Slitherine

Things to be aware of:
First scenario with the experimental way of handling Italian AUX units that persist for more than one scenario. We are especially interested in how many Italians you managed to save, and what you do with them in the following scenarios.

6) Syracuse – beta 1

Level: Field Marshal
Prestige - Begin: 2,500. End: 2,725. Net: +250.
Result: DV at 7/16, 14 of 27 units evacuated.
Replacements: None used, but many units very badly damaged and will be expensive at next deployment.

Core changes:

• · Disbanded: Churchills ( x2, never used them), KV1c (x1).
  · Upgraded two tanks to Tiger I, two to Panthers. Other two tanks are Pz.IV/H (six tanks total now: 2 x Pz.IV/H, 2 x Panther, 2 x Tiger).
  · Upgraded Bf110G to ME410; Ju87D to Ju87G; Ju88 to Ju188.
  · Sturmpanzer Is ( x2) to Grille/sIG 38(t).

Problems: None noted.

General impressions/comments:

• · What a blood bath. I wish I had left all my air and artillery at home! Cannot afford many victories like this.
  · I scouted what I really wanted to save (Bersaglieri, alpini, tanks, 90mm TD, artillery) and got it all out except the Centauro fighter, so in that regard it went well.
  · Scenario seemed to work fine and be clearly explained.

Syracuse Col diff.

Upgraded 3 PzIVG to H.

What a scenario! A real adrenaline rush .
My core units provided cover for the italian units to retreat, 17 managed to escape in total. Allied groundforces are numerous (love it) and what was usually lacking in DLC east, plenty of planes..thank you!
From turn 10 on, i started to retreat my units to the "escape hatches" for their mission was accomplished. At turn 13 another enormous wave of planes came in, left me with no choice but to retreat my planes as well.
Anyway, i let more than 7 italian units escape, i believe i read well, is the condition for a DV but i got a loss instead I was not going to lose a lot of units for a marginal outcome by holding on to the VHes, which is in my opinion, completely unnecessary and senseless.

Seems i will have to do the Endscn0 on this one.

Turn 16/16
208PP at the end of this scenario. No core losses.

General level. Starting prestige 2260, ending 235.

I upgraded two of my PzIVs to Tiger Is and the other two to PzIVH. I had to sell both Churchill's, a KV-1B and a Marder to get enough prestige after I first restrengthened all units. DV on turn 7/16. I was able to save 12 of the Italian units. Many were shot to pieces, but they survived. The Centauro fighter was down to 1 strength point, but he made it off the map. I decided to sacrifice some of the Italians to tie down the Allies while the others escaped. I counter attacked with my panzer forces and para troops to open an escape corridor for the Italians. That worked fairly well. Enemy air power is challenging to deal with. I have 3 Fw-190s and they have their hands full. I really liked the mission objectives. These scenarios have required different tactical solutions. Very engaging!

nikivdd wrote:Syracuse Col diff.

Upgraded 3 PzIVG to H.

What a scenario! A real adrenaline rush .
My core units provided cover for the italian units to retreat, 17 managed to escape in total. Allied groundforces are numerous (love it) and what was usually lacking in DLC east, plenty of planes..thank you!
From turn 10 on, i started to retreat my units to the "escape hatches" for their mission was accomplished. At turn 13 another enormous wave of planes came in, left me with no choice but to retreat my planes as well.
Anyway, i let more than 7 italian units escape, i believe i read well, is the condition for a DV but i got a loss instead I was not going to lose a lot of units for a marginal outcome by holding on to the VHes, which is in my opinion, completely unnecessary and senseless.

Seems i will have to do the Endscn0 on this one.

Turn 16/16
208PP at the end of this scenario. No core losses.

This happened because the scenario ended naturally, but there were still Italians units left on the map somewhere, something we didn't anticipate. We figured they'd all be dead or evacuated by that time. Another look at the victory conditions and triggers should solve this.

Kerensky wrote:

nikivdd wrote:Syracuse Col diff.

Upgraded 3 PzIVG to H.

What a scenario! A real adrenaline rush .
My core units provided cover for the italian units to retreat, 17 managed to escape in total. Allied groundforces are numerous (love it) and what was usually lacking in DLC east, plenty of planes..thank you!
From turn 10 on, i started to retreat my units to the "escape hatches" for their mission was accomplished. At turn 13 another enormous wave of planes came in, left me with no choice but to retreat my planes as well.
Anyway, i let more than 7 italian units escape, i believe i read well, is the condition for a DV but i got a loss instead I was not going to lose a lot of units for a marginal outcome by holding on to the VHes, which is in my opinion, completely unnecessary and senseless.

