Operation Watchtower HS12 Chesty's Turn

[KhandidGamera]

Looking over OW-Edson's Ridge scenarios and am interested in knowing the rationale for couple things in this scenario:

1. Is the ELR of 4 correct for the Marines, or should it be 5? If 4 - rationale?

2. Why is the Attached MG Section represented by 6-6-6 Regular US army squads?

Based on ROAR outcomes looks like John Basilone's non-posthumous MOH was miraculous.

The Pacific mini-series has grown on me since first seeing it, hoping to play this one soon.

About 9 years after this action, C-1-7 was my dad's unit fighting in Korea. Watching the 2nd episode of the Pacific with them positioning the M1917's reminds me of this in particular - taken in November 1951. Dad had a 35mm slide camera with him and took some good shots.

 

[Yuri0352]

Looking over OW-Edson's Ridge scenarios and am interested in knowing the rationale for couple things in this scenario:

1. Is the ELR of 4 correct for the Marines, or should it be 5? If 4 - rationale?

2. Why is the Attached MG Section represented by 6-6-6 Regular US army squads?

Based on ROAR outcomes looks like John Basilone's non-posthumous MOH was miraculous.

The Pacific mini-series has grown on me since first seeing it, hoping to play this one soon.

About 9 years after this action, C-1-7 was my dad's unit fighting in Korea. Watching the 2nd episode of the Pacific with them positioning the M1917's reminds me of this in particular - taken in November 1951. Dad had a 35mm slide camera with him and took some good shots.
View attachment 178

Great photo! That's how the place looked when I was there in the early '80's...the hills and the pine trees I mean, of course.

 

[klasmalmstrom]

1. Is the ELR of 4 correct for the Marines, or should it be 5? If 4 - rationale?

It is a Night (E1.) scenario.

E1.22:
"The ELR of a Scenario Defender in a night scenario is always printed on the OB as (and for a DYO scenario is assumed to be) one less than it would be normally...."

2. Why is the Attached MG Section represented by 6-6-6 Regular US army squads?

No idea.

 

[bprobst]

It's a pretty awful scenario. What I think might be miraculous is all those Japanese wins on ROAR. When I played it neither my opponent nor I could work out how the Japanese might actually win, ever. Just moving more than one hex a turn (even while Cloaked) is a mighty achievement, let alone exiting the map or even killing anyone. Well, I exaggerate of course, but the Japanese have a really steep hill to climb, in more than one sense.

I seem to recall that my Basilone did perform sterling service, worthy of his real-life MoH. Many a Japanese unit's butt was kicked.

Huh. I never noticed that those reinforcements were Army guys. There weren't actually any Army units on the island at that time, were there? Regardless, they are the final nail in the Japanese coffin. Just when they look like they might be able to break out in mass across the treeless summit, those guys turn up to say "nope, won't happen".

 

[jrv]

The Army 164th regiment had landed on Guadalcanal by the time of the attack:

At 03:45, the 3rd Battalion, 164th Infantry, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Robert Hall and being held in reserve, was fed piecemeal into Puller's line.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_for_Henderson_Field

JR

 

[KhandidGamera]

Yuri:
My impression from the slides was that it looked a lot like Colorado in some ways.

Klas:
Realized the same on the ELR later - guess the Raiders and Paramarines are assumed by their nature to be trained for night and so don't take the ELR penalty - noticed they are still 5 in one of the other scenarios.

Bruce:
I'm guessing that must be a common experience in the other scenarios too like High Water Mark. From reading Frank's Guadalcanal one take away was how the Japanese got lost just getting into position with no good maps.
Strikes me as very much the same you read about with Civil War troops getting lost, scattered, or trying to avoid that moving through woods. Played much more of Watchtower and does it suck bad for the Japanese on your points in with anything on the hill at night, if not in general?

One of my dad's most interesting stories was being up in and around Wonson Bay - now in DPRK - training Korean marines and having no maps save the kind left over from the Japanese era that were like the one's Frank talks about - nautical charts more that were too small in scale and without a lot of land detail. They ended up making new smaller scale maps by gridding them out and scaling them up by hand.

JR:
Thanks, should have checked that, probably questioned it, because the unit was listed on the scenario card. Have to check out the second episode again and see if that's the one where the Marines steal the Army stuff:
that also seems like a time honored tradition with Marines even up to Desert Storm. Dad made some comments once or twice to the effect that a can of yellow paint could be a marine's best friend.

