Targeting of Amphibious Assault Naval Vessels by Air Units

[Yoper]

Naval units providing support during the amphibious round of combat are also exempt from casualties.

I came across this while rereading the rules.

Does this mean that the naval units that are held back from a naval battle (a naval battle that procedes an amphibious assault) are not targetable by enemy air units that are in the battle?

Does that include the transports that are carrying the attacking ground units?

Or does this rule only apply to a proceding naval battle that only has surface naval units?

Craig

[John D.]

Hi Craig - Air units CAN target ANYTHING in the sea zone including transports, if they are defensively reacting to an adjacent naval battle.

John

[Yoper]

So the above rule situation only applies to a naval battle that only has defending surface naval units?  (Or maybe I should say that it applies to only that part of the naval battle that deals with surface vs. surface combat.)

The attacking naval units that are designated as part of the amphibious assault are shielded by the rest of the attacking naval units and cannot be targeted by the defending surface naval units.  Air units can fly past the shielding surface naval units and attack any of the ships being shielded.

This is how we have played it, but in rereading the rules the above rule was also near information the pertained to air units in combat so I was just trying to clear things up.

Craig

[Mark]

The rule stated above is in reference to the ground combat - the amphibious atttack of the land territory.  If there is a naval battle taking place in the sea zone (prior to the amphibious assault) all naval units can be targeted by air units whether they are involved inthe amphibous invasion or not.