect a bloodbath in St Vith.

[Fishbreath]

That's likely what's going to happen, if I can get there in time. I only have a day and a bit left in this scenario, I think.

[Fishbreath]

Hold onto your peaked caps, fellow armchair generals, it's a wild ride from D3 2000 to D4 1500, and it ends in a way I certainly wouldn't have predicted at the start.

The story begins fifty minutes after the last update ends. With darkness and snow veiling the Germans from the 4th Armored and, more importantly, the 4th Armored from the Germans, I decide that the time for bold action is now. CCR has orders to defend north of Galhausen, while CCB (comprising the 8th Tank Battalion, the 51st Armored Infantry Battalion, and the 35th Tank Battalion) receives orders to gather its strength around Breitfeld. The 10th Armored Infantry Battalion, an organic (that is, permanently attached) subordinate of CCB, has independent orders to defend Breitfeld.



That leaves the tracks southeast of Breitfeld dangerously underdefended, so I raid the stalwart 1st Battalion, 318th Infantry Regiment. A Company and the battalion AT platoon are detached from the defense of Steinebrück and sent north, to the edge of the forest just south of the south Breitfeld tracks. Between them they have about 130 men and a pair of 57mm Guns, M1, which aren't particularly scary AT armaments, but should serve to at least give Panthers and PzKpfw IVs pause.



The Steinebruck defenders are mostly under divisional command, which is inefficient and gives the on-the-scene headquarters very little control over the defensive arrangement. I place the 1/318 Bn HQ in charge. It commands the two of its rifle companies without other orders, its mortar platoon, and B Battery of the 489th AAA Battalion. My concern about holding Steinebrück is lessening; reconnaissance hasn't revealed any German probes in that direction lately. That said, I'd be reticent to reduce the defenders there to anything much less than a battalion; letting any German force of significant strength into the rear would be catastrophic at this point, and would torpedo any shot I have at St. Vith.



Day 4 arrives with little fanfare. The 94th Armored Field Artillery Battalion spots some German forces along the southwest St. Vith road, which seems a bit odd to me. I wouldn't have expected them to stick around there, except maybe to prevent an assault along the southwestern axis. Some units trickle through the woods southwest of Breitfeld, and the sounds of minor skirmishes echo through the night.



Remember how I said something about bold action before? This is where that happens. CCR and CCB will attack St. Vith from the south and southeast, in a left and right echelon to make the shape of the overall assault wedge-like. The divisional artillery park has been moved up to the road north of Steinebrück, where they will be on call to provide barrages throughout the day. Orders go out at 2:41am, Day 4.





Counting the artillery battalions (they're currently attached to CCB, which is inflating its count; I detach them later for the purposes of targeting their fire more precisely and another reason which will become clear when it happens), 3,740 personnel are taking part in this attack, including 485 armored fighting vehicles (although that includes some half-tracks and other non-tank vehicles).

   

As more tanks reveal themselves in the Breitfeld woods, I decide that A/318 and the AT gun platoon may not be sufficient. A/35 Tank Bn and B/35 Tank Bn should be sufficient reinforcement, so I grab them and shuttle them down to the road south of A/318.



By 3:41am, orders have filtered down to brigade commanders, who have made their own plans and are passing them along to their subordinate commands.



About half an hour later, CCR and CCB are both on the move. CCB has taken some admirable initiative and sent forces through the woods to the north, rather than along the southeast St. Vith road as I instructed originally. CCR is going to attack along the highway after all, and has already encountered some German resistance just north of the forest to the east of Neundorf.



Both CCR and the elements of CCB's 8th Tank Battalion have uncovered more enemy forces.



Given the way the roads looked yesterday, it's a great surprise to me that there are no German forces east of St. Vith. The leading elements of CCR's attack meet additional unit, including one I'll talk about more in a few pictures.



Some Germans sneak into Breitfeld from the south, bringing CCB headquarters under fire and removing the objective from my control. The town itself, while a much better defensive position, is largely outside the objective circle. The remaining elements of the 35th Tank Battalion and the whole 10th Armored Infantry Battalion get orders to re-secure the objective. To the southeast, the blocking force along the road south to Steinebrück engages a company of PzKpfw IVs and Panthers.



At 5:30am, I happen to notice that CCR has engaged not just any unit, but Peiper's headquarters—that is to say, the highest-ranking unit on the map for Germany. It's an incredible piece of good luck.



