Sean Nelson - Aug 28, 2008 10:41 pm (#5747 Total: 5749) Blackshirt AAR This week I received, put together, and solo-played Blackshirt. I enjoyed the experience (even the putting-together, oddly enough) and found the short (7 pages) rulebook easy to learn with enough flexibility to provide a suitable amount of strategic options for both sides. When first looking at the cardboard armies it appeared the Italians had a hard task ahead. The OOB, reinforcements, and resources of the allied forces looked imposing. Not knowing much about the actual Italian invasion into Egypt I decided I wouldn't be biased by trying to recreate events and would just play and see where things would lead me. The Italian attack started capably enough pushing the allied forces back from the positions close to the border; but within a few turns the allies were mounting counterattacks and I wondered if the Italian juggernaut really lost all its steam. It was then in the fourth turn the I was successful in making use of what the Italians had (a lot of fast weak mobile units) and found an opportunity to cut off the allied supply lines for the forces in the south. This became the theme of the battle as the allies in the north were never able to break through it was difficult to provide supplies for the forces in the south. By the final third of the game I suddenly realized the allies were going to have a hard time winning this. They were now the superior force and making gains but not fast enough to push the Italians out of Egypt by game's end. When the Italians were able to use their airforce to interdict the main road and cut off the enemy's supplies on the second to last turn the Blackshirts secured victory. Some hooks I liked about the game that may bring me back: 1) The setting is original enough I want to learn more and play again. 2) The terrain is quite a puzzle. The top of the map has a main road running east-west. For all intents and purposes all supply needs to link to this road to get back to a city or supply source. There is a large escarpment south of this road in the middle of the map. Troops that try to flank their opponents end up on the escarpment and have a long way to go for supplies. This requires thinking and coordination of units in order to prevent falling out of supply and getting bogged down. This is especially true for the allies if they are trying to clear Egypt of the fascists. Some quirks to the game 1) I had a situation where, in trying to cut-off an allied unit an Italian unit strayed too far and himself got cut off and was facing out of supply next turn. When the initiative roll came I realized the winner was going to actually lose - because not only does the winner of the initiative roll check for supply first but when the unit is out of supply they no longer prevent the enemy's LOS. In this instance the Italians won initiative - the Italian unit that flanked the allied unit went out of supply - meaning that when the allied turn came the unit would be in supply because the Italian OOS unit is no longer capable of blocking the LOS. If the allies had won the iniative the allied unit would have been OOS. 2) The opportunity to retreat your units instead taking hits (after the first hit) was something I thought would advantage the allied forces (because they need to push the Italians back). The opposite seemed to be the case. Essentially the Italians kept retreating two hexes and moving back to bog down the advance. The allies needed to really stack their armies to get some real momentum. Something I didn't realize until too late. All in all a fun game I hope to play again (maybe against an opponent this time).