Auto-Saharan Theatre Selector
Seeing as there was no selector for these guy in the Duel in the Sun book I thought I'd try my hand at making one. All feedback appreciated, I did post it to the Facebook group but just got likes and no actual feedback, which while nice to have doesn't tell me anything.
Auto-Saharan Platoon List
The Auto-Saharan Companies (Compagnie Auto-Avio-Sahariane) were Italian military units specialised in long range patrols of the Desert. The units operated from the late 1930s until the Italian surrender in 1943. Auto-Saharan forces were similar to the British Long Range Desert Group (LRDG) in composition and function except that the Auto-Saharan forces had the support of their own air arm to assist in long range reconnaissance and ground attack. An Italian force for the Auto-Saharan Platoon list must comprise of one or more Reinforced Platoons picked from the following theatre selector.
Each Platoon is made up as follows:
Auto-Saharan Platoon
1 Lieutenant – First or Second 2 Regular Infantry Sections or Colonial Troops Infantry Sections plus:
Headquarters
0-1 Captain or Major 0-1 Medic team 0-1 Air Observer
Infantry
0-3 Infantry Sections: Regular Infantry Sections, Colonial troops infantry sections.or a maximum of 1 Bersaglieri squad (representing the Arditi).
0-1 Machine Gun team. 0-1 Anti-tank team: Solothurn anti-tank rifle team.
Artillery
0-1 gun from: Anti-tank gun 47/32 Elefantino. Anti-Aircraft Gun: Breda 20mm AA gun.
*Armoured Cars
0-3 Armoured Cars or Recce vehicle from: Sahariana,
Tanks, Self-Propelled Guns and Anti-Aircraft Vehicles
0-2 Vehicles from AT Trucks, AA trucks.
Transport and Tows
0-1 transport vehicle per infantry unit in the reinforced platoon from: Fiat 508 CM, Trucks,
Special Rules
• Must Be Mobile: There must be enough transport vehicles in a Auto-Saharan platoon for every soldier to ride and any artillery must have a tow if taken.
• Rapid Reaction Force: Auto-Saharan platoons Do Not get the ‘Defensive Strategy’ special rules and gets the Rapid Reaction Force rules below instead:
o In scenarios with an attacker and a defender, if the Italian player is not the attacker after rolling, you must re-roll that dice – the second result stands. Note that in an Auto-Saharan vs Auto-Saharan battle neither player gets to re-roll.
o If the Auto-Saharan force is the attacker they get the below Rapid Reaction Force special rules.
- During set-up and the first turn of the game enemy units may not be placed on ambush as they are taken by surprise by the Auto-Saharan’s sudden appearance.
- The Auto-Saharan player may re-roll the die on the Air Strike chart – the second result stands. Auto-Saharan forces worked in close concert with their air support.
- Auto-Saharan units do not get the -1 to order checks while out-flanking.
Additional Units:
AT Truck
The Elefantino 47/32 anti-tank gun was the most common Italian anti-tank gun of the war. It was mounted onto a range of trucks such as the SPA TL.37 and the Lancia 3RO which were both used by the Auto-Saharan companies. Principal service: 1938–43. Numbers manufactured: Unknown.
Cost: 52pts (Inexperienced), 65pts (Regular), 78pts (Veteran)
Weapons: 1 light anti-tank gun on open platform with 360-degree arc of fire
Damage Value: 6+ (Soft-skin)
Posted Feb 5, 2016, 11:21 AM UTC · edited
Looks good, would like to see this fight an LRDG platoon. I really like the special rules as well, although they may be a little strong
That's my concern, though the forces loses half it's normal national rules (the good half) and gains those instead. They also only come into effect when attacking and not all missions have an attacker and defender.
True, but if they are on the attack they have a pretty major advantage.
They look really good though, it would make for some interesting scenarios.
The same as the Italian defensive special rules. Which work in a limited number of scenarios and not always but when they do give huge bonuses. I'd argue that these are less effective than the defensive bonuses and there are 3 attacking bonuses as opposed to 4 defensive bonuses.
I think you need to weigh it up against the Avanti Savoia rule as well. This list can't take veteran infantry and has lots of soft skinned vehicles. So you could easily find yourself 3 dice down very quickly and then it's all uphill from there.