The situation around Breitfeld has deteriorated somewhat, in that the German forces around are somewhat greater than they were before. Three companies (one a Panther company) sit between CCB HQ and Breitfeld, which is bad both because it involves a major headquarters being under fire, and because the Germans are neatly interrupting supply columns to Breitfeld.



Peiper's HQ routs with 25% losses. This is a massive win: until it's finished recovering from its rout, every subordinate unit will be stuck doing what it was doing when Peiper and company scarpered.



East of the river, the Germans managed to be pretty sneaky through the darkest parts of the night. Counting Breitfeld at the front line, they snuck a battalion and a half or so through various holes between it and the Steinebrück strongpoint.



At 6:30am, CCR has begun to push out from the forests into the fields south of St. Vith.



I've been ordering artillery bombardments on the German positions as CCR and CCB uncover them, but I haven't been taking pictures of those. It seems unnecessary.

As dawn breaks, I lose the Lommersweiler objective. CCA HQ hasn't spotted any German units, but I really need all the objectives I currently have for the final reckoning to go my way (note that the win-loss indicator in the interface has tilted away from me). B/318 Company and B Battery/489 AAA Bn form up to retake the town.



Ijust thought this picture was beautiful: so many of the German units between CCR and St. Vith are either retreating or routing.



At least one company is advancing on Lommersweiler. CCA HQ is more than capable of holding its position against company-level opposition, and the two companies on the way over should be able to push back.



Breitfeld continues to be a key point. The force at the T in the road remains unbroken, but A and B Companies, 35th Tank Battalion, have orders to clean up the routing Panther company.



A very curious situation occurs in Neundorf. The 37th Tank Battalion HQ has chosen that as its location, a decision made before the concentration of SS forces northeast of it were known. Somehow, despite the presence of a company of assault guns, some engineer companies, and an armored infantry company it has forced to retreat.

I can only speculate as to why the headquarters hasn't been wiped out. It's possible that German battalion has orders not to move, and that Peiper's HQ has not been able to reorganize and issue new orders. It doesn't seem likely that the German supply center is on the far side of Breitfeld and is being interrupted by combat east of St. Vith, but I'll allow that as a possibility. I'm just glad that a strong armored battalion, crucial to my attack, has not been thrown into disorganization.



Day-for-real breaks at 8:00am. 9:00am sees CCB fighting off the assault on the Breitfeld crossroads, and bringing the units attacking from the north back to the southeast St. Vith road. I can't fathom why they abandoned their commanding position to the east of St. Vith, but my subordinates have made their choice, and to modify their orders would be a big delay against only moderate gain. CCR crosses the rail line south of St. Vith, which I'll call a milestone.



In fact, the German forces around Breitfeld are badly depleted. The pictured Panther company has lost twelve of its thirteen tanks, largely to handheld AT arms and 57mm Guns M1, and the company to the southeast has been reduced to two working tanks.



At 10:00am, the Germans have been pushed back to the outskirts of St. Vith. Breitfeld has been recaptured and re-secured, and enough of the 1st Battalion, 318th Infantry Regiment has moved over to Lommersweiler to retake the objective. I am inordinately pleased to report that this, along with the heavy losses inflicted on the Germans in the march to St. Vith, has moved the win/loss indicator in my direction.



An hour passes, seeing more of CCR reach the southern St. Vith rail line. It's not obvious in this picture, but 8th Tank Battalion, CCB has begun to move northwest toward St. Vith.



The Germans have two companies at Lommersweiler, more than B/318 and B/489 can reasonably handle. I detached most of the rest of the 35th Tank Battalion and sent it south to help out (I believe the sum comes to an armored infantry battalion and a cavalry reconnaissance troop).

By 1:30pm, the Germans have fallen back into St. Vith proper. CCB (which, at present, is the 8th Tank Battalion and CCA's 51st Armored Infantry Battalion) has charged up the southeast road, and should help CCR make progress into the town.



Half an hour passes, and CCR and CCB have met up.



2:20pm sees CCR surging past the rail line. An obvious strong point lands an artillery bombardment. The 37th Tank Battalion HQ is still improbably unscathed.



News from Lommersweiler, twenty minutes later: hopefully, this attack will finish off the remaining German company here. I'll probably leave one company in Lommersweiler, send the 1/318 line units back over to Steinebrück, and reattach one of the armored units to the 35th.



