I was up in Dallas the other day and got to play some ASL with Randy Shurtz. Randy is one of my favorite opponents: great grasp of the rules, plays fast, and never loses his cool, even when you're dicing him, so I was looking forward to a really good time. After a little friendly banter, we settled on J50 The Cactus Farm.

This nifty little 6.5 turn scenario is set in 1943 Tunisia, and features the Germans and British fighting it out on boards 11 and 43. Just to add some spice, all walls and hedges are cactus hedges, all orchards are cactus patches, that patch of grain on the board 11 hill is turned into a level 2 hill, and a known AT minefield, pierced by a few TBs, stretches across much of the map.

Randy seemed to think all this favored the defender, and took the Germans. I couldn't really blame him. He got 9 5-4-8s with ATMMs by SSR, a 9-2, lots of MGs and DCs, a 20L AA gun, 2 40LL sqeezebore AT guns, some trenches, and even some 100mm OBA starting turn 4.

That left me with the British: 16 first and second liners, the standard mix of MGs and 50mm MTRs, and a group of 9 Churchill tanks, plus a FB entering on turn 4. This British force wins by taking the board 43 farm compound while keeping the Germans to under 14 VP. The Germans get VP by holding farm locations and keeping good order units and manned guns on the level 2 hill mass.

Looking things over, I decided the key to British victory was in the tanks. I had 9 of them, they all had sM8 and sD7, and even better, 11/8 armor. This leads to a very interesting matchup with the German 40LL sqeezebore guns. They can only fire APCR, which is a 14TK, jumping to 17TK at range one. So, the Churchills were going to be very tough at range, and even close in would be hard to kill.

With all the pre-game calculations out of the way, I looked at Randy's set up. He had a mass of troops in the farm (on my left), a sprinkling of counters across the wooded center, and a bunch more Germans in a trench compound on the hill to my right.

I decided to send most of my tanks at the hill on the right. That would avoid the minefield, allow them to use road movement, and would hopefully enable me to knock out the hill quickly. Due to the VC, that's where I expected all the German guns to be, and the hill configuration allows the German to make a nasty rear-slope defense with the AT guns.

Meanwhile, the bulk of the infantry would be sent up the wooded center. This allowed them the most cover, would make it tough for Germans on the hill to rout, and would enable me to attack the farm in the end-game. With a little luck, I could be in those stone buildings before the German OBA comes on line.

To the left, I decided to send two tanks. They'd make it tough for the Germans to redeploy, would be able to smoke the farm in the mid-game, and would be vital for encircling fire on the farm in the end-game.

With that, the attack kicked off. The first two turns consisted mainly of British maneuver and German skulking. The German 20L AA gun revealed itself on the hill, supported by three 5-4-8s. Resistance in the center was light, but Randy turned the farm into a major thorn in my side with a level one MMG that could cover a lot of the hill.

Despite the annoying MMG fire, my turn three assault on the hill started off well. British fire broke two of the three German squads while Churchills smothered the hill with sM and stormed the level two heights, cutting rout paths for the broken Germans. Randy was ready for this, though, and had both 40LL AT guns waiting. He needed an IF shot at an in-hex motion Churchill to do it, but he wrecked two of my tanks and reopened his rout paths. At least for the moment, the hill still stood.

Things were still desperate for the Germans, though. In CC, a British squad destroyed one of the AT guns, and the German RPh failed to bring any of the broken 5-4-8s back. The hill was covered with smoke, and the lone good order 5- 4-8 was facing 3 British squads.

Faced with disaster, Randy went to work. First, he rolled up some Gusts, blowing away all the smoke. The 20L used this new-found visibility to break the first of my squads. The second Brit went down to a point-blank shot from the 5- 4-8, who proceeded to toss a DC at my last squad. My boy broke and Randy's went Fanatic, leaving him the undisputed king of the hill.

My attack a shambles, I was faced with having only 4 turns remaining to take the farm. Randy still had 16 VP on the hill alone, so I still had to find some way to hurt him there as well. I decided to leave a tank and a platoon by the hill to attack the exposed 20L AA gun, hope my fighter plane could take out the AT gun on the backslope, and shift everything else over to the farm.

With this situation, those two tanks I had sent in on the far left started paying big dividends. I was able to immediately place encircling fire on the farm, and that fire only intensified as the British troops from the center shifted into place.

Even with the encircling fire keeping the Germans pinned down, I still needed some some luck to get into the game, and I got it when one of my silly British tanks (ROF 1, limited HE) went on an ROF tear, ripping up several 5-4-8s. Things got even worse for the Germans when their 9-2 died rolling a 12 on his MC, and suddenly Randy was playing Advanced Squad on that side of the board with only a Hero SMC in the area.

Back on the hill, I was able to kill the crew manning the 20L, leaving Randy with 12 VP there, but the fighter plane never managed to do anything to the AT gun. That forced my tank to sit quietly, guarding the 20L from being remanned, but unable to challenge the remaining Germans on the summit. The game would be decided by the fight in the farm.

There, the battle was still raging. My tanks were swarming everywhere, forcing any German that broke to die for failure to rout. Randy's cold dice continued, missing several high-odds street fighting attempts, but he had called down his OBA in the area, which made my efforts to cross the cactus hedges even harder.

That theme of dwindling German resistance and British inability to gain ground continued to the last German player turn. I had plenty of tanks in the area, but hardly any good order infantry and most of it was on the wrong side of the hedge surrounding the farm. Randy still had a few good order troops left in the compound, along with 5 building locations. That, along with the troops on the hill, gave him 17 VP, meaning I would have to capture 4 farm locations in my last turn.

A lucky DFPh in the German player turn allowed me to clear out the last of the 5-4-8s in the area, and let me mop up one building at the start of my turn. A mad dash into the last German-held building ensued, and Randy confirmed his cold dice status with an anti-climactic 11 on his OBA attack. That non-effect on my HS let him scamper into the pivotal 4th farm location for the win...

It was a great game against a great opponent, and I'd rate the scenario as being pretty good. The British tanks are fun to play with (love that 8 sM), and the matchup against the 40LL APCR guns is very interesting. If you want to learn how to use smoke to cover an attack, this is a great learning scenario. The VC are also quite intriguing, forcing both player into tough decisions about how to split their forces. Finally, the cactus hedges add a really neat feel to the scenario, making it much more tough to maneuver than you'd think just by looking at the map.

Zeb Doyle