There are a bunch of different tactical systems out there, and most of them are very good, but some are much better than others. There is always a new designer that will add some new tricks to make a new experience. Such is the case with Assault Red Horizon 41 from Assault Games that we played in 2021 and really enjoyed. This game made my Top 10 Wargames of 2021! coming in at #3 and we really enjoyed our plays of the game and have been looking forward to the planned expansions and future entries into the system as it was really that good. They are now launching a new big box addition covering the Italian invasion during WWII called Assault Sicily 43: Gela Beachhead, which dropped on Gamefound October 13th. I reached out to the designer Wolfgang Klein to get some information about the game and he was more than willing to answer my legion questions.

If you are interested in Assault Sicily 43: Gela Beachhead, you can check out the Gamefound campaign page at the following link: https://gamefound.com/en/projects/assault-games/assaultsicily43#/section/what-is-in-the-box-21001

Grant: Congratulations on your 2 published games to date including Assault Red Horizon 41 and the expansion Assault Red Horizon 41 TAS/OAS. What lessons have you learned from designing these 2 games and their marketing, production and distribution?

Wolfgang: Thanks for that! And also thanks to you and everyone else who supports us!

The feedback we get about Red Horizon 41 is really outstanding. We take every suggestion, every hint seriously and player feedback was key to moving from V 1.0 to V 2.0 of the game system.

With Assault Red Horizon 41 we entered a new journey for us. We had never produced, marketed or distributed a board game before. This meant that we had a very steep learning curve to overcome.

In principle, however, I have found that without you reviewer enthusiasts and wargame lovers, it would never work to successfully bring such a game to market. We are based in Germany and are grateful for you providing a voice for our games across the world through your internet presence. As far as distribution is concerned, I have to admit that with smaller print runs like with our Red Horizon 41, no large distributors and retailers can be approached. We can’t meet their profit margins with our production prices. Therefore, with a few exceptions, we can currently only offer the games through our webshop (www.assault-games.com). We are currently doing very well, so we expect the first edition of Red Horizon 41 to be sold out soon.

But that is secondary for us.

Assault Games remains a hobby for us. The important thing is that our games can be realized at all and that there are players who enjoy playing them.

As far as production is concerned, we will stay with our current manufacturer. The quality of the components will be just as excellent as in Red Horizon 41.

In general, however, a lot has changed in the artwork / design. Especially the maps, which are much more detailed and realistic. There our artist Michael has done a very good job.

Grant: What do you hope to do differently or improve upon with future titles? 

Wolfgang: Logistically, we want to do things differently for Assault Sicily 43. We are in contact with companies in the USA to set up a hub there. We will know if we will succeed after the Gamefound crowdfunding campaign – because a second hub is of course dependent on the number of backers. As a minimum goal we have decided to give the fulfillment into other’s hands. Currently, I personally pack every Red Horizon 41 package and take it to the post office. I have to get rid of this work. I would much rather put this time into the development of new modules.

As far as marketing, distribution and the upcoming Gamefound campaign is concerned, we are much better prepared this time. The Kickstarter campaign for our Red Horizon 41 was our first of this kind and caused a lot of stress.

Now we already had pre-production samples of Assault Sicily 43 made. This has already been sent to some reviewers. With this we hope to have much more content online for our interested players by the start of the campaign at the latest. This way our backers will be able to get more information about the game than was the case with Red Horizon 41.

As far as the game system is concerned, we want to try to stay with v2.0 for a longer time in order to collect more feedback. 

Grant: What is your upcoming title Assault Sicily 43: Gela Beachhead?

Wolfgang: Assault Sicily 43 will be the first title in our Western Front Series. Just like Red Horizon 41 (Eastern Front), it is a stand-alone game that takes place on a tactical level.

This time there are three factions in the box: Italians, Germans and Americans. The focus of the battles in Assault Sicily 43 is the American landing section near Gela (a harbor town in southern Sicily) and the airborne operations in the rear carried out the night before.

Assault Sicily 43 contains about 40 different scenarios which can be played individually. In addition, there is a dynamic campaign around the Gela Beachhead. This campaign simulates the first two days of the landing with the counterattacks of the Italians and Germans. It can be played historically or fictionally.

