ASL 120 "Return To Sender".....My fifth scenario played from AoO and possibly my favorite yet. My Bulgarians smashed into the SW/center of the map with only my 5-3-7 laden halftracks sweeping wide into the NW. The three 88L AA Guns in the hills counted coup on my tanks, flaming three of them. My bombers knocked one out with MG fire, double breaking the crew. Pat put one in AA mode which I privately scoffed at, never having seen Heavy AA be successful.....until a snake-eyes sent one flaming to the ground! My OBA then began to sing and knocked the other two 88 crews out of commission from which they never recovered.
I didn't bring my infantry-packed trucks on until Turn 3, losing two of them although each had a surviving squad. The rest thought it wise to unload their passengers in various covered avenues of approach on board 18. With the 88s unmanned, I was able to risk circumventing the roadblocks and truckin' over some Level 1 hills. My OBA proved my best asset, drawing three consecutive black cards after drawing an initial red one. No easy feat with an Axis Minor Drawpile! Aside from the two 88s, it did not cause casualties so much as it kept everyone with their heads down and out of sight.
His troops on the northern 3-hex Level 3 hill were being pressured by the 5-3-7s that unloaded north of it and a surging green mass in the center. Thank God that Rain never activated because I didn't start my assault on the hills until Turn 6, but had Controlled most of the L3/L4 hexes by the end of my Turn 8. By the end of my Turn 9 I Controlled them all, but he had three squads working their way towards the base woods to try and wrench at least one of those hexes back. One was vaporized by a long-range CH from one of my surviving tanks and the other two suddenly faced a wall of about 10 squads, several with MGs.
This is when Pat conceded midway through his 9b Mph (10b). He knew my endgame tactics well enough to know any brokies I incurred would not be routed to the maximum for future Rallying; not with one more SS MPh left! They would just rout one hex back into the woods and block his avenues of approach. We felt the two keys to Bulgarian success (ROAR has them as a nominal underdog with only limited playings recorded) were that either the Air Support or the OBA had to be successful against the SS, in particular the 88s, AND praying it doesn't rain! I wouldn't have felt overly comfortable approaching the hill mass at a faster pace than I was, knowing rain would slow down my ascent. The added MF to ascent however may have been counteracted by extra LV Hindrance protection upon approach. Regardless, it is a FUN scenario that we both enjoyed, and another that I feel is closer than what ROAR indicates.
