From: Markus Stumptner Subject: Victory at Midway replay This is the replay of a game of Victory at Midway from Command #14 that took place last week, against a friend who had not played it before (but has considerable experience with other carrier games). The game started in a very cautious manner. The Japanese stayed invisible throughout June 3 and June 4, leading me to worry if I had not missed them sneaking up on me from the S and SE. My subs were deployed in a belt NW of Midway. I had started moving my carriers to SW of Midway early on, passing S of the island in the night to the 4th. After that, I basically waited for the enemy to appear. Late on June 4, I therefore shifted my search patterns to cover more of the map to the S and SE of Midway, which was of course an error. On turn 12 (the last daylight turn of June 4), a Japanese airstrike out of the blue scored three hits on Midway after gaining initiative on the CAP (but still losing several steps to CAP and AA fire). With three hits, my long range search capability was gone and I would have to use bombers as scouts the next day to search from Midway. In the night, I kept the carriers to the west. Finally, on the next morning, turn 15 (0430, June 5), the battle started in earnest. Both the Japanese and US searched E and SE of Midway and did not find anything. I started drawing my submarines back towards Midway. On the next turn, my searches were successful, and my carriers (in hex E6) found themselves next to a carrier TF in F5 (with two US subs in the same hex!) and another in F7. I decided that F5 was more likely to be the transport force - an easy target that would smash the Japanese plans for a landing and leave my planes intact for a second strike against the carriers (for some reason I held the delusion I would be able to pull out of range on the next turn). Since the Japanese had not sighted my carriers, they launched another limited strike at Midway that swept aside the remaining CAP and destroyed the airfield. Two Midway air units returning from search missions had to ditch. My strike against the transports destroyed the CAP (the single A5M fighter from Zuiho), but only scored a single hit against a transport. The subs likewise failed. Belatedly realizing that if he moved northwest, I would be in range for a counterattack, on the next turn I split my forces into two TFs, one moving to D5, one to D6. Both were sighted by the Japanese (the first sightings of US carriers in the game). The Japanese struck against the northern force containing Enterprise, Hornet and most of the escorts. CAP was weaker than I liked since I had sent too many planes as escorts the previous turn, but so was the escort. Despite the fact that the Japanese fighters again struck first, my CAP lost only one step and destroyed several steps of Japanese planes, with another 3 steps falling to AA fire. The Japanese managed to hit Hornet and knock her out of the battle, but given that I had feared a knockout blow, damage was less than expected. On turn 17, with Hornet unable to move north into the fog (which mercifully had still not cleared and would be available for me to hide in if it just held another turn), I decided against leaving Hornet to its fate and to make another try for the Japanese CVs, estimating that CAP would be weak since he was certain to send in another strike and the planes from the previous strike would not yet be ready. I concentrated all carriers in D5, and my searches discovered the enemy carriers in D6 - only 100 miles to the south. I launched my strike in two waves and paid for it when Yorktown's planes rolled a '1' and missed the Japanese fleet (apparently a problem with outlying patches of fog :-(. Only Enterprise's planes went in to the attack. The Japanese fighters again fired first and scored some hits. AA fire was ineffective, but so were the bombers - not a single hit was scored! Unfortunately, the Japanese strike was more successful and damaged Enterprise. Half of my returning planes had to ditch, and with Yorktown the sole operative carrier, another try at a counterattack seemed out of the question. I slipped north into the fog on turn 18, the same turn that Japanese troops landed on Midway. I moved Yorktown off to safety and for the rest of the game the two damaged carriers, accompanied by most of the escorts, crawled slowly northeastward in the fog, which miraculously held to the end of the game. The Japanese carriers spread out to strike again should the fog rise but it was not to be. However, what transpired on Midway was even more incredible. The seven steps of Japanese infantry that landed on the island had been reduced to three by turn 24, while of the six steps of island garrison at the time of the landing, only one had been lost. On the last turn, it was even mathematically impossible for the Japanese to take the island, and overall the Allies won by 21:20 points (Midway held, 8 points for Japanese plane steps destroyed, and one transport hit versus two damaged carriers and 10 points for US plane steps destroyed). 20 US air steps had been ditched for no VP gains. Only in analyzing the results of the ground battle after the game did we note that out of about 30 Japanese ground attack dierolls, drawn out over a day of game time, only a single one had managed to fall within the 1-3 range! Kind of equated my earlier bad luck in only hitting one transport step. Summary: Very interesting in that the Japanese use of partial strikes actually came close to success, although I still consider it a suboptimal strategy. Both of us misjudged the other's intentions, but I managed to lose the aircraft on Midway before they could really do anything. A massive search effort over a 240 degree arc centered on Midway brought me the first sighting of an enemy fleet, but my fizzled airstrike wasted that advantage. If his first strike against the carriers had been full strength, leaving the remaining job on Midway to the battleships, I have no doubt some of my carriers would have gone down. Playing time: Two hours excluding setup (despite one of the players being new to the rules). Markus