Wake Island--BTS Style

[John 3rd]

Am giving strong consideration to creating a small Wake Island scenario but in the Between the Storms ALTHIST. Think it could be a lot of fun and very quick for playing purposes.

FIRST QUESTION: How do I create a smaller map. I assume that I use just certain panels but have never done thing. Anyone know? Thinking of running the panels from the Marianas to Hawaii.

Any help would be appreciated...

[Andrew Brown]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

Am giving strong consideration to creating a small Wake Island scenario but in the Between the Storms ALTHIST. Think it could be a lot of fun and very quick for playing purposes.

FIRST QUESTION: How do I create a smaller map. I assume that I use just certain panels but have never done thing. Anyone know? Thinking of running the panels from the Marianas to Hawaii.

Any help would be appreciated...

The playable map area of a scenario can be set in the AE editor, in the Scenario tab (Using hex coordinates - Left X, Top Y, Right X, Bottom Y). That will define a rectangle which is the playable area, which will be shown as a red rectangle on the bottom right jump map.

[John 3rd]

Thank You Andrew. Good to see you Posting!

I was going thru the Map and need panels 10-11-12 and 17-18-19. Going by what you say, I create a new Scenario and then take the four x-y coordinates and that SHOULD give me my map boundaries. Correct?

[Andrew Brown]

ORIGINAL: John 3rd

Thank You Andrew. Good to see you Posting!

I was going thru the Map and need panels 10-11-12 and 17-18-19. Going by what you say, I create a new Scenario and then take the four x-y coordinates and that SHOULD give me my map boundaries. Correct?

You don't need to make the map size match the panels. You can use any X,Y values you like to define the rectangle, based on what you want to include in the playable area. The map panels all remain in place and don't need to be manipulated in any way - you just can't select "out of bounds" areas of the map in the jump map, or scroll there, once you have set your boundary coordinates.

[John 3rd]

Ahhhhh....now I understand. Thank You Sir!

[spence]

I've only played the Big B Scenario dealing with the Wake Island Relief and that was against the AI.
I got a marginal victory as the US although the US had a 3:2 advantage in CVs (and US CVs carry more planes).

Things to consider:

1) What was the real strength of the Japanese air groups? In Big B the 2 CVs each have a strength of 16VF, 16VB, and 18VT. In the scenario the Japanese CVs enter on Turn 5 (forgot what/where that means). They had engaged already at PH and had a couple of days of ops against Wake itself before the US relief TF showed up. If the air groups had been reinforced while the CVs were off map that would be important because i've seen something that said the Japanese had 77 unserviceable following the PH strike (added to the 29 lost in the raid that be more than a full carrier's worth). Since IJN aviators were administratively attached to a particular carrier it would be very unusual for aviators to be reassigned to a carrier that was not their home.

2) What was the quality of the air group replacements (it's not like Japan had a real surplus of carrier trained pilots even when they started the war)?

3) Were the Marine defenders really on the verge of starvation. Comparing what has seemingly occurred when the Japanese try to take the island (in all my games anyways) VS the reality of their Dec 11th (try) it seems as if the CD unit should be given more than 6 shots.

4) I figure that the strength/OOB of each of the 3 US TFs assigned to this op are all pretty much
for sure. As I recall all of the capital ships at PH are not even included in the Allied OOB due to damage suffered in the PH attack.

5) Japan sailed for the Coral Sea and for Midway with less than the full KB. (I have no idea whether this even possible) but it would simulate the uncertainty of the US quite well (given PH I'd imagine that the US might lack confidence a smidge) if the Japanese can have a "variable OOB" which can include any/all of the Japanese carrier divisions (rather than just Cardiv 2 the Japanese could have Cardiv 1 or 5 or both or none). The victory conditions could be different for each different Japanese OOB.

Just some thoughts.