This is the story of a fictitious clash in the desert – a story I shall mostly tell in pictures … a French force operating on the Allied Southern flank running into an Italian Sahariana patrol.
(the terrain as I planned it at home … the white squares are impassable. In PBI terms, the black squares are ‘closed’ any other scenery makes the square ‘partial’)
(… and as it turned out to be, with troops deploying onto it)
The Italians should have radio’d-in the contact, maybe set some booby-traps and then disappeared into the sands, according to their doctrine.
But it wasn’t to be. They were there for a purpose – this was where they had requested a supply drop and that turned up randomly at the beginning of the game.
(PBI desert action: the Italian supply drop)
Thanks to Megablitz Tim for kindly donating a splendid Italian Sparviero to my collection – it made it’s combat debut by dropping the Italian supplies to the French (a random die roll that looked anything but!)! The scenario assumed the Italians would try a sharp action against the French in the hope of recovering them or getting there first.
(Italian Saharianas contact the advancing French – models by Battlefront)
The decision to fight was greeted by a Hawk fighter-bomber over flying the French advance
Seemingly following the same script, its strafing run completely missed the Italian vehicles.
(French Tirailleurs occupy the buildings – figures by Peter Pig)
(a Mk III Crusader dominated the early phases of the engagement – model by QRF)
(the French gain the cactus grove)
(supported by the tank, Chasseurs disguised in Arab clothing capture the centre)
(on the French right, FFL advance past burning Italian carriers – knocked out by a captured Italian A/T rifle)
The game seems to swing momentarily to the Italians as their gunners find their mark …
(A Semovente and Breda MMG range in on the advancing French)
(The Crusader dominated the centre but just took too many hits – one was bound to get lucky!)
(the second Sahariana platoon pepper the French with hits)
(that Conus Hotchkiss/Bren carrier takes a big hit)
But by now more of the French force arrives …
(PBI desert action: more Conus specials roll onto the battlefield)
… and the Italians are beaten.
(on the left, supported by AMDs, the Tirailleurs race forward as the Italians melt away)
(the French now also dominate the right flank)
This action also saw a first PBI action for the Conus ‘Jock Column’ vehicles that fought so bravely in NQM mode at Alamein.
Vehicle losses were very high on both sides – partially due to the flimsy or negligible armour of most of the vehicles … and partially due to the very aggressive handing of them.
PBI gives you the chance to take plenty of hits – but not indefinitely.
We are now using an adapted version of PBI 2006 that is looking more and more like PBI2.
