Battleground 2017: The Haul

Slightly overdue in coming ...

I was quite sensible (well to my strange mind) and all these purchases made a sort of practical sense to expand and fill out my existing collections. Firstly I acquired some Britannia Miniatures 20mm British Paratroopers from Grubby tanks so I could cover the Order of Battle for a Chain of Command "Red Devil" Para Platoon and therefore have no real excuse for painting up a WWII 20mm platoon in metal. I bought three - two man Bren gun teams, one - three man Vickers HMG, two [wait for it as this bit is a tongue twister] - two man: two inch mortar and one - three man: three inch mortar (see below, D-Day and Arnhem "we are go"):

Next came something sensible, Perry's Renaissance Light Horse, so I can expand my Renaissance Impetus army building project (see below, I think this was a "sensible" purchase - mug of coffee not included):

And finally the mandatory "mad saw it on the day purchase and could not say no" three WWII Soviet late-war JSII 20mm pre-made and painted plastic metal assembled kits (ones that are usually given as the toy part of a magazine offering .. Del Prado or the like). For three pounds each I could not complain or say no but in a way I was good in limiting myself to three (there was a big box of them), knowing I also had two JSII plastic kits already made but needing to be painted in the loft (see below, "Uncle Joe" says hello):

As a bonus ball I was honoured by Renko giving an early Xmas present from a bookstall of (another) Bismarck book. This comes recommended as the author "knows his stuff" (see below):

All in all a nice bag of goodies and all of which should find a good use and home in my collection(s).

The Battle of the Denmark Straits as we took it to the show (Battleground 2017 - Part 2)

The early ranging shots and salvos of both sides were traded with limited damage (apart from HMS Hood's opening salvo) to the point where HMS Hood historically had made it past her second 20 degree turn. Importantly this meant that the full broadsides can bear for both British battleships, as X and Y turrets cleared their arcs of fire. At this point HMS Hood had survived for longer than the historical counterpart (see below, RN bottom KM in the distant, with the little hands of Admiral  "Lutjens" [KM Admiral "A"] just visible):

Turn four saw a really effective exchange of heavy fire with HMS Hood having many visible (in the sense of shell bursts on her or in her) "battle scars" but these were mainly of the non-penetrating nature or penetrating but superficial (in GQII you can do the hard part of hitting but still do no damage). "Lady Luck" was holding out and smiling today for the Mighty Hood! Straddled by the KM Bismark she was in 'harm's way' but had escaped with just a slight reduction in speed to 9cm but still firing with all her main armaments (see below, HMS Prince of Wales sails on unmolested in the Hood's wake in the background):

By way of contrast the KM Bismarck bears the full force of 18 RN naval barrels (8 x 15" from HMS Hood and 10 x 14" [which if looked at closely had the better penetration power] from HMS Prince of Wales). The KM Prince Eugen by this time had suffered by too much attention from HMS Hood. Initially slowed to 6cm, she was then again hit and slowed to a creeping 3cm. Her main armament was also savaged and reduced to half. At the start of play KM Price Eugen would be hard pressed to hurt a battleship, now it was a sliding mathematical scale towards the impossible. Her torpedoes were now her only real threat and there was no way she could get in range to use them. After a few distracting shots to HMS Prince of Wales she tried to retire under smoke away from the 'battleship only' arena. Unfortunately HMS Suffolk and HMS Norfolk were well placed to make that escape infeasible (see below):

The meat grinder phase of the battle showed that the ratio of 2:1 in RN firepower (when exotic statistical outlier results do not creep in) are brutally unforgiving. There was a steady attrition of straddling and hit (after hit) accumulation began to take its toll on the KM Bismarck's statistics. Before long her batteries were falling silent one by one and her speed slowing down (see below):

There was a brief phase when both sides seemed to throw bad dice but then at the end there was a maelstrom of violence directed at the KM Bismarck. In the exchange HMS Hood had lost half her armament and survived an interesting critical hit but the KM Bismarck was left travelling at 3cm with a lonely solo turret firing. Her end was in clearly sight (see below, "the flashes" indicated critical hits which resulted in extra hull and armament boxes being lost):

In the end it was the HMS Prince of Wales (even with an extra dice roll to see if all her guns worked) that provided the "coup de grace" with a final massive hull critical which that wiped out the KM Bismarck's flotation and then some. The battle ended how the RN Admiralty had intended the historical version to end. No German 'swan-song' on this occasion. Both player admirals shook hands at the end and departed still "best of friends"! It was a good participation/demonstration game, plenty of spectator comment and nice to see the scenario played through to the end.

