So we are, as the magician with the fancy robe said, in the endgame. The Italians have three turns remaining in order to take the three hexes that make up the town of Bir Hackeim from the Free French forces that are currently streaming into it. Turn 8 ended with the Italian vehicles far away from the town and with vehicles that were most assuredly not built by Fiat. Can the Italians reach the town in time to push out the French? Lets find out.
Turn 9
The first counter out of the cup is the Chaos counter and with a roll of 11 we fill the sky with even more planes as a flight of Italian Folgore fighters join the fray. It is followed by a Dust counter and we are once again suffering from the obstructive effects of the wind and sand. The US P-40F is drawn next. The fighter has many options but all of them are covered by the 3RO AA gun. The Italians would probably like to ignore this fighter and concentrate their AA on the French aircraft but the P-40F has a 3-3 attack rating and if we can stop it from blowing up some tanks that would be a good thing. The fighter declares the tanks in L6 as a target and the 3RO fires. It gets a single hit which the aircraft does not save and it aborts. The counter is removed since it was only going to be available for this turn.
Perhaps because it was after the P-40F, the Folgore is drawn next. It sees the French infantry in the open and decides to strafe them. The French have no AA so the attack goes in but it is slightly off target. It still gets a hit and since they are in the open desert the infantry gets no save. The hit is allocated to the PIAT team who are now disrupted. The Folgore counter is removed.
Next out of the cup is an End Turn counter followed by the Italian Light Armour.
Neither of the disrupted L3s in J11 manage to rally. None of the remaining L3s have a target in range and none of them can hit if they do a Move and Fire action. The tankettes need to get closer but they also don’t want to get too close the French infantry and the PIAT. Instead they all advance their full movement but make sure that they keep one hex between themselves and the French infantry. This way there is an open hex that the infantry have to move through providing a possible opportunity for Op Fire.
The French D520 is activated next and the Italians are out of AA options. The fighter decides to attack the M13/40s in L6. Sadly, for the French at least, the attack is inaccurate.
The Free French are activated next. Most of the French units unload from their transports. The mortar team in P7 moves into the town in R6 and the ATG unloads in R7. The critical issue is the French infantry in N8. The Italians have kicked up some dust to provide a modicum of defensive modifiers to movement into O7 but any movement after that will be unimpeded and in the open desert.
Now if the GO French infantry was feeling saucy it could try to move into M7 and then Assault. LOS from L6 to M7 passes through two Dust hexsides and is blocked. It would still get possible Op Fire from L5. The Oracle of the Solo Assistant deck is consulted and it calls for an Assault. I am glad I have that available for situation like this. They decision is to try to hold off the tanks with an assault and the French infantry picks the Light Armour HQ in L8 as the target. If the French infantry moves into M7 it will only be able to be fired at from the two M13/40s in hex L5 and at regular range. If it moves into M8 prior to its assault it can get fire from any of the Italian tanks but again only at regular range. Both are about the same but M8 seems a safer choice in case anything goes awry.
One of the M13/40s in L5 announces an Op Fire attack. I want to keep the units in L6 from firing are they are closer to the PIAT team and it will give me two potential Op Fire shots at that unit if it moves. The Dust reduces the 2-6 attack to a 1-6 attack and the roll is a 2 and so the infantry unit dives into an assault. The French infantry roll a single hit and the L3 rolls a hit as well. Both sides are disrupted and the French infantry retreats back into M8. A bit anti-climactic for all the text the attack got :-)
The PIAT team would like to get somewhere safer than the windy open desert. To make itself safer it moves from N8 to O8 to restrict Op Fire from the tanks in L5. One of the tanks in L6 declares an Op Fire shot which is, due to the Dust a 1-6 attack which does not connect with the infantry. It then moves into P8 and another Op fire shot is declared from L5. This one also misses and the PIAT team ends their movement in Q7.
The Italian 7th Armoured is drawn from the cup next. The formation has a single disrupted unit in F3 and it rallies so the entire formation is in good order for the first time in many turns. The units in F3 and G5 advance as far as they can. Which isn’t very far at all. The 3RO in H4 would like to take a shot at the disrupted French infantry but the LOS crosses two dust hexes and so is blocked. It is decided to leave that disrupted unit to the Light Armour to deal with and the 1st will advance to try to engage the Free French at Bir Hacheim.
The M13/40s in L5 advance to O4 from where they can fire on the infantry in the Palm grove. The tanks in L6 also advance and move to O5. This puts them in range of the 75mm ATG but the Italians are secretly hoping that they go first next turn. The HQ stack in I5 moves to L6 and the 3RO AA gun moves into L5 which was recently vacated by the tanks.
The lack of speed and the short weapon ranges are beginning to have a cumulative impact on the Italian’s chances to win the game. The last counter out of the cup in the End Turn counter which ends turn 9.
Turn 10
The end is creeping ever closer and it doesn’t bode well for the Italians. Only four of their units are even within weapon range of any of the town hexes and the vast majority of the units are probably going to not be in range at the end of this turn.
The French fighter is first out of the block. The Italian 3RO can cover every Italian unit on the map from where it is located so that won’t help in picking a target. Given that they are the closest to the town, the D520 chooses to attack the tanks in hex O4. The 3RO opens fire and is unable to connect with the fighter. The attack is on target and manages to get a single hit which disrupts one of the tanks.