Yet another airstrike has been cancelled because of bad weather, which is making my job much harder than it has to be.

Which brings me to 3:00pm, fifteen hours from the end of the scenario. CCR advances toward St.Vith on a broad front, with CCB on the right flank. In the last hour or two, the artillery batteries have mostly reached their fatigue limits, though the 94th Field Artillery Battalion (attached to CCR) is still firing.



I honestly never expected to be this close to St. Vith at all, much less with enough time left to potentially take it. I attribute my unexpected success to two main causes:

1) Starting the attack early. Using the cover of darkness to mask my movement, a trick that's been around since the beginning of recorded military history, only occurred to me four days into a battle where poor visibility has been a problem for at least 48 hours, which doesn't say a lot about my talent as a general. By doing so, I got a large force into position to attack without encountering anything that would prevent it from moving freely.

2) Happening upon Peiper's HQ. I can't take credit for this, and unless one of my subordinates is luck incarnate I don't think any of them can, either. Paralyzing the German command structure just as the full weight of my attack was beginning to land almost certainly aided CCR in pushing the German defenders of St. Vith back to the city center. This is good luck, and probably the first honest good luck that I've had in this engagement.

I feel a bit strange doing postgaming now, though, since I'm so close to the end. Tune in next week or so for the exciting conclusion to Return to St. Vith!

[Fishbreath]

Fifteen minutes after we last heard from the 4th Armored, not much has changed. The 66th Armored Field Artillery Battalion has orders to lay down fire on the concentration of units around the city center, but has run out of ammunition.

The TO&E for the 66th is kind of interesting. The obvious bulk of the unit comes from the 105mm Howitzer Motor Carriages M7 (which you probably know as the Priest via World of Tanks), but it's got an impressive amount of organic transport capacity, and although 200 carbines, M1 isn't a great deal of infantry firepower, it's probably more than sufficient to hold off small-scale attacks.

Anyway, according to Wikipedia, all the US armored divisions involved in the Battle of the Bulge had three motorize artillery battalions, which gave them "unparalleled" mobile fire support. I buy that.



Obviously, another fifteen minutes isn't enough to make much progress, but it does give me a useful window in which to comment on the boundaries of the St. Vith objective: the villages to the southwest and south serve as convenient visual references, as do the vees in the road to the west, the highway to the north, and the rail line to the north-northeast. I'll call the edge of the industrial district west of city center the eastern border. Or rather, I'll suggest you do that; I can just pop on the indicator whenever I feel the need to check, but I don't usually take many screenshots of them.



D Company of the 37th Tank Battalion, the one that was nearly obliterated on the highway south of St. Vith yesterday, has recovered from its rout and attempts to surrender, and, by spearheading the attack on the western flank with a mere two M5 Stuarts, is demonstrating a great deal of pluck.



At 4:00pm on D4, A Company of the 704th Tank Destroyer Battalion has reached the city center, and elements of the 25th Tank Battalion, the 53rd Armored Infantry Battalion, and the 8th Tank Battalion are nearing the objective line.



Lommersweiler sees ongoing light fighting, with the elements of the 318th Infantry Regiment and the 35th Tank Battalion still trying to knock out the 2nd Company of the German 27th Fusiliers.



40 minutes later, a significant portion of CCB and CCR have made it into St. Vith proper. 7th Company of the 27th Fusiliers lurks in the forest east of Breitfeld, but it hasn't made many aggressive moves while I've been able to see it.



A twilight chill settles over the hills and forests of the Ardennes. Some of the CCR's units, including C/704 TD Bn, make their way to the southeast of St. Vith to help plug that flank. The fighting in the city center remains heavy, with US forces engaging at least two German headquarters units.



In Lommersweiler, the combined detachments from the 1/318 Battalion and the 35th Tank Battalion push 2/27 Fusiliers back to the west.



Nightfall comes at 6:00pm, twelve hours to scenario end (at which point I am judged by my superiors, no matter how close I might be to absolute victory). The American forces in St. Vith, led by A/704, begin to drive a wedge into the German contingent defending the northern edge of the town, while a smaller force pushes around to the northwest.



The concentration of German forces in the northern part of St. Vith looks denser and denser. I order the 35th, including its units detached to the south, to reorganize and move up to St. Vith.

