WHERE'S BEOWULF WHEN YOU NEED HIM?

WWII: PACIFIC THEATER OF OPERATIONS by DOUGLAS NILES

From TSR/SPI

Two 22" x 34" maps, 1200 Counters, 48 page rulebook, 16 page scenario book, two Player Aid Cards - 1 Japanese and 1 Allies, two plastic storage trays, 40 sticker inserts - 10 Task Force and 10 Supply Base for each side. Published By TSR Inc. $39.95

Reviewed by GARY S. MOODY

Grendel has returned.

That Mother of all dragons, TSR, has spawned yet another monster from the deep, a new Grendel, presently wandering the earth with the name WWII: Pacific Theater of Operations, in search of its brother, WWII: ETO, and a few Danes to chew on. If you're planning on setting about challenging this monster, it would probably help to give Beowulf a call and see if he's interested in some monster gaming.

The SPI line at TSR is truly the unwanted, fourth son of the over-bearing lord. Every once in a while TSR lets him out to see what he can do; usually it is little of anything. TSR is truly uncomfortable producing "wargames"; they don't sell in the six figure range that many of their D&D products do, and most (if not all) of their in-house design staff is RPG-oriented, at best … and role-playing is a totally different design discipline from simulation. Ultimately, the son, SPI, turns out always to be the ne'er-do-well of the family, mostly because TSR never seems to be able to do them well.

TSR holds the rights to a fairly large portion of the defunct SPI line. Many of these old games are totally useless, in terms of licensing. One or two could - and should- probably be redone and revived. However, aside from a nice-looking but screwball effort in remaking La Grande Armée - probably one of the least played games of the last decade - TSR has chosen to concentrate on their monster-scale, WWII property, all of which leads us to the monster at hand.

PTO is based upon the hastily thrown together ETO (Europe), which was, itself, a remake of TSR's disastrous World War II, which was a faulty redesign of an original SPI release. (Much of the errata needed to play the updated issue of ETO has to be found in PTO.) Apparently, TSR could did not find the time to do it right the first time, and has not exactly strained itself to ensure a quality product carries their name.

There is a lot I like about PTO, but it is very much a fixer-upper - although certainly not in the sense that FGA produces. PTO is one of those games that tempts us with the promise of something new, but which also, hopefully, upon what has gone before - in this case ETO. But what it fails to deliver is full satisfaction, mainly because the publisher seems to have settled, rather than selected, allowing a marginal product to reach the market rather than demand that the design be the best it could be.

TSR has produced some very nice, if slightly garish, physical products for both its D&D, as well as its "mainstream" wargame market. No such luck here. This is a game that,

graphically, looks like it's been asleep for about 15 years. The boxcover, while huge, is literally unbelievable: a two color box cover? Somebody should send the marketing team to Tierra del Fuego for that one.

The counters are standard stuff. - if your standards haven't advanced since 1975. Land units are mostly division or brigade in size, with no individual ID or visual personality. The air units do have distinctive aircraft silhouettes on them, but they are of the type only Keith Poulter would accept … and even he would do so reluctantly. Smaller naval ships, such as destroyers, subs and transports have unnamed counters that represent squadrons, convoys, or wolfpack sized elements. Carriers, (except for CVE's), battleships, and heavy cruisers are given individual named counters. The counters have a damaged side for most types, and have an attack value, an armor value and a movement rate. The informational markers are clear, but equally boring.

One plus with the package is the adhesive inserts provided to be placed in the recesses in

the storage tray covers. Ships in task forces or at supply bases are placed in these to cut down on the size of on map stacks and allow each player to camouflage much of his

deployments. Along with the sturdy, clear charts, these two features do show that some thought was cast in the consumer's direction.

The main exception to all of this is the two maps,the eastern map of which is mostly ocean. The maps look good, and they are clearly printed with good placement of tracks and force pool boxes. The only problem I have encountered is that, after being refolded several times, the maps became unusually prone to tearing along the creases.

Equally distressing, but perhaps more avoidable, was TSR's response to questions submitted concerning the system . All questions were neatly written in the usual yes/no format and sent to the address listed at the front of the rulebook (Ed. Hmmmm; see the note on such in the Speed of Heat review.) - S.A.S.E. included. The only reply received was a suggestion to subscribe to their fantasy magazine. Gives one "cruel doubt" as to whether anyone up there in beaverland really cares about anything except the bottom line.

As one can see from this issue of BROG alone, there have been many games published that cover the war against Japan at the theater level. A case could even be made that, because so many of the individual battles and campaigns in the Pacific were historically so one-sided, it is only at the theater level that players can expect to find a real opportunity to make decisions that would effect the final outcome. This is almost what happens with PTO. Except for a few very general impressions, this game will not, by itself, teach you

much about how the War in the Pacific was fought. But, if you do know your history, you can tweak this game into back into perspective.

Some of the games on this subject produced over the years go at it with greater detail, some with more accuracy, some with more playability, and some with more variation then PTO. What leaves PTO eligible for consideration at all is that none of these have succeeded in establishing themselves as the ultimate simulation of the event. Because of this, PTO will probably be played, and played repeatedly, by many gamers, including myself, if only because it does have a basically sound game system. The decisions you make, and the order in which they are made, will seem historically correct. It does do a fair job of creating that illusion of reality that leaves each player experiencing his problems and establishing his objectives within the same parameters as his historical counterparts.