In order to offer Red Horizon 41 players an extra value, we have also added a scenario for the combination of both games, Red Horizon 41 and Sicily 43.

Grant: What is the timeline for its crowdfunding campaign on Gamefound?

Wolfgang: The Gamefound campaign will start on October 13, 2023, and our goal would be to complete production in the first or second quarter of 2024. Subject to external influences, we should be able to ship after that.

Grant: Who is your codesigner Erich Rankl? What do each of you bring to the partnership?

Wolfgang: Erich and I met over 30 years ago during our school days. He is my best friend and constant companion in all situations. Already during our school days we started to develop different wargames. Military technology, strategy and tactics over different eras always fascinated us. But most of the concepts were never finished <lol>.

Erich served as an Panzergrenadier squadleader in the army and I in the technical branch on a frigate in the navy. In civilian life, we are both engineers. Erich is a civil engineer and I work in military logistics project management.

I think we both complement each other very well. Erich is an absolute expert on the various units, weapons and warfare of the past. He has an “elephant’s memory” full of data, purposes and modes of operation of the weapons technology of all nations at that time. He is virtually an encyclopedia. He loves complex games and has no problem to play titles like War in the Pacific or War in the East to the last detail.

He brings this detailed knowledge to the definition of the Unit Cards. He is responsible for the statistics behind the units and the dice that the players ultimately hold. On top of that, he deals with the Formation Cards, i.e., I define the campaign plot and he defines the formations that go with it, which then determines which units are available to the players.

I think my focus is in the creative area. My strength is to hold the strings together, to have the overview and to develop a vision. To do this, I do a lot of research and reading about how the battles of that era unfolded – then think about what a tactical campaign / order-of-battle might look like for it – what terrain pieces are necessary, finish the prototypes and then coordinate the work with Michael our artist.

New ideas and suggestions are always discussed between us to see if they fit into the overall concept and provide the optimal balance between playability and simulation.

Everything else… – laugh – I am then the so-called one-man-show. i.e. everything else until the finished game is my work. Writing: rulebooks, campaign book, game aids, card design, parts lists,… Management: Production planning, marketing, sales, webshop,…. all this is created and implemented on my PC.

Grant: What about the fighting in Italy during WWII is most important to model?

It was important for us to show the differences between the factions. The Americans had a lot of equipment, a good supply situation but little combat experience. The Germans had to fight on difficult terrain with a mixture of troops, some of them experienced but not very well coordinated. And the poorly equipped Italians had already lost most of their good quality troops in North Africa and were now facing a foe with immense superiority.

Grant: What research did you do to get the details correct? What one must read source would you recommend?

Wolfgang: I must say that my library has been enriched by many books in the course of the research. To single out one would not be fair. There are many good titles. I will mention a few of them.

In order to understand the overall subject of the landings in Sicily, I had to work my way through numerous books and internet sources. In doing so, I tried to utilize various sources English, American, German and Italian.

For example, for troop deployment we relied a lot on George F. Nafziger’s Order of Battle.

The fighting is described in some good books like Carlo D’Este’s Bitter Victory, Sicily 43 by James Holland, Edmund Theil Kampf um Italien, Helmut Wilhelmsmeyer Der Krieg in Italien 1943-1945 or also the Kriegstagebuch des OKH 1943 Teilband 6 and many more.

The weapons technology and basics for the units definition comes from various reference books such as F.M. von Senger and Etterlin (Die deutschen Panzer 1926-1945), Fritz Hahn (Waffen und Geheimwaffen des deutschen Heeres 1933-1945).

Grant: What is the scale of the design? Force structure of the units?

Wolfgang: The game simulates the tactical level of battles so each of the counters represent a single man or a few men. The players have troops in the strength of one to two platoons or, in the case of larger battle scenarios, reinforced companies.

The players command the individual vehicles, guns, infantry squads or teams and move them around the board taking objectives, destroying enemy troops and vehicles and trying to control the battlefield.

For the Gela Beachhead campaign, players will receive a larger contingent of combat formations to lead the battle over the two days of the landing with a much more diverse offering of troop types and vehicles.

Grant: What is new to the Assault System other than the geography?