This is as good a place as any to make the point that the appearance of passivity I've given thus far in this installment isn't that exactly: rather, I gave my orders early this morning, and modifying orders to CCR or CCB would take longer than I have to spare.



A few minutes later, C Company, 37th Tanks, to the northwest of 25th Cavalry Recon Squadron HQ, has finally recovered from its rout. In doing so, it has soundly beaten up on the infantry gun company that was right next to it.



Snow continues, of course. It's still below freezing temperature, although I wouldn't necessarily call that freezing in a figurative sense. Nor is it a major issue; its biggest effect is on fatigue recovery, and between now and the end of the scenario, the troops won't have time for that anyway.

The 37th Tank Battalion makes a flanking maneuver, while the heavy fighting in the center of the town continues. Having an overwhelming superiority in units is handy; it means that the German forces are more consistently under fire, which saps their fighting efficiency.



The 35th Tank Battalion, while making its way up the road, encounters a German company in the woods, which it promptly forces to retreat. This may be the 2/27 Company that had previously retreated from Lommersweiler, or it may be another. Either way, expect some supply disruptions overnight; it's very difficult to find units sneaking around in the dark and snow, so some supply columns might run right into them.



8:30pm arrives, and there isn't much to report. The 37th Tank Battalion pushes ever further north, the company the 35th Tanks bypassed is identified as the 5th Company, 27 Fusiliers, and a greater weight of forces arrives in St. Vith.



Once again, little to say an hour later. The 35th Tank Battalion reaches St. Vith, while the 5th Company, 27th Fusiliers pushes forward to menace the road. Two companies from the 10th Armored Infantry Battalion are tasked to push it back.



Just before 10:00pm, the balance of forces tips to the American side in St. Vith. The objective is, at least for the moment, ours.

In other news, supply columns returning to CCA's base from the front line suffer moderate losses, as I suspected might begin to happen.



The 37th Tank Battalion HQ, from its place in Neundorf, prepares to move up to St. Vith... except they forgot about the two companies of heavy tanks just to their north, and ended up having to fall back. Now that the enemy force is on the map, the 37th should path around them.

St. Vith remains in American hands. The 704th Tank Destroyer Battalion, although its units are split up among CCR's battalions, is proving to be a major factor in this battle.



St. Vith falls out of American hands in the next ten or fifteen minutes. The Germans must have units sneaking in to the north and east. Notice also that elements of the 10th Armored Infantry Battalion have forced the surrender of the 5th Company, 27 Fusiliers, which is one fewer supply disruption to worry about.



The 53rd Armored Infantry Battalion receives orders to attack north of the St. Vith objective. In doing so, they'll push the Germans further away from the objective and bring the force ratio more in my favor.



St. Vith has been recaptured, but it won't stick; a few minutes after I took this screenshot, it's lost again. The 37th Tank Battalion HQ knows enough to dodge the heavy tanks, now that they're marked on the map. It's now Day 5: six hours to go.



An hour later, the big story is transport column losses. Fortunately, this is happening in the last six hours of the scenario. That's a bit gamey; I doubt my superiors would look too kindly on my glossing over of losses to the supply lines just because I'm close to my current objective. Fortunately, they're not real, and they don't mind in this artificial scenario.



Another hour goes by, and the 35th Tank Battalion, which has been involved in nearly every major fight during this four-day battle, receives orders to once again go on the attack, pushing northwest from St. Vith's city center.



It's now 3:00am, another hour after the last picture, and the scenario ends in three hours. The 35th Tank Battalion is engaged with the forces to the north, and the 8th Tank Battalion now begins an attack to the east to widen the American perimeter. Even in this zoomed-in view, three gray crosses marking surrendered or defeated German units can be seen.

The town comprises three terrain types: town (the denser sort at the very center), village, and industrial (south of the two German units on the east road). Fortunately, they're all roughly the same for armored units: they're hard to navigate and present major obstacles to accurate fire.



The push to the north achieves some ground, while the 8th's push to the east meets lesser successes. Successes in the north prove to be sufficient, though, as I retake the objective at 4:59am, with one hour to go.



Another 30 minutes sees steady progress to the north and slight gains (but no losses) to the east. At this point I'm willing to call it.



And indeed, I am correct to do so.



