I finally met Iain Cheyne yesterday evening, and played him at Rommel in the Desert. We have been meaning to do this for about two years, but our diaries only coincided yesterday. We played the Gazala scenario, with Iain as the Axis. We're both relatively new to the game so we were a bit intimidated by the rules and the bewildering choices available at the start. Iain kicked off with a big advance towards Tobruk inflicting heavy losses on my infantry that stood in the way. However stong reinforcements were on their way up the coast road from Egypt, and I was able to do a short left hook and isolate his two attacking groups. Iain failed to break through the cordon and so a significant force was disrupted and later destroyed, including two of his elite armour units. After that my attack lost steam and I failed to capitalize on my victory. With the last of my supplies I did a quick run down the coast road to seize Benghazi, but Iain was able to pull back in the Buildup phase, and supplies were too depleted for either of us to do much with the second month. I finished with a Positional Victory.
This is an amazing wargame, incredibly tense and exciting, and very true to the dynamics of the desert campaign. Richly deserves its classic status.
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