Author	triangular_cube
Method	Solo
Victor	Britain, India
Play Date	2022-12-09
Language	English
Scenario	DeRa004

I should just copy and paste my disclaimer about the Desert Rats Surrender Rule vs the Afrika Korps or South Africa surrender rules...

Surprise surprise, swarms of Matildas charge up and ask for surrender and the Italians quickly take up their offer after one round of ineffectual counter assaults. Allies win, wiping the Italians to a man in quick time with no trouble. So far this has been how all of the nearly identical surrender rule matilda swarm Desert Rats scenarios have gone.

I'm going to talk about the vexing scenario design here instead. This is very similar to scenario 3, fighting in similar circumstances over the same hill (game map wise not real life hill). In 3, the Allies enter from the near side, here they enter from the far side. Why though? This scenario has surprise attack rules, so the Italians just sit and watch as the Allies walk across the map from the far edge? Seems fun? Why not have them come from the near edge like 3, and the far edge in 3 instead, so they can interact with the approaching force. Idk its weird.

Surprise rule, of which there is one, is very strange. Tanks cant move but can fire until they lose a step. Fair enough, I guess. But no one else can Move OR fire, so they Italians, who are surprised by the attack, have been watching and listening to the Tanks shoot up the approaching Indians and have not interest in finding out whats going on? Okay then. They can even be stacked with the tanks, but I guess they are just napping and figure the armored guys will deal with it. These guys unfreeze when they are put under attack, fair enough again, but is calling for surrender an attack? Its ambiguous at best :)

One last oddity. Probably just due to historical OOBs, but both sides have MASSIVE motor pools, but since trucks are not excluded from any step loss counts, they just hang out in the back and do nothing but look pretty. Seriously, there are 33! truck units in this scenario, and they both just drive off into the sunset to find a quiet corner to hang out in. I actually think the only way the Italians can win or at least draw is to get one lone unit safely off to that corner of the map and take out the motor pool.

Just a lot of strange things going on here that don't add up to anything because Matildas and surrender.