Slitherine

I don't want to be a whiner, but how do you get a victory in this one? I've tried it 8 times now and just get more frustrated each play through. There must be (like in earlier scenarios) a 'magic' force mix needed to win? Also, the battle predictions are just ridiculous for this one. Not one even came close to being accurate in 8 plays...0-6 seems to mean 3-1. And the allies seem uber-strong...a Greyhound putting losses on a 13 star PzIIIM?? So far the closest I came to any victory was hitting the transports as hard as I could before they get ashore. But that meant I had no hope of getting more than a couple of the aux units to the exit zones. Ideas?

Maybe this thread from the discussion of the beta version will help a bit? viewtopic.php?f=125&t=37446 I list my core there as well I believe.

If I remember correctly, I quickly set up a force on the north-east side coastal hexes to block the landing ships (they can move there in one turn if you deploy carefully), and contain the allied there to a few city hexes. I had two other groups, one in the west and one in the centre, which rapidly conquered the first city in their path and set up a defensive position, I generally did not get south past horizontal hex row nr. 9, to give you an idea. Keep an eye on the gaps between the three groups, especially light tanks can cause problems. The quicker you get the Italians out, the less damage you will take. Also, by not moving too far from your starting positions you can keep your slower support units (Flak guns, towed arty) covering your forces and the allies will take longer to reach you.

Don't be afraid to leave a couple of Italian units behind as roadblocks (more like speedbumps), not to cause damage but to make the AI spend time and movement on attacking them, so they won't race full speed ahead after your retreating Italians, buying them time to get out. So keep/put some infantry in close terrain, use those units that will never make it anyway, like the Breda 20mm AA with movement=1 that isn't even fast enough to make it to the evacuation hexes before the scenario ends... Just try to have them survive as long as possible, and tie up the AI.

A decisive victory is easier if you can block the allied landing on the far north-east side, I even walked out several really slow units sometimes. A minor victory is actually much harder to achieve, I never tried but maybe that's why you are struggling?

Alied airpower is punishing, and how bad depends greatly on your core setup. I usually have a lot of very good fighters and a few Flak, esp. the SdKfz 7/2 came in very handy.

My strategy was much like ThvN's. Just a few tanks can bottle up the east landing.

instead of taking vulnerable fighters, deploy 88s/128s protecting your artillery emplacements. The two western "groups" will create evacuation channels for the Italians to move north. It's a straight-up evacuation, not a confrontation of their landing. You should be able to get out 12 to 16 Italian units and not take very much damage on your own core. Try to leave the low value units behind - the immobile ones, and get out the artillery, tanks, fighter, etc. They will be very useful for the next scenarios. The whole thing should take maybe nine turns or so, you don't need to hang around very long!

Thanks for the tips. I was doing some of that, but I had no idea that the scenario would end once all the italians were either dead/evacuated. Would have helped had I read the briefing again That makes things much easier knowing that. I was trying to defend to the end of 16. Will try it again maybe tomorrow...

Got a DV on turn 9 this time. Only managed to save 10 aux units, but didn't suffer much damage to my core (I only play the first time through on Colonel though). Disbanded my Me tacbomber and a Stuka and bought an He111, which had a lot of fun smashing landing craft Totally different when your mindset isn't to hold to the end. Actually a really fun, well-thought-out scenario now that I played it properly. Interesting to go to turn 16 once though just to see the bloodbath you're in for.

So, all these weak italian units that I've saved are just for the prestige from disbanding? I'm assuming this as there are only 18 deployment hexes for 33 units in Etna? Wouldn't want to put them on the ground anyways... I haven't picked up AK yet, but slogged through the entire DLC east. Are the missions/gameplay in AK as good as this 42-43 DLC?

aleader wrote:Got a DV on turn 9 this time. Only managed to save 10 aux units, but didn't suffer much damage to my core (I only play the first time through on Colonel though). Disbanded my Me tacbomber and a Stuka and bought an He111, which had a lot of fun smashing landing craft Totally different when your mindset isn't to hold to the end. Actually a really fun, well-thought-out scenario now that I played it properly. Interesting to go to turn 16 once though just to see the bloodbath you're in for.

