"Our place in the sun," muttered Capitano Luigi Insalata staring at the cave pocked hill with disgust. "Ethiopia is our place in the sun? Did we lose a bet or something? What the hell's wrong with the Amalfi Coast, that has sun. Oh crap,"he added as Colonello Condottieri appeared behind him. "I would like to remind you of your duty as an Italian officer," said Condottieri heavily. "Our Eritrean troops are looking to their colonial overlords to set an example." Insalata was fairly sure his Eritrean troops would cheerfully attack the Ethiopians even if their officers were on another continent, something he was seriously considering. "Don't forget we have air support," added Condottieri attempting to cheer the captain up. "Mustard gas?" said Insalata hopefully. Condottieri looked around hastily but there didn't seem to be any foreign journalists nearby. "Keep your voice down," he hissed, "And, no. Just bombs and machine guns. Well, a bomb." Isalata looked around, everywhere eager Eritrean troops were gathering for the assault their Italian officers trudging reluctantly behind them. His own command was halfway towards the hills. "Off you go," said Condottieri, "not that way," he added. Possibly the only machine gun in the Ethiopian army chose that moment to open fire. Insalata turned to the Colonel but Condottieri was nowhere to be seen. With little real choice Insalata shambled after his men.
I threatened and here it is. Ethiopians versus Italians. Well really Ethiopians versus Eritreans with the Italians providing heavy support. Here my Italian led Eritreans will attempt to seize a number of nameless points on an unimportant hill against a group of Ethiopians who have occupied them against the wishes of their emperor. Obviously the stakes are high. My Eritreans are set up on the desert floor looking at a particularly difficult hill thronging with with Ethiopian troops. To win I need to amass 4VP from capturing victory locations. There are five such hexes each worth 1VP each except for 25BB5 which is worth 2 points. I have to achieve this without conceding 15 or more CVP to the Ethiopians. To achieve this heady result I have thirteen squads of first line Eritrean troops equipped with two lmgs and a medium machine gun. These colonial warriors are urged into battle by four Italian officers including a 9-1. On a turn to be determined by die roll another pair of officers lead six more Eritrean squads and a single lmg on a flanking movement. The main force is supported by a single 75mm gun and two fighter bombers one of which has an actual bomb. Unlike their shoddy Italian counterparts Eritreans are not lax, reduce to a second line squad rather than a conscript and become fanatic on battle hardening. If I had been the Italians I would have been trying to replace my entire army with Eritreans.
My opponent Dave commands the Ethiopians, eleven first line squads and five conscripts. The first line squads are 237s the conscripts are worse. These doughty but undergunned warriors are led by three officers including an 8-1. They also have a medium machine gun and a crew to man it. Dave also has six concealment counters and eight cave counters plus two tunnels which can only be used to connect one cave to another. Dave can HIP two squad equivalents. This, combined with the caves means a good proportion of his force is invisible. Broken Terrain is in effect which means all hammada hexes become crags and each open ground hex accessible to such newly created crags becomes broken ground giving a +1 TEM and being concealment terrain. Technically all scrub also becomes brush but actually another special rule indicates that scrub becomes cactus patches instead. Got that? Good. The long line of Allied control markers in the picture below actually designate a continuous cliff face with no wadis.
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| At start set up |
I set up intending to go for the two VP location on the right with part of my force and try and take the right hand end of the main ridge line with the rest. My force felt terribly naked sitting out there on the desert floor and I had to continually remind myself that the Ethiopians had low firepower and short range and it wasn't as suicidal as it looked. A kill stack with the mmg and 9-1 was set up to hopefully take out the most forward of his defenders on the right. In the absence of anything else to do the 75mm would do likewise.
The combined efforts of my gun and "kill" stack sufficed to pin a single squad and with that dubious encouragement my squads surged forward over the broken ground. The surge left them floundering about in the open but fortunately I wasn't really in the Ethiopians range as yet. Dave declined to shoot for the most part, keeping his powder dry.
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| Somewhere ahead of me are caves full of Ethiopians |
My second turn saw me overwhelm a forward squad and discover a couple of caves. I also discovered that while caves may be fearsome when you're approaching them once you've arrived you can walk over them and safely ignore the contents unless they want to stick their heads up. I also discovered Dave's medium machine gun. It did no harm this turn but that hopeful beginning would not be followed up on. Meanwhile my gun crew proved incapable of moving the gun anywhere. My air support and reinforcements turned up. I brought my reinforcements on the very southern extremity of board 25 intending to envelop the hill mass from both sides. Dave's mmg team broke one of my squads that had got a little too enthusiastic about its job. But in return a fighter bomber strafed his mmg team snuggled safely in a cave and to the astonishment of both of us gained a result. The mmg team survived but their guiding officer broke and ELR'ed.
