The Manchurian War

With the interest in naval wargaming in our group taking off, we played the first of several learning games to prepare for tackling the Defending the Malay Barrier Campaign. This campaign system was develop by Old Dominion GameWorks for their General Quarters 3.3 WW2 naval rule set. While I have a few GQ3 games under my belt, my opponent is new to the rules. Once we play several games to learn various parts of the GQ3 rules, we will begin the campaign game. 

The first game was basic daylight engagement between to similar sized cruiser forces. The Allies were approaching from the north west, the Japanese from the south east, both at 15kts. Both were in a cruising formation with destroyers out screening the cruisers. Optional rules rules used included Initial Salvos and Not Engaged. A few House rules were also used. 

The Forces: Allied: Cruisers Houston (F), Exeter, Destroyers Jupiter, Encounter, Alden, Stewart. Japanese: Cruisers Nachi (F), Haguro, Destroyers Hatsukaze, Natsugumo, Toksukaze.  A sketch of the battle

1100-1106hrs T1: The Allied cruisers turned south while their destroyers formed line abreast generally heading east. The Japanese Cruisers turn north with the destroyers forming in line on the disengaged side of the cruisers. With A Arcs open, both sides open fire 23,000m. All the Japanese rounds missed but Houston scored a hit on Nachi, destroying A Turret while Haguro was hit by Exeter but the shell didn’t penetrate. 

1112hrs  T2. Both side maintained course which gradually closed the range. At 21000m both sides exchanged shots. Nachi was again hit by Houston, now losing X Turret. Haguro returned the favor, hitting Exeter and knocking out her B Turret. 

1118hrs T3: Both sides had worked up to 30kts. The Japanese maintain course, The Allied cruisers executed a column turn to port, closing the range to 19000m while paralleling the Japanese cruisers, both sides steering north. All the Allied rounds missed. Houston was hit by Nachi but it was dud. 

1124 T4: The cruisers continued to parallel to each other while slowly decreasing the range to 16000m. The Japanese destroyers worked up to 35kts to draw ahead of the cruisers. The Allied cruisers maintained position, but the destroyers executed a turn to port, forming a line from their abreast formation and headed north with the two US destroyers leading. Houston and Nachi exchanged duds, while Exeter took two hull hits. Haguro remained undamaged. 

1130 T5: The Japanese cruisers executed a 180º turn to starboard heading south with the range closing a bit more to 14500m as the two lines came abreast of each other. This allowed the Japanese destroyers to cross behind the cruisers as they steamed toward the Allied destroyers. The cruisers exchanged fire with no hits while all four Allied destroyers began to engage the closing Japanese warships. Toksukaze was hit once by dud. 

1136 T6: Nachi and Haguro executed a 4-Point turn to starboard, slowing angling south west as the Allied cruisers continue moving north. The fight between the destroyers becomes hot as they closed. The Japanese destroyers were attempting to cut ahead of the Allied destroyers, so only their forward mounts could bear. Both Natsugumo and Toksukaze took hits, with Toksukaze losing a torpedo mount. Toksukaze slowed down due to hull damage. Hatsukaze was living a charmed life, being near missed but nothing more. Houston takes an 8” hit to her searchlights while Nachi loses a secondary.

1142 T7: The two US destroyers launch torpedoes (six each) while the Japanese decide to hold for one more turn as their firing angles were bad. This turned out to be a costly mistake. The slow American Mk 8s stream past Hatsukaze and Natsugumo but Toksukaze wasn’t as lucky. As her damage control party mastered the fire, three torpedoes slam into her hull. Her demise is quick and violent. The remaining two Japanese destroyers are moving due west and are sail inbetween the Allied cruisers and their destroyers. However bad luck once again followed the Japanese destroyers. As they set up for a long range torpedo attack against the Allied cruisers, both are hit by the Allied destroyers. Each lost a torpedo mount and fires had started. The Allied cruisers turn to port and engage the Japanese destroyers with their secondaries. The Japanese cruisers make another 4-point turn to starboard coming onto a heading just south of west.  Range has opened to 16500m. Exeter was hit by a dud while everyone else missed. 

