Scenario for testing PF #3 Caught Flat Footed

[Gunner98]

Thanks guys

Great reports! I'll get some fixes out this weekend. PF#4 is on the way... well foundations laid anyway.

Cheers

[AndrewJ]

ORIGINAL: AndrewJ

Civil

I'm not sure why the southern mortar platoon didn't engage targets at the Tacloban airport.

I see why now. The one in the north is on 'engage opportunity = yes', and the one in the south is not. Changing that allows it to engage.

There's no warning message for the one in the south, so maybe this is what you intended?

[Badlandz]

Forgot to mention a few things:

The Kanin class destroyer was nothing but a target. Perhaps changing the ROE to allow the SAM battery to fire on ships might help. They are very short ranged but, maybe they will get lucky.

Rebels: the reconnaissance mission request fired. However, I basically ignored it. I didn’t have and ISR assets available. Anyway to penalize the player for doing that?

The wreckage east of Luzon: love the distraction. Left me wondering what it was about. Maybe the downed airman rescue LUA would be a good add on. Points for rescuing a crew? I just collected the RHIBs and ran north.

The addition of these distractions can make the situation a bit more foggy.

Gunner, thanks again!

[Gunner98]

Good points. Will adjust

I think I may add a couple more distractions...

Probably move that Pilipino antique a little closer to the wreckage and give points for having it there for XX hrs. Will add some tidbit of int from a survivor as well.

Will fix the mortar at Tacloban, think I may add a bit more 'distraction' there as well. When you look at a map of the Communist 'hotspots' it is essentially everything except the metropolitan parts of Luzon and a few islands. So I might play that up a bit.

Cheers.

[Gunner98]

OK here is an update guys.

[Ilya78]

Finally, I had some time to finish this scenario. I made a 661 points Major Victory with all ships in the replenishment zone, except for the poor USS Gridley. I hope I can write the AAR next week, because it is absolutely worth it.

(Broncos are the best!)

[Gunner98]

Excellent, I look forward to it

[Ilya78]

OK, here it is… I played with the 1.1 version.

SITUATION

The USS Constellation CVBG was ordered back from Australia to the north of the Philippines, in order to reinforce the USS Independence CVBG near Japan. But first, they had to meet a replenishment group NW of Luzon, and the air wing had to carry out an exercise with aircrafts of the US and Filipino Air Forces. The replenishment group had already been departed from Manila.

FRIENDLY FORCES

US Navy:

USS Constellation CVBG: USS Constellation (Kitty Hawk CVN); Gridley (Leahy CG); Ingersoll (Spruance DD); Lake Erie and Vincennes (Tico CGs, the latter one is catching up from Guam); Mahon S. Tisdale (OHP FFG, investigating a wrecked trawler (looks like a trap)).

Replenishment group: USS Kinkaid (Spruance DD(VLS)); Willamette (Cimmaron AO); San José (Mars AFS).

Half of the carrier’s air wing was at Cubi Point, Luzon for an exercise. The fuel had got contaminated, so most of the aircrafts could not take off for some hours (probably a sabotage).

USS San Francisco and USS City of Corpus Christi (Los Angeles class SSNs following the CVBG).

P-3 Orion MPAs in ASW or MS configurations at Cubi Point and Anderson AB (Guam). EP-3 Aries ELINT at Cubi Point.

US Air Force:

F-5E Tiger II: aggressors for the exercise at Cubi Point
2 KC-135 tankers, a C-141 Starlifter at Cubi Point.
2 B-52s at Anderson AB, being armed with Harpoons (Yess!!!)

