LCU’s Won’t Load on TF

[rbilheimer]

I’m playing the Guadalcanal scenario and I want to send the 1st Australian Division to reinforce Port Moresby. I set the LCU’s to “strategic move” and it took them a few days to pack up as expected. But, after they were done packing up, I couldn’t get them to load onto the Transport TF I set up. I’m clicking “Load Troops” but the 3 LCU’s I want to load/move, don’t show up on the “available units” list. Can anyone tell me what I might be missing? BTW, I even set their “Set Future Objective” to Port Moresby, even though I don’t think I need to do that since they are moving to a friendly base and not a contested amphib landing.

[Onime No Kyo]

Take a look in the upper lefthand corner of the unit screen for the 1st Oz. Next to Attached To, you'll see that the HQ its attached to by default (Australia Command) had an (R) next to it. This means that it's restricted. In practical terms, it means that you can move it around the land mass it is currently on, and you can airlift "airliftable" components (squads, support, small mortars). But you cannot move the unit by ship.

In order to make in unrestricted, you would need to click on the HQ name on the unit screen, and change it, provided you have the necessary political points (you will see what's available on the right side of the same screen).

Good luck.

[rbilheimer]

Thanks... that explains it. I see the "R" after the Australian Command. So much for reinforcing Port Moresby from Brisbane.

[BBfanboy]

Managing scarce political points is one of the key parts of the game.

In your situation you can airlift some AV from that unit to Port Moresby from Cairns or Townsville using Catalinas or the other Flying Boat (Empire?) in the Australian inventory. You get the rifle squads and some support squads and mortars/machine guns but no heavier equipment. But it may buy you time to build up your PP (50 per day) so that you can buy out the unit to an Unrestricted HQ (no R after the HQ name) and ship it to PM.

Even more critical than infantry for PM is to get enough air support there that you can put in some fighters. If you have an Air HQ you should be able to fly all of it in. The down side is that you lose some of your naval search ability while using the Patrol aircraft as transports.

Don't sweat the mis-steps - it's part of the learning process the small scenarios were designed for. You can play it a second time and use all the things you learned, and even try different strategies. Enjoy! [:)]