Recent Nimitz Game - US Navy v IJN

It was nice to get a few of my recently painted WWII ships out for a game of Nimitz. I took the US Navy and Dale the Imperial Japanese Navy, with an allowance of 250 points each. We have played three previous games at 200 points per side and I wanted to see what difference the additional 50 points would make:

I deployed with a destroyer screen, a line of cruisers and four battleships:

Whereas Dale organised his fleet into three battlegroups, with a battleship, cruisers and destroyers in each line:

The side who gains the initiative gets much more scope in terms of where and the direction in which they can deploy on the table. I lost the initiative role and so deployed first. The first two moves were spent closing in to gun and torpedo range:

Large guns have a range of 24", small guns 16", while most torpedoes including those carried by the USN have a range of 12". The Japanese long lance torpedoes however have a long range of 24" and hit on the roll of a 6 on a D6, and they carry a lot of them. 

Torpedo attacks are resolved after all shooting has been done, so I blazed away with as much as I could enjoying the better USN odds due to superior radar and fire directors, and managed to inflict a fair bit of damage on the Yamato leading the closest battlegroup. I then held my breath as Dale fired his first dozen torpedo salvos, the Missouri suffering two nasty hits but managing to remain afloat.

Shooting is by formation on an IGOUGO basis, with the side winning the initiative for that turn choosing a formation to fire first. This is therefore an incentive to keep as many ships in formation or base-to-base contact as possible.

Turn 3 saw me finish of the Yamato which which exploded in a fireball, although it had already suffered significant damage, while the Japanese accounted for the Missouri and a couple of cruisers. Some of my destroyers managed to cross the Japanese line for a close-range torpedo run:

Turn four saw the demise of the Yamato's sister ship Musashi, while the Japanese sank the South Carolina which can be seen peeling off from the line, having lost buoyancy and been reduced to a quarter of its speed:

That left me with two battleships, the Massachusetts and North Carolina, with a gun turret missing on each, versus Dale's older Ise battleship. He however still had an advantage in the number of cruisers left and also outnumbered me in destroyers:

We both basically surprised each other at this point and simultaneously conceded that the other had most likely won, so decided to call it a draw.

This was a lot more of a slug-fest than the previous three games and I'm not sure whether the additional 50 points was the cause, but the other games felt a lot more tactical. In Nimitz you can retain half points value for any damaged ship which exits via its deployment zone, but the temptation is to keep them in the fray and pound away. In the absence of a campaign's in-built incentives to preserve forces I'm thinking that if two-thirds or three quarter points were retained for exiting ships then there might be more of an incentive to disengage earlier. 

I'm keen to include aircraft for our next game as this will add a whole new dimension, but we are about to delve into General d'Armee 2 which looks like it could be a decent set of rules for a few Napoleonic games.

French Fleet Completed

The last of the six fleets and the completion of my WWII naval project, this contingent was the quickest to paint. The main reason for this is that the French fleet was for the large part taken out of action early in the war, before the more intricate camouflage schemes were applied.

The French navy included some state of the art ships which were some of the fastest at the time, including the recently built Richelieu class in the Richelieu, Jean Bart and Clemenceau. The Richelieu was initially twice attacked by the British but was eventually repaired in the USA before serving with the British Home Fleet and then being transferred for action in the Pacific, while the Jean Bart fought a duel against the USS Massachusetts during operation Torch before surrendering to the Allies:

The Dunkerque and Strasbourg were similar to the Richelieu class in that their main armament was all placed forward. This was a distinct disadvantage when attacked by the British at Mers-el-Kebir as part of the controversial Operation Catapult, as they had been docked in the harbour with their sterns facing the open water which meant they were initially unable to return fire:

I also included three ex-WWI battleships in the Bretagne, Provence and Lorraine, the difference in construction over the preceding twenty years or so being quite noticeable:

Three Suffren class heavy cruisers include the Foch, Colbert and Dupleix, seen here alongside the one-of-a-kind Algerie:

With the Duquesne and Tourville completing the small contingent of heavy cruisers:

