Action In The Gulf Of Riga

One thing I've wanted to try with Torpedoes & Tides is a fight between large vessels. Obviously within the scope of the game, large is a relative term (Indeed it's relative to motor launches and gunboats for game purposes). And their stats don't have as much granularity as the smaller vessels. If something's big it's pretty much dangerous and difficult to damage.

Still, his afternoon I gave it a try. I adapted another scenario from 'Clear The Coast, this one being set in the Gulf Of Riga in November 1944.  The Germans are evacuating troops from a peninsula to the north of the Gulf, and have sent in a patrol to sweep for Russian vessels looking to disrupt the evacuation. They come across three Russian gunboats.

Here are the forces.

The Germans have two minesweepers (I used the M1935 stats) and two Vorposteboot (I used the Medium Vorpostenboot with the 88mm gun for each). 

The Russians have three gunboats. These gunboats were converted from German dredgers and are listed as Moskva class in the rules. In the scenario in CtC they have a different class name, but are still converted dredgers, so I assumed that they were the same. One is armed with three 76mm guns, whilst the other two have two 130mm guns. For game purposes I classed them as the same. 

I changed the stats in the rules slightly to allow for the gunboats' forward armament and the fact that they seem to be very slow indeed (dredgers aren't built for speed, after all):

Q3 C4 - Slow, Large, Large Calibre, Secondary Armament C2, Unarmed (Stern)

Here they are, since the models are new. 

I used the following setup The board is 60cm x 90cm for 50/80/120mm sticks. The long edges are north and south. There is no moon and there are two patches of mist, each places 1D3 medium sticks from the centre of the board in a random direction.  

The Germans are set up in a line heading east with the minesweepers at the front and with 1 x M between each vessel. The stern of the rear vessel is against the west edge, 1 x L from the southern edge. 

The Russians are also in a line, heading west, with 1 x M between each vessel. The rear of the line is against the east edge, 1 x L from the northern edge.

Roll for initiative to see who moves first.

I didn't work out any VPs. In the original scenario it's a straight fight, but I like the idea that the Russians are looking to get past the Germans and get off the western edge to harass German evacuation efforts. However they should have to sink or batter a couple of German vessels before they can score for this. The Germans are just looking to sink the Russian gunboats or drive them off. 

Any vessel can leave the northern edge. However it leads to the Sorve Peninsula, so is risky. Any vessel leaving that edge rolls a D6, subtracting 1 if it has taken damage and subtracting a further 1 if it is battered. On a 1 the vessel runs aground and is lost. 

The Germans can leave the western or southern edge safely. Any German vessel leaving the east edge is lost. The Russians can leave via any edge, but see above for the northern edge. 

Here's the game a couple of turns in, with the Germans bottom-left and the Russians top-right. Nothing is close enough to be spotted yet.

The Volga spotted a minesweeper and opened fire, missing.

The Germans were slow to react and the Bureya now came up out of the darkness. Its fire hit the bridge of the lead minesweeper. 

All ships were now revealed. To the left the two Vorpostenboots were moving to engage the Zeya. One fired a starshell to give the other a better shot. Meanwhile the two minesweepers engaged the Bureya. 

The Germans made good use of starshells to illuminate the Russians, and managed to score hits on all three gunboats. Volga was soon battered ... 

... whilst Bureya was sunk!

The minesweepers (right) began to turn back into the action. 

Volga was heading out of the fight now, but not quickly. One of the Vorpostenboots stayed closing, looking for a chance to finish it off. But the Zeya got in some accurate fire that took out some of the German vessels gun positions, reducing its fire. 

The Volga continued its attempt to escape as the Germans closed in on it. 

A minesweeper sunk it. 

The Zeya had disappeared into the darkness so could revert to a blind. In game terms this means it can move faster, and it quickly homed in on the German's battered V-boat. 

Looming out of the darkness its first shot finished off the German vessel. The V-boats are not large, so are more vulnerable to the Large Calibre guns of the Russians, and can be affected by regular firing as well. 

