Concerning Carriers

[John Brown]

I was rereading both the Europe and Pacific 1940 second edition rules and got really confused. In the unit section of both books, it says a carrier can do a combat movement.

How is this possible with a zero attack value?

I’ve always played that your planes leave the carrier during the combat move phase and the carrier comes in on the non combat phase for them to land.

They don’t get to move during combat and non combat?

That would be moving twice in one turn.

So how do you use carriers in combat?

It is got me totally confused.

Can someone help me, please?

Thanks,

John

[ItIsILeClerc]

A Carrier (CV) may move either in the CM or NCM, but not during both, ofc.

IF moving during the CM, it cannot initiate combat itself. It can only accompany warships with a combat factor. As such, they can be assigned losses during combat, even if already designated as landing zone for some of your aicraft away on a mission. No planes can land on damaged CVs so designated ones will have to find another landing zone. If none is available, they are destroyed.

[KaLeu]

You can choose to move the carrier either during the combat phase or during the non-combat phase, but by moving the carrier into combat, it can absorb hits when the defender fires. This is especially useful when the planes have an alternative landing spot: the carrier can take a hit and be repaired later. If you sail the carrier in only after the fight is over, your attacking plans and any other ships you have, will have to absorb the enemy fire.

[knp7765]

Also, you have been playing correctly in that the planes take off and make their own combat move and then the carrier moves. Planes and carriers have to move separately of one another but the carrier can make a combat move. You just have to make sure there is a place for the planes to land if you do this. Even if the carrier is damaged or destroyed, causing the planes to have no landing space, the original intention was to have the carrier as a landing place and that is the important part.

[John Brown]

Ok, thanks guys. This clears a lot of things up for me. :-)

Thanks again,

John

[cyanight]

A Carrier can also be moved with a Transport into a seazone with ONLY subs and allow the transport to unload.  Even though the carrier has no combat value it is considered a warship and it prevents subs from interfering with transports unloading.

[John Brown]

@cyanight:

A Carrier can also be moved with a Transport into a seazone with ONLY subs and allow the transport to unload.  Even though the carrier has no combat value it is considered a warship and it prevents subs from interfering with transports unloading.

OK, that is cool to know, because the sub could only hit the carrier once, because the carrier takes two hits to destroy it. I see what your saying.

Thanks,

John

[ItIsILeClerc]

You really want to ignore the sub in carrier versus submarine situations like this, John.

You see, the CV still has zero combat factors so if a TRS + CV don’t ignore a sub, the sub kills both ships!
I am not even sure if the CV is capable of ‘not ignoring’ a submarine (because of its zero combat factors)…

[knp7765]

Yes, a carrier CAN ignore an enemy submarine. I was told that by Krieghund himself. So carriers will count as an escorting warship for transports conducting an amphibious assault.

Personally, I don’t agree with this rule. Carriers can not conduct convoy raiding because of their 0 attack value. It just seems to me that they shouldn’t be able to escort transports because of that. However, Krieghund is the expert so I defer to him.

[ItIsILeClerc]

Hehheh, a wise dicision, I agree with you and I defer too ;-).

But I was wondering if the CV could opt to NOT ignore the sub, resulting in a combat. Not that any1 in their right mind would want that, but just for rules technicalities let’s say it is interesting to know…

In such a combat, the CV (having 0 combat factors) will never hit the sub. The sub, although rolling on a 1 only will eventually hit the CV and sink it and after that, sink all the TRS the CV was ‘escorting’.

[Narvik]

They should have give the CV an attack factor of 1, just to recognize it as a warship

[John Brown]

@ItIsILeClerc:

You really want to ignore the sub in carrier versus submarine situations like this, John.

You see, the CV still has zero combat factors so if a TRS + CV don’t ignore a sub, the sub kills both ships!
I am not even sure if the CV is capable of ‘not ignoring’ a submarine (because of its zero combat factors)…

I see what you mean. I just wanted to make sure I was playing carriers right and too explore options, if there were any.

Thanks again! :-)

John

[ghr2]

@ItIsILeClerc:

Hehheh, a wise dicision, I agree with you and I defer too ;-).

But I was wondering if the CV could opt to NOT ignore the sub, resulting in a combat. Not that any1 in their right mind would want that, but just for rules technicalities let’s say it is interesting to know…

In such a combat, the CV (having 0 combat factors) will never hit the sub. The sub, although rolling on a 1 only will eventually hit the CV and sink it and after that, sink all the TRS the CV was ‘escorting’.

Until the attacker decides to retreat, of course.

[Shin-Ji]

But if the attacker retreats, then the Amphibious Assault doesn’t happen.

I truly don’t understand why you don’t need to clear the sea zone before landing.

[cyanight]

You do not need to clear a seazone before an amphibious assault if the seazone you are unloading into has only enemy transports or submarines.  In the case of submarines you must have a warship (Carrier, Destroyer, Battleship or Cruiser) escorting the transport so you can IGNORE the submarine before the amphibious assault begins.