Six light cruisers include the Duguay Trouin, Primaguet and Lammotte-Picquet:

With the La Galissonniere, Montcalm and Marseillaise completing the half dozen:

Some of the French destroyers remind me of the larger Japanese destroyers in that they are almost the size of small light cruisers but maintain the advantage of being fast, such as the 36 knots achievable by the Vauqelin class, with the Vauqelin seen here alongside her sister ships Kersaint, Cassard and Tartu:

The Fantasque class was similarly large and fast, and I completed four with the Fantasque herself, the Audacieux, Terrible and Malin:

Three Le Hardi class destroyers with the Le Hardi, Mameluk and Casque complete the contingent of French destroyers:

The last ship in the fleet is the French aircraft carrier Bearn which, even though it actually launched aircraft and completed pilot training in the early part of the war, spent most of WWII out of action in the French West Indies:

Here are all thirty-two of the French fleet in their storage box:

The Nimitz ruleset we are currently using did not originally contain game cards for the French navy and I was readying myself to spend a bit of time creating in them, but a visit to Sam Mustafa's website shows they have now been released in the last week or so.

I did a quick count across all six fleets which shows I have managed to complete a grand total of three hundred and nineteen vessels, all but twenty-five of them over the past four months. I also purchased a batch of GHQ 1/2400 scale planes which I may also get around to completing at some stage, but since most rulesets use tokens or counters to represent the aerial component of WWII naval gaming these are not a high priority and will really only be used as table dressing.

Next up, a return to my ECW project with a few Parliamentarian foot regiments prepared and ready to be painted.

Regia Marina Fleet Completed

The penultimate contingent in my WWII naval project, I had been looking forward to getting stuck into the Italians mainly because their red and white striped aerial recognition markings are quite unique and provide a bit of colour. I was a little concerned about whether I would be able to paint lines that were straight enough without ruining the effect, but found that all the GHQ models with the exception of the destroyers had lines etched into the deck which made painting them quite simple.

I also purchased the Lifecolor WW2 Italian Naval paint set which took a lot of guesswork out of approximating the correct shades and were quite nice paints to use.

Here are the three completed Littorio class battleships which were the Littorio herself, the Vittorio Veneto and the Roma (the Impero was laid down and luanched, but never completed):

Followed by the Caio Duilio and Giulio Cesare:

Six heavy cruisers include the Trento, Trieste and Bolzano:

And three Zara class cruisers in the Zara, Fiume and Pola:

Italian spotter planes had a rather unique design, with red stripes on a very light grey background as can be seen here on the foredeck of the Zara:

I came a little unstuck on the light cruisers as some of the names are incredibly long and just wouldn't fit on my labels. The Abruzzi's full name, seen here alongside the Raimondo Montecuccoli, Muzio Attendolo and Giuseppi Garibaldi, is actually the Luigi de Savoia Duce degli Abruzzi:

While the final four light cruisers are the Attilio Regolo, Scipione Africano, Alberto Da Giussano and Bartolomeo Colleoni (which I chose as it sounded a little like Corleone to me):

The Soldati class destroyers are so-called as they are all named after different troop types. Below are the Velite, Mitragliere, Corsaro, Carabiniere and Bombardiere:

Followed by the Legionario, Ascari Artigliere and Alpino:

Three Navigatori class destroyers named after Italian explorers in the Antonio da Noli, Nicolo Zeno and Luca Tarigo, along side three Turbine class destroyers with the Turbine, Borea and Espero, complete the destroyer flotilla:

With the aircraft carrier Aquila completing the Italian fleet:

Here are all thirty-five ships nestled alongside some of the overflow from my US and Royal Navy contingents:

Only a similarly-sized French fleet left to go, which I hope to have completed by the end of next week.