Out of sight of the Germans the Zeya reverted to a blind again. But the undamaged minesweeper was coming up through the fog. 

It closed in quickly on the Russian vessel in the darkness , revealing it but receiving a damaging shot in return. 

The Russian vessel was badly damaged by this stage, but kept up a steady fire on the minesweeper, damaging it again. 

The minesweeper managed a hit in return, battering the Russian gunboat. 

But its own damaged caused it to collide with the wreckage of the sunk V-boat, putting it out of the fight.

However despite command issues caused by its damaged bridge the other minesweeper was now back in the fight, and its shooting finished off the Zeya. 

So the Russians lost all three gunboats, whilst the Germans lost a single V-boat and had a minesweeper disabled by a collision with wreckage. All in all a fairly convincing German win. 

After a slow start the Germans got in some really good shots early on, which damaged the Russians beyond the point of recovery. After that it was really about the Russians trying to stretch out the fight on the hope the damaged Germans would do something bad. Which they did. But it wasn't enough. To be fair, in their eagerness to turn back into the fight the Germans came close to a couple of friendly collisions, avoided only by a careful choice as to which vessel to move first, and through not failing activation rolls. 

Still, I don't think that the balance is too off. If I feel the Russians are hard done by I may upgrade their vessels from Slow to Short, to give them more flexible movement. I'll certainly be playing this one again. 

Update: I've played this through a couple of times now and the balance seems OK. I've worked out a couple of VP possibilities.

In both cases play until only one side has vessels left in play.

The first assumes a straight fight. In this case both sides score 2VP for each enemy vessel wrecked and 1VP for each enemy vessel battered. 

In the second option it's assumed the Russians are trying to maul he German forces and then head west to disrupt German evacuation operations.

With this option the Germans continue to score 2VP for each enemy vessel wrecked and 1VP for each one battered. However the Russians now score points for exiting the western edge. At the end of the action, each unbattered gunboat that leaves the western edge scores 1VP for each German vessel which was wrecked or which left the fight involuntarily. 

U-Boats Off Messina

Based on a recommendation in the 'Torpedoes & Tides' rules I picked up a copy of Pat Hreachmack's 'Clear The Coast', which is a collection of over 30 WW2 small ship action scenarios, many of which are adaptable as scenarios for T&T. At our club the other weeks we'd been discussing how submarines might fit into the game. Given the small time-scale of the actions the answer is really 'they mostly wouldn't', but one of the scenarios in 'Clear The Coast' features them, and I thought I'd have a go at adapting it.

Of course the first thing I needed was a couple of submarines. Theses were made in a hurry, and I want to redo them at some stage although you all know that I will probably never get around to it. 

So it's the night of 12/13th July 1943, and two U-boats are slipping through the Straits of Messina between Sicily and Italy, heading south. They are on the surface, but once they clear the narrows they can submerge.

But with Germans ships slipping through the straits on a regular basis, the British are waiting for possible targets. Three Vosper MTBs are lurking in the darkness.

OK, here's the scenario.

British - three Vosper 73' MTBs. These are MTB 81, MTB 77 and MTB 84 (see rules for stats)
German - Two U-boats (U 375, U 561). I'll post their stats below.

All crews on both sides are Q3.

The board is 60cm x 80cm (if using 50/80/120mm sticks). Short edges are North and South. The east edge is coast. Aside from that there is no terrain or mines. There is a partial moon to the South*.

All vessels start on blinds.

U-561 starts with its rear edge against the northern edge of the board, 1D3 x L from the East edge. U-375 is 1 x M directly in front of it.

One British MTB starts 1D3 x L from the southern edge and 1D3 x L from the eastern edge facing West. The other boats are placed each side of it facing West and 1xS away (so they are in line-abreast).

Roll for initiative.

And that's it. I haven't worked out VPs for it, but obviously the British are trying to sink one or both U-boats, whilst the Germans are trying to get them both off the South edge with no, or minimal, damage. The British mustn't lose any boats. The Germans can only exit via the North or South edges, whilst the British can exit from the North, South or West. However if a boat exists the West edge roll a D6. If it scores equal to or less than the number of hits the boat has taken, then the boat is considered lost to Axis shore defences. Anything hitting the East edge runs aground and is lost. 