I didn't even try holding on for that long, must have been frustrating.

So, all these weak italian units that I've saved are just for the prestige from disbanding? I'm assuming this as there are only 18 deployment hexes for 33 units in Etna? Wouldn't want to put them on the ground anyways... I haven't picked up AK yet, but slogged through the entire DLC east. Are the missions/gameplay in AK as good as this 42-43 DLC?

Noooooo, keep those Italians! They don't count towards your core limit so can be deployed freely, like SE units. But one thing, once you place one you cannot un-deploy it, due to the game mechanics, so save before deploying anything and think carefully. Some of them are actually decent combat units, I especially liked the anti-aircraft and artillery units. The reason you'd better hold on to them **MASSIVE SPOILER** is the Messina scenario, in which you have to evacuate a minimum number of units while holding off an allied attack. The Italians are perfect for this objective, otherwise you will have to evacuate core units in that scenario and have far less units available to hold off the Allied. After this scenario, the Italian aux units dissappear. I've already reasd stories from people who disbanded the whole lot and suffered for it during Messina.

Thanks for the warning. I lost some of the useful italian units to ridiculously powerful air attacks, and the ones I saved are pretty battered. Is it worthwhile spending prestige on any of them that have more than 100 experience? Maybe I'll play it through again to make sure I take better care of them...

Maybe the G55 Centauro fighter if you've managed to save that, but I wouldn't bother. And the 'green' reinforcements are free between scenarios so how badly beaten up they are when they exit the field isn't much of a concern for me.

Which, BTW, lead me to use 'interesting' tactics such as using some Italian units which made it to the German frontline as 'icebreakers' to knock of a few Allied points but absorb more damage in return, and then legging it as fast as they could towards the exits. With your own core you wouldn't dream of attacking at 4:1 combat loss predictions, but if a unit is effectively safe, I figured it'd be better to have it do some damage as opposed to none. It gives the rest of your units a much easier time. I also used this (with greater risk) to quickly break Italians through single Allied units in their way.

If you replay, protecting them from air attacks is difficult, but on the east coast I managed to keep the expensive Italian units more or less rallied around the anti-aircraft gun while retreating, it may not kill much but it prevents a lot of kills on your units. Downside is that the retreat is somewhat slower and the unit placement is critical. If you accidentally expose a unit, it will get slaughtered, but if you make sure the right unit is facing the right way you can keep losses from attacks evenly spread. But nothing helps against a string of bad luck. It helps to have a plan, I usually leave some units behind and take what I can rescue, and everything else that makes it out alive is a bonus. And I've been surprised many times, I once even managed to rescue that tiny tankette (L3/35 I believe), which usually dies in the opening turn.

I thought this scenario was really easy. Maybe too easy since you can come out of it with a huge number of italian units which you can place for free on later scenarios. As others have said the strategy is pretty simple; use your core to bottle up the enemy landing north of syracuse and you can pretty much evacute 7 units from that coast and win a decisive victory right there.

I put just enough units on the northeast coast to do that and then everybody else just to the west, attacking and capturing Caltigorone and Vizzini. This lets you also pull out a lot of units around Modica and Palazzola. I didn't set up a single unit anywhere near Barrafranca; just abandon it to the enemy. I saved like 17 Italian units this way. The best ones to save are the air defense and artillery since they can pretty effective and you can place them for free later. I only managed to save one of the air defense, unfortunately. But I did save plenty of garbage infantry. At least the Bersaglieri aren't completely incompetent.

I spent the $$$ to upgrade an Italian recon unit to a Sahariana just because they are cool.

Oh; you want to skedaddle as soon as the wolverines or whatever they are show up. They can do serious damage to anything but a 3+ star panther/tiger.