I know the Americans can move up the cliff sides in this scenario, and cannot assault on the turn they move up, but can they assault from down on the beach up into the cliff hexside? The rules seems to permit this, but since the rules also call the Assault move a representation of close, hand-to-hand combat, this seems a little odd.

Also, the road in the middle of this scenario that leads from the objective hex to the beach seems incongruous--a road down a cliff?

Maybe I'm being too literal, but any clarification would be appreciated!

No they can not. The beach at level 0 and the hill hex at level 2 makes that path impassible (core rule), for all purposes it may as well be the edge of the map board. To overcome this the american's have the operations card to scale the cliff with the associated strings attached as you mentioned.

Thanks. Another question--do the American tanks have concussive firepower against the bunkers, just like pillboxes? I' m guessing they do, but I don't think the Normandy expansion rules specifically state this.

And while I'm at it, one other clarification--I assume that in the relevant beach scenarios in the Normandy expansion, the German player can set up his machine gun crew figures outside of the bunkers, as the Op card says a fresh squad (of any type, I assume) can use the MG already in the bunker. In other words, placing your MG crews in the bunkers as the German players would be redundant, since the bunkres already are outfitted with MGs which a lesser squad (say 4 regular infantry) could use, allowing you to place the MG crew somewhere else (i.e. fortification elsewhere). Is this right?

Thanks again!

Tosko said:

Actually the rules only state that concusive firepower affects pillboxes and buildings so I would say that bunkers are not affected by it.

Yes, your observation about not placing MG crews in the bunkers is accurate.

regarding the road leading from the beach to the interior, in reality, there was actually such a road, look at the maps of Omaha and this road was shown in THE LONGEST DAY, and SAVING PRIVATE RYAN. In real life the Germans had built a concrete dam across the road, Engineers blew a gap in the concrete dam. I would guess thats why the game shows tank traps there. Engineers have to blow those as well.

Thanks to both of you for your replies. This one is a tough go for the Americans!