Here's how it ended up for me, with the U-Boats heading straight for the British boats. The British got the initiative.

Their line swung around to investigate the contacts, and immediately spotted U-375. 

U-375 fired a starshell at the British blinds ...

... and this enabled U-561 to spot and fire at one of the British boats (MTB 413 in this scenario. My boats have fixed labels and I wasn't changing them). The shot, from an 88mm deck-gun, came close but not close enough. 

MTB 413 swung around and fired torpedoes at the lead U-Boat, but missed.

(After playing my campaign it was exciting to have 73' boats with four torpedoes!)

Distinctly unorchestral manuevers in the dark, as everyone's activation rolls failed dismally.

U-561 fired again, and a shell smashed the bridge of MTB 430. 

The U-boats began to head south as fast as they could go. MTB 413 lined up another shot. It was at the stern of U-375, but at least the target was silhouetted against the moon. That was enough. BOOM! The U-boat began to sink, and not voluntarily. 

MTB 413 now had no torpedoes left but closed with U-561 looking to supress the gun-crews and make it easier for the other two British boats to make their torpedo attacks. MTB 430 was suffering obvious difficulties from its damage, but MTB 414 was now coming up after having lost contact with the action earlier. 

Another near miss as U-561 kept up a steady fire. 

However fire from MTB 430 caused the German crew to dive for cover. MTB 414 made its approach. But the German crews were still fighting hard, and managed to score a hit on the approaching MTB. The British boat caught fire. 

As the fire reached the bridge the captain ordered the torpedoes fired. Through the smoke and flames they were overjoyed to see the second U-boat heel over and start to sink.

So both U-boats were sunk. The British suffered bridge hits and light damage on two boats, with one of them also having fire damage as well. Overall it was a pretty successful attack for the MTBs though.

Here's the stats I used for the U-Boats:

Q3 C3 - Short, Large, Over-Gunned, Large Calibre, Unarmed (Stern), Secondary Armament (C1)

These are boats with a 88mm gun on the front deck. In fact around July 1943 these were being removed in favour of more AA-guns abaft the conning tower. The original scenario states that it's not clear if either of the German boats had had this refit. The author suggests maybe rolling a 50/50 chance for each boat. With the refit the stats would be:

Q3 C3 - Short, Large, Under-Gunned

Note: In theory a sub should also have the Torpedoes trait, but within the context of any scenarios likely to feature one I think they're probably irrelevant. Add them as you wish. 

So what happened historically? The two sides discovered each other when U-375 almost collided with MTB 81. MTB 81 realised there were two German boats present and got in a torpedo shot at he second, U-561, sinking it. The other two MTB chased after U-375. One had a torpedo misfire and the other simply missed. U-375 submerged and escaped.

*The scenario says a partial moon, but doesn't specify the direction. I used THIS SITE to determine its direction. 

Treasure Hunt

Three of us played Fjord Serpents last night. We tried the Salvage scenario, and adapted the initiative sequence for three players. Each of us had one big snekkja and one small karvi.

Here's my ships set up. 

Terrain was two islands towards the edges of the board and one shipwreck in the centre. The islands had one loot counter each, whilst the wreck had lots. In the background Ralph's ships head towards the wreck. Caesar and I sent our little karvis to the islands for a quick pickup. Our snekkajs headed for the centre. I could see that Caesar was aiming form my snekkja with the intention to board, so I raised the sails and sped away from him 

I passed alongside Ralph's karvi.

Caesar rammed it and initiated boarding, with his berserkers to the fore, led by a hero. The hero dies in the first round of combat.

Ralph was collecting loot. I ran aboard his snekkja with mine, looking to capture it and take the loot he had collected. 

A couple of long fights ensued. Caesar slowly whittled down the crew of Ralph's karvi with weight of numbers. Meanwhile Ralph and I saw our snekkjas locked in a stalemate of a fight, with neither side inflicting much in teh way of casualties. My hero sang heroic songs and inspired his crew, but couldn't translate all that work into actual hits. Ralph's hero let his crew fight and simply repaired damage. 

