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We had three members for the November edition of our ASL Game Day at Gameology.
At Oktoberfest, Perry gave me a roster of scenarios that MMP is planning to republish and include in the upcoming reprint of Armies of Oblivion. The list includes changes for those scenarios that have balance issues on ROAR. He asked me to take a look at them and offer any suggestions I might have. I told him I'd like to do one better than that; I would pass the list around at our up-coming game days and solicit input from the members. I have been doing that for the last month. I also printed three of the scenarios that I happen to like with the hope we could playtest the proposed changes. One of those is a favorite of mine; “End Station Budapest”. Jim Svette and Dave Kocot agreed that it looked like it would be fun, and we set it up, with Dave taking the defending Hungarians against me and Jim as the attacking Romanians.
With 10 turns and about 50 squads total, this is a large scenario. The board configuration is my favorite part of the scenario. Using RR overlays, board 45 is transformed into a giant downtown rail yard and trail station. By SSR, 18 building hexes are rubbled. Its Budapest, 1945, and the Hungarians are well led and well equipped, with a mix of elite and first line troops. They get a lot of wire and have most of 2 full boards to use to for their set-up. For additional support they get a Nimrod, a Toldi and two excellent Zryini A.G.'s, (one more than the original scenario). The Romanians get mix of 28 elite and 1st line squads (two less than the original scenario) . They also get a follow-on force consisting of two platoons of assault engineers with a 9-2, FT and DC's, plus two towed 45L AT Guns. Dave had an excellent set-up, and deployed his wire pretty far forward in a long line at the center of the board. This was a good choice, as it forces the attack to split into two groups to avoid it.
The VC's require the Hungarians to have one good-order MMC remaining in the Rail Station. With 10 turns, the Romanians have lots of time to get across the board, so the Hungarians have to conduct a very tenacious fighting withdrawal to burn time. Jim took about 2/3 of the initial force and went to the east. I took the remaining initial force, plus the assault engineers, and went west (left), the long way through the rowhouses of board 51. I think fighting withdrawals are one of the most difficult tasks to accomplish in ASL. Dave handled his with the skill of the veteran player he has become. The fighting was brutal and bloody every step of the way, and by turn 9 the Romanians were poised to break into the Rail Station, where Dave had his few surviving squads, his HMG and most of his leaders. Unfortunately, at that moment we got the 5 minute warning that the store was closing
and we couldn't see how it was going to end. Personally I think it was going to come down to the last DR. Did the changes make the scenario balanced? Hard to tell on one playing. Jim and I thought it probably did. Dave thought the Hungarians could use still more help. Our game was going to go down to the last DR, but Dave argued that he had better than average dice all day, and if he had not, we would have rolled over him. In any case, we had great fun. I'm glad this scenario is going to be fixed and re-published. It may be large, but with a defense done in advance it can be played in a day. Trust me, it is well worth the effort.
We decided to save some time and money and walked over to Jack in the Box for lunch. That worked out for our purposes, but I'm sure we'll return to The Hat next month.
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