My list of oddities, bugs and way of improvement...

[LargeSlowTarget]

And another oddity. I have just invaded Nauru Island with a single Raider Bn. It has been split up earlier and hasn't recombined on its own, so I thought a landing on a leapfrogged island in the backwaters of the war might help (sometimes it does). I haven't paid too much attention to Nauru before, just using it as practice range for Corsairs and SBDs on Tarawa, which bombed the hell out of the depot. I even neglected to use SIGINT to see if there are units on Nauru, because I had never encountered a Japanese garrison on this island before.
Well, my lone Raider Bn ran smack into the full-strength JA 30th Division sitting there entrenched up to level 9. In the first two rounds of battle the Raiders were almost wiped out, in the third round they only had enough power left for a "2 squad - 2 gun" assault - and the entire virtually untouched Japanese Division put up a mere 2 squad defense and got wiped out. Even with low PP and readiness due to lack of supply on the japanese side it is hard to believe that a single Bn can beat a Division - even the Marines were not that tough.

[Ranger-75]

LST;

The US interservice rivalry was going well and string in the Pacific in 1942-45. Macarthur disliked the marines and the Australians so he tried to keep them from commanding any battles. The CENTPAC and SOUTHPAC areas were BNavy dominated and therefore Nimitz repaid macarthrs kindness by only having marine commanders for the most part. You can get around this by changing the base to SWPAC for an army cdr or to Southpac or centpac for a maring commander, then change it back to what you really want to keep it at.

You got really lucky with the marine raid bn. You should really check sigint before doing that.

You son't have to land on an enemy base to re-combine, just on a different base than what the divided units were on. That works all the time for me. (How did you get a raid bn divided in the first place??? its only size 130 or so).

[BigE]

Wanna ask you about another oddity/bug -- a really annoying one at that. Occassionally, my fleet suffers "Bermuda Triangle Syndrome": ships disappear. This happens as I add ships to a new task force. I select some kind of mission, it doesn't seem to happen, and start happily adding ships to it, until I have either created the task force I wanted or, while trying to fill the slots, have added so many ships that they couldn't possibly have fitted the slots. So I leave the task force screen, and when I look for my ships, they are all gone! Never to reappear again, I should say. Right now I'm missing my five seaplane carriers, which were in such a phantom task force. Can live with that in February 1945, but in a game, this happened while I was creating a carrier striking force, and I lost three ESSEX and a CVL -- now that's something else... <img src="frown.gif" border="0">

[BigE]

Originally posted by BigE:
Wanna ask you about another oddity/bug -- a really annoying one at that. Occassionally, my fleet suffers "Bermuda Triangle Syndrome": ships disappear. This happens as I add ships to a new task force. I select some kind of mission, it doesn't seem to happen, and start happily adding ships to it, until I have either created the task force I wanted or, while trying to fill the slots, have added so many ships that they couldn't possibly have fitted the slots. So I leave the task force screen, and when I look for my ships, they are all gone! Never to reappear again, I should say. Right now I'm missing my five seaplane carriers, which were in such a phantom task force. Can live with that in February 1945, but in a game, this happened while I was creating a carrier striking force, and I lost three ESSEX and a CVL -- now that's something else... <img src="frown.gif" border="0">

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Yikes! Not only ships vanish, but divisions, too! It's mid.1945, and if click on "load TF", then pick a combat unit, but eventually choose not to load it to the Task Force, because there is not enough room, it gets lost...just gone away and doesn't reappear again...
On the other hand, I seem to be able now (in 1945) to load complete LCU to transports which apparently don't have the capability to load it in full -- usually, when I choose to load 90% of a division because they are urgently required elsewhere, still the entire division gets loaded. Now, that's good, but it doesn't make up for losing the 4th Marine Division in a Black Hole.

[Ranger-75]

BigE;

Not stated in the rule books, but a requirement for this game is a calculator. "borrow" one from work or go get a cheap solar unit (that's what i use).

I have never had that happen, but I have had TFs diaasppear or "retire" to the NW map edge. When that happens, I quit without saving and reload the beginning of the turn. Then I have to do everything over again and try not to make the same mistake.

The "retiring" bug seems to happen mostly with replinish TFs after a too far away TF tries to replinish.

[LargeSlowTarget]

Originally posted by Mike Santos:
LST;

The US interservice rivalry was ...

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Mike,

I'm aware of the interservice rivalry. Indeed Dugout Doug wanted all the glory for the US Army, not for the MC or the Australians, so he tried hard to keep them in subordinate positions (the "Alamo Force" is a fine example). The Marine units in his theater were few and didn't stay long under his command, so having MC leaders available for him in PacWar might be demanding too much.
But in the SoPac and CentPac there was a stronger emphasis on joint operations with a "mixed" command setup ('JANFUs') - not without problems, of course. Most attacks involved Army and MC units, and there was almost constant bickering about command authority. The divisions were always led by generals from the respective services. In the Gilberts, Marshalls and Marianas, the number of Army/MC units was quite balanced, with MC generals in charge at Corps level. On the other hand, during the Solomons campaign the Army troops were more numerous and although the initial assaults included MC units, most operations were conducted by Army Corps under Army Generals.

So I may modify my suggestion, leave SWPac and CentPac as it is, but make Army leaders available for SoPac.

It is basically a problem of the simplified HQ and Land Combat in PacWar, since it doesn't allow this kind of 'sophisticated' Div/Corps and Air/Ground command structure. It becomes even more complicated if we include the command setup of TF commanders responsible for the transportation and delivery of the assault forces to the beach and the Ground Force commanders taking over at the waters edge (also source of quarrels about when does command passes to whom - on a sideline, the MC generals in PacWar never have a chance to command an attack on an atoll anyway, since the battles take only one turn - with the TF commanders in charge). In the end it is a classic problem of wargames - how much historical accuracy? I for my part prefer historical order of battles, equipment, weather, supply and political restrictions, but I don't want to be forced to make every decision right like the historical figures - it's a game, not a reenactment. I'm the Big Boss in PacWar, if I want to attack Saipan with one Marine and three Army Divisions under overall command of an Army general, so be it. Of course changing the HQs and leaders back and forth is a bypass, but it costs PPs, and since I change leaders a lot for training purposes, a more convenient way may be found. I hope UV / WiP take care of that.

Concerning the Raiders, the Bn got split up by a 'loading accident'. I don't seem to have much luck in forcing units back together - I have landed some slit-up units several times on different islands, to no avail. I finally got fed up <img src="mad.gif" border="0"> and sent those splinter groups into an unsupported assault against Truk - held by four Divisions. The problem was solved within a week.