CSI MEMOIR 44 - FIRST WAVE

[MagnusNygaard]

The "piece de la resistance" of the base game, First Wave is notoriously hard to win as the allies.

https://boardgamearena.com/gamereview?table=313523717

[MagnusNygaard]

This is one of those maps you just know you can't win as the allies without a great deal of luck. So when I saw that I had 3 out of 4 cards in the center, I couldn't believe my luck. With 4 cards and no "time" to construct something useful, having 3 cards in the same sector was a gift.
Lucky for me - Edocentric tried to take out my right flank Armor. In a tiny attempt at a deception, I move up the damaged Armor and also moved an infantry forward.
Then I started my attack in the center. Was lucky enough to survive 4 dice against my cornered Armor, pick up INFANTRY ASSAULT and ARMOR ASSAULT, and suddenly I actually thought I could pull off an upset... I should have known better.
In rapid succession I was hit with GENERAL ADVANCE, RECON IN FORCE, THEIR FINEST HOUR, GENERAL ADVANCE, ATTACK left (just to give me false hope) another THEIR FINEST HOUR.... and then to top it all off... THEIR FINEST HOUR two in row, three in the game total.

OK, so 3-6 was still not bad, especially against that combo.

In game two I just had to make sure not to... and then my Artillery got taken out by the US Ranger with double grenades. OK, so no panic, I just needed to make sure Edocentric didn't wouldn't manage to break through the center with his Armor... and then he broke through in the center. I still didn't panic, I just had to make sure not to leave his Armor alive right next to my 1fig infantry! 8 dice, no retreat, that should be plenty...
So - having failed to kill his armor off, Edocentric had the posibility to win the match after all, but in the end, Karma decided that giving him 3 TFH had been enough, and he failed to kill my 2fig infantry with 3dice.

Extremely fun games, even though, as usual on this map, the allies never stood a real chance in either game.

Honestly, as I think was proven in both games, the secret to making something of this scenarios as the allies is to try to break through in the center at all cost. Any prolongued lingering on the beach will be severely punished by the German artillery.

[edocentric]

This is admittedly one of my weaker maps as I don't have a very coherent strategy on either side other than bombs away with the German Artillery and try to get the US armor off the beach and make a push inland. It's quite a hard task for the US player to win here as you'll waste a lot of movement getting the units on shore, let alone getting them into position to battle.

German Strategy: While the unit composition is just a mixture of scattered infantry and artillery, the units are well dug in and are hard to uproot. As long as you can pin down the Allied forces on the beach, it's easy pickings for the Germans. The placement of the obstacles on the beach also serves to slow down the advancing troops. A big miss for me on this map was using Behind Enemy Lines to get one of my center section German infantry units in position for close assault on the US armor with no retreat path and then not scoring a single hit - that set me up poorly for when Magnus could get his units deployed in the center section. A remarkable run of cards allowed me to salvage the situation with a 6-3 victory in the first round.

US Strategy: This one is tricky as the US player only gets 4 cards so a bad draw puts you behind the eight ball in trying to mount a concerted attack. Cards like Barrage and Behind Enemy Lines work well for the US player as you can use it to target the Artillery unit on the left flank. If you can knock out that unit early on you actually have a good shot of winning this scenario outright as you can flood the zone with units to overwhelm the lone German infantry and then pick up another easy medal with the undefended town of Colleville-sur-Mer. Then it becomes a mop up exercise as you move through the back side of the center section while staying out of reach of the other German artillery unit. Alas, I had a fairly bad initial draw with minimal unit movement options so it became more an exercise of can I get to 3 medals before Magnus gets to 6. Almost pulled it out but the last volley from my US armor failed me and I drop the second round 6-2 to Magnus.

A good match up with Magnus! Looking forward to our next CSI Memoir 44 battle!