From the VUCA stable - carrier battles in the Pacific, a subject of great interest to me and has given me some of my best games over the years.
The back of the box.
One of the counter sheets - this is for the Royal Navy and also for the Royal Australian Navy so the Indian Ocean may well see some action!
The WW2 naval shelf - my four additional copies of Flat Top are stored elsewhere.
One of the key elements of a carrier based game is the whole ‘Find, Fix and Strike’ process (with a nod to Mr Manley for using the name of his excellent WW2 rules, available as ever, from the Wargames Vault under his Long Face Game label) and both Flat Top and CV use a plot map. This is a lot of fun and places a premium on accurate record keeping as well as a good knowledge of the rules. All of this takes time and, to be honest, dedication. Games such as Flat Top, excellent though it is, are not particularly fashionable these days, in my opinion that is, so I am not expecting a horde of people getting in touch to have a game!
Task Force - Carrier Battles in the Pacific, published by VUCA Simulations, is the latest addition to my collection of carrier games and for a variety of reasons, may well be, for me at least, the most effective way I can indulge my passion for air strikes and naval surface actions!
The game is quite simply beautiful to look at and as with The Far Seas, the overall production quality is off the charts. The rule book is surprisingly modest - 19 pages in all - and there are 11 scenarios of increasing complexity. I like the idea of this as it effectively layers the rules so that one is not overwhelmed from the outset. The scenarios are as follows:
1. Attack on Pearl Harbour
2. Sinking of the Prince of Wales and Repulse
3. Battle of Java Sea
4. Carrier vs Carrier (fictional)
5. Battle of the Coral Sea
6. Battle of Midway
7. Battle of the Eastern Solomons
8. Combined Fleet vs Pacific Fleet (fictional)
9. Indian Ocean Raid (fictional)
10. The Battles of Santa Cruz Islands and Second Naval battle of Guadalcanal
11. Solomon Islands (custom scenario)
Certainly I did not expect to see Force Z featuring, nor the Java sea action but they are most welcome additions! Naturally there is the facility to design one’s own scenarios which will be very useful and I have already thought about adapting some of the Flat Top versions.
In many ways the acquisition of Task Force represents a bit of a change of direction in respect of gaming carrier operations. It will be far easier to persuade someone to have a go rather than inflicting the air and sea majesty that is Flat Top on an unsuspecting gamer!
Well, maybe later, once they have cut their teeth on Task Force!
