People play wargames for many reasons. Some play because they like to work out their frustrations by committing acts of violence on paper and cardboard. Some play for the suspense and uncertainty, while others enjoy getting a hands-on experience of military history. Still others enjoy planning operations and seeing them evolve and/or unravel. It is for this last group that Leros, The Gamers cruise to the Aegean, will have a special appeal.
Many of the TCS titles so far released concern battles, like Stonne or Krasni Bor, that are not exactly household words. Leros is another such obscure battle, but the point here is not the magnitude or importance of the battle but the tactical situation which is, in this case, a combined sea and air invasion. Indeed, one of the strengths of the TCS is that there are numerous unexplored engagements from WWII that, even if they lack the historical significance of Kursk or Normandy, are, in themselves, interesting microcosms of the war at large, offering rich tactical playgrounds.
Leros depicts the German combined air and sea invasion of a small, hourglass-shaped, 7-8 miles long Aegean island, garrisoned by a British infantry brigade. The Germans have a hodgepodge of airborne and ground units. Their task is first to land and secure part of the island and then to bring on reinforcements of heavy weapons and artillery. After that, they have to force the British surrender to garrison, mostly by inflicting casualties. The battle therefore has distinct stages: the German landings, consolidation and the long wait for reinforcements while the British counterattack, and then the island's mop-up (provided the Germans survive). The exercise had no other goal than to eject the British garrison from the island and show the Turks, who were then leaning toward the Allied camp, that the fun-loving old Reich still had some sharp teeth in its scarred maw.
All of the TCS games have their own peculiar conditions and problems. Leros has the German making a fast grab for some chunk of the island and digging in until he develops the strength to subdue the British garrison. The problem here is the British shore batteries (a lot of them, with a lot of firepower). The bulk of the first German forces on Leros land on beaches. All of the beaches are covered by overlapping fire from shore batteries. Some of the landing zones are covered by enough batteries to make any landing there all but impossible. The German airborne landing (a battalion) has to worry about numerous flak guns scattered around the island, not to mention the British response when they hit the ground.
The next problem is that the Germans cannot land any of their artillery, larger mortars or vehicles (no panzers here, just two SP flak guns) without taking some of the piers around the island. The third complicating factor is the weather. Bad weather stops incoming seaborne reinforcements. In other words, a harried and dug-in German force that has spent long hours waiting for the big guns to drive off those persistent Brits may see their hopes blown back to sea by bad weather. Although the German is the attacker, once he has landed, he may easily spend a large part of the game defending against a British counterattack before he has the strength to start an offensive to finish the invasion.
The British are, of course, the defenders but their best defense is going to be an offense if they have any hope of holding Leros. They have to hit the Germans while they are still dispersed and unreinforced, all the while looking anxiously over their shoulders for incoming German reinforcements landing behind them. With a command system in which orders may take a long time to implement, the British have to plan for surprises and contingencies far in advance and correctly anticipate German moves. Neither side has an easy task in Leros.
The campaign game covers as many as 6 days. At 20 minutes per (daylight) turn, that is a lot of game turns to plan, implement and execute unit orders, so the TCS command system gets a thorough work-out … and so do the players, provided they have the time and space to set up this real monster. Smaller scenarios are provided for specific actions, but most of these are so one-sided they serve better as training scenarios. The heart of the game is indeed the campaign scenario.
The historical campaign scenario gives the German landing sites that, to my mind at least, make little sense: their landing zones are covered by some big coastal guns that drive off much of the first wave. Those sites contain few of the desperately needed piers and one site in particular is nothing but a corked bottle à la Bermuda Hundred. That the Germans actually won the battle using this plan gives great credit to their fighting prowess and makes one wonder just how disorganized the British defense must have been.
I found the best way to play Leros was to use free deployments and free German landings. This at least gives the Germans a shot at seizing a pier where they don't get pounded to pieces by shore batteries. Correct combinations of air drops and coastal invasions may secure a strong and reinforceable beachhead. The British in turn have a chance of anticipating the best German landing sites and creating a reaction force with the correct orders for countering the opening German moves. Note that if the German finds it, there is a very interesting opening gambit that could win the game if the British are unaware of and unprepared for it. Leros' topography (as rugged as Crete) offers not only many choice sites for defense lines but also concealed approaches that allow the same to be infiltrated or unhinged. The steep broken terrain also makes it hard to establish lines of sight for direct and indirect fire.
The island's rough terrain, the possibility of bad weather and an overall situation where either player may, at different phases of the battle, may be on the defense or offense (sometimes simultaneously), combined with 6 full days to let the battle develop and evolve make Leros a worthwhile, if time-consuming, addition to the TCS line.
CAPSULE COMMENTS
Graphic Presentation: Very good. The machine-guns don't look like mortars this time.
Playability: All in the eye of the beholder. The TCS is always a serious undertaking. Add to that the length and you've got a major time investment.
Replayability: Use free deployments and landings and it's a wide-open situation.
Creativity: The more I play these TCS games, the better they look.
Historicity: Who’d know? Historically realistic tactics.
Wristage: A good warm-up for the arm-wrestling event in Atlanta this summer.
Comparisons: Smaller than Omaha and a lot less bloodier.
Overall: One of the more maneuver-oriented TCS entries. Fun, but long.
from THE GAMERS
Three maps, 560 counters, Series rules, Game rules, charts; Boxed. The Gamers, 500 W. 4th St. Homer, Ill, 61849. $36?
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© Copyright 1994 by Richard Berg
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