Egyptian Airmobile Attack

May 25 2015

Turn 1

This is an easy turn, just get the units on the board.

End of Turn 1

Now that the turn is over, I can already see a problem: the Egyptians should have put down on the road to allow two hex movement forward. This is because the Israelis are almost certain to overrun the northern units, and that will give those three Israeli units an almost clear shot to the edge of the board.

Turn 2

With the Egyptians deployed, the Israelis need to make a decision: slug it out, or charge through? Slugging it out may allow good defensive fighting to preserve the Israeli forces, after which they can bolt for the eastern edge around Turn 7. Getting as close to the exit as early as possible has its own advantages though. One key thing is to stay well out of reach of Egyptian infantry close assault.

They choose to advance, but off road, will set up to engage.

The Egyptians are a little stuck as it takes a full turn to load and unload from helicopters, so it makes no sense to pick up and move. So they unload.

Turn 3

The Israelis in the north will—of course—attempt an overrun, should be 3:1 odds, good chance for total annihilation. Had the Egyptian set up 1 hex back, it would have been out of range for one of the overrunning Israelis, 2 hexes back, out of range for all three.

Israelis direct fire on southern most helicopter at 2:1 rolling a 1 for a kill. That's one 30 AF Egyptian air strike which won't happen.

The remaining Israelis overrun two stacks.

Opportunity fire disperses one of the tanks in the north, which reduces overrun odds to 2:1 (50:30, shift 1R).

Opportunity fire in the south at 1:2 rolled a lucky 2 and dispersed another Israeli tank.

Resolving overruns,

50:30 is 1:1 with 1R is 2:1 roll 5, D.
25:18 is 1:1 with 1R is 2:1 roll 5 again, D.

Not a bad day's work for the Israelis.

The Egyptians passed their morale checks so all are undispersed.

Direct fire Saggers took out a tank, dispersed another, and rolled 6 for a miss on an already dispersed tank, which is a bummer as that was 50% chance of elimination.

The infantry behind the lines continues to move forward. Helicopters move off, but will be out of range of tanks not involved in overrunning, and those which are overunning need to continue lest they get chewed up by Egyptian close assault.

Close assault got another kill for the Egyptians. Turn 4 is going to be bloody for them.

Score: Egyptians 8, Israelis 2.

Turn 4

One of the Israelis failed morale check, that will be bad next turn as it stays dispersed and will surely suffer another Sagger attack.

Remaining tanks will attempt overrun at 3:1 adjusted odds, which is 50% chance of kill. This is where it gets bloody for Egyptians. Except, bad luck for Israelis, rolling 5 and 6 which is dispersal for each. That was not good!

For the Egyptians, direct fire Sagger took out another, and dispersed one. Close assault yields two dispersals and a kill. The Egyptians are tearing this up. However, they only have 2 more Sagger shots.

Score: Egyptians 16, Israelis 5.

Turn 5

Israelis finally managed to get an overrun kill, taking out the north stack. Now to get these tanks off the board, which will be tough.

Egyptians have two more Sagger rounds, one of which scores!

Score: Egyptians 20, Israelis 6.

Turns 6, 7, end game

There isn't much left to do, so just playing it out the best the Israelis can do is get the remaining two tanks off the board, and they have a decent chance of that given Egyptians fail a couple of air strikes. None of the infantry can catch them now.

The best score for the Egyptians would be 28 to 6.

For the Israelis, possibly 14+ to 20.

AAR

So a clear Egyptian win here. There were definitely a couple of really horrible rolls for the Israelis, having 2 3:1 overruns fail in the same turn was pretty much this game. However, I really like this scenario so I'm going to set it up to play again soon. But next time, I'm going to go through the turn track point by point.

Blunders

Setting the helicopters down just a couple of hexes too far forward. This allowed the Israelis to overrun one unloaded stack, and a 2:1 odds direct fire on another helicopter, which reduced the air strike capability by 1.
Deploying Saggers forward is dumb, they require a minimum two hex range to activate, hence can't be used for opportunity fire when approached by a 6 MF unit 4 hexes away. It require 1/4 MF to acquire for opportunity fire, which puts the approaching unit below minimum range. It turned out not to matter this turn, but if I were doing this again, I'd have the Israeli tanks take out only the Sagger units from a distance, then close for overrunning. It would have been a different game had I done that.

What to play next?

Deciding what to play next is always a tough call when faced with a closet full of games, all of which were purchased with intent to play. Here's one I'm dealing with the decision.

Something New: this means both something new to me and a game which has been published recently, within the last two or three years.
Something Classic: I've acquired a number of games properly considered "classic" which haven't yet been played. The current example would be PanzerGruppe Guderian.
Something Again: mastery requires constant practice, which means playing games many, many times to allow nuance to appear.
Something Vietnam: as I'm on a Vietnam binge. I don't have all the Vietnam games ever published, but I can say that I have a lot of them, and probably more than most people.
Something Obscure: as it's fun to poke around in the dustier corners of game design.
Something Different: break away from the same old publishers and try a game from one of the new kids on the block. Or, conversely, dip into legacy with a classic tried and true.
Something Light: once in a while it's nice to actually finish a game all the way through in one sitting, in an hour or two.
Something Heavy: if possible, it's nice to set up something big and complicated which can be left out for days or weeks or even months, for a leisurely stroll through a very large or long game.

There are surely many more ways to choose, but the above method keeps me busy enough, helps me get both breadth and depth into my play, and provides me with a sense of progress.

The odd man out

When there is an odd man out:

Have a solo game ready to play.
Keep score or advise on a game in progress.
Referee a game in progress.