PoCr022 
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| Overall Rating, 3 votes |
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2.67
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| Scenario Rank: --- of 957 |
| Parent Game | Parachutes Over Crete |
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| Historicity | Historical |
| Date | 1941-05-24 |
| Start Time | 09:00 |
| Turn Count | 22 |
| Visibility | Day |
| Counters | 50 |
| Net Morale | 1 |
| Net Initiative | 1 |
| Maps | 3: 96, 97, 98 |
| Layout Dimensions | 84 x 43 cm 33 x 17 in |
| Play Bounty | 158 |
| AAR Bounty | 166 |
| Total Plays | 2 |
| Total AARs | 1 |
| Battle Types |
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| Exit the Battle Area |
| Conditions |
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| Off-board Artillery |
| Randomly-drawn Aircraft |
| Terrain Mods |
| Scenario Requirements & Playability | |
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| Parachutes Over Crete | Base Game |
| Introduction |
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The 8th Greek Infantry Regiment had held the south-western shoulder of the Allied positions around Prison Valley since the initial German landings. With German mountain troops advancing through the hills from Maleme, the Greeks now stood between them and the trapped 3rd Parachute Regiment. A link-up of the German forces would threaten to unhinge the entire Allied position |
| Conclusion |
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Thanks to the determined Greek stand against the mountain regiment, the Allied command managed to extricate the 5th New Zealand Brigade from potential encirclement. Once again, a Greek sacrifice became necessary to balance the mis-steps of the New Zealand Division's timid leadership. |
| Additional Notes |
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Gebirgsjäger leaders in Parachutes Over Crete use conventional named ranks. The library was setup using German rank references. The production print of map 98 is missing 3 town hexes, Avalanche press has created a Map 98 overlay to correct this oversight. Philippe Leonard has also created a very nice overlay for map 98 on Board Game Geek. |
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| Heer |
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| Army |
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| Cretan Irregulars |
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| The Unimaginable Happens! | ||||||||||||||
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Yes, just when victory seems to be "in the bag" the vaunted German mountain troops fail miserably on rocky Crete! This seemed like a safe one to play with the dreaded T-Rex. He had no armor, it was a simple matter of exiting units and shooting the heck out of the weaker defenders, there was no Greek air cover, we both drew crummy leaders, and we played this scenario out over 7 high-casualty sessions. This was my first attempt at a Parachutes Over Crete battle. It started out great, but then devolved into an ugly, slogging draw with a relentless and cunning opponent. This awful play-through, the Axis seemed destined and all but guaranteed to win. Adjacent-hex firefights consistently went to the stubborn Greek defenders, as did a bunch of close assaults. Who would has guessed at this outcome? BUT NO. Even when the scenario is completely unbalanced against the Greeks, the best that the Mountaineers from Germany could achieve was a very costly draw. After the 4th turn, nearly everyhting went wrong for the Alpine troops. Leader decap, many terrible morale recovery rolls, many combat 7-die rolls -- almost all on the German side -- too numerous to count casualties at critical moments, and 12 FOW-shortened turns. My OPLAN contained several fatal flaws that showed up in ways that were unimaginable-- you name it, the Greek fates were very cruel to the Axis. I was very lucky to get this draw and I think that a replay would have the Germans winning in a walk. This battle was too one- sided to judge its merits as a shared play scenario as I can't imagine an outright Greek victory in such an unbalanced game. This one gets a 3 from me and the suggestion that it is so unbalanced that solitaire play is best. A rewrite would certainly help with play balance in a shared situation -- but better luck than I had, is a MUST. |
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| 1 Comment |
Concur with my gracious and honorable opponent's opinion of this nightmarish scenario, as published, with the caveat that pure luck, the intercession of the PG fates, and not any skill of mine led to this hard-won, high-casualty DRAW.
The Greeks should have been crushed outright as there is no real chance of them doing better than an unimaginable draw.