Wolfgang: I have to say that the Assault System is now growing up. Besides the minor rule inconsistencies that have been fixed, there are a few new things to be found. 

The first is that the rulebook is now in version 2.0. and this version can also be used for Red Horizon 41. 

In the rule version 2.0, the Assault System gets some new features. 

For example, we have added more details to the game terrain. There are now fortifications like bunkers, MG nests, trenches as well as obstacles like barbed wire, minefields and tank barriers integrated.

We’ve completely reworked and redesigned the close combat chapter. Close combat is even faster and feels more intense now.

We have introduced new action and status markers: hide action, hidden and ambush. With these, you can now sneak up on certain units and prepare ambushes. This will be very interesting and exciting later on especially in modules with urban battles -watch out spoilers!> lol.

We have integrated the single box Tactical Air and Artillery Support (TA/OAS) Expansion for Red Horizon 41 into the box for Sicily 43 and accordingly into the rulebook.

There are some new rules for the players like the Command Point Focus which does not need to be planned and can be used spontaneously in the battle. Units can now also combine their fire with the Joint Fire rule.

And so that the battle does not always have to be led to the bitter end, we have invented the Troop Status Board (Troop Management Board = name for the pre-production sample) for the troops of the players.

At this point we would like to thank all those who gave us feedback. Of course, we have incorporated many of these ideas, comments and suggestions into this version 2.0.

Grant: What do you feel this system offers that other tactical systems don’t?

Wolfgang: I won’t presume to know every other tactical system out there but I am convinced that this system serves the niche well between a veteran wargamer and the younger casual player.

Because of our Formation Card mechanics, this system offers extremely high replay value. No two battles are the same and players can choose their Order of Battle quasi-randomly or deliberately. This adds a lot of variety.

The Assault Game System is very focused on game flow and little downtime. Once the game mechanics are understood, players don’t have to constantly look at flowcharts or tables to progress.

It plays very intuitively and feels right. The rules are easy to understand, well structured and very logical.

Our dice system is extremely easy to understand. The different colors represent the possible strength of the dice result. It is very quick and easy to estimate what the possibilities of success or failure are at any given moment. For e.g. there is always a defense roll to avoid the frustrating aspects of many other games and to avoid that you just can’t do anything against many actions.

In this way, we focus on the game experience, on the mission. And that should be the focus, in my opinion.

Perhaps a postscript to the gameplay. In the Assault System, the underlying statistics regulate all the emotional states of the players – from feeling superior to despair because an important action went wrong and you suddenly lost the initiative.

Despite everything, the games are exciting until the last turn.

Grant: What roles do the Formation Cards play? How can they be different in each game?

Wolfgang: There are three different categories of Formation Cards, one for each type of unit: infantry, artillery and vehicles. The combined strength of all units on the individual Formation Cards are deliberately designed to be pretty much comparable with each other. For example, a US Artillery Formation Card has the same strength points value total as a German Tank Formation Card. This means that if you play an encounter battle with the same number of troops, both players will usually have the same number of Formation Cards.

The Formation Cards tell the players which individual units they are leading into the battle and how many of them. As well as this, the cards will indicate the experience level of these units, (recruit, regular, hardened, veteran, elite). Further information is also provided on the number of available Command Points, (for activation), and higher formation, (the historical name of the next level of the command structure).

Each scenario specifies what type of Formation Cards the players are allowed to have and their setup. These Formation Cards are drawn randomly, to simulate that as a military leader (e.g. company commander) you cannot always choose which units you have to command. The Formation Cards also speed up the game because you don’t have to choose every single unit and check with the point values to check whether the game is balanced. I have already explained the Unit Cards themselves. Each type of unit listed on the Formation Card will have an equivalent Unit Card. Players will only need one Unit Card for each type of unit. Its purpose is to provide all the necessary information that the players need to know about their unit counters on the map tiles in order to play the game. This includes how they move and attack, how well protected they are when under fire, their special abilities and any attributes they have, good and bad.

Grant: Can you show us a few examples of the Formation Cards and what information is found on them?

Wolfgang: Each card will state what type of formation it is, (in this example a Ranger Platoon), and list the different units that the player will have, if they draw it. It will also show which historical command the formation belonged to during the war.

