I had been debating about making 'Guadacanal' my next PG purchase for quite some time but when I found it for the low price of 35€ at the local game store here in Düsseldorf I didn't hesitate to clear it from the shelf. I had gathered from reading the errata and AARs here, at the site, that it was going to be a bit tedious adapting to an entirely new PG environment and didn't have the greatest expectations getting into it. Then once I got the game home and opened it up I was intimidated by the 3 pages of game rules along with the many SSRs. However, taking in as much as could I finally began to set-up for this first scenario. A lot of questions began to pop-up in my mind and after a while stopped posting queries here at the PG-HQ forum and just proceeded on. I did find Armyduck's AAR to be of a lot of assistance and Jay Townsend's notes a great help as well. I knew mistakes were going to be made and at one point was tempted to set the scenario up again and start all over but I pressed on.

The first obstacle was with the Japanese deployment and had to take care to clarify which hexes were the proper ones to deploy in and count for VCs. Then there was the issue of "hidden" units playing solo. I used a method suggested by Shad with minefield counters placed but that didn't work as well as I thought it would. For every unit hidden two minfield counters were placed; one representing the real unit(s) and the other a decoy. The game rules state that each time a unit enters a hex within three hexes of a hidden unit it is spotted on 6/D6 roll, which can be modified. So it wasn't each new hex entered but each unit. So most of the time it was a triple stack of Raider units moving together, one at a time, giving three rolls for every hex entered. The problem was as soon as a decoy was uncovered then it was 100% certain that the other minefield counter represented were the actual unit was. So with all this in mind hidden units were found out well before any American units blundered into a very deadly surprise assault from the Japanese. In my next scenario I will try new things with "hidden" units but really think that only a shared play itself can make them fully effective.

So the American invasion begins and right away there are problems, thanks mostly due to more frequent chance of fog of war (after two activations and 15+ roll) and that in jungle hexes units and leaders cannot be affected or subactivated by adjacent ones. This takes some getting used to. Air-support is available for the first 10 turns but is randomly determined and a lot of times was unavailable. Only once did the Americans get 3 SBDs at once and that air-attack failed to eliminate the Japanese 37mm AA gun. Luckily for the Americans all shots fired by the AA gun missed that were fired at the LCVP landing craft. Task Force Mike were deployed at the other end of the island and could not move through hex 1912 as it was not a full sea hex so warships were grounded from assisting to eliminate the AA gun; it had to be taken out by Raider units. The amphibious landings were slow going and a lot of times due to fog of war were postponed. By the end of the scenario there was still one unit of Marines at sea that had only just been able to load after 38 turns had passed! There are so many American units going up against the Japanese defenders that not all of them are needed so further landings after the first wave were last on the priority list.

Most of the Japanese were in the central and eastern portion of the island but a token force of SNLF on west end proved to be very stubborn to remove. Only a small detachment of Raiders were sent after them but it wasn't until 14:45/turn 29 that the west end of the island had been secured. Of course the biggest stumbling block for the Americans would be the caves in the central hills. Just as dangerous were SER units that had dug-in at the top of the hill barring the way and getting a(+1) DF modfier firing down at units on lower elevations. I only chose to deploy Japanese units in just two of the caves, the ones that counted for VCs. Other units were used to manuever around and do more than just wait to be attacked; going on the offensive to do all they could to inflict American casualties as Japan only needs to inflict 7 American step losses to secure a victory if holding onto control of objectives fails. Step losses mean nothing to the Japanese as long as they can hold onto 3 of 5 hexes. The American VCs are a lot more stark. There is no and/or option for them to win like the Japanese. First case, the Americans can take no more than 2 step losses to meet their VCs; the catch 22 is in order to reach the other objectives they have to triple stack a lot to have effective firepower and brave a lot of opportunity fire getting to target hexes. In my play Japanese opportunity fire caused over half the American step losses, more so than assaults.

Though it seemed inevitable that through the course of 38 turns that the Americans would lose more than 2 steps, the third step loss did not occur until 12:45/turn 21. At this point the entire American strategy had to change right away and all emphasis placed on preventing a Japanese victory to force a draw. Around this time is when I started to make the most mistakes with the Americans. Too many troops and to much time was spent worrying about clearing the caves instead of sending a sizable force east to clear VC hexes there. The caves could of been totally bypassed first and then attacked later. If those two cave VC hexes are the only ones left to clear then a Japanese victory can be averted. This mistake ended with the Americans losing 7 steps by 14:30/turn 28, sealing the Japanese victory. However I played out the last 10 turns to see if the the other Japanese VC could be prevented and looked at it as training for the full Tulagi scenario, #4; in which the first 3 scenarios are combined for a mini-campaign. Ultimately, by the end of play, the Japanese were also able to hold those three required hexes which would make it a major victory all-around. However, though a little too late, things started clicking for the Americans. The one cave in hex 1709 was taken and the really difficult cave, hex 1608, in jungle and hill was hit hard leaving both the HMG and SNLF unit in it demoralized. Of course both of those units easily recovered to disrupted status but they were weakened enough for a last ditch assault attempt on the last turn. The key to this was combining the fire of units in clear terrain, something that was overlooked a lot earlier. Of course this also makes the American units very vulnerable to DF but really was the only way to weaken the defenders effectively. Other than that, triple stacked units in the jungle, unable to combine fire from adjacent ones, were only able to fire on the 4 column of the DF table at cave/jungle hex 1608. American units in the jungle never really had much of a chance of keeping the defenders down and even then, with the caves counting as entrenchments for all purposes this added a (+1) recovery bonus along with the leader's morale modifier; making it so that a full strength SNLF unit only needed to roll less than an 11 to recover if disrupted/10 if demoralized. Occasionally a random event would affect play but usually, by chance, worked in favor of the Americans: A sniper was able to take out the highest rated Japanese army LT(10-1-1); Misunderstood orders caused one Japanese SER unit to leave the protection of the jungle and wander out into clear terrain and a thunderstorm occured once but only lasted 15 minutes/1 turn. Step losses were almost even; Americans losing 7 steps, the Japanese 8. American losses would have been lighter had they focused on the eastern portion of the island first and made that top priority, at least to force a draw.

Anyway, I think I have written enough concerning my first foray into 'Guadalcanal' but despite the errata with this scenario I really enjoyed it, even more after the first half, even when it was clear that the Americans wouldn't win after the 7 step losses. I learned a lot by trial and even more error. My solo play ended with a "4" but because of the broken status of the scenario and that it is tough one for a first play can only rate it a "3" overall. Interestingly enough I would like to play this one against an opponent with either side but I think for a good shared play that both players should have already played this one solo first to get a feel for it. I am really looking forward to completing the next two Tulagi scenarios before into the mini-campaign of scenario #4 which runs at 137 turns. I think I have a good feel for the terrain now and overall very enthusiastic about completing 'Guadalcanal' and venturing into other Pacific theater PG games. I have a lot more motivation to continue with this than I did with my first impression of 'Airborne' but on the other hand would not suggest this one for beginners. I think after a solid year of other PG gaming I picked the right time to take this one on.