1148 T8: The Allied destroyers also turn and now Encounter and Jupiter launched their torpedoes at the Japanese destroyers while moving to rejoin the cruisers. The destroyers on both sides lose some gun mounts but the Allies score three bulkhead hits on Natsugumo. The damage control parties on the burning destroyer will not be able to get ahead of the damage and the Natsugumo is slowly sinking. The crew begins to abandon ship. The cruisers exchange shells with a hull hit on Exeter but no hits on Nachi or Haguro. 

1154 T9: The two Japanese destroyers launched four torpedoes each as the Allied cruisers turn to port to take up a heading of due south. A torpedo from Encounter then hits Natsugumo, putting a rapid end to that destroyer. With the Allied force now sailing south, the range closes down 11500m between the cruisers. Exeter again receives a hull hit while Nachi loses a secondary. Hatsukaze is clearing the battle area at 23kts due to damage with two turrets and one torpedo mount out of commission. The Japanese commander is unaware of the damage to the Allied ships, but Nachi has lost two turrets. Hagurto remains in good shape and both cruisers are still able to stream at 33kts. He decides a torpedo attack is the only option to try to salvage the battle. What the Japanese commander doesn’t know is Exeter has lost a turret and has take several hull hits. Her lost of speed is only now becoming apparent. Houston had also lost a turret. The Allied commander decides to withdrawal as he hasn’t lost any ships and has sunk two Japanese destroyers. 

1200 T10: The Type 93 torpedoes from the destroyers continue to chase the Allied cruisers. The Allied cruisers turn to the south west and their destroyers move in behind them  turning west as well . The Japanese cruisers continue a bit more to the west before turning to starboard and head towards the north west to set up their torpedo launch. Bad luck again visits the Japanese as one of Nachi’s torpedo mounts is hit and starts a fire right before torpedo launch while Haguro loses her Y Turret to Houston’s gunnery. However the Japanese 8”guns strike hard taking out Houston’s Turret III and Exeter takes an engineering hit through her thin side armor. 

1206 T11. Exeter fails her engineering damage control roll. Nachi and Haguro launch a total of 12 torpedoes towards the fleeing enemy while Alden and Stewart fire their remaining portside torpedoes at the Japanese cruisers. They didn’t anticipate that immediately after the cruisers launched their torpedoes, they would immediately turned to port. The Japanese sailors watched as the American torpedo speed behind them. The Allied destroyers turn west to follow the Allied cruisers. The Japanese torpedoes from the destroyers are still running but will likely miss the cruisers. However the Allied destroyers’ turn put them directly in the  torpedoes’ path. Alden is hit by two torpedoes and immediately begins to sink. Seeing what was happening to their leader, the other three destroyers take rapid evasive action and manage to avoid the other torpedoes. Steaming due west, Houston can’t fire as Turret III is out of action. Exeter only has Y Turret and has other issues. Exeter takes another engineering hit and begins to slow to stop. From what appeared to be a tactical success was now turning into a disaster. 

1212 T12: With the Exeter slowing to stop, the remaining destroyers decide to cover her with smoke. Turing to port, they cross behind her to lay a screen. Once again it was badly timed turn by th eAllied destroyers. Nachi’s and Haguro’s torpedoes arrive. Encounter took two hits while Jupiter took one. Both lose speed and began to abandon ship. One of the torpedoes that missed strikes the DIW Exeter and finished her off [note we forgot about the Type 93’s sensitivity. The remaining torpedoes should been have detonated in the wakes of the destroyers. Exeter was lost cause at this time so this error didn’t impact the result.]

1218. T13. Houston and Stewart sped off as the Japanese commander decided to break off any pursuit. Without a destroyer escort, it would be dangerous to continue due to Allied submarine activity and the cruisers had lost nearly half their main gun armament. Thus ended the combat.

This was a learning game, so both sides tried different things to learn how they worked in the rules. The tactical error I made as the Japanese commander was pressing my destroyers forward when they didn’t have a good relative bearing to the enemy. Better would have been to turn to port and press the cruisers with torpedoes which would have endangered both the Allied cruisers and destroyers.