Eventually Caesar took Ralph's karvi. And Ralph scored some hits on my crew. But at that moment my karvi came up in support ...

... and we had to end the evening. Caesar and Ralph had both collected a fair bit of loot each, but Caesar looked set to wait for the fight between Ralph and I to end before swopping in and taking stuff off the victor. 

It was all good clean fun, although the lack of frequency with which we play this game meant that we still had to look a lot of stuff up. The rules are a little unclear in places, and the mechanisms for combat, whilst clever, do take a bit of time to get your head around. 

It was nice to have a break torpedo boats for an evening.

The Adventures Of Harvey Knight - 10

The 12th MTB flotilla was soon out on another patrol, heading for one of its hunting grounds off the coat of France. Knight's MTB 413 was accompanied by Orion James' MTB 430 and the green crew of Lennox Dean's MGB 91. This would be good experience for both Harvey Knight's and Dean's crew.

But as they approached the French coast an ominous shape was spotted in the darkness. Heading straight at them, making no attempt to hide on its approach, was a German destroyer!

The British boats poured on the speed as the destroyer closed with frightening rapidity. 

And then opened fire.

With two green crews the British escape was disorganised. So disorganised that whilst my brain told me that one boat was MTB 430 and that another was MGB 91, I actually swapped them over in terms of models. Which is my way of saying that in the following pictures the part of MTB 430 will be played by MGB 91, and vice versa. 

Anyway, the destroyer kept firing and a hit on Knight's MTB 413 damaged the engines. There was little changes of outrunning the big German vessel now. 

Dean's MGB 91 was ordered to run for it as it had little hope of damaging the destroyer. Meanwhile Orion James brought MTB 430 round to engage the destroyer with torpedoes, hopefully buying the damaged MTB 413 time to escape.

Torpedoes away! But they missed. 

The destroyer continued to engage Knight's boat as he sought cover in a patch of mist. 

A near miss on MTB 430, but no damage. 

The destroyer was fast, and was soon ahead of MTB 413, blocking its escape. Knight turned sharply away and headed away from the German vessel, trying to buy time. Maybe he could line up a torpedo run of his own. 

Orion James came up again. He had no torpedoes, but he did have an reasonably experienced crew and some depth-charges. In desperation he sped towards the German vessel. It fired at him, and a fire started on the little MTB. Putting the helm over James attempted to pass the destroyer's bow and drop depth-charges as he did so. 

The manuever failed, and the little boat was run down by the destroyer and smashed to pieces. Amazingly most of the crew survived, clinging to life-rafts. But the impact had badly damaged the bows of the destroyer as well. MTB 430's sacrifice might yet not be in vain.

The damaged destroyer kept up its aggressive attack on Knight's limping MTB 413. And it was inevitable that the frantic dodging and weaving ... 

... would lead to another collision. Knight's boat was now seriously damaged, whilst the destroyer escaped unharmed. But Knight had depth charges too.

Despite its damage Knight pulled his stricken boat past the destroyer and fired off charges as he did so. They hit, and the already damaged destroyer began to list and sink. 

There was no hope of continuing with the night's patrol. Knight coaxed MTB 413 over to the remains of MTB 430 and picked up the survivors (Orion James among them), and then headed for a rendezvous with MGB 91 and the trip home. 

Knight's reputation didn't improve off the back of this encounter. Yes, he was praised for sinking an enemy destroyer, but it came at the loss of yet another MTB, as well as the serious damage done to his own boat. And things got worse. The repair crews were already stretched and whilst they got MTB 413's engines back into working order they were unable to do little more in the way of repairs. And in addition there were no replacement boats available for MTB 430 or MTB 418. On the plus side, James' crew were recovered so they wouldn't lose their accumulated experience, and all of the boats picked up valuable experience as well. However the 12th MTB Flotilla was now down to one functioning MTB, with a second badly damaged and two others waiting to be replaced. For the next mission they would be relying on the two MGBs.