Charlie Deuce Takes the Lead, 1970 - new beta for testing

[Mgellis]

Some more Cold War action. This is a fairly simple scenario. It's 1970 and the Cold War has gotten hot. You are in command of a group of American destroyers charged with patrolling the waters south of Sardinia and eliminating any Soviet submarines found in your Area of Operation. You have two days to do this.

As always, please let me know what you think. Gameplay, units chosen, Events, how the orders are phrased, etc. Anything you can suggest that would make this scenario more accurate, more interesting, or more challenging is welcome.

Thanks in advance!

Version 2 uploaded 8:30 CST 12 Feb 2025

Charlie 1.JPG (183.75 KiB) Viewed 332 times

[HalfLifeExpert]

YES, I've been waiting for this one!

[HalfLifeExpert]

I've completed my first playthrough, and I got a 'minor victory despite losing one ship and one being damaged

I lost one destroyer to a surprise attack from an Algerian bomber, which gave no serious warning before weapons release, so I had no effective defense due to ROE.

I ended up Sinking a number of Soviet subs, but The Charlie Deuce was crippled by an Algerian Styx missile, since my SAMs couldn't engage them as they were flying too low, and my 5-Inch AAA couldn't engage fast enough.

I also never encountered any biologics/false contacts, despite seeing them in the unit list view.

A couple notes:

-The patrol zone coordinates in the briefing need to be tweaked as the longitude is from 8 deg East to 10 degrees WEST, a bit big don't you think?

-The ROE making the bomber attack unstoppable could perhaps be amended by allowing firing on any non-allied military aircraft within 4-5 miles of a ship and at or below 2000ft. Cold War One has gone hot, so I'd think that you'd be given more reasonable opportunities to defend yourself, and a general message would be sent to non-belligerent aircraft to this effect. We can assume that radio warnings are happening.

-While the Algerian Komars are a nice addition, the firing characteristics of the Styx missile makes your ships largely dependent on the roll of the dice to defend themselves. I'm not sure if there's good options unless you can tweak how low the Styxes flies.

[schweggy]

I finished this one up yesterday.

A couple notes:
- NATO side needs to be tweaked so when "United States" (player side) is hostile against the Soviets, NATO will be too. As it is, NATO will be happy to hang around and drop sonobuoys but won't attack any detected sub, nor will they attack Algerian units that the player has engaged (and are now hostile.) IMO that's not very realistic.
- Additionally, for the time allotted, 2 days, NATO would surely need more air assets to keep up a continuous air patrol... especially the F-104's. There were times (both day and night) when there was zero air support.
- As noted; the Algerian air attack(s) come out of the blue. I typically have an engagement zone of X miles around my surface forces in situations like this where any unknown unit that enters is automatically considered unfriendly and then I doublecheck who and what it is. So the Algerian Beagle's were tagged hostile on my own authority... but NATO declined to provide assistance.
- I never did get close enough to the Algerian missile boats to fire a shot before they returned to base after taking a pot-shot at my SAG. I think between the distance, my jamming and the Algerians having a poor solution lead to all missiles missing or falling short.

As usual, a fun scenario.

At 1 day and 1 hour to go: TRIUMPH 400 points
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
AS OF: 2/5/1970 12:50:50 AM

SIDE: United States
===========================================================
LOSSES:
-------------------------------
1x P-3B Orion
1x QH-50D DASH
EXPENDITURES:
------------------
132x 127mm/38 Twin HE-PD Burst [HiCap, 2 rnds]
80x 127mm/54 HE-CVT [HiFrag]
4x Mk46 LWT Mod 2
15x RIM-24C Tartar
6x RUR-5A Mod 4 ASROC RTT [Mk46 Mod 1]

SIDE: Neutrals
===========================================================
LOSSES:
-------------------------------
EXPENDITURES:
------------------

SIDE: NATO
===========================================================
LOSSES:
-------------------------------
1x F-104G Starfighter
EXPENDITURES:
------------------
6x AIM-9F Sidewinder
271x AN/SSQ-41A Jezebel LOFAR
160x AN/SSQ-47 Julie Active Range-Only

SIDE: Soviet Union
===========================================================
LOSSES:
-------------------------------
2x PL- 613 Whiskey V
1x PL-641 Foxtrot
1x PLRK-651 Juliett
EXPENDITURES:
------------------
11x Generic Acoustic Decoy

SIDE: Algeria
===========================================================
LOSSES:
-------------------------------
2x Il-28 Beagle
3x MiG-21F-13 Fishbed C
1x MPK SO1 [Pr.201M]
EXPENDITURES:
------------------
2x AA-2a Atoll [R-3S]
6x SS-N-2a Styx [P-15]

[Mgellis]

Just uploaded version 2, which I think tackles the issues mentioned. (Schweggy, thanks for catching the posture error.)

You're right about NATO being a little short-handed for the P-3 patrols. I assumed planes were needed for other missions, grounded for maintenance reasons, etc. Suffice that NATO doesn't have as many planes available to help TG 65.1 as they would like. That was deliberate.

I've added a line in the briefing saying that if Algerian aircraft get within 2 miles of the ships without permission that you can open fire. That's probably cutting it a bit close, but NATO doesn't know if Algeria is in the war yet, and doesn't want to push them into helping the Soviets by shooting down a plane by accident. The player is just going to have to watch those Algerian planes carefully.

As always, please let me know what you think. Any errors, issues with gameplay, scoring, etc.? What else needs to be done to get this ready for the Community Scenario Pack?

Thanks.

[Mgellis]

Any more thoughts on this one or is it ready for the Community Scenario Pack?

Thanks in advance.