Friendly fighters over enemy fleet question

  • '10

    I’ve misplaced my rule book and need to know this for my current game.

    If USA has a fleet in the seazone west of Japan, can Japan fly fighters over that fleet to attack Manchuria, or does the fleet effectively block that move?

  • '18 '17 '16 '11 Moderator

    Good question.  Are the fighters “cargo” on England’s Carriers or are they airborne?

    If Japan attacked the sea zone, the fighters would be able to defend the fleet.  Therefore, I would lean towards the latter and you have to engage the fighters in that sea zone and cannot by pass them in combat move phase.


  • There is no Combat Air Patrol in Revised.

    ANY enemy FIGs in a given sea zone or territory are ignored if they are just being “flown over”

    The ONLY unit that you have to worry about in a fly over is enemy AA, and then only during Combat Movement.


  • @Sime:

    I’ve misplaced my rule book and need to know this for my current game.

    If USA has a fleet in the seazone west of Japan, can Japan fly fighters over that fleet to attack Manchuria, or does the fleet effectively block that move?

    A&A Revised Rulebook, page 12.

    “Air units (fighters and bombers) can fly over hostile spaces as if friendly, but they are subject to the following special rules.”  The main special rule is AA guns, which would not be present.  Therefore, your fighters can fly over the fleet without engaging in combat.

  • '10

    @Cmdr:

    Are the fighters “cargo” on England’s Carriers or are they airborne?

    I’m not sure what you’re talking about with England carriers (?).

    @Cmdr:

    If Japan attacked the sea zone, the fighters would be able to defend the fleet.  Therefore, I would lean towards the latter and you have to engage the fighters in that sea zone and cannot by pass them in combat move phase.

    But if you allowed that precedent, wouldn’t that mean that any time that a friendly fighter flew over an enemy land territory holding an enemy fighter that they would have to engage in combat?

    @ncscswitch:

    ANY enemy FIGs in a given sea zone or territory are ignored if they are just being “flown over”

    Although this is a partial answer to what I need, I never mentioned that there were any fighters in the fleet.

    @ncscswitch:

    The ONLY unit that you have to worry about in a fly over is enemy AA, and then only during Combat Movement.

    This is what I need. Thank you.

    @timerover51:

    A&A Revised Rulebook, page 12.

    “Air units (fighters and bombers) can fly over hostile spaces as if friendly, but they are subject to the following special rules.”  The main special rule is AA guns, which would not be present.  Therefore, your fighters can fly over the fleet without engaging in combat.

    And this is what I specifically need.  Thank you even more.

  • Official Q&A

    @ncscswitch:

    The ONLY unit that you have to worry about in a fly over is enemy AA, and then only during Combat Movement.

    In the box rules, AA also fires in noncombat movement.


  • I’d like to see BB provide an AA cover in battle.

    Either:
    Maximum of one BB doing so per fleet as normal AA gun rule
    or
    1AA dice at 1, per BB to a maximum equal to the number of attacking fighters

    I would reduce the shore bombrdment to maximum one shore bomb per unit landed.


  • @Corbeau:

    I’d like to see BB provide an AA cover in battle.

    Either:
    Maximum of one BB doing so per fleet as normal AA gun rule
    or
    1AA dice at 1, per BB to a maximum equal to the number of attacking fighters

    I would reduce the shore bombrdment to maximum one shore bomb per unit landed.

    Your shore bombardment idea has been picked up in the Anniversary Edition rules, evidently.  In my house rules for A&A Pacific, I have naval gunfire support acting just like artillery, and boosting the attacking infantry to 2 and US Marines to 3.  One aircraft per attacking unit can support as well, boosting the attacks to 3 and 4.  I allow this for islands.  Still deciding about whether to allow it when you are attacking the mainland.  Naval gunfire does not have unlimited range.

    I can understand your idea of having a BB providing AA fire if flown over, especially US BBs, which had the best AA fire control system by far in WW2.  However, an AA gun represents the AA defense of an entire region, which could be hundreds of gun batteries, verses maybe 20 guns per BB.  What you could do is allow a task force with a BB present to have one shot for each attacking plane, success on a die roll of 1, like an AA gun, at the start of the combat round.


  • @timerover51:

    Your shore bombardment idea has been picked up in the Anniversary Edition rules, evidently.

    Ya, i saw that, that’s great news :)
    I can only wish i was the one to propose it to the game designer but it really is a coincidence. That was a house rule we used way back then. Still great to see he thought of it too. :)

    I like the also th idea of BB acting as artillery support. Good thinking there too. I would not allow it for planes too, i find them already too flexible as a unit acting both in land and sea. I’d rather have them seperated in 2 classes, Land based fighters and CV based fighters. They already have the different molds for some nations, german stuka and Bf-109 for exemple. anyways, that’s another discussion.

    For the BB acting like an AA, that’s exactly what i meant. Would give a reason to have one in a fleet.


  • @Corbeau:

    @timerover51:

    Your shore bombardment idea has been picked up in the Anniversary Edition rules, evidently.

    Ya, i saw that, that’s great news :)
    I can only wish i was the one to propose it to the game designer but it really is a coincidence. That was a house rule we used way back then. Still great to see he thought of it too. :)

    I like the also th idea of BB acting as artillery support. Good thinking there too. I would not allow it for planes too, i find them already too flexible as a unit acting both in land and sea. I’d rather have them seperated in 2 classes, Land based fighters and CV based fighters. They already have the different molds for some nations, german stuka and Bf-109 for exemple. anyways, that’s another discussion.

    For the BB acting like an AA, that’s exactly what i meant. Would give a reason to have one in a fleet.

    You need to remember that roughly 2/3 of a carrier’s aircraft were attack planes, dive bombers and torpedo bombers, that would be used in support of ground troops.  This is the basis for the flexibility in fighters in A&A.  If you had a dedicated attack plane, like the Stuka, you could reduce the fighter’s role by a little bit, but by the end of the war, the US Navy’s Corsair fighter was carrying a bombload heavier than that of the Stuka, and delivering it with comparable accuracy.

    As for BB getting an AA roll, that makes a fair amount of sense, and is pretty historically accurate.  Quite simply, BBs normally acted as a magnet for air attacks, even if a carrier was around.  The US South Dakato shot down 26 Japanese aircraft while escorting the carrier US Enterprise at the Battle off Santa Cruz in October of 1942, while Adm. Raymond Spruance deployed his battleline in advance of his carriers at the Battle of the Philippine Sea in June of 1944 to deliberately absorb Japanese carrier plane attacks.  However, the US did have the best naval AA fire control systems of the entire war, so what holds true for the US does not hold true for everyone else.  The Bismarck had major problems with defending against a limited number of British Swordfish, while the Italian BBs had similar problems.  The British were so-so, and the Japanese were close to hopeless until late in the war.  You could make it a National Advantage for the US, but I suspect that would not be acceptable to a majority of Axis players.  Making it universal is a bit of a stretch.  It would be up to you.

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