Merchant/Transport Ships Completed

As the next stage in the WWII naval project I wanted to complete a small contingent of merchant and transport ships, to be used in convoy games or campaigns. The Queen Mary is the largest model in the GHQ WWII range, bigger than even their largest battleships, but proved more fiddly than I was expecting as all the lifeboats had to be glued to the ship in pairs. It was painted grey prior to undertaking transport duties across the Atlantic, and accordingly was nicknamed the 'Grey Ghost'. With a top speed of 32 knots it could outrun German U-boats and was an obvious choice to transport up to nearly 16,000 troops at a time:

 

The Circassia was another passenger ship which was requisitioned by the Admiralty for transport duties, albeit much smaller:

Here it is alongside the Queen Mary for comparison:

Next up are four merchant ships in the Clan Macauley and Tower Hill:

The New Zealand ship Otaio and the merchant vessel Gran, so-called because it was crewed by volunteer ladies all over 70 (sorry, couldn't help it):

Of course, no merchant fleet would be complete without the famous Liberty ships, and I have included three in the Ara, Alnitah and Murzim:

These models came with 1/2400th scale Sherman tanks and 2 and 1/2 ton trucks, which I painted separately and glued in place. At least my painting tally this year will include a dozen Sherman tanks and fourteen trucks:

Finally, the USS Capella completes the Allied merchant fleet:

 

A total of ten ships in all, which should be enough for a decent-sized convoy game and give my escort ships something to protect:

Next up the penultimate fleet in this project, the Regia Marina or Royal Italian Navy.

Royal Navy Fleet Completed

The last of the Royal Navy ships were finished a week or so ago, with the completed Royal Navy fleet now taking its place alongside the US Navy, Imperial Japanese Navy and Kriegsmarine. Given that the Royal Navy ships were the first I started it is nice to finally complete them. The last batch includes the Nelson and two Queen Elizabeth class battleships, the Barham and Valiant:

Two more King George V class battleships in the Duke of York and Howe:

and HMS Resolution:

Four more County class heavy cruisers include the Cornwall and Shropshire:

And the two Australian County Class cruisers Australia and Canberra both in their 'Chicago blue' colour schemes which they adopted for operations alongside the US Navy in the Pacific. As mentioned previously the Canberra was sunk and a US Baltimore class cruiser named in its honour later in the war, while the Australia was the first Allied ship to come under kamikaze attack and was subsequently hit by them another six times, suffering the most kamikaze attacks of any ship during the war:

Additional light cruisers completed include HMS Manchester and Belfast:

Three RAN Leander class cruisers in HMAS Perth, Sydney and Hobart:

And another Dido class anti-aircraft light cruiser, HMS Argonaut:

Two Fiji class light cruisers, HMS Fiji and Bermuda, plus HMNZS Dunedin and HMS Dauntless complete the light cruiser additions:

I also added three 'O' class destroyers, Onslow, Offa and Onslaught, to bring the total number of destroyers to fifteen:

As we are planning a few convoy games, I decided to add several corvettes and destroyer escorts to the fleet. The four Flower class corvettes, Clematis, Arbutus, Samphire and Sunflower are tiny models, seen here together and next to a pencil for scale:

The three Hunt class destroyer escorts, Bicester, Exmoor and Grove are also considerably smaller than the usual destroyer models:

Five U-class submarines, Union, Umpire, Ultor, Unruly and Urge will also be useful for campaigns, if we manage to get one off the ground:

I completed three more fleet carriers with the Victorious, Formidable and Hermes shown below:

Along with several escort carriers for the aforementioned convoy games. These include HMS Attacker, Battler, Archer, and two converted grain carriers in the Empire MacAlpine and Empire MacRae. These latter two carriers continued to transport grain, and therefore had both a merchant crew and a Royal Navy crew to service and fly the four Swordfish aircraft they carried:

Finally, here is HMS Archer alongside the Ark Royal, just to give an idea of the difference in size between an escort and fleet carrier:

The entire Royal Navy fleet consists of 79 models in total, most of which fit snugly in one A3 storage box although the carriers and a handful of battleships have had to find a home alongside some of the overflow from the US and Japanese fleets:

Next up will be the completed merchant and transport ships, only a dozen or so, and then the Italian and French fleets to complete the project.