Comments on Historical Naval Losses in MWIF Turns

[Courtenay]

I suggest that all comments on warspites "Historical Naval Losses in MWIF Turns" go here, and reserve the "Historical Naval Losses in MWIF Turns" thread for warspites postings only. That way the thread will only have the losses on it, and if people want to look at them, they won't have to wade through a bunch of commentary.

I think having only the loss postings will look better, too.

[Orm]

Hear, hear.

[brian brian]

The Royal Navy took losses in WWII. It didn’t sit in port and wring it’s hands - “but they have NAV bombers out there!” And the result was that then Rommel sometimes didn’t have enough shells and gasoline in his Panzers.

[Neilster]

ORIGINAL: brian brian

The Royal Navy took losses in WWII. It didn’t sit in port and wring it’s hands - “but they have NAV bombers out there!” And the result was that then Rommel sometimes didn’t have enough shells and gasoline in his Panzers.

Whilst they took losses, they didn't have to contend with MWiF's land-based air rules [;)]

Cheers, Neilster

[brian brian]

True. But many players simply refuse to risk battle with the Royal Navy and just sit and watch while the Axis takes over the Med. Until the air-to-sea factors reach a critical quantity, ships with good AA factors can contest the seas just fine. For the entire first year of the war, the Axis have exactly 2 TRS in the Med, and that’s it. If you make search rolls looking for them, their life span should be short.

Good players operate the Royal Navy aggressively, reinforce it correctly (repair the good AA ships, build FTR 2/3 and all the CVplanes, send in SUBs; not building the Lions and Implacables), and force many a good Axis player to conclude that the Italian force pool is more effective by not sending it overseas at all. The Royal Navy is the most dominant Allied force on the board at the start of the game, but not if it cowers in fear turn after turn. “They sank my cruiser - the Med is a death trap now...”

[AlbertN]

Yes, the Royal Navy has no problems operating in the Mediterranean at all during the first year of the game.
Axis does not have enough NAV to scare them away, and the CVPs can still kick the arse of Axis LBA FTRs (Especially as German FTRs are needed in France and cannot exactly go help in the Med. Usually it's Italy sending 1 FTR in France!)

In late '40 when Euro-Axis can pack together 4-6 NAVs, then yes, there could be problems!

[Neilster]

I agree that the Royal Navy should be used boldly in MWiF. It's the best thing the Allies have at the beginning of the war and the Axis needs to be distracted as much as possible.

Cheers, Neilster

[brian brian]

We are coming up on an historical loss that Courtenay has mentioned, which can’t be replicated in WiF: the Blucher.

In the new Collectors Edition rules, that possibility is getting closer, with new rules for Coastal Forts (not in MWiF), which impose some risk on naval units shore bombarding or disembarking troops onto their hex. However, Oslo does not have one of these. Yet?


Here is an historical loss + WiF trivia question. What aircraft model sank a Cruiser in history, but it’s WIF counters could not do so, as there is no air-to-sea factor? (The right honorable Sir Warspite is still some turns away from listing the ship involved).

[Orm]

The black on red makes the table unreadable to me (for Norway).

And is it possible to get the original 'chart' instead of the picture when it is all done?

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: Orm

The black on red makes the table unreadable to me (for Norway).

And is it possible to get the original 'chart' instead of the picture when it is all done?

warspite1

It was supposed to be Dark Blue on Red - I wanted to keep the MWIF counter colours for the table. Sadly I don't think this will be possible in the interests of legibility and I will need to replace the lettering with white.

I am keeping the excel spreadsheet so yes.

[Courtenay]

Posting mainly to bump thread up.

To repeat, all comments on warspites "Historical Naval Losses in MWIF Turns" go in this thread.

[Courtenay]

Jul/Aug 1940

The Italian losses were relatively light during the turn, 1 light cruiser in a surface action, and 4 destroyers to Fleet Air Arm bombers (although Pancaldo would be later salvaged. Just one submarine was lost courtesy of a British submarine.