There are four seasonal turns in each year: incomes are collected; units are built, repaired, undepleted or added to the force pool; and Initiatives are secretly purchased and revealed - the side that purchased the most will have control of the initiative for the following three months. This has a direct effect upon the sequence in which certain actions are resolved.

In the monthly turns the first thing you encounter is the weather. Either the turn track will designate a specific weather condition, or a single die will be rolled when several options

are listed. The map has four weather zones and three possible weather conditions. Each has differing effects upon land combat. In zones with Monsoon or Winter conditions a roll of two dice determines if air units will be able to operate in that zone for the current month.

The next phase is strategic warfare, which allows the US player to commit eligible bombers, their fighter escorts, and Allied subs to strategic warfare. This renders the committed units unavailable for offensive actions for the current month, but will reduce the Japanese collection of EPs (economic points) in the next seasonal turn. If the Allied player can do enough damage to the Japanese EP collection he can force a Japanese surrender without the need to invade the Home Islands.

The Naval and Air Phase follows next, with the side having initiative deciding who moves first. Each side moves his naval units into position, resolves interceptions, both naval and air, as they occur, and conduct a series of air operations to either rebase air units or attack enemy forces within range. It is in this phase that the sides stage units to the points of attack they wish to develop or defend against in the upcoming Offensive Phase.

In the Offensive Phase,the heart of the system, play starts with the player that holds the initiative. Each side will then alternate executing either a land offensive, an air offensive, or a sea offensive. Purchased offensives will be consumed or impromptu offensives can be purchased, at twice the cost as a seasonal purchase. The phase ends when both sides pass

on an offensive execution, or when no more offensives remain for either side. After that, all land units not activated for offensives in the current turn may be moved.

In the End Phase a second movement of naval units is performed, mostly for the purpose of returning units to port - and only limited air action is allowed. Supply attrition losses are resolved, some bookkeeping is conducted, certain, eligible eliminated units are replenished, and some limited installation repairs are allowed.

As you can tell, there is not much about the basic game system that an experienced gamer will not have encountered in some form during his career. Like the current trend in ice cream, fruit juices and bubble gum it is a mixture of several proven, but not usually blended, flavors. Whether you enjoy the taste is pretty much up to how much you want that sort of thing. Being so operational oriented, PTO is much less of a challenge than the tactical-leaning King Kongs, such as EATS and War in the Pacific (with which it has nothing in common).

Play balance is not going to be a strong selling point - but, then again, it never is with games this size. The play's the thing, as the melancholy Dane would say. A Japanese player who cannot take either India or Australia, or both, to ensure a minor victory, is asleep at the switch. The Japanese can sweep the Pacific in the first year if every initial operation goes well. An Allied player who cannot crush the Japanese by the end of a full game, no matter how well the Japanese did to start with, has not been paying attention.

PTO certainly was not given the attention it needed to emerge from the pack. Its ultimate fate appears to be to simply fill a gap in TSR's catalog and ride the coattails of its older brother ETO, allowing players to cover all of WWII.

Like World in Flames, and far to many other games coming out, the basic game system is there, but the playtesting is not complete. What you have here is a more expensive alternative to World in Flames. After a couple of playings of either PTO or ETO, and after deciding upon a few variant rules, you will then have something comparable to the WIF 6.2, or whatever version Harry has tinkered us up to - except that the ETO/PTO combination will be more likely to be played to conclusion, and in a shorter period of time. If you've already struggled to master the "Many Faces of WIF", making the switch will probably be hard to justify unless Ed McMahon calls with your check.

If you are willing to put in the effort to research and apply the missing historical influences, you can make the adjustments needed to bring a proper focus to the game. If you prefer to purchase games that are complete, right out of the box, then let this one pass.

CAPSULE COMMENTS:

Graphic Presentation: Functional and, except for the maps and play-aids, unexceptional. The rules booklet is sectioned well, but not only cursorily edited.

Playability: A sound basic game system that combines the familiar with some new approaches to simulating its subject. Speed of play suffers because rules are not presented in a clear. It is unlikely that potential wargamers will stay with the hobby if PTO is their

first exposure to wargaming. Solitaire? Oh, sure. Play only with people who will still be a

friend after an extended discussion.

Replayability: If you like the system, you'll probably stay with it, as these things are more of a social gathering than a real gaming session.

Historicity: Forced, and somewhat simplistic. Grand strategy will follow the historical considerations fairly well, but decisive engagements will lose much of this historical feel

as the players are forced into selecting tactics that are fine in gaming terms, but are truly historically suspect.

Playing Time: Anywhere from 6 to 8 hours for earl-war scenarios, up to 60 or

more total hours for a full campaign.

Comparisons: Read the enclosed reviews of the other monsters herein, then return here to proceed further.

Overall: Not bad, not good … and not too expensive, by the way. It's playable, it's fairly interesting, but it's somewhat unsatisfactory. Not helped by the total lack of support TSR gives this monster. Sic 'em, Beowulf.