From: Roberto Chiavini

Ia Drang (Vae Victis)

This is a solitaire game of US Army in Vietnam in 1965, with the player
taking the role of the Americans. As in a previous solitaire effort from
Vae Victis, I don't particularly like the subject of this game, but the
design approach is a little better than the other one (Operation
Apocalypse). With the usual very good graphics, you have an area map of
the zone of operations and several counters that represent infantry
units for both sides, artillery and the helicopters and air units used
by the Americans during that campaign. Most of the US troops are
normally moved through helicopters. Otherwise, all the ground units may
move one zone each turn. Combat units are rated both for combat and
defense. The Vietnamite units are moved through a not complex pattern
made by colored arrows on the map and are divided in several forces,
each representing from 0 (there are several dummy units to make the game
more interesting) to 5 units (the maximum stacking for the Americans and
for each single Vietnamite force). 

The objective of the Vietnamite is to take several different objectives
on the map and normally the system forces its units to reveal and have
combat only inside those zones. For the rest, it's up to you, as the
player, try to reveal the composition of the Vietnamite forces on the
map (risking ambushes, by the way) and destroy them when you can. With a
correct use of observation helicopters and the movement of your
heliported units, this is not impossible, but with unlucky rolls it's
possible to get a debacle against a sort of phantom army moving through
your defenses like a thin mist. 

Other than for a really convoluted combat system (with dozens of
different modifiers to obtain normally the same result – especially in
air bombardment), the game works for what are its aims. As a solitaire
game, it's playable, probably interesting for wargamers who likes
Vietnam (not me, sorry), with also a few variants and rules (appeared in
the following number of Vae Victis) to try the game as a two players
experience.

I rate the game 6 ½ in a 1-10 scale