Seems i will have to do the Endscn0 on this one.

Turn 16/16
208PP at the end of this scenario. No core losses.

This happened because the scenario ended naturally, but there were still Italians units left on the map somewhere, something we didn't anticipate. We figured they'd all be dead or evacuated by that time. Another look at the victory conditions and triggers should solve this.

Yes, there was still one italian infantry unit left, in a coast village (Licata 3,13). AI never bothered to attack that place. I figured it would never reach safety, so i completely forgot about it after turn 1.

Syracuse
General level
Imported core
DV turn 16/16

Now THIS is a classic scenario! There is great deal of strategic complexity to this one, I am already looking forward to playing it again. I managed to save nine Italian units. There are a lot of interesting decisions in how you use your German units to create a pathway for the Italians to retreat through. Bravo! My favorite scenario of the campaign, and one of my favorites ever.

This was a really challenging scenario. The first wave has damaged my units hard, as the second wave came I saved the remaining Italian units quickly. One unit I had to disband to end the scenario successfully and protect the units still on the field.
Evil player could trick the game, if they disband all italian units after the obejective has been achieved. Shame on them!
I had thought that I must stand up to turn 16 that would cost a lot of core units. Thanks to the posts here, I managed to finish the Syracuse successfully.

Lieutenant, DV 7/16, stock campaign core.
prestige: start/end 1966/2033

Very nice scenario, trying to withdraw the Italians is tricky, as you have to count on your core forces to open up the lines of retreat,and move the Italians through the frontline, and the ZOC rules can really screw with your plans. Allied airpower was strong, but not overwhelming. Although the extra reinforcement, the Flak gun, was very useful.

I did as a rule not advance my core further south than (x,9), to preserve a coherent front. Especially fast light tanks were troublesome if not contained. I have a feeling that DV will be easier to obtain than MV, because I don't think I could hold on to 5 victory hexes (4, maybe) when I see all those extra Allied troops moving in.

I have one remark though, about the evacuation 'mechanism': units which are evacuated enter the reserve and can than be placed back on the map on the original deployment zones. They can even be placed back somewhere else on the same turn if need be. This also worked for my core forces, for example, I could move an artillery unit positioned on the right into the reserves, and than redeploy it on the other flank to bolster defences. I did not do that during playthrough, but I tested it afterwards and it worked, which I think is a bit of an exploit. You can also 'swap' core troops, for example a unit that is no longer useful or damaged and useless without very expensive reinforcements can be evacuated, and a nice fresh tank or something can be put back instead. A nice feature, but I'm not sure that it is intended to be used like this.


Because there were some upgrades from the stock core, first the core troops (+strenght) I used:

Infantry: 2x conscript (17), Pionier (10), Grenadier '43 (12)

Tanks: Tiger (13), Panther D (12), 2x SE PzIV H (12), 2x SE PzIII N (10), 2x Churchill (10)

Recon: Pz II Luchs (10), Panhard (10)

Artillery: SiG38(t) (13), sFH 15cm (11), Polish 10,5 cm (13)

Fighters: Bf109 G (13), 2x Fw190 A (11)

Tactical bomber: Me410 (11)


The evacuees:
Infantry: 2x It. infantry (10)(7), 2x Alpini (2)(6), 2x Bersaglieri '43 (10) One of the Bersaglieri had a truck, which helped alot.

Tanks: P26/40 (5), M15/42 (10)

Recon: AB41 (2) This one was noteworthy because I used it as a delaying unit, should have been dead.

AT: M41M 90/53 (2), L40 da 47/32 (4). Didn't race them because I did not want to outrun the infantry, but I really tried to save the 90mm, it took an heavy air attack. The small L40 was a blocking unit, even survived some combat, was not expected to survive.

Arty: 105mm towed (10), M43 105mm SPA (10). I concentrated on these units, as I lacked artillery in previous scenarios, esp. the M43 was top of my list, just as was the G55 Centauro (4), which I only used on 'easy' targets, and evacuated quite early.

Very nice scenario, I won DV 10/16, I think I saved 12 or so units. Definitely could've saved more if I planned it out better, but the AI sent its planes to wreck the Italians, whose low AD does not help against the numerous Allied bombers. Also that Centauro got 8 str knocked off by a Spitfire in one hit, so sadly I could not save that either.

I had a Tiger and a Panther, and honestly neither unit was necessary. The Allied tanks are of poor quality and even the Panzer IIIM destroys them pretty easily.