The Italian Light Armour is drawn next. One of the two L3s in J11 rallies as does the L3/HQ stack in L8. The L3/HQ are adjacent to the French infantry so they decide to fire and try to reduce it. Even with the help of the HQ and the range modifier they are unable to hit. The tankettes in L7 also try their luck and both of them miss. Maybe the infantry are a mirage? The GO tankette in J11 moves forward to L9. The reduced L3 in M6 moves to N6 and then O6. It is stopped there as the French ponder their Op Fire options. Since the 7th Armour has not yet moved they decide to allow the L3 to continue moving. It moves to P7 and then to Q6 where the French infantry in Q5 decide to fire. It hits and disrupts the L3 but it adds an Ops Complete counter and adds a dust obstruction in the hex to hinder the ATG.
The Palm Grove in Q5 is only obstructing terrain so the Italian tanks will be able to fire through it at the town behind it.
One of the End Turn counters is drawn and the the Chaos counter. A roll of 8 gives the Free French a free leader which is put into hex R7 with the ATG. Dust is pulled out from the cup next which rather invalidates the brave actions of the L3 tankettes. And to make matters worse, the Free French counter is then drawn.
The PIAT team in Q7 rallies. The infantry far, far away in M8 are not adjudged to be Out of Command but that doesn’t help them rally. The ATG fails to rally as well even with the Leader. The French infantry in the Palm Grove in Q5 attempt to take out the L3 currently illegally parked in front of the town. It actually hits but even more incredibly the L3 actually makes its armour save. The PIAT team in Q7 takes aim at the same vehicle but then realises that if the L3 is wrecked that it will be providing ‘dust independent’ obscuring terrain. Not good for the ATG. Instead it decides to move back into S7. It moves to R8 where it is fired at by one of the M13/40s in hex O5. It misses and the team ends their move in the, relative, safety of S7.
The mortar takes aim at the Light Armour HQ in M8 and disrupts the tankette with it. The final infantry unit decides to save its fire for possible Op Fire later in the turn.
The Italian 7th Armour goes next. There is a disrupted M13/40 in Q4 but it fails to rally. The rest of the unit is ready to go but not really in a position to do much. The 3RO takes aim at the French 75mm ATG and misses completely. The M13/40 in Q4 fires at the French infantry in the Palm Grove but is unable to hit. One of the tanks in Q5 fires at the ATG but is also unable to hit. The other tank fires through the Palm Grove to the mortar team in R6 and is equally unfortunate with its die roll.
The rest of the formation advances behind the first line of tanks and at this point the Italians concede the game.
Final thoughts
This was, for me at least, a tough scenario for the Italians. Their vehicles are lightly armed or slow and while their opposition isn’t necessarily much tougher the French don’t really need to wreck any Italian vehicles to win, they just need to slow the Italians down. The French Armoured infantry was deadly against the Italian vehicles and if there had been more of them I might have thrown them into the fight with more gusto. As it was, they were needed to defend to town and so I tried my best to keep most of them intact.
The HE barrages didn’t really inflict a lot of damage but it disrupted huge sections of the Italian Light Armour and with their low morale that kept them stuck for some time. The Free French mortar was also effective but that was probably helped by the lack of terrain based defensive dice on most of the map. The desert is a dangerous place to play in with its lack of cover and the Dust didn’t seem to be that effective but I just might need to get more experience with it.
The French ATGs were left exposed with no infantry support and it was just lucky that the 75mm ATG managed to decamp and head to Bir Hacheim. The mortar was left behind the hill and I think that was the right decision given that it didn’t have a truck and had to hoof it when the Free French decided to disengage. If it had been on the hill it would most likely have been overrun or assaulted.
Fighting in the desert really presented a few problems. There is not a lot of cover and even the ‘cover’ there is doesn’t provide the same type of protection that you see in White Star Rising and Stalin’s Triumph. The lack of terrain also meant that once the Free French decided to decamp there was nothing to slow them down. The Bren Carriers ate up the distance between the hill and the town and left the Italians behind.
I think the plan I had for the Free French worked out well. They don’t need to take out the Italians they just need to slow them down and keep enough of their own troops in one piece to keep the town defended. Where I fell down was in coming up with a good plan for the Italians. Their infantry needed to be more forward to help keep the French infantry at bay and I came up with a decent plan of attack against the guns and mortar but probably a turn too late.
This is an interesting scenario because it presents each side with significantly different problems. The French have to defend and extricate themselves from the hill in one piece while the Italians have to take out as much of the French force as they can and also try to keep in contact with them when they do retreat. I think the artillery and the infantry give the Free French a better set of tools to do their job with but perhaps once I get some more experience with the system I will figure out a better way to approach this scenario with the Italians.
I used the Solo Assistant in this game and my experience with it was mixed. This has nothing to do with the Solo Assistant itself but more to do with the scenario. The French, with whom I was using the Assistant, have two divergent goals. They need to stay and hold off the Italians until the point in which they need to decamp and move to the town. That is not a decision making process you can put into a deck of cards. Where the Solo Assistant worked quite well was using it as a decision tool when I unsure of a possible action or when I had foreknowledge about the plans of a unit. Near the end of the game I moved an Italian L3 into position to obstruct the French ATG. The deck was quite helpful in determining when the French would use Op Fire.
The experience reinforced for me what the Solo Assistant can provide for me when playing. I don’t want a system that plays the entire game for me but just something that I can use when I need a neutral opinion or even just a crazy idea. And in that respect it works very well indeed and the times that I really needed it I was not only happy with the results but also happy that I had it to help make the game more interesting.
I am not sure what scenario or game I will be playing next but I have certainly been enjoying these games and will be playing more of them.
Pile of dice 
Really enjoy reading your battle reports Zac. I think it highly improbable I will ever play this game, but I really enjoy the experience vicariously.
Thanks. It is one of my favourite games at this scale.