Grant: What are the Unit Cards and what information is found on them? Can you show us a few examples and tell us the differences between the German/Italian and American forces?

Wolfgang: Yes, of course. Below is the explanation of the Unit Card. For more information, please refer to the the rulebook which is available on online at our website (Download)

Each type of unit listed on the Formation Card will have an equivalent Unit Card. Players will only need one Unit Card for each type of unit. Its purpose is to provide all the necessary information that the players need to know about their unit counters on the map tiles in order to play the game. This includes how they move and attack, how well protected they are when under fire, their special abilities and any attributes they have, good or bad.

When creating the Unit Cards, we took care to take into account the historical composition and equipment of the units at that time. For example, in ’43 most German standard rifle squads consisted of 10 soldiers: 1 Gruppenführer, 1 light machine gun and 8 riflemen. The equipment was as follows: 1 MP-40 (submachinegun), 1 MG42 (light mg), 8 Karabiner 89k (bolt action rifle).

On the US side, there were equipped differently, with fully and semiautomatic weapons e.g. the M1 Garand or M1918A2 BAR. These groups were superior to the German rifle groups at shorter distances. This fact can be seen on the unit cards (compare the dice for infantry targets):

Another example is the comparison of vehicles. While the Italians had old and weak tanks, the US had light and medium tanks at their disposal. The Italian guns had real problems stopping the US tanks. You can see below the values of the Italian 3.7cm gun of the Renault R35 (top row right of the tank’s symbol) and estimate the probability of penetrating the Sherman’s frontal armor (two red and one blue dice on the shield left of the tank). In contrast, it was much easier for the 7.5 cm of the Sherman to penetrate the R-35 at his front armor.)

Additional to that, the Renault tank had an engine with considerable lower horespower. We have represented this fact with the “slow”attribute.

Among others, a unit of the 504th Heavy Armored Section with 17 Tiger tanks was stationed at Sicily. This unit was deployed on the day of the landings to throw the American troops back into the sea. This did not happen because American airborne troops had landed in the rear the night before. Armed with bazookas, these light troops posed a serious threat to the cats at short range.

The Italians had numerous very lightly armored and smaller vehicles. One variant was the L3 equipped with a flamethrower. Extremely dangerous to its opponents, but weakly armored. The Americans did not land with heavy weapons until later. Thus, the lighter guns were the first units to land in Sicily to provide fire support. The 37mm ATG is very low in height and therefore harder to detect.

Grant: We know that the units are represented by hex shaped counters. What was the reason for this choice?

Wolfgang: The  important thing, the hex is part of our company’s logo. Just kidding! No, a good question! These units in the hexagon have the advantage of a more precise directional representation. So it is quite easy to see where the areas of impact of the unit are.

Now, with additional content, the hex form becomes important when it comes to the setup of fortifications, for example.  

Grant: What is the anatomy of these counters and can you show us a few examples of different units?

Wolfgang: Every Infantry, artillery and vehicle unit is represented in Assault by a counter. These counters have a front and reverse side. Units at full strength are placed on their front side and are flipped to their reverse side when they have suffered damage points equal to half their original strength. Their full and half-strengths are noted by the use of heart symbols on their unit cards. Here is a look at several different counters.

Grant: What is Experience Level and why was this important to include?

Wolfgang: If you want to represent units in the game historically accurate, then you can’t avoid representing them with their experience as well. For example, Experience Level plays a role in our Formation Cards. The Italian coastal brigades were more or less reserve units with little training and experience. Thus, we represented most of them as Recruits. In contrast, some German units are by combat experience, Veteran or Elite.  

Furthermore, the Experience Level is also a nice feature in our campaign games. For example, after the battles, the surviving units of the players can gain experience and thus get an advantage in the next battle.

Grant: How are units activated in the game?

Wolfgang: In general the Assault Game System offers two ways of activating units:

  1. Players use the optional rules of Command Points, allowing them to activate one unit for each Command Point spent.
  2. Players who do not use the Command Points, allowing each player to activate all of their units during a turn.

