I finally got round to playing the last game in my mini-campaign for Broadside and Ram this morning, before it got too hot! This scenario involved the US North Atlantic Squadron of monitors being intercepted by the Royal Navy relief force sent to break the US blockade of Halifax, Nova Scotia, with the French turning up as reinforcements for their American allies. In the actual game, they didn't arrive until Turn Seven, so played a minimal role in the game which had a time limit of ten turns.
In the first half of the game, the US monitors managed to slip through the advancing British ironclads, suffering some damage on the way past but also more than holding their own. The Royal Navy squadron split into three separate commands, attempting to encircle the monitors and cut off their escape. This resulted in a double ram attack by HMS Minotaur and HMS Agincourt on USS Wyandotte and USS Ajax, which fortunately caused more damage to the former than the latter.
In the second half of the game we had to move into the shade, but the action was no less hot. The US monitors took a battering from the Royal Navy, with the rear squadron of slower ships being sandwiched between two opposing lines of the British ironclads. This resulted in a lot of damage to USS Roanoke and USS Colossus in particular, although HMS Caledonia also got a hammering. The rest of the US fleet managed to escape at full speed but only nightfall and the end of the game saved the trailing monitors from probable destruction.
The end result was a clear victory for the Royal Navy, who inflicted twelve points of damage for the loss of only six to the US Navy. The French played no real part in the game, although they did get in a single broadside in the penultimate turn. The worst of the damage was suffered by USS Colossus, which was Crippled, but USS Ajax and USS Wyandotte were also Silenced, leaving USS Nebraska, USS Puritan and USS Roanoke Damaged. In return, HMS Minotaur and HMS Caledonia were Silenced, while HMS Agincourt and HMS Ocean were only Damaged.
In the mini-campaign, the result of this final game means that the blockade of Halifax will now be lifted by the Admiral Hope, whose warships will now steam north to relieve the besieged port. The damage inflicted to HMS Minotaur and HMS Caledonia will be patched up in the naval dockyard and both ships will be able to return to Portsmouth for full repairs. The US Navy has been badly mauled and will have lost USS Colossus, which was so badly damaged that she has been scuttled by her crew. The remaining monitors manage to disengage under cover of darkness and slip back to Boston, where Rear Admiral Boggs will shortly be court martialled, albeit on rather unfair grounds. The French squadron makes a discrete but rather premature about turn and steams back to Brest!
The game threw up a few niggles again but I have ironed these out by modifying the AP cost of repairs and uprating the impact of Silenced and Crippled status on the ability of ships to move and fire. It's very difficult to actually Shatter ironclad ships, as they invariably repair before the damage can be inflicted and it requires 4:1 modified odds to get a Shattered result. I've now tweaked this a bit to make it more expensive to repair Silenced and Crippled ships, also making the negative DF modifier higher for ships with these levels of damage. It needs playtesting but I think it will make things a little more decisive?
Nice to see the right side won.
ReplyDeleteOf course! The US might have won if the French had turned up a bit earlier but C'est La Guerre!
ReplyDeleteFantastic! Shame the French didn't get much of a look in.
ReplyDeleteYep, I think that might have swung the balance toward the allies. The lad as RN commander was really worried about them attacking from the flank but they only made it in Turn 7, so couldn't make much of an impact.
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