The fifth in Daniel and my efforts to refight the Peruvian/Ecuadorian conflict of 1941 ended in another close fought, tense draw. In this case, my Peruvians enter onto the western edge of the board along with their gunboat support with the intention of quickly overwhelming the garrison of the first town and then moving on to victory. The Ecuadorians are spread thinly through the area due to set up restrictions that force them to garrison every single town hex.

It took several turns to move into contact. As my mixed force of Marines and Peruvian regulars bore down on the first town a sortie from the second town down the river crossed and came into range of the gunboat. While the gunners didn't kill anyone they successfully forced the reinforcements to ground and ensured that they could not interfere with the combat then going on.

That, it turns out, was a good thing as the Peruvians once again demonstrated that, while they are better troops than the Ecuadorians, they do not qualify as elite. Slowly the Peruvians rooted the Ecuadorians out of the town but in the end were unable to destroy them all as some demoralized troops were able to run away and once the town was secured forced the Peruvians to maintain a garrison to hold it. Luckily my attackers were a little better at killing leaders than steps so they had no way to approach and gain a lodgement back in the town.

As the fighting wore down a quick look (belatedly) at the victory conditions indicated that assaults on the following town were a requirement if the Peruvians were to be able to pull a victory out of their hat. As befits a scenario with a watery theme, my forces seemed to ooze along the river and flow into the town. Unfortunately I was only able to enter one town hex coherently and could not dislodge the defenders. More time would have generated better results but a draw it is: 20-19 in favor of Ecuador. Currently Daniel leads the engagement record 2 wins to 1 with 2 draws.

One unabashed plug for the game itself. There is no other PG product that provides this variety of scenarios in such a small complete package. I strongly encourage fans of the system to get this set. The scenarios vary greatly from one to another. They are very carefully balanced and provide the Ecuadorian player with ways to win when standing up to the Peruvian can seem impossible. One caveat: Daniel has played the Ecuadorians throughout so I cannot speak to the experience from that side. Given the defensive nature of their fight it might seem somewhat less exciting.

As to the personal victory condition, we have now played 5 of the 6 scenarios in this packet and I, as the Peruvians have yet to lose a single unit. While I have had step losses (4 in this scenario) none have resulted in the complete elimination of a unit. It is even more surprising since I have not played to avoid such losses, they just haven't happened. Given the forces to be arrayed in the final scenario I have my doubts about maintaining this record.