If players choose to play with Command Points then it is getting more interesting:

Command Points simulate the prioritization of orders during a scenario. In a combat situation, the company, platoon or squad leader must react decisively and doesn’t always have the time to worry about all of his subordinate units.

Each turn, the player only has a certain number of Command Points available so it will be impossible to fully activate every unit that is available on the battlefield. Instead, players assign all but three Command Points (Command Focus) to units or Tactical Air/Off-board Artillery Support Cards to decide which units to activate. This happens in the Planning Phase.

Command Focus: The three remaining Command Points simulate a kind of Command Focus and allow the player to activate additional units spontaneously during a turn, independently of the planned units.

During the Planning Phase, each faction has a limited number of Command Points and Command Cards at their disposal. Be aware that, generally, there will not be enough Command Points to activate every unit. The player will need to plan ahead and to think tactically to compensate for the shortage of Command Points. A unit can only be activated once per game turn. Special effects and Command Cards can create exceptions to this rule. Both players must take the following actions during the Planning Phase: draw Command Cards, assign all available Command Points to the Unit Cards. Not all actions require the player to use a Command Point. Those that don’t are called Free Actions. Free Actions include such things as:

·  Playing a Command Card

·  Artillery responding to armor overrun attempt

·  Passing

·  Artillery changing facing in Support Phase

·  Emergency Disembark of transported units

Grant: What aspects of tactical combat have been abstracted?

Wolfgang: One aspect is the composition of the units. This means that not every soldier is represented individually but the unit is given strength points instead. A full infantry squad, which would normally have 10 or more soldiers, has 4 strength points. An infantry team (e.g. heavy machine gun squad) with around 5 men has 2 strength points.

Another aspect is that we have not directly represented the leadership structure or military leaders, as counters in the game. Instead, we have created the Command Cards. These bring some of the leadership aspects into play, such as increasing morale, special abilities and so on. We do have plans for implementing more in this direction later, in future expansions, but not for the moment!

We have also abstracted the behavior of soldiers under stressful conditions. Suffering casualties or coming under fire means there is a chance they will become Suppressed. This means that the combat stress caused by excessive fire, wounding and casualties has become so high that the soldiers throw themselves into the dirt and keep their heads down. This gives them a temporary advantage in defense, but also prevents them from taking any further action. If this suppressed unit is then suppressed again by another result, they start to disengage and perform a retreat. This is how we have tried to include the issue of Troop Morale. We are really pleased with how we have managed to incorporate the luck factor into the game. In real combat, training but also personal luck often determines whether an action is successful, and its consequences. With our dice system, we have a statistical basis for estimating results, but also a dose of luck that makes them a little harder to predict.

This luck is particularly important for players when they are presented with an unequally matched combat. In the Assault System you can theoretically fight with any unit. Even with a truck you could defend yourself against an attacker in close combat. Thus, we have simulated the two crew members in the truck. Should you want to attack a truck unit in close combat, there is a small chance that the two men (driver and passenger) will fight their way out. It is a somewhat comical situation but quite conceivable in reality. Imagine the boasting rights of players if they achieve it though! Perhaps a better example is the unequal fight of infantry against tanks. Which, by the way, was common practice on the various fronts. In the Assault System, every Infantry Unit has a certain number of dice against tanks. Now any unit, no matter how weak, can damage or incapacitate a tank with a certain amount of luck. We have achieved this by abstracting the targeted use of explosives, (or other objects), in such a way that it is possible to bring a tank to a halt. The player with the Infantry Unit can now decide whether they want to try and damage the tank generally or whether they will take a more high risk strategy and specifically aim to destroy its drive train (e.g. engine, tracks,…). If they fail, they do nothing to the tank. If they succeed, they will prevent it from grabbing a Victory Hex or wreaking havoc on another part of the map. In the area of movement tactics, we do not have separate action markers for each type of movement. We only distinguish between Normal Actions and Fast Actions. This helps us to make the game less cumbersome with fewer rules, and to promote an enjoyable, smooth flow.

We have limited ourselves with the different types of terrain represented in the game. There was a very long discussion about the topic of elevation levels and there were several rule changes. We did not want any ambiguities to lead to arguments between the players and thus spoil the fun of the game. Assessing things like the effects of different terrain types and hills should be able to happen quickly to keep the pace going.

