Author	treadasaurusrex (Germany)
Method	VASSAL
Victor	Germany
Participants	bugmaster@aol.com
Play Date	2022-06-18
Language	English
Scenario	AfKo019

This was a 3-session introductory play-through with the insightful, and clever, bugmaster, as the British Commander seeking to push through a blocking scratch force of the German 5th Light Division, with the intention of clearing the road to Tobruk in early-April 1941. We used the optional smoke, excess initiative and extended assault rules. We chose not to not use the Fog of War rule. The Brits objective was to exit 8 steps off the far eastern edge of the map in a set of 7 exit hexes, centered on Hex 2034.

Action was focused on the British movement-to-contact in the 3-level wadi that extends the length of the map’s north margin. A series of combined-arms blocking positions were established and abandoned in this play-through by the Germans as they slowly gave ground along the southern margins of the wadi. Accurate AT fire by the Tommies resulted in the destruction of 2 steps of Pz-II tanks and another from the Jerries’ armored car unit in the 2nd session (game turns 5-8), as well as the capture of a pair of stray British trucks units, and the destruction of 1 step of the A13 cruiser tank platoon, as well as a single platoon of Bren Carriers.

The exciting 3rd session (game turns 9-14) featured the final end of the British A13 cruiser tank and multiple, close range opportunity fires, resulting in many morale rolls. The Allied Commander experienced amazingly good luck in his morale recovery and combat rolls. Excessively aggressive German extended assaults resulted in the elimination of both halftrack platoons by accurate AT fire, as well as an additional step of Pz-III tanks, and the remaining half-strength armored car, which was close-assaulted by a company of well-led, Bren carriers. Despite the high level of British success in this session, the German side ended up winning a disappointing – and mostly undeserved – pyrrhic victory, thanks to both the flawed victory conditions, and a number of overly-aggressive Axis combined arms counter attacks at several points throughout the game.

We determine that the British side would not be able to exit sufficient steps off the east edge at start of the 14th turn and called the game at that point, rather than playing on to the full 16 turns. I give this fun-to-play scenario a 2. My suggestions for improving this relatively balanced scenario include changing the victory conditions as follows: 1) Still require that the British side exit 8 steps of combat units to win, but also 2) Require that the German side not lose more than 10 steps