New Scenario for Testing "The Red Banner Northern Fleet"

[vettim89]

Submitted for your approval:

This is my baby. I have been working on this scenario since CMANO. This is actually the second iteration. It is huge. It may in fact be unplayable. Nonetheless, like a child, I love this scenario'

So my interest in modern naval gaming began in the 1980s with two games. The first was the Harpoon miniatures rules. The second was Second Fleet. My good friend (who was single) set up the grand campaign on the floor in his spare bedroom and we played it all the way through. We had a great time and it is still one of my fondest gaming memories. Since I first purchased CMANO I have always wondered if I could design a scenario to recapture the grand campaign nature of Second Fleet. As I said before I started once and tabled the idea. But now I am done or at least as close to done as I can get for now.

My guidelines for setting this beastie up were based on the assumption that the USSR would have several months of planning and preparation before the "balloon went up". I was therefore rather generous with the readiness levels for the units involved. I generally used an 80% availability rate except for some of the older platforms. The aircraft have been stood down, tuned up, and crews rested for 100% of peace time OOB. That may change as you start using them. Most of the units are in port or at peace time bases. The scenario actually starts three days before hostilities are initiated which gives the player some time to move his units into the points where they can do the most good. Just getting all the ships undocked and the aircraft moved around took me several hours of game time to accomplish in my play test. To me this is part of the fun as you get to set everything up the way you want vice the way the scenario designer deemed proprer.

I used several sources to be as close as possible to the actual OOB, but with time passing some information was just no longer available. I was forced to just "make do" with some ship names and bases. If any one sees a glaring error, I would appreciate the input

Just like in Second Fleet, the player gets to choose his own doctrine at the beginning of the game: defensive, limited offensive, or full offensive. Depending on which doctrine is selected, new tasks/missions will become available. There is a small amount of land combat that is possible, but I have kept it to mostly small unit affairs that shouldn't overtax CMO's limited ability to handle such matters. I opted to just make this scenario cover the first week of the war as I figured trying to model AI behavior beyond seven days was just impossible.

I have included a text document with the doctrinal extra missions for player's to refer to as the window detailing them only appears once. I could add a Special Action where it would pop up after doctrine is selected. In fact, now that I though of this, I will add it to the finished product

I cannot post this scenario without thanking all the folks who frequent the Lua Legion sub forum. Their patience in answering my sometimes outright stupid questions has been the only thing that allowed this scenario to reach its current state. A special thanks to Knighthawk75 for all the tips and outright code writing. In a way this is as much his scenario as it is mine.

I realize this type of scenario probably does not have mass appeal. I have contemplated that no one beyond myself would have an interest in playing it. Even if I am the only person who will play this monster, I felt like I had to share it. So be good friends like when some one shows you their pictures of their ugly baby. Just smile and say, "cute kid!"

Thanks for reading,

Tim

[Gunner98]

Tim

This is intriguing and is a parallel story to Northern Fury but 5 years earlier. I'll give it a try and in the process provide a couple editor points as I go.

First look:
- setup, initial camera altitude is zoomed in. Best to center your scenario and use the Z and X keys to zoom in and out to the desired level before saving. Using the scroll wheel doesn't seem to do it, but the hotkeys do.
- Using coloured text in the briefing is problematic. it shows up well in the initial read, but when you take a look later, the coloured text is washed out against the white background
- The task of taking the radar stations at Barlevag **, Skarsvag **, and Sorvaer ** is confusing as there are no units there, just locked RPs. A marker unit might be useful for locating them.
- At Luostari AB, there are 27 An-12BK-PPS in the 912th Tpt Regt. I think these should probably be An-12BK or BP Cub A, transport variants instead of the EW (PPS) version
- At Luostari AB, having 24x Mi-26 in one unit is unlikely. I think they deployed in a max of 6 as part of larger units. I was unable to pin down the 33rd Air Assault Regt in a couple of my 'go to' Soviet sites.
http://www.ww2.dk/new/newindex.htm
http://www.easternorbat.com/index.html
- Some of the helicopter basing and unit numbers do not match up with my research but you could easily be right and me wrong on that stuff.

I like the doctrine choices, they really give a good feel to the situation. One suggestion is to put the text in an Event Action message so it shows up in the log. The key bits are in the text file so it is no biggie.

OK, going to give this a bit of a play. Cannot promise that I'll finish but here goes.

