Dash to the wire! (your way of play thru)

[David105]

Hi generals!

That scenario (Dash to the wire) is very interesting and have many way to play it, so I want you to share your way of playing. For decisive and marginal victory.

The way I play is defensive style. Because I try to take the offensive and get lots of casualties. I try to play from lieutenant to fieldmarshal and don't get any appreciable differences. You have to split your forces to destroy supply camps, and it's very hard to put that group healthy and well. It's very important to make that group with right unit choice, so share with me about that to! Do you have to leave some occupied cities, or make a run to Sidi-Barani?

So guy's please share your experience, for me it would be very interesting!

[captainjack]

I usually deploy my armour in a block near Tobruk, to clear out the tank forces, with a pile of artillery (most British tanks have high initiative, so they need to be suppressed before attacking them). A reasonably mobile force with a decent recon unit (or a freshly bought Sahariana) holds the town nearest the lower left corner.

In theory the tank force destroys most of the British forces in the first two turns. You should be able to get some surrender prestige as well. The faster units then head for the deployment zone while the rest clear up stragglers so my three or four strong hangar hunting group can head off to collect trophies. The ones that head for the deployment hexes then head south to link up with the hangar hunters to clear out the city defended by the Indian force so you can get the Crusader. It is pretty rubbish but the prestige for disbanding it is handy and in an emergency it is better than an empty slot.

As for Tobruk, if prestige is reasonably plentiful I upgrade the Italian infantry into berseglieri or alpini, and sometimes convert the 75mm guns to 105s for the range and greater hitting power. You can pull units back from city hexes to get out of range of the Tobruk guns, allow the garrison to take your cities and then recapture them when they pull back. If they don't pull back, at least your 105s and berseglieri can actually damage the garrison units. You may also have the bonus units available to join in.

With your new crusader and the exploratory forces, some then head back to Tobruk to head off the escaping South Africans while the rest track down the supply dumps.

Remember the tanks that stayed behind for the mopping up work outside Tobruk? They head east to see if they can reclaim the town your auxiliaries were defending (they might still be defending it if they were lucky). If you are a bit slow, then they will bump into the South Africans and soften them up before they damage your besieging artillery (the ones exposed behind your lines that are crying out to be attacked by 14-strong infantry units appearing from nowhere).

This approach or something very like it almost always gets a DV plus the full set of captured and bonus units. With a little bit of luck I once captured all of the hexes except the paratrooper-held city at the eastern edge of the escarpment.

[ExiledZebra]

Hmmm my approach is rather sketchy but it does the job.

1st wipe out British forces attacking the objective cities just outside of tobruk and move Italian infantry out of position so as to not get casualties from artillery stationed in tobruk.

Once all 3 cities are secured, I leave my infantry in static defense (taking up positions around and in the objective cities) and make my tanks wage a semi mobile defense (essentially making my tanks wander not too far from the objectives and intercept and armor/ trucks that decide to roll in from the east or south).

I generally ignore the supplies and just concentrate on holding the objectives and waiting on the British to commit to the offense.

This tactic gets me MV every time but it's obviously not the greatest/ most satisfying way to win the scenario that's for sure.

[captainjack]

This tactic gets me MV every time but it's obviously not the greatest/ most satisfying way to win the scenario that's for sure.

Aiming for MV can be a very sensible idea. Most of my worst losses have come from trying too hard to get DV.

Your strategy sounds pretty sensible, but it sounds like you are missing out on the bonus units. Send a force down the lower left hand side - fast recon units or sahariana are usually quite good with a couple of support units (Italian tanks are fine as they have pretty good fuel and do enough damage to be useful). Blow up all the hangars you can find (watch out for any guards) and you should get some bonus units - at least one is an SE unit (possibly 2) which makes them even better.

[David105]

If someone had a replay of decisive victory (Fieldmarshal level). Share it with me please! I'll be very grateful!)) This is indeed interesting map with plenty of way of play thru...

I' am playing for both sides of conflict and you know there are no equal play thru. Every time unique situations and difficulty level is not so important to complete this mission with 100% result...