Boating weekend...

 

Greek armoured cruiser, Georgios Averof

Pics from last weekend of March at the Club, using my 'Chubby' warships on an 'open' table. 

Rules used - Portable Naval Wargames (Bob Cordery) adapted for an ungridded table, and with my own ships' stats.

Arrival of Georgios Averoff,
engaging Hamidiye at long range

First game. played between Andrew Barclay and myself  was a version of the 'Pre-dreadnoughts In Action' scenario from the PNW book. This pits units from the Turkish Navy against the Greek from the era of the Balkan Wars and World War I. 

Turkish 'protected' cruiser Hamidiye turns
to escape its much more powerful 'armoured'
adversary

Narrative:

Wishing to visit some kind of hurt to Greek commerce, but unable fully to lift the blockade of the Dardanelles Strait, the Turks plan a quick sortie to unleash their best trained and most efficient warship, the protected cruiser, Hamidiye, into the Aegean Sea and beyond. To get this fast but vulnerable ship past the blockading squadron called for the services of the pre-dreadnought battleship Turgud Reis and the coastal defence battleship Mesudiye.

As the damaged Mesudiye (left) turns for home,
Turgud Reis (right) steams in the opposite direction 
to engage the Greek battleship

The blockading Greek squadron comprised the modern pre-dreadnought Lemnos, the armoured cruiser Georgios Averof - almost a battlecruiser - and the coastal defence battleship Hydra. Whilst the  Th/K Hydra maintained the inshore watch over the mouth of the Dardanelles, to north and south respectively Th/K Lemnos and Th/K Georgios Averof kept in touch should the Turks attempt a sortie. The attempt was not long coming.

Greek 'modern' pre-dreadnought Lemnos, off the
Gallipoli coast.

Offered the choice of sides, Andrew chose the Greeks - none too surprisingly as theirs was marginally the more powerful squadron. I should mention, however, that my own stats benefit the Turkish warships rather more than Bob Cordery's system in respect of the Turgud Reis class pre-dreadnoughts and more than history in respect of Mesudiye, giving that vessel fully functional primary armament rather than the 'Quaker guns' with which she had been issued.

I gave Turgud Reis the benefit of its 6 x 11-inch guns in 3 twin-gun turrets (A, Q and X), the Q-turret (with slightly shorter gun barrels) concealed beneath a 'flying' over-deck. Outranged by the 12-inch guns aboard Lemnos, the Turkish battleship's extra pair of primary weapons made her a formidable adversary at anything less than mid-range.

The battle narrative is quickly told. As the Turkish squadron sallied forth, Mesudiye leading and Hamidiye astern, Hydra immediately engaged, and made it very clear that the cruiser was her target, come what may. But she had to run the gauntlet of the Turkish battleships. Although scoring at least one hit on the Hamidiye, Hydra could achieve little more before being battered into a sinking condition.

By this time the support ships were barely on the horizon to north and south. Instead of fixing the times of arrival at moves 5 and 6 respectively, I invited Andrew at move 3 and then 4 to dice for them, with this schedule:

Roll: 
1 = Arrive 2 turns early (T3, T4 respectively)
2 = Arrive 1 turn early (T4, T5 respectively)
3,4 = Arrive at ETA (T5, T6)
5 = Arrive 1 turn late (T6, T7)
6 = Arrive 2 turns late (T7, T8)

Persuading me that the ETA for both vessels should be hidden, Andrew's dice rolls were concealed. He must have rolled at least 5s and I'm fairly sure, 6's, for both, for both turned up later than expected.  Coming from the north, Lemnos engaged Mesudiye and scored a number of hits, the most telling causing damage to the screws, and halving the coastal battleship's speed. Immediately, that vessel turned for home, whilst Turgud Reis moved in to engage the Greek battleship and cover its comrade's retreat.

Meanwhile, Hamidiye had veered onto a southwestern course to keep its distance from Hydra whilst that Greek warship could still swim and shoot. This brought her closer to the Greek pride and joy: Georgios Averof - an armoured cruiser so powerful the Greeks styled her battleship status. It would not have been too much of a stretch to call her a battlecruiser, withal. As Georgios Averof steamed up from the south, Hamidiye turned starboard a full eight points onto a northwest course. Although taking a further hit, the lighter cruiser had the legs of the heavier and managed to escape without further damage.

The action was something of a success for the Turkish Navy. Hamidiye was now at large in the Aegean Sea, and a Greek coastal battleship had been sunk. Although the Turkish light cruiser had taken some damage (3 Flotation Points out of 10) it was not enough to keep her from her commerce raiding mission. Meanwhile, Mesudiye had taken more serious damage, but was able, covered by Turgud Reis, to withdraw into the Dardanelles Strait.

Greek battle line.

Towards the close of this action, Paul 'Jacko' Jackson turned up, and, as we had plenty of time for a pick-up action, we quickly arranged a clash between powerful squadrons. Paul chose the Greeks, and formed his five vessels, all in line astern, heading eastwards. They were steering directly towards a Turkish squadron, commanded by Andrew, also of five warships, two columns, on a northward course.  The squadrons comprised:

Greek:
Panthir - torpedo boat/ destroyer
Georgios Averoff - armoured cruiser
Hydra - coastal battleship
Lemnos - pre-dreadnought battleship
Aetos - torpedo boat/ destroyer

Turkish:
Westward column:
Turgut Reis - pre-dreadnought battleship
Hayreddin Barbarossa - pre-dreadnought battleship
Mesudiye - Coastal battleship
Eastward Column:
T165 - torpedo boat/ destroyer
T166 - torpedo boat/ destroyer

Turkish battle line 

Rather impetuously closing the range, Panthir sped to engage the enemy battleships with her torpedoes. Heroic and futile, she never closed the range enough to launch. Running into heavy gun salvos, Panthir simply vanished into a welter of shell bursts.  

It transpired that the Greek battle line was arranged in probably less than optimal an order. Instead of leading the major units, Georgios Averof might have been better at the rear of the column, with Hydra, with its idiosyncratic forward-facing gun arrangement, leading. At the rear of the column, the vessel most powerful and with longest ranged guns, Lemnos, took too long to get properly engaged. The Turkish vessels being less complicated, were easier to coordinate. Moreover, the destroyers were kept in the 'lee' of the bigger vessels, ready to sortie with their torpedoes at an opportune moment.

There was one other consideration that perhaps the Greek admiral overlooked was the earlier mentioned three 'big gun' turrets carried by the Turkish pre-dreadnoughts. At over 50cm (5 hexes) range, Lemnos had the edge, and outranged the Turks by 20cm (2 hexes) at that. Between 30 and 50cm (4 to 5 hexes), the two were a match. At anything under 30cm, the Turkish pre-dreadnought had the edge - a slight one, but enough that Lemnos alone could not face two of them. 

At any rate, Paul found himself splitting his squadron in an effort to bring the best out of his disparate vessels; Andrew kept his main battle line well in hand, but had his destroyers dallying in the rear, presumably in some way to divide Paul's attention.

What happened was pretty much a Greek disaster, the which I didn't take any pictures after the manoeuvres in these final two. From memory, both Hydra and Lemnos were sunk for trifling damage to the Turkish main units, and maybe the Greeks 'got' one of the destroyers.  

The main point of the day was to test whether the Portable Naval Wargames rules could be translated into an ungridded table. In my view it could, but I think we might have to look into the matter of turning circles. The device (actually designed for artillery) used in the final picture was not the most satisfactory method of determining allowable course changes and gunnery arcs.