November 43: after crossing the Volturno River, US troops of the 133rd and the famous Nisei guys encountered a fresh German line of greenhorns. The Germans were defending the east-west road that ran via Hill 550 straight through Santa Maria Oliverto. The 133rd were ordered to take this small hamlet while the Nisei were tasked to take Hill 550 and to surge forwards into the hinterland and the hills beyond.

Actions started way early in the morning to surprise the defenders. However the Germans were not sleeping and had positioned FAOs at key positions. As soon as the Americans advanced, they were pelted with off board artillery and some well guided mortar fire. This slowed the advance and soon the Americans had to leave units behind so they could recover.

The Nisei troops were the only ones to shrug off the incoming fire as they searched their way through the western light woods. But halfway through they blundered into a German minefield and in the chaos of all this mayhem, they lost their sense of direction and headed for the wrong hills! It took a full hour until their American commander realized the incredible mistake. This logistic blunder cost them a lot of time and some serious curses and profanities were uttered while they were rushing back to their original target.

At the other side of Hill 550, the 133rd started assaulting Santa Maria Oliverto. Immediately they had a foot in the door and started pouring into the small town. The German commander had to defend several places at once and clearly this town was the "Achilles Heel" of his operation plan. The Germans were quickly overwhelmed and the town fell without US casualties. The Germans were putting up a much stiffer opposition at Hill 550, so the belated Nisei troops left this job for the 133rd and decided to bypass this objective to try to get through the German lines. The few German units defending the mountainpass were no match for the elite Nisei and the Germans faced utter annihilation. At that moment the Nisei victory mood gets spoiled when they step in another 2 well concealed minefields and they fail yards away from their objective.

In the end, the Americans accomplished a minor victory, which somehow felt sour after coming so close to total victory. The Germans had the impression that this scenario was unwinnable, but ended on a high note, considering that the end result could have been so much worse.

Even after 100+ plays I can still make ridiculous mistakes. I find that when I do, the dice jump in and make sure that I am painfully aware of those mistakes. In this scenario, the Germans are arrayed on a line of hills, two of which are victory locations for the Americans and one is hanging off to the side. The Americans will set up close by in the river valley amongst the muck leftover from the typical Italian heavy rain. The hills alone are free of mud so getting on them is crucial for the Americans. The Germans set up first.

As the German player, I carefully considered my options. Previous plays of similar scenarios had shown that failure to concentrate my defenders had led to excessive losses through being chewn up in detail. As a result, I concentrated my defenders near the hilltop and town that were American objectives and left the third hill unmanned. I expected that the Americans would try to take both of the immediate objectives in a frontal assault and the time necessary for the Nisei to traverse the open hill would give me time to bloody the remainder of the force and then turn on the Nisei.

It never occured to me that the Americans might also use the concept of concentration. They completely ignored the town and pressed towards the hilltop. My outlying defenders were swept away through assaults. Despite having the high ground I watched as my first fire (they were dug in) was ineffective and the assaulting Americans demoralized my troops (despite a "2" morale leader!) and they were sliced and diced when they subsequently failed their recovery rolls.

Two hours in and I had lost over 1/3 of my infantry to cause two step losses to the Americans and the Nisei had arrived on my right flank, completely untouched. I had sent a company to reinforce the hilltop from the town but it now had to fight its way to the hilltop which was being assaulted. It was clear that the Americans with a local superiority of 5-1 were going to take the hilltop and that I was powerless to stop it. Similarly the untouched Nisei were going to easily send their force off map as required by the third victory condition, thus leaving the victory to them.

The mistake was not setting up a small delaying force to hold the Nisei back, with only five hours of action available a delay of 45 minutes or more would cause a huge problem for the Americans. Had the Nisei not shown up when they did, unblooded, the hill might have had a chance to hold despite the lousy dice, but there it is.

I enjoy the ability of PG to highlight the implications of deployments and decisions in an emphatic way. I give this one a "4" because there are just so many tough decisions to make for both sides.