Thanks all in general for the responses, my questions answered.

 

[bprobst]

Played much more of Watchtower and does it suck bad for the Japanese on your points in with anything on the hill at night, if not in general?

I've only played 3 or 4 of the OWT scenarios, and this is the only one I didn't like. None of the others I played were night scenarios.

I should amend that by saying actually playing it was entertaining enough; there's lots of opportunities for interesting things to happen. But IMO the Japanese have no realistic chance of winning the scenario as presented. Maybe if they get the balance, but even then I think it would be a struggle.

 

[KhandidGamera]

I've only played 3 or 4 of the OWT scenarios, and this is the only one I didn't like. None of the others I played were night scenarios.

I should amend that by saying actually playing it was entertaining enough; there's lots of opportunities for interesting things to happen. But IMO the Japanese have no realistic chance of winning the scenario as presented. Maybe if they get the balance, but even then I think it would be a struggle.

Thanks for the feed-back. There are certainly some dog scenarios out there, but there are some that aren't winnable by a side I still like to play and can enjoy - they're just hard and unfair. Mad Minute felt like that when I played it. Of course I've been playing so long and not often well, maybe that has to be my perspective to continue pushing counters. Still, I think in the gaming world there's a lot missed for not seeing that way - putting oneself in a desperate place small imitating the desperation of the real guys. Come to believe without getting some sort of that empathy, hard to get at historical events in general.

 

[Blackcloud6]

I played this one as the Japanese and lost. But I did find it interesting to play. It is tough and as I recall I remember it being close..and then the Japanese got all shot up.

 

[klasmalmstrom]

Klas:
Realized the same on the ELR later - guess the Raiders and Paramarines are assumed by their nature to be trained for night and so don't take the ELR penalty - noticed they are still 5 in one of the other scenarios.

Could be. Or it could be an oversight by the designer(s)/proofreader(s) - that rule is easy to miss. But unless there is errata I would assume it is correct.

In HS4 the Raiders/Paramarines have an ELR of 4 - which is consistent with E1.22.
In HS11, however, the regular U.S.M.C. have an ELR of 5 - which is not consistent with E1.22.

 

[bendizoid]

The GIs got 'shanghaied' into the MarineCorp for a night. The GIs had M1 rifles, the marines had bolt action Springfields. Straight off the boat, Chesty had each GI pair up with a marine. I can imagine the GIs moral might go up because nobody wants to look chicken around marines. That info is from the book 'Marine' the story of Chesty Puller.

 

[bendizoid]

Change a 6-6-6 and a 4-5-8 into 2 Marine 5-5-8s.

 

[KhandidGamera]

The GIs got 'shanghaied' into the MarineCorp for a night. The GIs had M1 rifles, the marines had bolt action Springfields. Straight off the boat, Chesty had each GI pair up with a marine. I can imagine the GIs moral might go up because nobody wants to look chicken around marines. That info is from the book 'Marine' the story of Chesty Puller.

I have that book, will have to look that section up, and in Frank's book. That's sounds like a little Civil War-peer-influence-while-under-fire effect.

Alternative idea would be Army troops get a +1 ML increase is in LOS/adjacent/stacked with USMC MMC/SMC.

 

[bendizoid]

The US should get to use the rare 'cut paths' rule in section G and cut a few free trails before start.

 

[jtsjc1]

Great pic I like the Garand in the shadow at the bottom and the two pineapples next to it. Its great to see photos from the actual time and place. John Basilone was a human fighting machine and his actions with the M1917 saved his men. If I recall, there was talk of presenting him with a posthumous MOH for his actions on Iwo. He did receive the Corps' second highest honor. I haven't played Chesty's Turn but now I'm thinking of taking it out and running through it.

 

[Srynerson]

Great pic I like the Garand in the shadow at the bottom and the two pineapples next to it. Its great to see photos from the actual time and place. John Basilone was a human fighting machine and his actions with the M1917 saved his men. If I recall, there was talk of presenting him with a posthumous MOH for his actions on Iwo. He did receive the Corps' second highest honor.

As I read it, the picture that KhandidGamera posted shows Korea, not the actual time and place of this particular scenario.

 

[jtsjc1]

As I read it, the picture that KhandidGamera posted shows Korea, not the actual time and place of this particular scenario.

Sorry I meant to say the time and place in Korea. I should have clarified my post.