Against my better judgement I had the urge to add some more Third Rates to the Royal Navy fleet, with the result being four 74 gun ships of the line - HMS Ramillies, HMS Renown, HMS Defiance and HMS Culloden. I will undercoat them all later today so that they are ready to paint alongside the rest of the fleet.
I've been off work for a couple of days with chronic hearing loss due to a medical condition, so feeling pretty fed up. To cheer myself up and distract me from the constant buzzing noise in my head, I have located the 1/285th Raiden Miniatures Westland Whirlwind models that I originally prepared to use with the S-Boat strike scenario. I'm liking the idea of painting these up and rejigging the scenario to simplify it for a club game. I have everything else I need for the game including the other aircraft and the S-Boats, so why not?
Another book for the library today which I've been after for a while. I have devised and played several 1941-42 Malta games for Bag the Hun which feature Hurricanes of No.185 Squadron, but haven't done anything for 1942-43 when Spitfires were more often in action. I'm hoping this book, along with some others I already have on the shelves, will give me some ideas for more scenario development. I've already got a few Raiden and Museum Miniatures Spitfire Vb models with Vokes tropical air filters somewhere, so that's another good reason to dive into more mid-war Mediterranean Theatre Bag the Hun action.
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| That looks like a bounce! |
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| Khalkhin Gol Bogey Markers |
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| Wrong Squadron but you get the idea.. |
The recent Bag the Hun scenario writing project has got me thinking about an old scenario that I was working on a few years ago, which revolved around an anti-shipping strike on some E Boats by No.263 Squadron Whirlwinds in 1943. This was never finished and ended up being way too complex for a good game but I'm now thinking of rebooting it in a streamlined format for a club night. As I have some painted Spitfire Vb"s and FW190"s this will be a 1/300th scale game, also making use of my nice Cruel Seas models. It might not even feature any Whirlwinds, although it would be a shame not to include at least a couple of them, as they're pretty cool.
http://jimswargamesworkbench.blogspot.com/2018/12/bag-hun-schnellboote-strike.html
I thought these new rules for the Falklands and designed for 10mm figures looked interesting, so I have ordered the .pdf version for a closer look. It's a conflict that I remember well from my school days and which resonates even today, over forty years later, but one which I've shied away from in the past for just those reasons. However, the Pendraken 10mm range is excellent and I have some RM commandoes stashed away from an abandoned Cold War project that will more than fill out the ranks. If this is a decent set of rules then it may well be something to add to the list for 2024?
Now that Bag the Springbok has been completed and emailed off to Nick at Lard Island, it's time to get back to what I was supposed to be doing this month. I am now going to paint up the 1/2400th Royal Navy Napoleonic fleet that I assembled, perhaps adding a few more 74's before I get stuck in, so that I can tick off the project from the 'to do' list and actually play some games. The French are already done, so it would be a shame not to get the other half of the project underway, now that the decks are cleared of Bag the Hun related stuff. The Red Actions! project is now going to be bumped over to 2024, as that needs more time than I'll have free over the next couple of months.
A playtest of Scenario Two, Turning the Tables, with three South African Gladiators bounced by four Regia Aeronautica CR42's in November 1940. The game clicked along at a good pace and worked well, the end result being an Italian victory, with two Gladiators shot down for one Falco forced off with critical damage. Thanks to the players who really got stuck in. Good fun!
One of the scenarios I might play test tomorrow is a maritime strike mission by Swordfish from HMS Eagle against a flotilla of Italian destroyers in the Red Sea in April 1941. The Swordfish attacked using dive bombing, each aircraft being loaded with six 250lb bombs, something which might be a surprise given the Stringbags torpedo bomber reputation.
Dive bombing in Bag the Hun is tricky, To hit the target each aircraft has to fly half a move to within one hex of the target, then dive to ALT 1, remaining within one hex of the target after the bombs have been dropped. Any overshoot or undershoot results in the bombs missing the target. This means that the best approach for bombing ships is lengthways but it also means being exposed to flak at low level on the way out.
To make this mission feasible for the Fleet Air Arm crews, most of them are rated as Veterans in the scenario, which is realistic given their training and experience. This means when dicing for movement they can choose to add a range of hexes to their base move from the d4 random modifier. I'm hoping this will give them a better chance of being in the right place to hit the target and to avoid overshooting after the dive bombing has been carried out?
If we don't play this scenario at the club tomorrow, I'll definitely give it a try myself at home this week, if I can find the time. Here's a link to a description of the attack based on an Italian account from crew of the destroyer Daniele Manin:
I spent the best part of two hours cutting out and laminating the cards for the Bag the Springbok play test games today, which is a tedious task but has to be done. These are pretty basic but the lamination pockets I use mean that they are interchangeable with other sets I've made, being the same size and format, so much more flexible when you realise you've missed one out or need to add an extra one. I have enough her for four scenarios, so we have some options if the players want to try some different or if a scenario turns out to be a dud, which I'm hoping won't be the case (fingers crossed)?
