| Archive for Axis & Allies ForuMINI Specialised in the World War II Axis & Allies Miniatures and War At Sea Games |
| ericjohn |
Operation Sealion - "We will defend our island..."This scenario is inspired by the book "Invasion: The Alternate History of the German Invasion of England, July 1940" by Kenneth Macksey. I don't necessarily agree with the assumptions contained, but it does lay out a dramatic situation which begged for a War at Sea treatment.July 15, 1940. The Germans have gone for an early knockout of Britain when she is at her weakest point after the fall of France. The RAF has not had time to complete its radar network, nor to ramp up aircraft production and pilot training. After a short but intense campaign by the Luftwaffe, Fighter Command has been largely neutralized as an effective force. With the preponderance of power in the skies, the Germans have used concentrated airborne and seaborne attacks to capture a small beachhead around Dover. Now they are preparing convoys to bring across the 7th and 9th Panzer divisions. If they reach shore, they should be enough to dice up the ill-equipped and immobile British army. Churchill orders the Royal Navy into action. The fleet has overwhelming surface strength. However they will have little fighter cover. The Germans can counter them with a combination of surface units, patrol boats, mines, U-boats and Luftwaffe squadrons. Can the German convoys be stopped and Britain saved? Or will the Royal Navy go to the bottom of the Channel, and with it Britain's hopes for survival? The scenario file (Word DOC) is hosted here: http://myfreefilehosting.com/f/84df29775e_0.4MB EDIT BY AQUARIUS: That link is dead. The file is now hosted here: http://rapidshare.com/files/184089369/was_scenario_invasion.doc (scroll down to the bottom to where it says Click Here To Download - if anyone knows any better free file hosting let me know, this one at least doesn't appear to me to be doing popups, etc...) (I've played it 3 times myself, but I'd really like to get some fresh eyes on it - please post or PM feedback, particularly on play balance) |
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| EvilKobra |
Nice scenario - you certainly get an A+ for presentation!
I will try it as soon as I have the opportunity, perhaps tomorrow. My only concern a priori is with the minesweeper deployment - it seems to effectively cripple the initial minefields, as the Kriegsmarine player must either keep the mines under gunnery cover, or lose nearly half of them from the outset. The Stukas should pretty much dispose of any deployed minesweepers on turn 1, but by then there's 5 mines gone (or more, if the German deployed more than one in any sector). Another question about mines: after a successful hit, does a mine disappear? |
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| ericjohn |
Regarding mines, they do not disappear upon a hit. Each token probably really represents dozens of mines. Regarding minesweeper deployment, please let me know how the mines work out. In the games I've played mines have been a factor, but not decisive in themselves. The UK player basically has a choice - deploy the minesweepers where they can take a big bite out of the German initial minefields, but the minesweepers will be very quickly dispatched. Or, save them until they can be deployed with the fleet, and they will be less effective but they might last a little longer. For the German player then there are options as to how to employ ship, sub and air assets to deploy more mines (I expect Kondors will be deploying mines almost every turn, but the German may choose to hide their MTBs or expose them to strafing in order to deploy more mines; they might choose to place U-boats more for sea control or ASW, or more for minelaying...). Then the UK player has to decide whether to commit their fleet before the Germans can build up their minefields, while exposing the fleet to more air attacks, or wait until the German convoys are underway but potentially better protected by mines... Anyway you get the idea, my hope is that there are a lot of different viable options and move/countermove possibilities. But maybe the UK can clear too many mines up front, let me know how it plays. |
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| Aquarius |
I will play this tonight, but I have one question. Do each of the British task forces have to enter all at once, or can each ship enter whenever it feels like it? | ||
| ericjohn |
Each individual ship can enter independently whenever the British player wants, the task forces do not need to act as a bloc The British player may often want to enter many or all units en masse in order to overwhelm the Luftwaffe. But there may be advantages to moving in waves, for example DDs might be able to clear U-boats and MTBs loitering around the entrance area ahead of the BBs, or the British player might hold back Cruisers altogether since they can cost VPs and are pretty brittle. Or possibly stagger the east-west threat: move in the heavies, get the Nordmarks moving west and then use the small Portsmouth squad to inflict some disproportionate damage The general flow of the scenario is that the British hold the inititative, since they choose when and where to fight. The German player needs to try to force the initiative by sending out transports, but carefully since they are then exposed to attack. The British player wants to discourage the transports from moving (and be ready to sink them when they inevitably do have to move), while exposing the minimum amount of force to air attack and for the least amount of time. Conversely the Germans need to force the British to loiter under attack for the maximum amount of time, but the Germans also need to move the action along quickly so they have time for their transports to make it across before the game ends. |
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| Aquarius |
Well, I played this out tonight and it turned out pretty good. The game finished with a draw, as I had gotten one crippled transport across and sunk 4 cruisers. If I had to choose two things that killed me, they would be my slow rolls and mine/torpedo rolls.
