@hbg-gw-enthusiast

Thank you for this list: Alternate Ending Games and Combat Miniatures were new to me.

HBG is the Gold Standard for sure, especially as they offer a plethora of 3D printed models next to their own miniatures. Quality is excellent and prices are reasonable. Next to them I ordered nation specific battle dice from I Will Never Grow Up (originally from Field Marshal Games) as I had problems with ordering straight from FMG.

I know this is getting expensive, but when it comes to tanks, armored infantry and Katyusha rocket launchers, tin models from GHQ in 1:285 scale are by far the best: https://www.ghqmodels.com
I cannot say anything about planes and ships as I never bought some. But the tanks are superb and way better than anything I have ever seen in plastic.

A somewhat less detailed and a bit cheaper alternative was supplied by CinC models. I couldn’t find their website and therefore don’t know for sure whether they still produce wargaming miniatures.

As I live in Germany, here is a useful website of a company based in Northern Germany that offers GHQ models (and a few CinC models that are still in stock): It is easier, faster and cheaper to order at Master of Military if you want to avoid custom fees and delivery time from the United States. I placed half a dozen orders in recent years and can wholeheartedly recommend them. The website is both in German and English and might be useful for all players in Europe: https://www.mastersofmilitary.de/index.php?lang=en

In the thread about Tactical Bombers I already mentioned how I would add Seaplanes to the game. Even though I had the optional rule of Hidden Movement in mind, it would also work without using it. For those who don’t want to search, here it is:

Seaplanes
Cost: 3; Range: 5; Air: 0, Sea: 0, Land: 0
Set-up: 4 seaplanes are placed on both Rabaul and New Caledonia

Seaplanes are used for reconnaissance of enemy naval forces. They take off and land exclusively from Rabaul (Japan) and New Caledonia (USA) respectively. Thanks to their range, they can reach any sea zone on the map, but not the sea zones around Rabaul and New Caledonia.
Turn Order:

1. Starting with the first player, transports and destroyers are loaded and the movements of naval units are secretly noted as mentioned in the rulebook.
2. Then seaplanes are sent out, once again starting with the first player. A player can scout a maximum of five sea zones per turn and send a maximum of two seaplanes per sea zone.
3. The secretly planned sea movements are executed.
4. A die roll is made for each seaplane that is in a sea zone containing at least one enemy ship. For a roll of 1 through 4, the attacker receives the appropriate number of bonus dice, but not more than one bonus die per fighter, tactical bomber and bomber he orders into that sea zone for combat. On a roll of 5 the seaplane does not sight the enemy, on a roll of 6 it is lost.
5. Special Case: If a seaplane rolls a 1, instead of rolling one bonus die for an attacking aircraft, it may force an enemy submarine that is in the sea zone to submerge. A submerged submarine may not attack in this round.
6. The other subs attack – hits and damages are assigned and removed.
7. Starting with the First Player, bombers, (tactical bombers) and fighters are moved.
8. For the bonus dice gained by seaplanes, the attacker may roll once for 1 to 4 aircraft before starting air combat. Hits are assigned to enemy sea units according to the Casualty Strip, damaging or destroying them without returning fire. A maximum of 8 bonus dice is possible, if a player has two seaplanes in a seazone and rolls a 4 for both of them. Snake Eyes could force two subs to submerge and save a valuable capital ship from getting sunk or damaged. But: two sixes let your seaplanes get smashed to smithereens.
9. After casualties have been removed, the regular combat sequence takes place: air combat, sea combat and land combat.

Unlike my rule for Tactical Bombers, this rule needs to be play tested. But I think it will add a nice twist to the game without unbalancing it.

I am still working on a different approach without attack bonus, but this is tricky.

Here is a second variant for adding Seaplanes to the game – this time without a bonus attack round. This variant can only be applied when playing with the optional rule of Hidden Movement.

