cealigh the MadScot
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600pt Battle in the Philippines game...Kurita's center force is moving up into Sibuyan sea located in the Philippine island group. Halsey detaches a portion of his Third fleet to escort troop transports, LST's, and Supply ships loaded up with a unit of Seabees and Marines for the purpose of establishing forward airfields on several small islands located there.
The Kurita forward scouting aircraft has spotted the American Battlegroup, and Kurita has detached a major portion of his fleet with Group Adm. Hamishiro to intercept and destroy this battlegroup. Unfortunately he is critically short on "attack aircraft" and heavy on fighters. This means the task force will have to attempt to close quickly on the Americans in order to dispatch them.
Adm. Halsey has detached R.Adm Spruance with the three sisters of the Yorktown class carriers as part of the escorting Taskforce. This is a huge gambit on Halsey's part putting all three of his big fleet carriers in one basket. But Halsey and Gen MacArthur needs these forward airfields for the two sqdns of B25's and PBJ's temporarily based at Guadacanal and elsewhere and for land based fighters of the USAAF to support the assault on Mindoro and the Main Island of the Philippines. R.Adm Spruance has PBY's out looking for the Japanese fleets but so far it has met with little success and /or inaccurate information.
My friend Curtis and I played this out on Sunday and here are the force breakdowns for both fleets, and following that in a following post will be photos from the game. Some photos may be fuzzy and I appologize in advance.
We used two squalls which moved each turn and we used fog which either expanded, moved, or dissapated each turn. We also used a house rule regarding the use of smoke.
Fleet Order of Battle; Allies
USN: Halsey 3rd Fleet: Rear Adm. Spruance Escort Task Force
USS Washington BB
USS Massachusetts BB
USS Baltimore CA
USS Salt Lake City CA
USS Pensacola CA
USS Boise CL
USS Phoenix CL
USS Atlanta CLAA
USS Juneau CLAA
USS San Juan CLAA
USS Fletcher DD
USS Yorktown CV
1x F6F5 Hellcat
1x SBD Dauntless
1x TBF Avenger
USS Enterprise CA
1x F4F Wildcat
1x SBD Dauntless
1x TBF Avenger
USS Hornet CA'
1x F4F Wildcat
1x SBD Dauntless
1x TBF Avenger
Landing Assault Force;
Haskell Troop Transport ATA #12 Able Benson
2x LCVP (US Marine Able Co 5th Bdn)
Haskell Troop Transport ATA #10 Rbt Henderson
2x LCVP (US Marine Delta Co. 5th Bdn)
1x LCI (2nd USN SeaBees Bdn)
LST#321
1x LCVP (US Marine Bravo Co 5th Bdn)
1x LCT (US Marine Tank Bdn Fox Co.)
LST#355
1x LCVP (US Marine Charlie Co. 5th Bdn)
1x LCT (US Marine Tank Bdn Echo Co.)
Victory Class supply ship SS Eminent Victory
Victory Class Supply ship SS Total Victory
USN land based Aircraft
2x PBJ Sqdns
1x PBY Sqdn
USAAF land based Aircraft
2x B-25 Sqdns
Australian Commonwealth forces;
HMAS Canberra CA
HMAS Sydney CL
HMAS Perth CL
HMAS Nestor G02 DD
HMAS Nepal G25 DD
HMAS Arunta DD
Royal Dutch Navy forces;
Hr. Ms. Van Galen DD
Hr. Ms. J.V. Amstel DD
Fleet Order of Battle; Axis
IJN Kurita Forward Battle Group: Grp Adm Hamashiro
IJN Musashi BB
IJN Yamashiro BB
IJN Kongo BB
IJN Haruna BB
IJN Myoko CA
IJN Nachi CA
IJN Tone CLS
IJN Chikuma CLS
IJN Yahagi CL
IJN Yukikaze DD
IJN Isokaze DD
IJN Nowaki DD
IJN Akitsuki DD
IJN Yugumo DD
IJN Type 13
IJN I-26 SS, IJN I-28 SS
IJN I-19 SS, IJN I-20 SS
IJN Akagi CV
1x A6M5 Zeke
1x D3A Val
1x B5N Kate
IJN Shokaku CV
1x A6M5 Zeke
1x D3A Val
1x D4Y Judy
IJN Zuikaku CV
1x A6M5 Zeke
2x A6M2 Zero
IJN Junyo CVL
2x A6M2 Zero
IJN Shoho CVE
1x A6M2 Zero
IJN Zuiho CVE
1x A6M2 Zero
The Battle was Glorious! And very LONG!!!