There are a few things of interest to pull from the post-battle screen (and, for that matter, the revealed map in the background, but I'll get to that).

1. I missed a better-than-marginal victory by a few scant points, I think, and if I'd been a bit faster to St. Vith I could have had it.

2. Personnel losses favored me. I suspect this is because much of my early progress featured my tanks against German infantry. AFV casualties were more even, but given the German prowess in that respect and the fact that I was attacking, I'll take it.

3. A lot of German units ended up merging, and even once you discount those, seven of them were eliminated entirely. 233 personnel losses came from surrender, while only 4 came from bombardment and none from air strikes. In fact, German aviation and American friendly fire did better than American aviation, which is eyebrow-raising. Too, German bombardment proved more effective than American (although I submit that the American bombardments were more effective in blunting attacks and driving off defenses).

4. 11 members of D/37 Company managed to surrender before they were relieved.

Hitting that Review Final Situation button gives me a map with everything revealed. Handy.



On this one:

1. In the mess of counters at St. Vith is Peiper's HQ, which answers the question fo where that went.

2. The reason the heavy tank battalion southwest of St. Vith never moved is finally clear: the unit with the half-filled circle symbol is Peiper's Kampfgruppe base. Having a full brigade enemy brigade close to it must have spooked him; without it, his forces would have almost instantly been in bad supply shape. Such is the fog of war: if those three companies had attacked a few hundred meters east, they could have seriously thrown off my attack.

3. Speaking of supplies, the unit I thought was 7th Company, 27th Fusiliers was actually a division-level base, practically unprotected. That would have been nice to knock out, if I had known it was there. Such, as I just said, is the fog of war.

4. The stubbornly persistent 2nd Company, 27th Fusiliers was the cause of my supply disruptions. A/318 and the AT platoon didn't even notice it there through most of the night.

All told, I'm willing to take my marginal victory. Given my early blunders, even making it to St. Vith at all was fortunate. Hitting Peiper's HQ completely by accident and keeping the 501st Heavy Tank Battalion out of the fight by appearing to threaten Peiper's base probably won me the battle, and that's probably the greatest endorsement of this game I can give. This fictional scenario played out like so many real ones: a force moving at nighttime stumbles upon the enemy, engages them, and throws them into disorganization, and one commander, units perfectly placed to halt his enemy's steady advance, refuses to act because his intelligence is poor.

Thanks for reading. I probably had as much fun writing about this encounter as I did playing it. As a coda, I'm hoping for the patch to fix the halting bug to land before about December 20th. If it should, watch this forum around Christmastime for

The Battered Bastards of Bastogne: A Command Ops Christmas Special

[Zrk2]

That was great.

[Fishbreath]

I'm glad you thought so.

For the Christmas AAR, I'm planning something entirely different. Incoming to Casa del Fishbreath* is a book entitled A Time for Trumpets, on the siege of Bastogne, written by a historian who was a company commander during that same battle. My hope is to run it in real-time on the same days as it actually happened, with the historical narrative coming first and a description of my own actions through the day coming as part 2.

* Oh, how I wish it could be warm enough here to justify that title.

[Sheb]

It was pretty great, and I'm really looking forward to that AAR. Can you outsmart McAuliffe? Will you get to be as classy as his famous "Nuts!"?

However, could you please downsize the screeshots a little bit, and spoiler your updates?

[Fishbreath]

I'll spoiler next time, but I'm not sure downsizing is in the cards. Original publication came at Broken Forum, which runs Xenforo, which automatically thumbnails embedded images, which is fantastic for AARs. On the other hand, the format for the next one should be heavier on text and lighter on pictures, so fewer screenshots should mean a greater inclination on my part to crop. We'll see; I intend to get a lot of it done before Christmas actually rolls around, and I'll play with formatting between now and air date.

[Sheb]

You can resize image in the BBcode, using [img width=800 height=300] with the numbers being width and height in pixels. If it has been published on another forum, editing it is as easy as doing Ctrl+f and replace.

[FritzPL]

twas amazing. Looking forward to the Christmas special.

[Fishbreath]

It's not going to be that much longer before I begin composing the Christmas special. Return to St. Vith featured the end of the battle; the Christmas special will feature the middle. If you're hankering for more Command Ops goodness, I recommend this AAR from the official Matrix forums, which covers the opening phase of the battle in the vicinity of Bastogne.