Grant: Why were these aspects chosen to abstract and what was your intent in the abstraction?

Wolfgang: Most of the abstractions are there to ensure a playing time that is realistic for players with busy lives and to provide a smooth flow to the game. If all the scenarios in the Assault Game System lasted a full day, there would be less incentive for players to try out the campaign, with a number of connected battles. It would simply take forever to progress through it. That said, there is nothing to stop players setting up a much larger game and playing all day if that’s what they want to do. The flexibility and modularity of the system makes it very easy to do this. Another reason for our abstractions was to reduce the downtime in the game. We did not want players micromanaging their units. I mentioned before that the early versions of the design had each soldier and vehicle represented individually. This would be great for the player doing it, but also potentially boring for their opponent, as they wait for them to finish. Ultimately, our goal was to produce a game that fitted nicely into the niche between hardcore wargame and the very casual – for it to have the broadest appeal. Thus, the level of complexity and the playing times of 1-3 hours per battle (depending on the scenario) felt perfect to us.

Grant: What advantage does the use of map tiles give the game?

Wolfgang: The map tiles are geomorphic so that they can be put together in a number of ways, which adds variety to the different set ups we can make available to players. They are also deliberately designed so they can be interlocked. This has the advantage that you have continuous terrain at the map edges. In wargames with straight rectangular maps, there are hexes cut in half. Because of these half hexes, it can make the placement of units physically difficult or just confusing. How often have you seen threads on BGG or Consimworld where people ask if half hexes can be used? The half hexes can also, (in the sense of LOS), create free corridors to fire down. We wanted to prevent this and therefore have only whole hexes at the edges with the possibility of mapping the corresponding terrain there.

Grant: What are the Training Scenarios? How many are there and what broad topic are covered?

Wolfgang: As in Red Horizon 41, there are two training scenarios in Sicily 43. One with only infantry and one with only vehicles. These scenarios allow players to learn and practice the basic mechanics of the game system without optional rules. The scenarios are designed to last from 30 minutes to an hour of gameplay. Once players can play these scenarios without difficulty, they are ready for any further missions.

Grant: How does combat work in the design?

Wolfgang: In the Assault System there are different types of combat; Ranged Fire, Close Combat and Off-Board Air or Artillery Support.

Ranged Fire is split into Indirect and Direct Fire. Indirect Fire takes place in a Support Phase before any movement and Direct Fire and allows players to soften up their opponents for an attack. Indirect Fire will be things like mortars and artillery.

Direct Fire and Close Combat come later in the Action Phase. Direct Fire is between units that can directly see each other, and different modifiers will apply. Direct Fire of two adjacent units can also be combined to Joint Fire.

A third type of combat is the Tactical Air and Off-Board Artillery Support. This is integrated through Command Cards and simulates the impact of airstrikes or divisional artillery and ship support from behind the lines.

Essentially all types of combat are opposed dice rolls with the attacker and defender both rolling all the dice they are entitled to and then comparing the outcome of those dice rolls. It’s very easy and quick. Once players are familiar with the different dice they get for various factors, it saves lots of time. There is no math involved!

Grant: What are the different colored dice used for combat? What advantage does this give to your combat system?

Wolfgang: There are four different colored dice with symbols on them. These dice are used for attack and for defense rolls. These dice are also used for special situations such as firing smoke with the mortar or triggering a special effect.

The different colors symbolize the different strengths of the dice. This makes them easy for the players to identify. A red die always means the highest danger for the opponent in an attack. Blue, on the other hand, is rather weak as an attack die.

Look at the table to see the different effects of the dice:

The bullseyes represent hits (one or two hits depending on the number of them on the die face), the X represents suppression and the skull and cross bones represent critical hits. 

The advantage of our combat system is that players do not have to deal with large tables of results and point lists of modifiers. The dice roll against each other provides action and speeds up the game.

Grant: What roles does the Troop Status Board play?

Wolfgang: The Troop Status Board is used to record the effects during combat, such as casualties and pressure. It is important for both players to monitor the current pressure marker.

