This rather breezy item is the throw-away included with the Proud Monster add-on issue, Death and Destruction, or “Ty Does D&D”, which is little more than umpteen hundred more Russian Front counters for those who were not satisfied with the first umpteen-hundred they got. Personally, I felt that Gazala was the main offering, as I have no desire to revisit “The Land That Hated ZOCs … and the Gamers That Loved It” in the near future. As for Gazala, it appears that the irrepressible Tyrone was so favorably impressed with MiH’s Triumphant Fox that he donned his best Karloff-as-demented-scientist demeanor to see if he could successfully transplant it onto the Budapest ‘45 system. Well, if Design for Effect is your way to go, you’ll find this a snappy, and rather playable, game. What I found most interesting is how good the Beth Queman map looked, especially compared to such recent disasters as Piercing the Reich. The counters are the usual, NY Times Large Print specials, except that they don’t have much print on them … and there are not very many, either. Actually, there is one more than you need to play the game. Smack in the middle of the counter mix is the “5G”, which starts in hex 2913, and comes in the same flavor (butterscotch) as the rest of the Brit armor. Well, we spent about a half an hour trying to (a) find out the unit’s strengths; then (b) find out what the unit was (5th Grenadier Guards? … 5th Gazalian Wogslappers?…5 gaudy Gurkhas …?) until it dawned on us - Nobel Prize winners that we are - that this was an extra counter for Budapest ‘45. That it was a corps-sized unit we didn’t spot, as the unit starts flipped. We also didn’t spot the beyond minuscule print on the counter tree - 2 point font? - stating where the unit belonged. Ty prefaces his designer’s notes with the comment that “ … you can eat a sausage from both ends.” True, although the application to wargame design is somewhat obscure, despite Ty’s best efforts to make it relevant. One could also add such aphorisms as “It’s all goulash to me …” and “Don’t look now, but here comes Erwin…” and be just as literary. What we do have with Gazala is a tasty stew of Libyan goulash, with this rather interesting, albeit shopworn situation, being combined with XTR’s Budapest ‘45 system with much the same results as in “The Fly”: a bit scary to contemplate the theories behind the move, but, nonetheless, interesting and fun to watch in progress. Unlike TF, Gazala has lots of space and not many counters; actually less than 50 combat units. Also unlike TF, Ty’s Gazala has lots of free-wheeling movement and a half-chance for the Brits. It’s all Igo-Hugo, crash and bash, a rather free-wheeling slugfest that emphasizes action rather than insight. What differentiates it from a ‘70’s quad game is that all units are inverted (hidden) and the combat results are a steady stream of strength/step reductions of which you keep track, accounting-style. The burden of attack is on the Axis, and it is the Axis player who must pay close attention to what nuances the situation offers, especially the supply situations, which may be generic (infinite line time) but are still important. If Ty was trying to show he could design a game entirely different from T-Fox he sure succeeded, as the feel of Gazala is so entirely unlike that of the former that they’re almost two distinct situations. Where in TF the Allies have an almost impossible task in switching units from one locale to another, the Commonwealth starts shifting units around like a three-card monte game almost from the start. In the two games we played, the Allies were counter-attacking right from the start. Not that this is a recommended strategy, but the feeling is that, with only 5 German panzer units to worry about, whittling them down ab initio seems to be the way to go. There was so much sturm und drang in the first 5 turns, and so many units were at about half their strength, that it soon became obvious that half the 26 turns would prove unnecessary with aggressive players. Possibly the best recommendation came from one of the players, the ubiquitous Carl Gruber, fearless foe of Krimsters worldwide, who remarked, while watching our own Fox blast two of his panzers into sands mites, that “…this was more like it,” referring to the usual “Command” offerings. We agreed. What Gazala lacked in insight - other than what Ty wants you to have - it sure made up in action. CAPSULE COMMENTS: When you get #32, dump all those Eastfront cardboard divisions into a box, set the box aside for when your social life hits rock bottom, and have a go at Gazala. Good, manly fun. from XTR 22” x 33” map; 61 counters; Play Aid Chart; part of Command #34’s game-included subscription. Inquiring minds can reach Ty & Co. at 1-805-546-9596 Back to Berg's Review of Games Vol. II # 19 Table of Contents Back to Berg's Review of Games List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1994 by Richard Berg This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com