Playtest:  Gibson vs. Smith, May 2007

In two games played, Gibson took the Texians both times.  In the first game he only eliminated 11 of my units (16 eliminated needed to win), so I came out with a win.  Then he was ready for revenge.  On the first turn he placed his Texians heavily in the northern half of his defenses, probably because that's where I breached his wall and poured over in Game 1.  I placed Columns I and II to assault the south wall, my only placement on Turn 1.  I figured that if he started stripping the north too quickly, I would then hit the north; if not, then I would reinforce the south wall and hit the southwest wall.

My main effort turned out to be up north.  There, on Turn 3, I actually breached the North Wall--what great fortune--the game had scarcely begun and I had broken through and swarmed into the Alamo grounds.  Unfortunately, I had only 5 units that advanced after combat.  At this time he had three units in East Wall a, one in the central Plaza, and two units in West Wall a, plus artillery.  Instead of retreating, as I hoped he would do, he made a counterattack and eliminated 2 of my 5 units.  Meanwhile, I had assaulted the northwest wall on Turn 2 but could not break through.  Within two more turns I was unable to reinforce my breach (sigh--lack of reserve columns), while he eliminated my units inside the Alamo and sealed the breach!

The photo below shows the situation shortly after he sealed the North Wall breach:

It was back and forth for the next few turns, with Gibson racking up hits with deadly firepower up north, while I finally breached the South Wall and poured in....but with far fewer troops than I had hoped.  The photo below shows the end game.  Gibson had five units left, with my men storming toward him from the south, while I was still pounding away on the northwest section.  He made the decision to go inside the buildings for a last stand.  Four of his units made it, as you can see below. By this time I had suffered catastrophic losses, 14 units eliminated.  In a last furious defense, Gibson eliminated three more units on the last two turns and won the game--taking out 17 of my units, while I only eliminated 6 of his 10.  An excellent job by the Texian player!