Completed Canarys Cage

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cns180784
Posts: 448
Joined: Fri Jul 31, 2015 7:22 am

Completed Canarys Cage

Post by cns180784 »

Absolutely loved this scenario, gave me some headaches and hairy moments but came through it good.Spain reclaimed their islands and they are now once again thriving with fat British tourists drinking San Miguel and playing with punching machines (been to Gran Canaria twice and Tenerife once myself, had good times there except for my apartment being broken into in Tenerife).

Suffered losses but was expected, losses were the Frigate F71 Balaeres to an enemy sub's torpedo, my subs the S63 and S73 sunk due to enemy ASW ops, 9 Harriers and a P-3 MPA shot down by enemy Mig 29s, 5 F/A-18A Hornets but only 2 were shot down by SAMs from the Amphib group, other 3 ran out of fuel and crashed but those pilots were recovered and are now recuperating at a bar in the Costa Brava resort of Lloret De Mar, and are now on their 15th pint of San Miguel as they try to block out the trauma they went through.

the enemies' losses were excessive, here they all are.

SIDE: NAIL
===========================================================

LOSSES:
-------------------------------
2x 012 Rais Hadj Mubarek [PL-877EKM Kilo]
1x 416 Ziyad [Pr.1234E Nanuchka II]
4x 670 Ramadan
1x 801 Rais Hamidou [Pr.1234E Nanuchka II]
2x 901 Mourad Rais [Pr.1159 Koni]
4x Ammo Pad
3x Ammo Shelter
6x AS.565MA Panther
3x E-2C Hawkeye Group II
2x F 911 Mubarak [Perry]
3x F 946 Abu Qir [Descubierta]
2x F 951 Najim Al Zafir [Jianghu Type 053H(E)]
11x F-16CG Blk 42 Falcon [Peace Vector II Upgr]
4x F-4E Phantom II
3x L 9030 Champlain [BATRAL Class]
1x LST 1179 Newport
5x MiG-25P Foxbat A
4x MiG-29 Fulcrum C
6x Mirage F.1CH-200
5x Mirage F.1ED
4x S 849 Romeo
6x SA-3b Goa Quad Rail
6x SA-7a Grail [9K32 Strela-2] MANPADS
1x Sea King Mk47 [HAS.1]
4x SH-2G(E) Seasprite
4x SSC-3 Styx TELAR [3P51]
2x Vehicle (AN/MPQ-46 HPI)
2x Vehicle (Flat Face B [P-19])
2x Vehicle (Low Blow [SNR-125])

There were some losses i havent included as these happened when the game was running RC5 by mistake and a/c werent RTB when at bingo fuel.

Having opened the scenario in the editor after, looking at the NAIL side, there were a good number of strikes the enemy hadnt launched which must have been due to failing probability checks. I'm sure if i attempted this again it could pan out very different, and not be so easy. I actually think my forces would have took heavy losses and maybe lost some or all of my amphib group which would have meant a failure if at least 2 more of those strikes launched, mainly as i was almost the whole time relying on Harriers to defend both my surface groups whilst i had my Hornets dedicated to striking Sidi Slimane and the enemy amphib group, after those then striking Gando and Los Rodeos. Splitting them between strike elements, SEAD and fighter escorts...not using any Hornets to defend my surface groups, and had the tankers set to refuel my Hornets striking the amphib group and Gando/Los Rodeos.

The Frigate i lost to a torpedo from a sub was due to the sub slipping through my ASW net, which i think the patrols were set a bit too big for the choppers, and the surface groups' sonars couldnt hear anything as they were all cavitating traveling at 19 kts. All of a sudden the torpedoes were detected by the F71 at just over 2nm away, and then the goblin detected.

This was great fun and hats off to Miguel Molina. I just finished Choking Halifax which included a mining mission based on a sub which was different, now i'll give Down town 1967 a go which looks a great prospect and i like the idea of timimg my missions with another strike that isnt under my control.

magi
Posts: 1533
Joined: Sat Feb 01, 2014 1:06 am

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by magi »

Glad you had fun... It is a cool scenario.....
marksi10
Posts: 66
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 1:59 pm

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by marksi10 »

I´m impressed that you managed to complete the mission without using any Hornets on LORCAP. I kind of want to play the scenario again now, but unfortunately the surprise at the end is spoilt for me now. Does anyone know of any similar scenarios? Ones where you cover an amphibious landing?
cns180784
Posts: 448
Joined: Fri Jul 31, 2015 7:22 am

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by cns180784 »

By the sounds of it Operation Gudrun is such a scenario, you should already have it in your community scenario pack. I was just lucky that i managed to complete Canarys Cage without using any Hornets for LOR/BARCAP. I did use them for TARCAP's though as well as escorts for a strike package on Sidi Slimane.