I brought all the transports out the first turn, but one from each group was slow. I laid all my mines where the heavy group was going to come in, and positioned my Graf Spee, Koln, and Karl Galster to pound the small group from a distance when it came in. I figured that the MTBs would help take care of the BB group. He brought out everything on the second turn. I had managed to get my second-to-last transport to one square next to Dover on the previous turn, but it had been crippled. I roll for my slow, and bang, I can't move this turn. That got pounded, and I managed to get my last crippled transport into the harbor safely, but that was about it. My Stukas did a pretty good job killing off all of the cruisers and destroyers, and my MTB evasion rolls were ridiculous. I only lost 1 of the five, despite their being exposed for the whole game. My mine and torpedo rolls, however, SUCKED!!!!!! I counted my torpedo rolls (mines + MTBs + U-Boats), and I came out 5 for 87. I didn't land a single hit from either of my subs, and my MTBs only made 3 hits the entire game. I got 2 mine hits in the very beginning, hurting a Rodney and killing a Javelin, but that was IT!! Great scenario, thanks for posting it! |
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| Dco2US |
As Aquarius' opponent I can attest to the Brit perspective. First: Those Nordmarks get a 1 turn headstart. I saw no alternative but to get everything that could shoot within range as soon as possible, which meant entering every ship on turn 2! The O'brians weren't much use in clearing mines- 2 of them were killed by the mines they were looking for on the first turn. I had to take Farraguts advice and "Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!" with the rest of my fleet.
In the first turns I thought the objective was impossible, as I was being swarmed by the entire Luftwaffe in an unending field of mines. But, I quickly got in range of the transports and found average success at sending them to the bottom of the channel. It now looked as if the Homeland could be saved! I did in fact sink 5 of the 6 transports in a reasonable amount of time. But, Uh-Oh! The battle wasn't going to be over until I got the hell out of that mess! The Graf Spee couldn't last long under those big guns and so the German heavy was no longer a threat but the rest of the game was like being chased out of the neighbors yard by a pack of yapping Miniature Schnauzers!!! Only the Hood and Rodney survived! I'd like to see the scenario played a few times by others as I think Aquarius and I played it about the best way possible. Someone show me how the Brits can win! |
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| ericjohn |
Thanks both of you for the feedback 
Yes I think it might be balanced against the Brits. Basically it's hard for the UK fleet to survive, and hard for Germans to get much shipping across, and the games usually turn on "can I sink that crippled Hood" or "can I get that crippled Nordmark into Dover" - but I think the balance may go slightly against the Brits, a win is difficult. None of the 3 games I played had a UK win, although two of them were draws that could have swung to UK or German minor victory with a bit of luck either way. I added the Hurricanes in to help, but maybe that wasn't enough, I toyed with dropping a Stuka or U-boat as well, or perhaps with not counting VPs for sunk cruisers (they are so very fragile...) The Minesweepers are indeed of little use. That's sort of intentional - Brits had a lot of minesweepers, but it's hard to imagine they would have been very successful in this operational environment. But mines usually aren't decisive for the Germans either. Generally when I've played the Germans haven't rushed all Nordmarks at once. Instead trickled them out to avoid having them all plastered by a single UK incursion. But maybe the mad rush is the best German strategy, and if they try it the UK definitely has to go all-in. The quick resolution did give you the chance to extricate both Battleships, which has been somewhat uncommon in the games I've played (Hood lack of torpedo armor against mines, MTBs and subs being a particular problem; Rodney usually lasts a good while...) |
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| ericjohn |
Optional variantsThere are a couple of optional variants I have kicked around but not playtested. You may be interested:1) Instead of using 6 Nordmarks, use 24 Type-13 Subchasers (without the ASW attack value or Subhunter special ability) to represent motorized Prahms. Each is worth 1 VP when it reaches Dover instead of 4VPs. Up to 4 Prahms may be counted as 1 ship for stacking purposes. With this variant the game should be extended to 12 turns. --- This would probably be a lot more "realistic." I think it would benefit UK, since they would be so slow, although I did extend the time limit to let Germans spread them out a bit more and still get them to Dover in time. Even so, might need to assign the Germans 30 or so to improve the balance. On the flipside, it benefits the Germans in that it would essentially negate vital-armor hits, making the UK battleships in particular much less menacing 2) The German player may add 2x Scharnhorst (representing Scharnhorst & Gneisnau) to their initial deployment. Each Scharnhorst starts with 2 points of damage, as both were torpedoed off Norway and have been rushed into service without proper repairs. In this case the UK player can add an additional HMS Rodney (representing HMS Nelson) to the Harwich force, as it was shadowing these battlecruisers, and is released for service when they are committed. --- This would be a plausibility stretch, since it was rare for any ship with significant battle damage to be put back into battle, and particularly the Germans. And it probably benefits UK overall, since having another highly survivable battleship would really help them. But it would be a way to get those great German battlecruisers into the fray
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| Aquarius |
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| drittal |
the link is dead. Takes you to a page with no content. | ||
| Aquarius |
I fixed it. |