Assault - Sicily '43: Gela Beachhead

From Sound of Drums / Assault Games:

Assault Sicily 43 is the second volume in a planned series of tactical-level wargames in which players lead historical units into battle during the landing and airborne operations around Gela Beachhead in July 1943. Americans, Italians and Germans fight bitterly for the back door of Sicily as a launch pad for the invasion of the continent.

The scenarios and included dynamic campaign show the fierce and brutal fighting in the early days of the landing. US Rangers and Airborne soldiers face Italians and German counterattacks by Panzergrenadiers and the Hermann Göring Division, supported by the 504th Heavy Panzer detachment. Become part of the courageously led assaults on Italian positions by the American airborne troops of the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment dropped the night before the landings.  

The Assault Game System:

Structure of the Rulebook:
The Assault game system is easy to learn. For this purpose, the rules are divided into basic rules and optional rules. Optional rules deepen and intensify the game experience. For an easier introduction to the game system, you can simply omit these optional rules and start.

Scenario Design:
To raise the re-playability, scenarios can be played with historical setup or fictional. For this we have designed the blue and green factions. Historical setup means that the blue faction is played with units of the German Wehrmacht and the Italian Army. The green faction is played with the US Army units. Players can easily change the perspective by swapping the set up areas for both sides.
 
To describe how the Assault Games scenario design is working I would like to quote Grant from The Players Aid (Article Grant´s Top 10 Wargames of 2021):
"This game is designed to be a different experience, even with scenarios that you have already played. This is accomplished through the use of the Order of Battle which is variable through the use of Formation Cards. In each scenario, rather than being given a set Order of Battle, the players will randomly select Formation Cards based on the side they are playing. These Formation Cards give the player a certain number and type of units available for the scenario. This ensures both variation and regular surprises, since the make-up of your forces will change from game to game. This was a really refreshing take on the genre as these Formations are close in unit makeup but with slight variation that will provide new challenges or opportunities."

The Formation Cards give the player a certain number and type of units available for the scenario. This ensures both variation and regular surprises, since the make-up of your forces will change from game to game. Your High Command has assigned you certain units to achieve a particular goal; you will have to adjust your individual tactics based on the available units and the objectives you have been given!

Units in the Assault Game System are activated by command points (if played with this optional rules). Players receive a certain number of command points, which are listed on the formation cards. Before the command phase, players secretly decide which units to activate in the current turn. The command point allowance lets the player activate approximately 75% of all available units. Thus, players must set priorities for the turn. Not only does this speed up the game play, (since all units are not used in each turn), but it also makes for some exciting moments in the battle.

In the Assault Game System, we have tried to minimize the counter stacking issue. With many game systems in the hobby, you can find towers of counters and markers on certain hexes of the game board. The overview is then quickly lost. In the Assault Game System, there is a clear limit of one unit counter per hex, with the exception being when units in are being transported or in close combat. In addition, there is only ever one status marker per unit.
We have devised a simple double-marker system for a unit’s status or the command points: each marker is double-sided and after the end of the round, in the organization phase, the markers are simply flipped or removed depending on their color. This helps to speed up play.

The combat system is very easy to learn as it uses different coloured dice that have different hit numbers, so units have better or worse chances of hitting depending on the dice they roll. These dice can be modified by providing a different die of the type or increasing to the next colour based on various factors such as cover, range etc. This type of custom dice system is catchy and keeps the game light and interesting as you just never know what will happen.

Provided with the game for use in combat are four six-sided dice, each with a different colour: red, yellow, green and blue. Red is the most powerful dice; blue is the least powerful.

To present the players with an even more intensive way of playing, this box contains the campaign 'Gela Beachhead'. This is a historically based and fully dynamic campaign in which players have a choice of units to deploy throughout the campaign. The campaign could be set-up either historical or non-historical.