R2V Mort aux Cons - Combat Mission: Fortress Italy

A fantastic map and excellent scenario that provides a significant challenge to both players. I would have rated it higher but there are a few items that should be addressed to improve balance and enjoyment as follows:

1) Initial Deployment - ZERO for the German defender as everything is fixed and the Paks are very poorly located. The Germans should have deployment zones to set up a proper defence.

2) Artillery - Way too much for a battle this size IMHO. Recommend removing 2 of the 3 x 105mm missions for the Allied side and the nebelwerfers for the Axis side.

3) Victory Points - The Allied player has ~600 points of touch objectives and a 250 point "secret" destruction objective while the Axis player has 500 points for holding the town - which is impossible. To balance this, I would recommend eliminating all of these objectives.

Mort aux Cons - death to idiots - definitely felt like an idiot sometimes playing this from the French side, when a lot of my soldiers died in well placed (TRPs) artillery strikes or minefields. Still an interesting scenario / fight, but a lot of artillery in it, maybe justifiably so, but it felt overpowered sometimes.

My first comment is about the game engine. I cannot believe that the bridge bug has not been solved by Battlefront after this many years. Every one of my French vehicles moved awkwardly onto the bridge, then took a hard left and crashed into the railing, then stopped, then turned 90 degrees to the right, then crashed into the opposite railing, then stopped, then straightened out and awkwardly exited the bridge. A total fiasco. There are many unsolved bugs in the game engine and this is one that drives me nuts. OK rant over!

For the designer: I really enjoyed the terrain, map and design of this scenario. Other than the off board artillery (which was a little extreme for the size of both forces), I thought the force composition was challenging for both sides. I would recommend that you reduce the TRPs, reduce the off board arty, eliminate the victory points for discovering the minefields, and allow the German ATGs to have a flexible set up. IMO, if these things are done, the scenario will improve for the better.

My opponent and I had a fantastic scrap for the "battle of the orchard", the one just to the German side of the town approximately where a German platoon starts out. It was bloody! If it wasn't for my flamethrower, the Germans could have held on.

I had good fun with this scenario other than the annoying bridge bug.

Too much artillery

German set up has AT guns in fixed positions. Unable to move/relocate before scenario start

Initial contact in orchard near the Allies entry point was the most exciting. After that it became an exercise in artillery pummeling

ChappyCanuck was a great opponent and will definitely play against him again

Agree too much artillery. Also felt the M5A1 stewart tanks had lazer guided optics. As axis my AT guns were well placed and ranged yet could not get an accurate shot on target whereas the Stewarts roll up and take everything out first time.

Allied artillery is excessive, and the lack of any terrain for the German to defend except the victory zone ridge in the center of the map means the allied artillery will all land on the Germans. Cut allied artillery in half, and allow the German side more flexibility in where to set up.