War at Sea
Allied Nations
- Australia
- Brazil
- Canada
- France
- Greece
- Netherlands
- New Zealand
- Norway
- Poland
- Soviet Union
- United Kingdom
- United States
- Allies stat table
Axis Nations
Neutral Nations/Installations
Sets
- War At Sea
- Task Force
- Flank Speed
- New Starter
- Condition Zebra
- Set V (Fleet Command)
- Surface action
- First Strike (Forumini Expansion Deck A)
- Infamy (Forumini Expansion Deck B)
- Battle Line (Forumini Expansion Deck C)
- All Hands on Deck (Forumini D)
- Action Stations (Forumini E)
- Dead Reckoning (Forumini F)
Unit Card:
Set - Rarity - Number
Surface Action-
History:
USS Hornet CV-8, the seventh ship to carry the name Hornet, was a Yorktown-class aircraft carrier of the United States Navy. During World War II in the Pacific Theater, she launched the Doolittle Raid on Tokyo and participated in the Battle of Midway and the Buin-Faisi-Tonolai Raid. In the Solomon Islands campaign she was involved in the Capture and Defense of Guadalcanal and the Battle of the Santa Cruz Islands where she was irreparably damaged and sunk. Hornet was in service for a year and six days and was the last US fleet carrier ever sunk by enemy fire. For these actions, she was awarded four service stars, a citation for the Doolittle Raid in 1995, and her Torpedo Squadron 8 received a Presidential Unit Citation for extraordinary heroism for the Battle of Midway.
Reviews:
Vergilius Powergaming Evaluation
The long-awaited Hornet finally makes its appearance, and in the end, is not really that impressive. She does not obsolete either Yorktown or Enterprise, and in fact, is probably slightly weaker than both. Victory Point SAs are generally only meaningful in 100 point games. 12 points out of 100 is 12%, but 12 points out of 200 is 6%, and so forth as you get into higher point games. Expert Bomber-2 is nice, but makes for a lone SA on this unit. Still carriers with single SAs can be combined with other carriers that have more SAs so that you have enough SAs to spread throughout your fleet. The highlight of the Hornet is the way the B25 has been integrated. You lose the use of the flight deck on the first turn of the game, and gain victory points if the B25 is not shot down. Then the B25 is removed from the game. Overall, this may fit the unit’s history very well but it is of dubious gaming merit. VPs are mainly useful in 100 point contests, but carrier builds at 100 points tend to depend upon destroying the entire enemy fleet, so usually an extra 12 VPs is not going to matter. There is one clever way around the flight-deck problem. You simply need space at your land base for the planes that you intend to fly from the Hornet. You fly them from the land-base as per normal, and only land them on the Hornet at the end of the turn. Moreover, you pay 9 points for the B25 which is then removed from the game, and the 12 VPs are no certain thing. This makes the entire ability of dubious merit. Worse off, the ability which has clear drawbacks to complement its advantages also seems to have raised the cost of Hornet by a point or two. If you decide not to use the ability, you’ve paid 22 points of EB-2, 3 points shy of the Enterprise where you’d add an AA die, Flag-2, Expert dogfighter-1, and Survivor. Hornet’s inclusion will quiet the folks who wanted it included for its namesake, but Enterprise, Yorktown, Lexington and Saratoga are all better early war carriers for gaming purposes. Powergaming Grade: F
Plastic Figure Notes:
A reprint of Yorktown/Enterprise. Nice camouflage paint scheme. The island might lean little inward, but that was present on the earlier sculpt as well.