1. Players secretly plan all sea movements (including freighters, destroyers and their cargo).
2. Seaplanes are sent out - with the limit of maximum five sea zones and two seaplanes per sea zone.
3. Submarines may be moved to scout ships. No attacks at this time!
4. Dice are rolled separately for seaplanes and submarines: The result determines how many and which ships the opponent must reveal in that sea zone - i.e., he must reveal (= execute movement for) one ship of each category that either remains in or is moved to that sea zone. The following assignment applies: 1 = one freighter, 2 = one freighter + aircraft carrier each, 3 = one freighter + aircraft carrier + battleship each, 4 = one freighter + aircraft carrier + battleship + cruiser/destroyer each. On a roll of 5, the seaplane returns to base because it missed the enemy; on a roll of 6, it is destroyed. For submarines, a roll of 4, 5 or 6 means no enemy sighting. Thus they cannot sight cruisers and destroyers.
5. Optional: for every die roll of 1, a seaplane may force a submarine that has remained in or moved to its sea zone at this point to submerge instead of having the enemy to reveal a freighter.
6. Example 1: Japan rolls a “1” and a “3” for its two seaplanes in sea zone H. The US player must reveal the following units, if available: 2 freighters, 1 aircraft carrier, and 1 battleship. He does not have to reveal the planned movements of the other ships in sea zone H.
7. Example 2: The US rolls a “2” and a “5” for a seaplane and a submarine in sea zone G. Japan must reveal one freighter and one aircraft carrier, if available. It does not have to reveal a second carrier or any other ships.
8. Starting with the First Player, players move their bombers, tactical bombers and fighters.
9. Only now the remaining naval movements are executed. Submarine attacks are also done in this step. This also applies to subs used for scouting in step 3 (unless they have been forced to submerge).
10. Following the submarines, as usual, the battles take place in the order of air, sea and land combat.

Everyone is kindly asked to playtest and report on both variants. Depending on my gaming buddy, I will give both variants a try. Perhaps the first variant without using Hidden Movement, the second variant using this optional rule.

In the thread about Tactical Bombers I already mentioned how I would add Seaplanes to the game. Even though I had the optional rule of Hidden Movement in mind, it would also work without using it. For those who don’t want to search, here it is:

Seaplanes
Cost: 3; Range: 5; Air: 0, Sea: 0, Land: 0
Set-up: 4 seaplanes are placed on both Rabaul and New Caledonia

Seaplanes are used for reconnaissance of enemy naval forces. They take off and land exclusively from Rabaul (Japan) and New Caledonia (USA) respectively. Thanks to their range, they can reach any sea zone on the map, but not the sea zones around Rabaul and New Caledonia.
Turn Order:

1. Starting with the first player, transports and destroyers are loaded and the movements of naval units are secretly noted as mentioned in the rulebook.
2. Then seaplanes are sent out, once again starting with the first player. A player can scout a maximum of five sea zones per turn and send a maximum of two seaplanes per sea zone.
3. The secretly planned sea movements are executed.
4. A die roll is made for each seaplane that is in a sea zone containing at least one enemy ship. For a roll of 1 through 4, the attacker receives the appropriate number of bonus dice, but not more than one bonus die per fighter, tactical bomber and bomber he orders into that sea zone for combat. On a roll of 5 the seaplane does not sight the enemy, on a roll of 6 it is lost.
5. Special Case: If a seaplane rolls a 1, instead of rolling one bonus die for an attacking aircraft, it may force an enemy submarine that is in the sea zone to submerge. A submerged submarine may not attack in this round.
6. The other subs attack – hits and damages are assigned and removed.
7. Starting with the First Player, bombers, (tactical bombers) and fighters are moved.
8. For the bonus dice gained by seaplanes, the attacker may roll once for 1 to 4 aircraft before starting air combat. Hits are assigned to enemy sea units according to the Casualty Strip, damaging or destroying them without returning fire. A maximum of 8 bonus dice is possible, if a player has two seaplanes in a seazone and rolls a 4 for both of them. Snake Eyes could force two subs to submerge and save a valuable capital ship from getting sunk or damaged. But: two sixes let your seaplanes get smashed to smithereens.
9. After casualties have been removed, the regular combat sequence takes place: air combat, sea combat and land combat.

Unlike my rule for Tactical Bombers, this rule needs to be play tested. But I think it will add a nice twist to the game without unbalancing it.

I am still working on a different approach without attack bonus, but this is tricky.

