Battle of Laroc Sea - a BIG Playtest

Possibly the most interesting of the naval battles of the Pacific during World War Two, was the inconclusive action in the Coral Sea that induced ('forced' seems too strong a word; 'persuaded' perhaps more apt) the Japanese command to call off their attempted seaborne landing at Port Moresby, New Guinea. Methought something along those lines, but at a smaller scale, would make a fine, and fairly comprehensive playtest of the Gridded Naval War Games Rule set that I have been assembling. Tell you what: it was a lot of fun!

Having neglected to take a picture of the original set up - hiatus valde deflendus - I show the above, with the action well along, but yet to reach the crisis. (Edit: turns out I did take a pre-game picture, but it was in a different folder. See below).

The playing area comprises 4 sheet of thin card stock upon which the grid array had been drawn. It turns out I have as many more of these (two of which two make up a Bloodbowl field I had completely forgotten about!). This action will be repeated on a 3x2 arrangement, instead of this 2x2). The islands are terrain pieces for land war games, and the towns (Trakta and Port Fewersby) a couple of those tinytowns that this project seemed to call for. 

This turned out to be a very complicated game, although it did not take very long to play. It did, however bring up a vexed question of spatial and time scales. At the moment, I've settled upon each 5cm hex representing a linear distance of 3 nautical miles/ c.5400 yards/ c.5000 metres (roughly). This would suggest to me a time scale of a little over 3 hours per Game Turn. Call it 3 hours; 4 game turns representing the hours of daylight. The question of night moves arises of course. For this game I just carried on through as though the sun had slowed down. I didn't count, but I think the action went for 7 or 8 Game Turns, which would represent a day and a night (24 hours) or maybe two days of daylight hours.

Situation, morning 4 May, 66942

Background Narrative:

As part of their programme of imperial expansion, Ra'easharn had invaded the north coast of New Sterling with the view to advancing across the island and down the peninsula to capture the Port Fewersby. The operation went badly. The local defenders, poorly equipped though they were, slowed the enemy advance, finally bringing it to a halt well west of their objective. To break the deadlock, Ra'esharn High Command resolved upon sending a landing force - a brigade group loaded into 5 merchant vessels - to seize the vital seaport. In view of the risks involved in making the passage of the Lindisfarne Strait, this expedition was to be escorted by a small group that included a light carrier,  and supported by a 'Covering Group' built around the battleship RNS Barbatos, and a 'Striking Force' that included two fleet carriers.

The whole organisation comprised: 

Raesharn Expeditionary Force:

Invasion Convoy: Rear Admiral Honduki

• Light Carrier RNS Angra Mainyu (12FP) (Flotation Points)
  to include 1 Fighter and 2 Bomber squadrons @3FP (Flying Points)
• Cruiser RNS Charun 12FP
• Cruiser RNS Charonzon 12FP
• 2 Destroyers: R21, R22 @ 6FP
• 5 Transports: Chubby Maru, Ramjam, Shagnasti, Mangla, Barracuda @6FP                                    carrying Brigade Group of 3000 men

The Invasion Convoy

Covering Group: Rear Admiral Suzumaha

• Battleship RNS Barbatos 24FP
• Cruiser RNS Chemosh 12FP
• 2 Destroyers: R23, R24 @ 6FP
• Oiler Tanker Trampas 6FP

Striking Force: Admiral Mazota

• Battleship RNS Bushyasta 24FP
• Fleet Carrier RNS Achlys 12F ( 1 Sqn fighters, 3 Sqn Bombers @ 3FP)
• Fleet Carrier RNS Azi Dahak 12FP (1 Sqn fighters, 3 Sqn Bombers @3FP)
• Cruiser RNS Cimijes 12FP 
• 2 Destroyers: R25, R26 @6FP

The Carrier Strike Force, and in the distance west of 
Trakta, the Covering Group.

Ra'esharn also had two submarines, patrolling the area: 
RU18 roughly half way along a line between Trakta and Port Fewersby,

RU23 somewhere within the area of the Rehoboam Archipelago.

Working overtime, with a partially cracking of the Ra'esharn naval 'Code Mauve', the Saabian intelligence services knew something was afoot in the area of the Laroc Sea. Whether it was further landings in the Rehoboam Archipelago, or perhaps something to do with the impasse on New Sterling, they could not be sure. Their anxieties driven by the amount of radio traffic concerned the Allied Area Commander sufficiently to order the gathering of forces to oppose anything the enemy might develop. This opposition comprised three Task Forces: two, TF1 and TF7 supplied by the Saabia Navy; and TF34 by Kiivar. 

Allied Regional Defence Force:

Saabia Task Force 1: Rear Admiral Fitcher

• Fleet carrier SNS Bahamut 12FP (1 Sqn fighters, 3 Sqn Bombers @ 3FP)
• Cruiser SNS Cockatrice 12FP 
• Cruiser SNS Gullinkambie 12FP
• 2 Destroyers: S11, S12 @ 6FP

Saabia Oiling Group:

• Oiler Oumanaka 6FP
• Destroyer: S20

Saabia Task Force 7: Rear Admiral Flett (overall command)

• Battleship SNS Hakawai 24FP
• Fleet Carrier SNS Bake-kujira 12FP (1 Sqn fighters, 3 Sqn Bombers @ 3FP)
• Cruiser SNS Sarimanok 12FP
  
• 2 Destroyers: S77, S78 @ 6FP
  

Kiivar Task Force 34: Rear Admiral Craze

• Battleship KNS Harrier 24FP
• Cruiser KNS Heirax 12FP
• Destroyer K43

Kiivar Task Force 34.

There were also two submarines patrolling well south of the Rehoboam Islands, SU19 somewhere southwest of the westernmost Rehoboam island; SU47 due south of Guanocanal.

One issue that cropped up in this action was that at 18FP, the carriers would prove a little bit to resistant to bombing attacks. So I brought them back to my first thought: 12FP only. 

The Coral Sea battle that this action is supposed to resemble involved no battleships. However, I thought it would be interesting to include two on either side. This isn't really a 'refight' of Coral Sea - or even a 'might have been'. On the other hand the oilers on both sides really served no function for this game other than simply to be there. But it does raise the question how they might functionally be incorporated into the set of rules.

During the course of the action a number of issues cropped up that this action was intended to discover. They will be treated as they arise in the narrative. The main one was recording damage, and expenditure of certain types of weapons, to wit, torpedoes and depth charges (yes, a submarine was sunk during the course of this battle!). I have worked out a system better than the pen strokes I used on this occasion.

An issue also arose concerning air attacks on shipping - especially when intercepted by fighters. At present, I have the defending fighters taking on ONE attacking squadron, and neutralising it. They still fight and take losses, but even if the attackers take no loss (which happened at least once) they have been forced away from their objective. The remainder carry on. To make their attacks, they have to survive the flak.

Flak fires once only. However, if 2 squadrons are attacking, and the defence scores 2 hits, the loss may be shared between the 2 squadrons. Bombers that survive the flak (not the fighter intercept) carry out their bombing attacks. Late in the action two identical air attacks were carried out in the same Game Turn against two carriers. The results were almost as completely disparate as they could be!

I said this was a pretty complicated exercise. There were at least seven air attacks I can think of (which raised the issue of turnaround time for second sorties), but there was some surface action as well. The latter probably led to heavier losses than the air attacks did ... possibly.  At any rate, there was plenty of incident.

I'll leave the story of the battle for next time...
To be continued...