Amphibious Assault Blocking

[Guest]

The one thing that I would like some clarrification on is when an enemy ship is in the path of an amphibious assault.  Let’s say a US transport and BB are stationed in Hawaii.  If the US player would like to conduct an amphibious assault on Japan, but a Japanese DD is in SZ 16, then can the BB first sink the Japenese DD and stop in SZ 16, allowing the transport to go through SZ 16 and reach Japan?  Accoding to the rules, a player must announce an amphibious assault before conducting combat.  Does this mean that the amphibious assault must be conducted in the same sea zone that the sea battle will occur?

[domicron]

The amphibious assault must happen during the conduct combat phase, so the answer is no, you cannot do that.

You could, however, sink the Jap destroyer during combat phase and on movement you could move the transport through that sea zone to Japan, but they would not be able to attack.

[Guest]

Thank you, domicron!

[JamesAleman]

Using Destroyers to block combat movement is a cheap and easy way to protect vital areas for a turn.