B

[vettim89]

Gunner98,

Thanks for your initial comments. Bonehead move on the AN-12s

New file in OP with the following changes

1. Hopefully fixed the aspect view issue
2. Added a special action that allows the player to review the doctrine specific missions at any time
3. Fixed the AN-12 issue
4. Placed Target Markers at the three Norwegian Radar sites
5. Changed the highlighted text in the briefing to just Bold type

As to the helicopters, I had a reference that indicated that a Special Air Assault RGT attached to an Air Assault brigade had
24 MI-6 and 32 Mi-8. Unfortunately the Mi-6 is not in DB3000. So I substituted the Mi-26 which I realize is not really a one-for-one trade but it is the best I can do. I cannot find the reference right now. Not to be "woe is me" but you cannot believe how many different references I have paged through putting this thing together.

[vettim89]

I forgot. The helicopter basing thing is an issue for me. I could only find reference to the primary base at Murmanski. I feel I am missing the forward operational bases that would have been used in war time. If any one has that data, it would be most appreciated.

[Gunner98]

Not to be "woe is me" but you cannot believe how many different references I have paged through putting this thing together.

I bet I can http://northernfury.us/ There is a lot of stuff out there, it is mostly conflicting and the Soviets made a game of obscuration and misdirection.

For the Mi-6, you could pull one in from the Soviet listings vice Russian, I'm sure I've used it but maybe not, perhaps do a search without the country selected, there is a Chinese variant as well. But the Mi-26 is a good replicant.

B

[vettim89]

I opened the Database Viewer and there are no entries under Mi-6 nor "Hook". I am positive it is not in DB3000

[Nikel]

There is a Soviet Mi-6A in the last version of the database, Cold War v493.

But you are using DB3000 v483? Why not the last? Though I do not find it there.

[morphin]

Lua error when opening the scenario file first time:
(in the log directory)

Exception: [string "Scenario:Function Load"]:97: ')' expected near '='
Stack Trace: at NLua.Lua.ThrowExceptionFromError(Int32 oldTop)
at NLua.Lua.DoString(String chunk, String chunkName)
at fPYwXrc0UtbXdiSTPPXI.CQrLSxhfKi6(Object , String , String , fPYwXrc0UtbXdiSTPPXI )
at Command_Core.Lua.LuaSandBox.RunScript(String str, Boolean RunInteractively, String script)

[vettim89]

Lua error when opening the scenario file first time:
(in the log directory)

Exception: [string "Scenario:Function Load"]:97: ')' expected near '='
Stack Trace: at NLua.Lua.ThrowExceptionFromError(Int32 oldTop)
at NLua.Lua.DoString(String chunk, String chunkName)
at fPYwXrc0UtbXdiSTPPXI.CQrLSxhfKi6(Object , String , String , fPYwXrc0UtbXdiSTPPXI )
at Command_Core.Lua.LuaSandBox.RunScript(String str, Boolean RunInteractively, String script)

Well that is bad. Will have to go back and look at my functions. Odd, because I tested everything. Must have made an edit without checking

[vettim89]

There is a Soviet Mi-6A in the last version of the database, Cold War v493.

But you are using DB3000 v483? Why not the last? Though I do not find it there.

The old databse is a representation of how long I have been working on this project

[WillpowerDisturbance]

I noticed two things when I started playing. First I can select "Finland/Sweden" but I think they are meant to be computer only since its doesn't seem like they have any units. The second is I get an error message when I try to view the cargo at Luostari AB and when I try to load cargo onto the aircraft located there. I'm using the beta version of CMO right now so I think that is the cause.

So far it runs pretty well considering how large the scenario is!!

[morphin]

It is because of beta

[vettim89]

I have taken this scenario down temporarily. After finding the error in the function load I believe I need to more rigorously stress test it before it is up for publishing. Sorry for wasting your time up to this point. It will be back I promise

[Schr75]

Hi Vettim

I noticed a little error in the naming of the SSBN patrol boxes.
The White sea box is actually in the Kara sea. The White sea is south of Murmansk.

Only a small thing but it sets of my OCD Sorry.

Hope this helped.

Søren

[Randomizer]

I will confess to being pumped in anticipation of this scenario's updating. Just mission planning for the fleet's operations will take many hours regardless of which strategic option is selected and that is a part of CMO that I really enjoy.

As an aside from the White Sea/Kara Sea bastion noted by Schr75, the universal availability of all the ships and subs using the default ready times might be an issue since some ships would almost certainly not be immediately available, requiring fuel, ordnance loads, essential repairs and other factors with delays of up to several days being reasonable. Of course this represents a ton of additional work, I'm wondering if there is a Lua script that might randomize ship ready times when the scenario is loaded initially.

Looking forward to the next upload.

-C

[morphin]

Any news?