Three of these destroyers were lost to night air attack by the Fleet Air Arm bombers, showing that even in 1940, night air missions could be made.

[paulderynck]

Good thing Fleet Air Arm was not using the latest CE rules.

[Courtenay]

ORIGINAL: Courtenay

Jul/Aug 1940

The Italian losses were relatively light during the turn, 1 light cruiser in a surface action, and 4 destroyers to Fleet Air Arm bombers (although Pancaldo would be later salvaged. Just one submarine was lost courtesy of a British submarine.

Three of these destroyers were lost to night air attack by the Fleet Air Arm bombers, showing that even in 1940, night air missions could be made.

Just realized I should have said night port strikes. (Yes, strikes.)

[Orm]

ORIGINAL: Courtenay

ORIGINAL: Courtenay

Jul/Aug 1940

The Italian losses were relatively light during the turn, 1 light cruiser in a surface action, and 4 destroyers to Fleet Air Arm bombers (although Pancaldo would be later salvaged. Just one submarine was lost courtesy of a British submarine.

Three of these destroyers were lost to night air attack by the Fleet Air Arm bombers, showing that even in 1940, night air missions could be made.

Just realized I should have said night port strikes. (Yes, strikes.)

And just how many WIF counters would have been lost by the night port strikes during the war? Enough to include night port strikes in WIF?

[ashkpa]

And just how many WIF counters would have been lost by the night port strikes during the war? Enough to include night port strikes in WIF?

Well, it's not like we don't have access to planes that were never built. Justifying anything in this game by actual history is fraught with conflicts.

[Courtenay]

ORIGINAL: ashkpa

And just how many WIF counters would have been lost by the night port strikes during the war? Enough to include night port strikes in WIF?

Well, it's not like we don't have access to planes that were never built. Justifying anything in this game by actual history is fraught with conflicts.

A single night strike at Truk during operation Hailstorm accounted for about 50,000 tons of shipping, one-third of the damage inflicted during operation Hailstorm, despite the fact that there were more than twenty strikes during the day as opposed to one at night. During that operation the only serious damage inflicted by the Japanese was done in a night air attack, which torpedoed the Intrepid.

[Courtenay]

Please try and keep comments on warspite's posts here, not in the Historical Naval Losses thread.

One of the Italian submarines that was sunk this turn, the Tarantini, was interesting, not for itself, but for the British submarine that sank it, HMS Thunderbolt. Why is Thunderbolt interesting? I had never heard of it. Thunderbolt was not always its name. Earlier it had been HMS Thetis, the victim of one of the worst accidents suffered by the Royal Navy in peacetime, when in 1938 they managed to open both the inner and outer doors of one of the torpedo tubes simultaneously. (Don't do this at home. In fact, don't do this, period.) There were only four survivors, and 99 fatalities. The submarine was salvaged and recommissioned as Thunderbolt.

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: Courtenay

Please try and keep comments on warspite's posts here, not in the Historical Naval Losses thread.

warspite1

I've asked one of the mods to move the comment to this thread and will look at it at that time.

[rkr1958]

I'm currently in the second book, "Day of Battle", of Rick Atkinson's, "The Liberation Trilogy" and ran across this bit about the HMS Warspite -

"Fritz-X attacks in the coming day would also cripple the battleship H.M.S. Warspite and the cruiser H.M.S. Uganda, among eighty-five Allied vessels hit by German bombs at Salerno."

The Fritz-X was a bomb guided by a German bomber pilot using a joystick from his cockpit. It nearly sunk the U.S.S. Savannah and did sink the Italian battleship Roma as she was sorting to join the British fleet at Malta after Italy's surrender.

All of this was during Operation Avalanche in September 1943.

The first known attack by the Fritz-X was in late August 1943 in the Bay of Biscay in which a British sloop was sunk.

I know all this is way ahead of where you are now ... but I wasn't aware that Germany made use of guide bombs during WW2.