Second re-fight (without pictures): As the traders were starting the long process of packing up, myself (Admiral "M" RN) and one of the other game organisers (Admiral "I" KM) decided to do another quick replay, not as tied to the historical event, with more latitude of action shall we say. Here HMS Hood decided to concentrate on hitting and dispatching the KM Prince Eugen who seemed to be intent to close to torpedo distance. This meant taking several hits from the KM Bismarck, leaving HMS Prince of Wales to fight her battle for her. HMS Hood was thus reduced to 6cm but thankfully nothing worse. HMS Prince of Wales sadly did not even scratch the paintwork on the KM Bismarck. Admiral "I" KM was happy to play a long distant gunnery duel game with the British battleships. The speed advantage was in his favour (HMS Prince of Wales 11cm and HMS Hood 6cm to KM Bismarck's 12cm). As the range lengthened Admiral "M" RN (me) deemed it prudent to disengage and resume shadowing with the cruisers (HMS Suffolk and HMS Norfolk) and regain contact with her "lost or misplaced" RN destroyer screen (the four escorting destroyers that could not keep pace with the battleships in the bad weather). This would also give the British time to organise a Swordfish torpedo attack from HMS Victorious (as historically happened) and allow perhaps a damaged KM Bismarck to be re-engaged by the combined force of one battleship (HMS Prince of Wales), two cruisers (HMS Suffolk and HMS Norfolk) and three destroyers (assuming that one is left to escort the damaged HMS Hood). In addition there were the additional heavy units of the Home Fleet (HMS King George V and HMS Repulse with Tovey) closing in "with all haste" or even those heavier ships still on convoy escort duty (the battleships HMS Rodney, HMS Ramillies and HMS Revenge, plus the cruisers HMS Dorsetshire and HMS Edinburgh) that could come into play. Force H from Gibraltar may or may not be needed (probably used as insurance a policy). If not they may have been on hand strategically to help out (or be sunk) in the Mediterranean, as the invasion of Greece and Crete was in full swing at this point.

Wow. All good fun and a very, very enjoyable day out. In between battles I managed to pick up a few other bits and pieces, but more of them later. Also a huge thank you to Renko for kindly lending me the dark blue North Atlantic playing surface and those very useful plastic hit (orange 3D explosion) and critical (red exploding star) markers. The very effective looking smoke came from tumble-dryer belly button fluff! With three kids I seem to have an endless supply of the stuff ;)

Sitting back with a relaxing cup of "RN Cocoa" I was thinking on what the "lessons learned" were for the whole day/experience (but that is for another post).

:)

The Battle of the Denmark Straits as we took it to the show (Battleground 2017 - Part 1)

I have to confess that I got a huge buzz from Battleground 2017 (Stockton, UK) today as for the first time I was involved in a demonstration game (The Battle of the Denmark Straits 1941). Normally when I go to a Wargames Convention I spend most of my time circulating around the traders and "Bring and Buy" looking for essential purchases and bargains, trying desperately to stick to a "budget". My conversations with other wargamers are very restricted to comments to other shoppers and the 'talkative' stall owners. I scan the demonstration games (huge battlefields crammed with excellently painted figures ranging from 28mm to 6mm), consume the vista and move on. I have never as yet really participated in any of the participation games being more keen to move onto the essential shopping and get back to the family before it is too late. This year was different as I had babysitters (although my kids are now not babies) arranged and a full afternoon pass (the wife was also away enjoying herself on a University reunion).

So I spent a whole afternoon "virtually" in the Denmark Straits or talking about the battle and other other naval stories. I was amazed by the level of detail other people had on the subject and also some fascinating anecdotes and personal connections (in particular with HMS Hood and HMS Prince of Wales). After we set the game up I was called upon to start the General Quarters II (GQII) demonstration. To help me I had two young admirals rolling the dice. We'll call them "P" for the RN and "A" for the KM. The forces were placed on the table (see below, the Germans on the 1/3000 plot approaching at bearing 300 degrees to North):

We also had a 1/1200 representation of the local tactical arrangement, whereby most of the markers would be placed to keep the 1/3000 plot clear of unnecessary 'clutter' (see below, KM Prince Eugen leading the KM Bismarck):

Admiral "P" leads the RN in on their historical 220 degrees to North bearing (see below, both sides have pink "Post-It" notes close to the respective ships with their GQII characteristics on so damage can be easily marked off. Also note the small flag denoting nationality):

Standing back and the table area revealed the 1/3000 'battle area' (middle), the top section of the table with a laptop running various videos and also 1941 facsimile documents [something I discovered in a "remnants shop" one day while I was mooching] and the "messy bottom" area with the GQII rules and also the two 1/1200 tactical areas (see below, you can just see the 1/1200 model of HMS Hood bottom right):

History was immediately rewritten as RN Admiral "P" hit the Prince Eugen with a salvo from HMS Hood (10% chance, don't leave 'dice' in the hands of small children as they can do the impossible) causing a massive two hull box damage and immediate reduction in speed to 6cm. As the KM Prince Eugen slowed and veered away the KM Bismarck passed her and masked her from additional RN shots. It was now a stand up fight between two RN battleships (one old 'The Mighty Hood' and one [too] new the 'PoW') and a KM one at the peak of its efficiency (see below):

The KM held a brief advantage in penetration capability at this long range but the RN battle line was closing fast. The "battle royale" was about to begin!

Next: Let the "big guns" speak!