Some folks asking questions on BGG about the ‘Italian mess’, the ahistorical invasion of Italy and subsequent collapse. Here are some more details for you and a few comments.
This was all 3 months ago or there abouts. I believe we played correctly, and I also do not personally have an issue with how this unfolds in the game.
Some criticism about Corps being landed with no air support and no this and no that….Well ok. You work with the system and the rules as they are. If it buggers your view of history, ya need to move on or house rule.
In this instance it would make sense to see some sort of house rule on how invasions may be conducted or how the Collapse rules work for a given country. I can see what happened in my minds eye. Just as I can see the absolute ass kicking the Allies took D-Day in a recent game of MMP’s The Mighty Endeavour.
Sit about and monday morning QB’ing saying a game is broken is weak sport. Just because the railroad history you prefer does not come about EVERY time.
Any way we sunk that bloody fleet.
Then the unopposed landings. This activates the collapse. Italy is out of the war for the Axis. Subsequent shipping pressed units into Trieste and other locals.
Seems a bit quick to not even give the Italians the chance to take a loss before surrendering. At least in the real war, they managed to absorb the humiliation and casualties in Greece and Libya and Tunisia and Sicily before throwing in the sponge.
Mercy..bah. No mercy!
This point surfaced long ago in the original Third Reich. Note that the Italians did not guard what should be ‘precious’ to them, namely the Home Country. In most ETO games, it’s a gamble between the resources lost to an Invasion versus its outcome and loss of resources to the Axis side. In THIRD REICH, you got one turn to recapture the capitol prior to actual surrender. Here it would seem that the Italians & Germans might also get a chance to reverse the situation.
Even so, if you look at the Italian deployments, they always kept substantial force at Home, lacking resources to support them abroad AND fearing British (and while it lasted, French) naval power.
Likewise with Great Britain in THIRD REICH, some complained Britain was too easily captured and surrendered (by, for example, airborne forces alone. I invented a trick of capturing a northern port as a bridgehead to move force to Britain.
The ‘answer’…was for the most part to GARRISON Britain. Like the Italians, there was a considerable amount of force retained in Britain proper. One tweak alone to provide for some additional stacking in London due to the just-manageable odds achievable with concentrated German air power and airborne corps.
It might still be possible, then, IF…the Brits paid scant attention to their Defense AND the Germans were willing to risk the loss of the airborne corps for the remainder of the war.
So in hindsight, without knowing the rules, I mostly of the mind the early invasion is actually ‘okay’, to provide reasonable caution and a check on Italian ‘Adventurism’ ….which is itself Alt-Hist. and a bit Unreasonable given the resources available.
The Only Thing perhaps needing some tweaking, and I don’t know/own the rules so I can’t say, is there might perhaps need a chance for retaking the locations that encourage the surrender. In that way, if the Brits/French gamble with a ‘Blade Force’ while Italian/German forces are near enough to intervene, the Brits/French will have to gamble the resources expended will not just be lost, leaving them in worse shape, with Italy in the war (without having to make their own Decl. of War)……and the Allied resources lost to the Defense of France and the United Kingdom and respective territories.