We started set up at around 2pm'sh (this included building our fleets from scratch)
The game actually started at around 3:30-4:00pm and the last turn of the game was at around 1am.
Operational Objectives:
Allies: get landing craft to at least two of the Islands in the middle of the board, establish an airfield on each, move land based aircraft onto one or both of the established airfields. unload aircraft from one of the supply ships onto one of the established airfields. (Allies immediately get one stand of F6F Hellcats that are Land based which will be available on the next turn placing a "rearm" counter on them)
Each Island assaulted and airfield established gives the Allies 150pts towards winning the game.
If the Allied forces suffer at least 50% losses before establishing at least one airfield then they must retreat off the table from the closest edge available.
Or, if the Allies lose both LST's and Both ATA's before establishing at least one Airfield, then they must retreat off table on the closest edge available.
Axis: Destroy all of the Allied ATA's and LST's before they can get a foot hold on any of the islands in the area.
If the Allies establish at least one airfield then they win at least one Tactical Objective, but not necessarily the game.
If the Nihon Kaigun suffers 50% in unit losses then they must retreat off the table at the closest edge available regardless of whether the allies establish an airfield or not.
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holt
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good ill need to by a lot more boosters for that
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cealigh the MadScot
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600 Pt Battle in the Philippines pics
USN: Spruance task force
IJN: Hamishiro task force
1st turn USN move.
1st turn IJN move
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Okie
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This look's like it should be a lot of fun! Can you expand on how you did the Squall's, fog, your use of smoke and Island placement? Also the brack down of each Fleet. Do they all start on the map or come in a differant time's? Do the commonwealth and Dutch mix with the US or form a different Fleet? I want to try this with the guy's at the game store. Thank's!! Okie
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cealigh the MadScot
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| Okie wrote: | | This look's like it should be a lot of fun! Can you expand on how you did the Squall's, fog, your use of smoke and Island placement? Also the brack down of each Fleet. Do they all start on the map or come in a differant time's? Do the commonwealth and Dutch mix with the US or form a different Fleet? I want to try this with the guy's at the game store. Thank's!! Okie |
I integrated the Dutch and Aussie/UK units with the Americans.
As far as the Squalls go. I/we rolled 1D6 to determine how many squalls would be in the game. and did the
same for the Fog. We each took one squall and equal amount of fogs and then placed them where we desired.
This was done before any units were placed on the board. The Islands were arrainged so that there were 4 large
islands in the center of the map forming a circle of sorts. Then two small islands were placed on square from one
edge and 4 rows from the center row. Three small islands were placed on the other side of the center island group,
again one sector from the edge but on the opposite side of the map board.
Squalls and fog was handled by the player who won the initiative. for the squalls roll a d4 and a d6. d4 determined
direction the squall moved and d6 how many sectors. Fog; on a roll of a 5-6 fog dissapated, 3-4 fog moved one sector
players discretion, 1-2 fog increased by one in any direction dictated by the player.
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Okie
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So cool! thank's for the break down.     Okie
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cealigh the MadScot
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| Okie wrote: | | This look's like it should be a lot of fun! Can you expand on how you did the Squall's, fog, your use of smoke and Island placement? Also the brack down of each Fleet. Do they all start on the map or come in a differant time's? Do the commonwealth and Dutch mix with the US or form a different Fleet? I want to try this with the guy's at the game store. Thank's!! Okie |
Okie, the pics above are from the opening and 1st turn of the game. Everything you see on the table is 600pts for each side.
We set up on the first two rows. Also you will notice that the game map is a bit long. 22 rows long from end to end.
One other thing. Once an airfield was established on an island, it became like an un-sinkable aircraft carrier. One thing we have yet to flesh out is how to handle ship based land bombardment. Something the Americans were very efficient at doing by the way.... The sad thing is for all the ordinance the USN expended on Mt Suribachi and they still couldnt dislodge the Japanese...
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cealigh the MadScot
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Here are the chits that we used in the game:
Feel free to copy them and print them out.
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Okie
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Thank's a lot there you mad Scot! I surly appreciate you taking the time to get me all setup here! Okie
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jfkziegler
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I had been thinking that some kind of a What If scenario involving the Center Force coming through Surigao Strait might be interesting, but I haven't worked out the numbers for that yet. This provides nice inspiration, though.
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