During a battle, the friendly and enemy troops are under great pressure. Depending on the course of the battle, this pressure can become stronger or weaker and thus trigger certain effects. If the pressure on the troops becomes too strong, they may withdraw or even surrender. The pressure in a battle is influenced by various factors: losses, capturing or losing objectives, special events and time pressure.

Grant: What different scenarios are included?

Wolfgang: There are a total of 40 different scenarios in Sicily 43, and even more with the additional Units & Artwork Book add-on. 28 of them are part of the Gela Beachhead Campaign, but can also be played as individual scenarios.

Players can immerse themselves in the landing of American troops on the beach at Gela, the fierce battles around the town of Gela and in the hinterland to repel the Italian and German counterattacks.

In addition, we have created scenarios of the American airborne landing. These are mostly delaying battles, because these troops were dropped behind Gela in the mountainous terrain to stop or delay the counterattacks. The exciting challenge here is to stop the Axis tanks by attacking their weaker tops with relatively light weapons and all this being done while being outnumbered.

If this number of different scenarios is not enough, the players have the ability to play them non-historically, i.e. the Assault System offers the possibility to simply swap sides in the game setup. This would make the Axis the invaders of Sicily and the Americans the defenders.

Grant: What is the new Campaign System? How does it work? What are the 2 ways it can be played?

Wolfgang: The Gela Beachhead Campaign can be played in two different ways. Once in the standard mode and for the real fans, the optional grognard mode.

The standard mode is ideal for new players entering the Gela Beachhead Campaign. In standard mode, players have a smaller number of so-called Core Formations whose units remain available to the player throughout the entire campaign and can gain experience. Losses of Core Units are replenished after each battle, making this mode somewhat easier to master than grognard mode.

Do you love intense wargames? You spare no effort for interesting gameplay? Then you have come to the right place. The grognard mode is an interesting alternative for more intense gameplay. In the grognard mode, players have a fixed pool of pre-selected Core Formations. These Core Formations can be used depending on the scenario. During the campaign, unit losses are not replenished, so players have to pay much more attention to the available units. To keep track of unit losses in this mode, players would need to document the strength of a formation in the troop roster after each scenario.

Grant: What type of play experience does the Campaign System provide?

Wolfgang: To present the players with an even more intensive way of playing, this box contains the campaign ‘Gela Beachhead’. This is a historically based and fully dynamic campaign in which players have a choice of units to deploy throughout the campaign. The campaign could be set-up either historical or non-historical.

US Rangers and Airborne soldiers face both Italians security forces and German counterattacks by Panzergrenadiers and the Hermann Göring Division, supported by the 504th Heavy Panzer detachment. You can become part of the courageously led assaults on Italian positions by the American airborne troops of the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment dropped the night before the landings.  

With the campaign system, players take on the role of a commander of a contingent (formations) of troops. With these troops, both players must lead the battle for the first two days, July 10 and 11, 1943. To do this, players select the deployed formations when setting up a scenario. Losses of units have a negative effect on the course of the campaign. However, units can also gain experience after a successful battle and thus become better.

Players are encouraged to act carefully with their units and not burn through them. The Troop Status Board is used to monitor the condition of the troops in battle. High casualties during can also cause the troops to abandon the engagement (without giving the player a choice in the matter) and withdraw from the battlefield, rout, or surrender. These results then factor into the scenario outcome and affect the progress of the campaign.

The outcome of a campaign can be historical or it can deviate from it depending on the game play and battle luck. Theoretically, if the game is played optimally, the landing at the Gela Beachhead can driven back into the sea.

Grant: There are several scenarios that include the Americans having just landed on the beach. Are there any special considerations for these scenarios?

Wolfgang: In the Campaign Game, the intro scenario is the initial landing of Darby’s US Rangers on the western part of Gela. I wanted to use this section as a starting point because the Rangers did not have an easy time against the Italian Coast Brigade in the first hours. The beaches were well secured and mined. Some of the Ranger casualties were very high and the will of the Italians to resist was not broken in the first hours. Artillery support was almost impossible in the darkness. Air support was not possible at all. Nevertheless, the Rangers managed to penetrate the city but it took until late morning to fight the city free. 