@general-6-stars

This is how I envisage to introduce seaplanes into the game, when using the optional rule of Hidden Movement.
Cost: 3; Range: 5; Air: 0, Sea: 0, Land: 0
Set-up: 4 seaplanes are placed on both Rabaul and New Caledonia

Seaplanes are used for reconnaissance of enemy naval forces. They take off and land exclusively from Rabaul (Japan) and New Caledonia (USA) respectively. Thanks to their range, they can reach any sea zone on the map, but not the sea zones around Rabaul and New Caledonia. Turn Order:

1. Starting with the first player, transports and destroyers are loaded and the movements of naval units are secretly noted as mentioned in the rulebook.
2. Then seaplanes are sent out, once again starting with the first player. A player can scout a maximum of five sea zones per turn and send a maximum of two seaplanes per sea zone.
3. The secretly planned sea movements are executed.
4. A die roll is made for each seaplane that is in a sea zone containing at least one enemy ship. For a roll of 1 through 4, the attacker receives the appropriate number of bonus dice, but not more than one bonus die per fighter, tactical bomber and bomber he orders into that sea zone for combat. On a roll of 5 the seaplane does not sight the enemy, on a roll of 6 it is lost (due to bad weather, enemy fighters or engine failure).
5. Special Case: If a seaplane rolls a 1, instead of rolling one bonus die for an attacking aircraft, it may force an enemy submarine that is in the sea zone to submerge. A submerged submarine may not attack in this round. The other subs would get their shots on enemy vessels immediately after the dice rolls for seaplanes.
6. For the bonus dice gained by seaplanes, the attacker may roll once for 1 to 4 aircraft before starting air combat. Hits are assigned to enemy sea units according to the Casualty Strip, damaging or destroying them without returning fire. After casualties have been removed, the regular combat sequence takes place: air combat, sea combat and land combat.

Unlike Tactical Bombers, this rule needs to be play tested. But I think it will add a nice twist to the game without unbalancing it.

@frimmel

Amen. You are absolutely right about that one. My first Guadalcanal game also took way longer than expected. But we were both rather unprepared and thus it was our fault. With a few games played I do like Guadalcanal a lot. It is different, but very balanced. Battles can be a nail-biting experience, especially when a lone enemy subs preys on your carriers or transports.

Re: Adding Tac Bombers from AAP40!

Even though I bought the game back around 2010 I just recently started to give it a try. Anniversary and Global consumed all the time and focus. Last weekend I had my first game of Guadalcanal with Tac Bombers as an additional unit in the set-up. It works great!
Here are the stats we played with:
Cost: 4 reinforcement points
Range: 2
Air: 1
Sea: 2
Land: 1
Special ability: Target select for sea and land combat.

The first dice (or die) in the neck of the battle box (depending on the sort of combat and the number of Tac Bombers available) are those of the Tac Bombers. Hits are assigned by the attacker – the casualty strip is ignored for these hits only.

On the receiving end, the casualty strip positions 3, 4, 9 and 10 are assigned to tactical bombers instead of fighters.

At the beginning of the game, we started with one tactical bomber instead of one fighter on both of the two Japanese carriers in the seazone surrounding Rabaul and on the two US carriers in seazone K and the seazone surrounding New Caledonia.

Guadalcanal is an incredibly well balanced game. With tactical bombers the chance of sinking capital ships and thus scoring additional victory points rises. I would suggest to raise the victory score to 20 instead of 15.

Once we have more games under the belt, we will try the optional rules, including hidden movement. When doing so, we will most likely add another unit to the game: Seaplanes. They scout the endless ocean for the enemy and will give attacking aircraft an extra attack on naval forces in order to reflect the advantage of knowing where the enemy is. I still have to figure out exactly, how to do it. And I need some sculpts from HBG to get the job done.

@hbg-gw-enthusiast

Thank you for this list: Alternate Ending Games and Combat Miniatures were new to me.

HBG is the Gold Standard for sure, especially as they offer a plethora of 3D printed models next to their own miniatures. Quality is excellent and prices are reasonable. Next to them I ordered nation specific battle dice from I Will Never Grow Up (originally from Field Marshal Games) as I had problems with ordering straight from FMG.

I know this is getting expensive, but when it comes to tanks, armored infantry and Katyusha rocket launchers, tin models from GHQ in 1:285 scale are by far the best: https://www.ghqmodels.com
I cannot say anything about planes and ships as I never bought some. But the tanks are superb and way better than anything I have ever seen in plastic.

A somewhat less detailed and a bit cheaper alternative was supplied by CinC models. I couldn’t find their website and therefore don’t know for sure whether they still produce wargaming miniatures.

As I live in Germany, here is a useful website of a company based in Northern Germany that offers GHQ models (and a few CinC models that are still in stock): It is easier, faster and cheaper to order at Master of Military if you want to avoid custom fees and delivery time from the United States. I placed half a dozen orders in recent years and can wholeheartedly recommend them. The website is both in German and English and might be useful for all players in Europe: https://www.mastersofmilitary.de/index.php?lang=en