Oh what is the surprise thats' been spoilt that you're referring to? thing is i think people play Canarys Cage numerous times and i'm sure they check the enemy forces in the editor after playing it once. They've said how unpredictable it is and plays out differently every time. I may well play it again at some point and i'm interested to see what the scenario "building a cage" is like which is played as NAIL set before Canarys Cage where you have to capture the Canaries from the Spanish- i'd imagine this is another such scenario you'd be interested in too.
marksi10
Posts: 66
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 1:59 pm

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by marksi10 »

Ah, I didn´t realise that the events weren´t fixed - I might play it again then! Thanks for the tip about Operation Gudrun, I will try it right now.
cns180784
Posts: 448
Joined: Fri Jul 31, 2015 7:22 am

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by cns180784 »

Whats' Operation Gudrun like? i havent played it myself- i just did a search for scenarios that include amphibious landings.
marksi10
Posts: 66
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 1:59 pm

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by marksi10 »

I went for Play the Fool instead - it seemed a bit more interesting, and it was...for the first half of the scenario. By that point I had already clearly won, unless something really unexpected happened (it didn´t). I ended up only achieving a Minor Victory, despite the fact that I had sunk the Liaoning and almost all their naval forces, downed all their planes, and captured Woody Island without difficulty. This was because I got lazy/bored once it was clear I had won - after being super careful with them up to that point, I sent one of my subs at flank speed at the carrier task group, because I was frustrated by how long it was taking my Hornets to sink the carrier. I ended up getting my sub sunk by their sub. I also failed to micro manage an unnecessary strike on Hainan´s airfields, and ended up losing 5 F-35s (they did that thing where they flew directly over the target until the SAM´s radar came on and it shot them down).

So what went right? Basically everything in the first half of the scenario. I got both my Global Hawks shot down early, but they had already identified the closest threat to my forces. I had already armed half the Hornets (both Super and non-Super) with SLAM-ERs, so that I would either be able to attack Woody Island or any naval threats. I decided to go for the latter first, and with a couple of Growlers sank their frigate SAG. Then I sent an F-35 (Black Knight 5) on a recce mission, and he managed to circumnavigate the whole area without getting shot down, and identify all their forces except for the carrier group. I had armed the F-35Bs with JSOW, not realising that these were external, but it turned out that they were still stealthy enough to attack Woody Island through the gap created by the Hornets taking out the SAG, and destroy half the defences along with the radar, losing just one aircraft.

I had sent all my naval forces forward individually, and at this point the leading group, the Zumwalt SAG, was attacked repeatedly by both air launched and (I think) surface-launched ASMs. The enemy only succeeded in sinking one LCS, and the Zumwalt destroyed an enemy frigate in an old-fashioned gun battle! One of my subs took out the other forward frigate. At this point I sent Black Knight 5 out on the same route again, and this time he managed to identify their carrier group too! He almost made it back, but failed to dodge the last Flanker´s missiles. Still, losing one F-35 to discover all the enemy dispositions seemed like a good deal!

I then used the Hornets to destroy the fast patrol craft SAGs (which they almost managed in one attack) and sent the F-35s back to Woody Island to destroy the rest of their defences. At this point I concentrated on getting rid of all the submarines between my amphibious group and Woody Island. The subs, Seahawks, P-8s and Zumwalt SAG managed this without much trouble. All that was left was to send the Hornets at the Liaoning group, which it took them about 3 strikes to destroy completely, and the F-35s at Hainan, which I left alone after the above attack.

This scenario was fun, but a little too easy, although if the creator was trying to make it realistic then I don´t have a problem with that, especially as the scoring reflects the challenges the two forces face (If I had lost two LCS, instead of one, it would have cancelled out all the points I got from sinking the Liaoning, which was worth less than my SSN!). The only easy way to make it more challenging would be too make it about half the length. To make it more of a contest, the PLAN needs something with which to threaten the carrier groups, such as ASBMs, sub-launched cruise missiles, or some stealth aircraft of its own.
cns180784
Posts: 448
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RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by cns180784 »

Interesting and sounds like a good scenario. I myself decided to continue my Vietnam war 1967 Down town save. Despite destroying the bridges and railway yard with 2 strike packages my score is only average due to losing 17 a/c, so decided to create some SEAD and DEAD missions to strike some Sa-2's and AAA batteries, which should earn me some points- just got to hope i dont lose any a/c or as few as possible, AAA is everywhere in this scenario. Then i'll go back to playing the Duelists 1989 scenario. Only thing is i havent been playing Command over last few days as i've got back into Falcon BMS, as it seems now that a previous problem i had with my power usage has been sorted. I have an X-55 HOTAS and despite having a powered USB hub it caused my socket to overload and blew my PC up...but now should be ok.
TheOriginalOverlord
Posts: 337
Joined: Tue Jun 20, 2000 8:00 am
Location: The Marines

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by TheOriginalOverlord »

Sounds great...now I'm going to try it!
Semper Fi!