In general, I should've retreated the Italians faster, but I couldn't resist trying to use them to delay the Allied landings and to launch local counterattacks, which did inflict significant damage on the AI but at the cost of several of those units. I think this is a nice design feature, use the Italians more aggressively and potentially recapture much of the map, or try to withdraw them asap so they can be used in the future scenarios.

I think the Allied air units should have about 2-3 stars, because the Western Allies had a huge advantage in air power. To compensate, perhaps add a reinforcing mobile Flak in addition to the 12.8 cm FlaK. It would be nice if that unit came with 1 or 2 stars.

I think it is best to add a very small per turn prestige income on this map, perhaps about 20 or 25.

I saved 6 infantry, 1 towed arty, 1 SP arty, the ADA, 3 tanks, the fighter, 1 AT. I really liked how you could do this and move them on. The fighter was a last minute save though, I did not think of moving it to an evac hex since there was no airfield but at the last minute it made sense. Overall, it was an easy scenario, DV 5 turns early.

Beta 2, FM level. Starting prestige 3625, ending 505. I sold much of my captured equipment to upgrade to 3 Tigers and 2 Panthers.

My strategy here was to counter attack quickly to clear a corridor for the Italians to get behind my German forces. Once that was done, it was a simple matter to move them to the evacuation hexes. The allied air power is strong, but not overwhelming. DV on turn 8 with 14 Italians moved to safety.

Syracuse
beta 2
general level
non-imported core
Ending prestige 462

Once again an exciting scenario, I managed to save 11 Italian units and earned a DV on turn 6.

beta 2

Colonel, DV on turn 11/16.
Prestige start/end: 72/515 (so I have 1515 for Etna)

Core was upgraded quite a bit, all infantry to '43 versions, deployed a Tiger tank, an Elephant (green), Sig38(t), an a mobile AAA (SdKfz 7/2). Also the Churchill, both KV-1's, one Panhard recon and the Ba-64. Kept the T-34 with the hero and disbanded the rest of the bonus units.

The evacuees, 19 total:
Infantry:
4x It. infantry (one with truck), 3x Alpini, 2x Bersaglieri (one with truck). 3 of those were down to one or two strenght points, the rest was in good shape.
Tanks: P26/40, 2x M15/42, all in good shape.
Recon: the AB41 made it out against all odds.
Antitank: the 90mm SP gun.
Artillery: the M43, 2x 105mm towed.
Anti-aircraft: one 20mm Breda with truck, I had walked another one into safety but calculated it would cost more turns to get it out than the scenario would last, so I disbanded it.
Fighter: G55 Centauro, which I used very conservatively.

So, with a bit more bad luck I would have gotten out about 15 units, not bad. My strategy for them was simple: leave a few sacrificial units behind for the AI to chew on, the rest simply ran, I did not try to do a fighting withdrawal this time.

I managed to get DV right before the big wave of allied planes would hit, so that probably saved me some problems. I could have retaken Augusta in another two turns, as I had managed from the start to block most landing hexes there, but without that exploit I would have had a tougher time. I am not sure if a MV isn't actually harder to achieve than a DV, seeing how much extra Allied units show up near the end.

We don't really want people to hang around Syracuse, so the getting the marginal victory here is not only more difficult, but less rewarding as well. This is especially important given how important the Italian AUX units become in the next couple scenarios, and they fact they cannot be replaced at all. If someone really wants to fight though, they can.

Syracuse, beta 3 – imported core

FM, DV 7/16
15 Aux extracted
Begin pp: 550 End: 525. Net: -25.

Finally made some intelligent deployment decision, got 15 out (max was 13 before). Should make Etna and Messina more successful.

Beta3 - imported core - Colonel level.
The French campaign was varied and entertaining.
Played this scenario in Beta1 and now I could save the italian units faster, so my core units had not taken so much damage. Although I only had prestige for one tiger it could stop all allied units between Syracuse and Augusta. Truly a great scenario, I could save 15 Italian units and some of them exchanged for prestige.

beta 3

Colonel, DV 7/16
prestige deploy fase/after reinforcing/last turn: 1670/346/621

Managed to evacuate:
2x Bersaglieri
1x L3/35 (!)
1x P26/40
1x M15/42
1x AB41
1x 47mm SP Antitank
1x 90mm SP Antitank
2x 105mm towed
1x SP 105mm (M43)
1x 20mm Breda AAA
1x G55 Centauro

This time I tried a fast & sloppy evacuation to see how fast I could manage to get as much off the board as I could. Still managed to save quite a lot of units (13), but a lot of (walking) infantry were left behind.