We have – because it is a dynamic campaign – of course developed different scenarios of the landing depending on the outcome of the battles. If the player does not manage to win in the initial landing, he has to try again with a partial foothold ashore in the second scenario. In this way, we have tried to create a follow-up situation that is as realistic as possible, depending on the outcome of the previous scenario.

Grant: What are a few of your favorite scenarios and why?

Wolfgang: For example, I find the airborne scenario “Into the Dark” very exciting:

9th July 1943, 1145 PM. Northeast of Piano Lupo: The day before the main force landed, the paratroopers of the 505th PIR jumped in the mountainous terrain northeast of Gela in the Piano Lupo area. 

Due to the enemy defensive fire and the resulting chaotic approach, the various units were scattered and only a few airborne soldiers found themselves in the planned landing zone.

In the darkness they were tasked with eliminating enemy defensive positions along the few main roads. A smaller unit of paratroopers under the command of Lieutenant John gathered to take an Italian flak position.

In principle a small tactical situation but very exciting. The US player cannot predict exactly where his Airborne troops will land and whether they will arrive in full strength on the battlefield. The mission, however, is to neutralise and occupy an Italian hilltop position in the rear. Since this action takes place at night, there are special rules such as Darkness to simulate the situation of short LOS and poor visibility. However, since the defenders have flak search lights, causing the Americans to make the best use of the terrain as they approach the objectives.

I also love the “Achtung Panzer!” scenario.

After occupying the important road junction “Y” at Priolo, Sayre’s men prepared for an attack by the Hermann Göring Panzer Division. The Germans had to pass through this eye of a needle from the direction of Niscemi in order to reach the landing beach via Route 115.

For the airborne troops without heavy weapons, this seemed an impossible task. But it was extremely important to delay the German troops as long as possible. Every hour brought relief to the American beachhead and more fresh troops could be landed. A desperate race against time.

In addition, we have provided the scenario “Stranger Things in Sicily” which combines the game materials from Red Horizon 41 and Sicily 43. This then results in really funny / fictional but exciting games such as the invasion of Sicily by the Soviets. 

Grant: What are you most pleased about with the design?

Wolfgang: Everything! Well, I really have to say that Assault Sicily 43 has become an all-round beautiful design. We’ve really made a lot of progress in that respect. Regarding the game system, I always find it exciting how inferior you can feel at the start of a scenario and yet the moment comes in the course of the game when you realise…. “Hey, now I’m coming steeply out of the sun!” and suddenly your opponent is on the defensive.

This game is designed for endless playtime. It offers a quick way to create your own scenarios. Playing alone is also easy and a lot of fun.

And the most important thing. Erich and I still play it with great pleasure!

Grant: What has been the response of playtesters?

Wolfgang: “When will the game be available to buy?” – that sums it up. The testers who already know Red Horizon 41 are of the opinion that the Assault System has reached a higher level and seems more mature.

Grant: What other games are you currently working on?

Wolfgang: Oh yes. We have a kind of roadmap on our website. I’ll have to update it sometime – lol.

We have prepared the Sicily 43 box with the inlay in such a way that we can easily integrate the troops of Great Britain and Canada, i.e. a next expansion will bring the British/Australians possibly others into the game. The setting will be the eastern part of Sicily – focus on the Primosole Bridge (OP Fustian). This is a real intense several days long battle between the British Red Devils and the German Green Devils. We are really looking forward to finish this campaign.

But we also have the eastern front further in mind. I already have literature on Sevastopol at home. It might actually be that we create a campaign module in the Sevastopol environment. If we do that, the goal is that we will also reproduce all the game materials for Red Horizon 41, such as fortifications and obstacles, Troop Status Board etc.. So players can then apply the full 2.0 rulebook to the Eastern Front.

And last but not least, we are considering whether a kind of starter kit for the Assault System would make sense. But this is still an open discussion.

And the very last thing we always have ideas towards Assault solo mode, Assault as a strategic or operational game. Erich is working on a fantasy tower defense game and if we really get bored we will dedicate ourselves to our real passion – we will make a game with ships – laugh!

If you are interested in Assault Sicily 43: Gela Beachhead, you can check out the Gamefound campaign page at the following link: https://gamefound.com/en/projects/assault-games/assaultsicily43#/section/what-is-in-the-box-21001

-Grant