Jeremy

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cns180784
Posts: 448
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RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by cns180784 »

ORIGINAL: Overlord

Sounds great...now I'm going to try it!
Have fun, let us know how you do.
marksi10
Posts: 66
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 1:59 pm

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by marksi10 »

I just finished the Duelists, which worked out a bit like Play the Fool - I was engrossed by the first half, and then spent the second half surfing the internet and only checking on it occasionally (and I didn´t pay for my negligence).

This was partly through choice, as after I had lost both my subs I could have pursued their SAG with my CVBG, but I felt this was against the spirit of the mission, which was to stop the Soviets breaking through. This I managed by sinking the Kiev. The other ships proved much harder to sink though - they took 16 Sea Eagle and 8 Harpoon in quick succession and only sustained light damage! Most of my losses were silly ones, the first sub for instance was lost when I basically gave up on it after realising that its Tigerfish torpedoes weren´t fast enough to sink the Russian sub that was attacking it. The second sub was lost after I gave away its location by firing some Harpoons off (I love the level of detail in this game!)

Spoiler alert!

This was actually the second time I played it, the first time I got the Invincible sunk pretty quickly. The second time I remembered reading that the RN planned to protect its carriers from the Soviets by destroying their recce aircraft with Sea Harriers. I also turned off the radars in the CVBG and just used the AEW one. This seemed to work pretty well, although I took a couple of missile salvos before I could work out how to stop the CVBG turning their radars back on. The highlight of the game for me was using a Nimrod to take down a recce Badger with a SideWinder after a long ´chase.´

The other thing I would quibble with (apart from the length of the scenario) is the scoring, which was very basic! I got a minor victory from sinking two Soviet ships even though I lost 4 of my own! I think a verdict of a Pyrrhic victory would have been much more appropriate!
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Sakai007
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RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by Sakai007 »

I think in the doctrine tab for a unit/group/side, you can order them to maintain EMCOM even when under attack. I think it's 'ignore EMCON when attacked' (yes/no) Many of those doctrine choices can have a serious impact on how the AI will use the units/groups that you assign to a mission. They can also be quite handy when scenario building when you want different groups of AI controlled units to act in more or less aggressive manners. Seems like 70% of the time spent building scens is spent fine tuning the ROE, doctrine, and WRA to get the specific behavior you're looking for.
When in Doubt, Charlie out!!
marksi10
Posts: 66
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 1:59 pm

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by marksi10 »

Yeah, I actually wanted them to use the radars when under attack, I just wanted them to turn off again when the attack was over. I eventually realised that I had to change their EMCOM doctrine on the mission page rather than just clicking ´radars off´ on the unit status, which worked initially but it would always reset after an attack, and wouldn´t click off again.
marksi10
Posts: 66
Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2015 1:59 pm

RE: Completed Canarys Cage

Post by marksi10 »

I just completed Sandbox Scenario 2. I think it was my third attempt, the first two times I gave up halfway through, as I was about to this time after my ASuW strike (44 Harpoons, 8 HARMS)failed to do any damage whatsoever to their two ships. However, when I checked that this was the case on the Losses table, I noticed something else - they had used up nearly all of their SAMs, both the sea and land-based. I realised at that point that the rest of the scenario was going to be rather easy, as still had most of my units in reserve. I was still worried about the ships being on the ingress route to Latakia airbase and its SAMs though, so I sent a 2 SEAD f-16s and 4 15Es armed with LJDAM (I assumed the L stands for long-distance, which should give me the necessary stand-off range). This strike sank the Slava (shooting down several Mig-29s in the process, it´s nice having strike aircraft that can look out for themselves!), and my SAG finished off the frigate with SM-6s as they had expended all their Harpoons in the first ASuW strike.

This left the way open to a DEAD and airbase strike, which I put pretty much all my remaining forces into, making it a 40-plus strong strike package! This destroyed much of Latakia and shot down an incoming Fencer airfield attack to boot!

I had started the game by learning from my previous losses and sending the HVUs at low altitude to orbits outside the range of the S-400, and by sending the two RAF reapers at low altitude up the Bekaa Valley to attack their SA-5 from the south, which they managed to do but failed to destroy it despite firing 8 Brimstone and 4 PAVEWAY IVs at it, although they did heavily damage it.

The first part of this scenario taught me that S-00 SAMs are very effective A2AD weapons (to minimize my losses to SAMS I left my fighter aircraft on the ground for the first part of the scenario and relied upon the Patriot battery to protect Turkey´s airscace). In the second part I learnt that this is only the case until they run out of SAMs, and that it is better to use missiles than aircraft to use up enemy SAMs. If the scenario had been longer than 6 hours however, I would have just rearmed the F-22s with whatever the longest standoff weapon available was, and tried to take out the SAMs this way, which I find to be a much more elegant solution than the cannon fodder approach. I think it might be possible to do the job more efficiently with better use of the Growler´s too, although these seemed quite vulnerable to the SAMs (I had 3 shot down at a reasonable distance from the SAMs).

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