• My question is about the order of declarations when scrambling comes into play.

    Say the US holds Hawaii.  It has one infantry and two fighters on Hawaii and a destroyer in SZ 26. There is an airbase on Hawaii.

    Japan attacks with a cruiser, a transport carrying a tank and an infantry, and two fighters.  The fighters can reach Hawaii (not just SZ 26).  Japan’s goal is to kill the destroyer and then take Hawaii in an amphibious assault.

    The US can choose to scramble to defend SZ 26 if it wants because it has an airbase.

    My question is, when does the US have to declare its scrambling intentions?  Is it as Japan makes the combat move into SZ 26 or only after Japan has fully declared all its combat intentions?

    The order is a big deal in scenarios like this one.

    If Japan has to declare everything first, it means the US can wait and see what is happening.  If Japan sends its fighters to the SZ, the US can hold its fighters back on Hawaii thereby making it pretty sure that Japan won’t take the island.  If Japan sends its fighters to Hawaii, the US can scramble and will likely annihilate the cruiser and transport in the SZ while the Japanese fighters continue futilely on to Hawaii.

    On the other hand, if the US has to declare its scrambling intentions first, Japan can arrange for its fighters to match up against the US fighters thereby giving Japan a much better chance of carrying the day.

    My friends and I find the scrambling rules hard to decipher on this point about the order of declaration.

    The best reading we can give it appears to require the attacker to declare first.  This strikes us as wrong for a number of reasons, however.

    First, it basically means that the defender gets to decide where his aircraft were after the attacker makes his attack.  “Your aircraft are attacking my island?  Oh, well then my aircraft were actually over the SZ.  Your aircraft are attacking my SZ?  Oh, well then my aircraft were actually on the island.”  In all other situations, the attacker gets to decide what he is attacking.  Imagine attacking two adjacent land territories and the defender getting to decide after the attacks are announced which territory his infantry were in.  Absurd!

    Second, it doesn’t seem to match real life.  If the Japanese commander in my scenario gave his pilots instructions to protect the attack, they wouldn’t stay out over the empty ocean while the US fighters pounded the Japanese troops attempting to take the beach.  Nor would they obliviously let the US fighters fly past them toward the ships while they (the Japanese fighters) merrily continued inland.

    Third, if the defender gets to declare last it basically turns any island with an airbase into an invulnerable fortress.  The attacker essentially has to bring enough forces to defeat the defender’s air force in two battles, knowing that one of them won’t actually be fought.

    How do you handle the question of when and how the defender has to declare his scrambling intentions?

    Thanks.


  • Just see

    @rulebook:

    Scramble
    Scrambling is a special movement that the defender can make at the end of this phase. It must be done after all of the attacker’s
    combat movements have been completed and all attacks have been declared.
    The attacker may not change any combat
    movements or attacks after the defender has scrambled.

    HTH :-)

  • 2023 '22 '21 '20 '19 '18 '17

    P@nther is correct, of course.

    That’s the biggest advantage of the airbases though, is getting to decide where to defend. It’s up to the attacker to base his/her attacks on what the defender might do in this situation. I like that it brings a little decision making personally  :-)

    Also, if we’re going to talk real life scenarios, I’d say the two fighter groups missing each other is one of the most plausible things that would have happened. Airspace is obviously very large, the odds of the planes running into each other is probably very slim, unless of course fighters were sent up as interceptors intentionally.

    It’s on the Japanese player, in this scenario, to decide if bulking the naval attack is more important than bulking the amphibious landing. The USA player has the chance to react. That’s the risk taken when attacking a territory with an airbase.


  • Thanks for your help, both of you.  We only have the first edition where the rule is not spelled out as clearly.

    I still don’t like it.  In real life, either the defenders had their fighters out on combat air patrol when the attack came or they didn’t.  You don’t get to decide after the enemy attacks whether you had posted outlying sentries.

    However, the rule is very clear with the second edition book.

    Thanks again.


  • Some follow up questions on scrambling:

    I understand that a defender can scramble to protect a sea zone surrounding an island with an air base even if that sea zone has no defending ships.  My question is, does this apply if the island in the sea zone is not the target of the attack. That is, can scrambling be used to interdict a combat move?

    For example, consider a situation where Japan has a fleet in SZ 33 around the Caroline Islands and wants to launch an amphibious assault on French Indo China.  To get there, they have to pass through SZ 35 around the Philippines where the US has an airbase.  Say the US has a fighter on the Philippines and no ships in SZ 35.  Can they scramble the fighter to attack the Japanese fleet as it passes through SZ 35 even though the Philippines is not itself the target of an attack?

    If they can and they scrambled their single fighter and lost to the Japanese fleet, would it stop the Japanese fleet or could the victorious fleet continue on to French Indo China as planned?  (Basically, can you use scrambling to stop fleet movement by causing a battle?)

    Finally, in an unrelated scenario, what happens if an attacker launching an amphibious assault intended to use a battleship for a support shot but the defender then scrambles a fighter?  Is the battleship now unavailable to defend against the fighter because it was declared as part of the amphibious assault?  Or does the amphibious assault get interrupted because the scrambling has to be resolved first?  If it is interrupted and the fighter loses, does the battleship still get to provide a support shot when the amphibious assault proceeds or has the battleship’s fighting for that turn been “used up” in the scramble battle?

    Thanks in advance for your help.


  • @Kingston:

    Some follow up questions on scrambling:

    I understand that a defender can scramble to protect a sea zone surrounding an island with an air base even if that sea zone has no defending ships.  My question is, does this apply if the island in the sea zone is not the target of the attack. That is, can scrambling be used to interdict a combat move?

    For example, consider a situation where Japan has a fleet in SZ 33 around the Caroline Islands and wants to launch an amphibious assault on French Indo China.  To get there, they have to pass through SZ 35 around the Philippines where the US has an airbase.  Say the US has a fighter on the Philippines and no ships in SZ 35.  Can they scramble the fighter to attack the Japanese fleet as it passes through SZ 35 even though the Philippines is not itself the target of an attack?

    No, as there is no attack in SZ 35.

    @Kingston:

    Finally, in an unrelated scenario, what happens if an attacker launching an amphibious assault intended to use a battleship for a support shot but the defender then scrambles a fighter?  Is the battleship now unavailable to defend against the fighter because it was declared as part of the amphibious assault?  Or does the amphibious assault get interrupted because the scrambling has to be resolved first?  If it is interrupted and the fighter loses, does the battleship still get to provide a support shot when the amphibious assault proceeds or has the battleship’s fighting for that turn been “used up” in the scramble battle?

    The seazone has to be cleared of defending units before the attacker can unload his troops. So a sea combat occurs. The battleship is part of that sea battle then. This is why the battleship will not be able to bombard.

    The attacker has to consider the possibility of scrambling planes when planning his attack.

    HTH :-)


  • Thanks very much.

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