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| Mixed results but at least I'm in the general vicinity of the hill |
Now that I was in the general vicinity of his defences there came the long painful process of crawling up the most irritating hill in ASL. Dave for his part declined to reveal his caves until I was standing right in front of them. Over on the right I attempted to push toward the two VP location and lost another squad to his mmg team but I was starting to build up a force. On the main ridge I painfully eased forward until I got shot at. Fortunately low Ethiopian firepower meant I survived a fair number of these shots. Still everything was going very slowly. Down on the bottom of the map my flanking movement was more of a flanking increment. Dave's attempts to reinforce his central position from the flanks failed as my air support came into its own.
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| Getting nowhere very slowly |
As you might be able to see from the above I'm trying to slide my centre force across to the left. That's where the other victory locations are. To do that I have to run the gauntlet of his troops in the caves which were spread out all along the ridgeline. The word "run" gives the completely wrong impression by the way.
Casualties started to come faster now as more Ethiopian troops peered out of their caves and shot up my troops as they went by. Over on the right I was starting to position myself for the push to the victory location despite the occasional casualty from his mmg. My flankers started to earn their pay as they tangled with a couple of Ethiopian squads lurking on the rear of the ridgeline. I'm also pushing my gun around, as much to give the crew something to do as for any other reason.
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| Slow and messy but I'm inching in the right direction |
Turn 4 was a mixed bag. The stalwart Ethiopian defenders in their caves made a mess of my centre force but on the right I had finally driven off the few defenders of the victory location. Now all I had to do was take it myself. I approached a little warily not believing that Dave hadn't allocated more to the defence of the 2VP location. In the rear his neglected cave dwellers popped out for long enough to DM my broken squads which was deeply annoying but revealing himself in the open didn't do much for his troops life expectancy.
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| It has to be admitted that my attempt to slide to the left has met a temporary speed hump. |
If I had been commanding Italians things might have been a bit rough at this point but my Eritreans were made of sterner stuff, rallying quickly and reorganising. An Italian officer went berserk, fortunately his troops were too sensible to follow his lead. Alone the man charged a cave and then realised he couldn't get inside it. He stood there for the next couple of turns looking silly. Over on the right I captured the VP location, two of the four I needed. Now I could focus on the left. Eager to prove it was contributing my gun banged away at a couple of distant squads without result. My aircraft ruled the sky (easy when there's no opposition) making every Ethiopian move in the open fraught with risk. Down at the bottom of the board my flankers were finally flanking.
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| Starting to close in on the left |
Slowly and painfully I closed in on the left and now Dave understood that the caves were a trap. Now that I had moved past him his troops there were completely helpless unless they wanted to stand up in the open and invite fire. Air support killed another of his squads on the left and suddenly Dave was very undermanned in the victory locations, if I could just get there. The combination of cactus patches, crags, wadis and broken ground making movement so difficult that any defensive fire Dave put up was largely incidental to my struggles. Still we were making it, my flankers coming from one side and my at start force from the other. Over on the right my machine gun teams took up positions waiting for the inevitable. Dave would have to get out of those caves at some point.
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| So close I can smell it. Or possibly that's the Ethiopian food |
The moment came, Dave's cave dwellers sallied forth and were hit by a combination of air attacks and machine gun fire that promptly knocked them out of the game. Meanwhile slowly and painfully I had dragged myself up to the victory locations. A single conscript squad barred my way but not for long. I fought my way in and seized the remaining two locations needed for victory. Dave had another turn but nothing that could hope to restore the situation. Victory fell to me in the final turn.
This was a long, grinding game. The Eritreans need all of the time they're allotted as it takes a long time to get anywhere. I quite enjoyed it but I was the one moving forward (also I won). Dave who spent most of his time sitting in caves not shooting at things didn't find it quite as entertaining (also he lost). Dave gained revenge for the Ethiopians when he won The Wells of Borgut in the first turn but for right now I was triumphant.
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| Victory believe it or not |
Capitano Insalata sank onto a handy chunk of stone. His Eritrean's hadn't needed much guidance, his command had consisted of pointing occasionally in the direction he wanted them to go. He gazed up at the sun blazing down from a cloudless sky. Colonello Condottieri approached, Insalata considered leaping to his feet and saluting but decided he couldn't be bothered. That was something else the Eritreans could do for him.
"Well done," said Condottieri. "You kept out of the Eritreans way for long enough for them to get the job done. Masterful leadership." Insalata pointed at a sun warmed chunk of rock, inviting the colonello to take a seat.
"What is this?" asked Condottieri gingerly taking a seat.
"Our place in the sun," replied Insalata.
