Midway!

Today's game is AH's classic of Midway.  I took the USN and Dan took the IJN.

My USN had the IJN in it's sites right up till the turn we get in range for air strikes...

First strike goes after the Enterprise.

Second strike goes after the Hornet.

The Hornet managed to avoid being sunk but Enterprise and a lot of support ships are out.

The USN follows up with a strike on Akagi.

Taking out Akagi and a couple of other vessels.  The Japanese made a mistake by having different task forces instead of one big blob.  Due to the wonky AA rules in the game having all the carriers and support ships in one square is often better then having them seperated.

The USN finds the Japanese first early on the second day of battle and what little is left strikes.

Two more Japanese carriers down.

The IJN strikes back a couple hours later (one turn) and finishes off the USN carriers.

The final tally at game end.  A lot of the IJN losses can be attributed to very lucky Die Rolls for the USN.  My average roll had to be near a 5 and the IJN average closer to a 2.

The positions of the ships (from the USN search) at game end.

A fun game but a mess when it comes to being a simulation.  If the Japanese hold off on bring their forces forward till the second group comes on it gets nearly impossible for the USN to win.  The Coral Sea variant plays a good bit better since the forces are more even but even that has the problem with soak off attacks versus a fleet - which is something that was not done on purpose.