"Favourite WW2 Surface battle to game?" Topic

Whats you favourite Surface battle to game from WW2?
I am looking at getting the ships for a few of the famous actions and was just wondering what others think.
River Plate has to be up there doesnt it?

The battles off Guadalcanal and in the South Pacific, mostly night actions. Very exciting.

We do night actions differently. We cut out all the folderol of the approach, and set out the ships in a theoretical "first spotting" That is, usually at 5,000 yards or less. the two ships spotted are put out. Other ships still "in the murk" are put out but with either a paper three dimensional silhouette of a generic "ship on it" which is removed when hit or illuminated. Or we simply use a piece of tight weave cheesecloth, put over the ship, which is removed when spotted or illuminated. Once hit, it's assumed to be on fire and the cheesecloth removed or the marker replaced with the real ship.

All the rest of the rules are our regular daytime surface action rules. At 5,000 yards or less everything penetrates torpedoes hit in the next turn, and fires illuminate averything.
and ships don't last long. Ships move about 24" (I game in 1:1200) after which they are either sunk, sinking or the game is over.

Very exciting.

We also do battles in the Aleutians. Pretty much the same rules, except now we have fog instead of night. No night actions in the Aleutians, no one can see anything. unless you run into it.

Coral Sea – multi-ops battle with the Japs trying to land barges to assault Port Moresby whilst the Jap and Allied Carrier fleets seek to sink each other with other surface groups on hunt and destroy missions…..Also it was the very first true carrier vs carrier action.

Denmark Strait is a classic. Just a few ships, reasonably balanced: Bismark and Eugen vs. Prince of Wales and Hood. You can adjust the balance by making PoW less effective (historical) or more so.

Denmark Strait and the Battle of the River Plate.

Both fairly small and well balanced.

Pure surface actions were rare in WW2 generally.

The Battle of the Java Sea. Not the most balanced scenario*, but you get a nice mix of American, British/Australian and Dutch ships to play with.

* – "Tiptoe through the Long Lance"

Another good one is the Komandorski Islands, features mostly cruisers & destroyers.

#1. Denmark Strait
#2. Battle of the River Plate.
Tried KGV vs Scharnhorst but it wasn't that much fun.

Denmark Strait is a good demo/training game, but should not turn out as it did historically. Coral Sea is great if you desire surface and/or air ops. I tend to favor actions in the Mediterranean like First Sirte or the near miss engagements. I find that the British and French ships are more balanced against the Italians ship for ship than you find in the Pacific.

Those are all good, for major surface actions.

Don't overlook the small end of the spectrum, in the English Channel, Mediterranean, or Pacific Theater, e.g. with MGBs/MTBs/PT Boats vs. S-Boats and other German craft, or pitting small vessels against larger units too, e.g. frigates, destroyers, and larger vessels too.

Another vote for Guadalcanal,Java Sea and Med actions. we've played those several times.

Calabria, if only for the possibility that the Regia Aeronautica will accidentally bomb the Regia Marina again.

LT

Cape Spada. Two RM light cruisers vs 5 RN DD's and an RAN light cruiser. Very fluid action.

Bob

River Plate is a good learning scenario but not very interesting tactically.
Barents Sea is an excellent one.
So is 1st Narvik, but you need terrain for that.
Lots of fun actions in the Med with RN vs Italians.

Gents;

I am almost 59 (given just as a reference). My first Fletcher-Pratt naval game took place when I was 14. It was the "Battle of Java Sea". We used a large warehouse floor and the scale was 12" per 1,000 yards, and commanded those lovely 1/1200 scale metal warships and some that were scratch built of wood. I was commanding the HMAS Perth, and unlike real life, the "Combined Striking Force" managed to sink a destroyer and torpedoed a light cruiser.

It was an amazing first game, I have remained stuck on FP since, and Java Sea remains my favorite naval war game scenario.

Hopefully, I will get another one in someday :)

Mark

The Raid On Granville March 1945

link

Kind of one sided so you need to have some of the Higgins PTs from Cherbourg show up unexpectedly.

Plate, Savo, Guadalcanal,Empress Augusta Bay, etc.. all good except
How do you do say Savo? "Strange ships entering harbor" and the complete surprise, or Adm Scott's "Odd ships fire to port, even ships fire to starboard" at Guadalcanal or the several ship collisions (night battles, close range) or friendly fire (torpedoes, firing at your own ships, etc
and then there's almost always fog, or other visibility problems (a game of Norfolk/Suffolk shadowing Bismark/Eugen--need an umpire, even run as a double blind game?
Ive only played GQ and with its turn sequence, ugoigo, everything visible(but not spotted) means that crazy night brawls do not happen
also, aviation appears in a lot of these surface battles, if only say at Java Sea, the Japanese have spotter planes and the ABDA do not (and how do you run the ABDA flotilla where the Dutch adm has to have his orders translated into English by some junior officer, or the unintentional change in formation because one of the ABDA cruisers fell out of formation due to damage, and the following cruisers followed that cruiser) or the "dry run" attacks by Taffy Kaircraft vs Kurita's force at San Bernadino
All these scenarios have their points, but what makes them interesting, the confusion, is taken out by the all too orderly game play

That imaginary battle between Vittorio Veneto and the Richelieu.

The Battle of the Java Sea. Not the most balanced scenario*, but you get a nice mix of American, British/Australian and Dutch ships to play with.

* – "Tiptoe through the Long Lance"

Sounds like it'd be right up my alley. Raise the Rising Sun, BANZAI!!!

(Kinda odd, given that I served on the side that utterly slaughtered the IJN…)

I like Otto's ideas for those night battles.

Many of the above are good choices. I like Java Sea because of the mix. Med actions are good because the Italians tend to be more competent. Guadalcanal actions are up close and personal, but night rules lengthen game turns.