Bug with attacking lone AA guns?

[homem_de_ovo]

I just sent a single Fighter to attack a territory that only contained an enemy AA gun, and was surprised that the battle ended immediately in my favor without the AA gun firing its one roll that it gets as AA defense prior to start of battle. Is this a bug or following the rules as written?

[aardvarkpepper]

Deleted earlier post after looking at it a bit closer. New post follows.

Hasbro/WotC will not resolve rules questions. As far as I know relevant sections:

Page 14

A number of units have special rules that modify or overwrite the combat rules in this section. See Unit Profiles, pg. 24 for
combat rules associated with each type of unit.

Antiaircraft artillery are mentioned in passing in the strategic bombing section but not elsewhere that I see. So it's on to page 24+ for unit special rules.

Page 25

No Combat Value: It can, however, be taken as a casualty. If a territory containing AAA units and no combat units is attacked,
the AAA units are automatically destroyed. AAA units may never attack.
Air Defense: An Antiaircraft artillery (AAA) unit can fire only at an air unit when that unit attacks the territory containing
that AAA unit. AAA units fire only once, before the first round of combat. Each AAA unit in the territory may fire up to
three times, but only once per attacking air unit. In other words, the total number of air defense dice rolled is three times
the number of AAA units, or the number of attacking air units, whichever is the lesser. Once the number of air defense dice
is determined, the dice are rolled. For each “1” rolled, the attacker chooses one air unit as a casualty. These casualties are
removed immediately, and will not participate in the remainder of the battle. This AAA attack is made immediately before
normal combat occurs in the territory containing the AAA unit. AAA units do not defend industrial complexes against strategic
bombing. Industrial complexes have their own “built in” air defenses (see Industrial Complexes, below)..

The moment the AAA is "attacked" it's automatically destroyed. But at the same time it also fires at the air unit(s). Simultaneously.

Say an air unit attacks a territory with a lone AAA, the AAA blows up the air unit, but the AAA is still destroyed. Everything dies. Yes, I know, normally air units destroyed by AAA guns never get to fire, in this case the air unit never makes an attack roll. Nonetheless. Everything is destroyed.

Posters can dispute the timing, and I don't like it, but that's how I read it, and I can't find anything that specifically says otherwise.

==

(edit - thanks to homem_de_ovo for bringing this up. Never really thought about it until now.)

[Julius Borisov]

The AA gun is automatically destroyed if the area with the gun doesn't have any combat units. In that situation, the gun behaves like a lone transport.

If a territory containing AAA units and no combat units is attacked, the AAA units are automatically destroyed. AAA units may never attack.

[aardvarkpepper]

I asked around; Krieghund on Axis and Allies org boards cited the "Defenseless Transports" sidebar on page 17 and the errata.

Errata excerpt:

I'm a little confused about how transports work in combat. Could you explain when they can be taken as casualties and how "defenseless" transports work? . . .The sole point of the defenseless transport rule is to keep you from rolling potentially endless dice until you kill all of the helpless transports.

If the rules are read literally (which *usually* I would encourage but I've said right along the 1942 2nd edition rulebook is poorly organized) then the resolution works as I described in the OP.

However, if you look at the *intent* and consider the errata "the sole point . . . to keep you from rolling potentially endless dice" - the intent of the rule is not to render AAA guns useless in some situations, but to prevent needless dice rolling. Reading through the reference at the end of the rulebook offers an alternative to what I wrote earlier.

Destroying
defenseless transports in this
way still counts as combat for the
purpose of offshore bombardment
and similar rules.

The "automatic destruction" rule for transports "counts as combat". Again, reasonably the AAA should fire. And AAA fires before the first round of combat.

So it comes down to - a literal interpretation of the rules? In which case what I wrote in the OP applies and the AAA fires. Or a reasonable interpretation of the rules (lot of heavy implication)? In which case, again, the AAA fires.

I strongly suggest what I'm calling the reasonable interpretation (if AAA fire destroys all attackers the automatic destruction rule doesn't apply) be used.

Note: I'm not submitting this to Beamdog's portal. I wasn't the player in question that experienced the behavior in the first place, and I don't submit reports based on hearsay. I looked up the rules, I asked others for their input, I got their input, I'm reporting that input, whoever thinks it should be followed up on can follow up on it.