Filipino Air Force:

F-5A Freedom Fighters (without radars) at airports on Luzon and Leyte
Interesting attack aircrafts: OV-10A Broncos, AS.211 trainers armed for ground attack, piston engine (!) SF.260Ws
Recon: F.27 and BN-2 MPAs; Super King Air 200T area surveillance aircrafts

Filipino Navy:

Miguel Malvar (a relic from World War II); Antonio Luna (a more modern patrol boat)

POSSIBLE ENEMY FORCES

Minsk (Kiev CVH); Frunze (Kirov BCGN); Chervona Ukraina (Slava CG); Sovremenny and Udaloy DDGs; unknown number of submarines (Juliet, Victor-II and “something more modern”); aircrafts of the CVH (Yak-141 Freestyles and Yak-38 Forgers); ASW and AEW helicopters of the CVH and destroyers.

PLAYTHROUGH

EVENING

Silence before the storm

The ordinary patrols (CAP, ASW, AEW, ELINT) were set up around the CVBG. The AEW immediately detected an AGI and a destroyer in front of and behind the fleet, and a Bear MPA was following us as well. The S3 Viking doing the “carrier far ASW” detected a submarine with its radar (!). I thought it was the Juliet, so the Viking flew closer and dropped some sonobuoys. I was right, it was the Juliet at periscope depth, and before I could do anything, the Viking launched a torpedo and sank the submarine (which was marked as unfriendly, so practically I started the hostilities, but nobody saw it). Similar patrols were set up west of Luzon with the available aircrafts, except for the AEW, because the Hawkeye was still waiting for fuel. I was afraid of a bomber attack form Camh Ran AB. A P-3 MS from Guam spotted the “Pelicano”, a large trawler to the west of the wrecked boat. By some reason, this trawler was hostile. The Miguel Malvar accelerated to flank speed (15 kts) to reach the wreck before morning. And at this moment the hell broke loose.
To be continued…

[Ilya78]

NIGHT

Guerilla attacks on Luzon

There were a lot of small boats floating in the bay near Cubi Point AB. Three of them suddenly turned hostile, and the closest one started shooting the AB with guns and rockets. And something (probably a pack of mortars) started shelling the AB from the top of a nearby hill. I changed the WRA for the Kinkaid and launched three Harpoons on the three hostile boats. Two of them hit their targets (including the attacking boat), but the third one missed and sank a civilian boat (they were too close to each other, sorry...). Both the AB and the Filipino Navy gave me a patrol boat, and they finished off the last guerilla boat. AS.211 trainers and OV-10 Broncos took off to silence the mortars. The trainers could not hit anything, but the Broncos made short work of them. This attack costed me 6(!) F/A-18D Hornets, 3 Tomcats, both tankers and an ES-3 Shadow. And this was the smaller problem...

Doom of the Gridley

Right when the attacks on Luzon started, the carrier AEW detected a huge number of low and high flying missiles launced from the north and flying towards the carrier group (low flying, SS-N-19 Shipwrecks) and the USS Vincennes (high flying, SS-N-12 Sandboxes). So both the Kirov BCGN and the Slava CG launched their missiles at the same time. And suddenly another 24 Shipwrecks and 16 Sandboxes appeared on the radar. What is happening here? Probably there was an Oscar class SSGN in the area (in addition to the Kirov), and the Soviet destroyers launched their missiles, too. All available fighters took off from the carrier and tried to shoot down the very fast and very low flying Soviet missiles. They were qutie ineffective, those missiles shook off the Sidewinders. SAMs launched from the destroyers and cruisers shot down one missile after another. The Vincennes heroically defended herself fron two salvos of Sandboxes, but she had only 10 SAMs left at the end. However, the carrier group had a bad luck. One missile somehow got through the SAMs (the CIWS were completely ineffective against it) and impacted into the USS Gridley, which exploded to pieces. The crew of the carrier saw the gigantic explosion, which cannot be survived by anyone. The Soviets had to pay for it.

To be continued...

[Gunner98]

Good stuff!

I'm planning to put these AARs on my webpage when I get them together and sort out how to do it, looking forward to the rest of yours.

Cheers

[Ilya78]

NIGHT (continued)

Cruise missile attack on Cubi Point

The guerilla attacks did not stop after killing the mortars. Two fuel truck exploded at two Filipino airports, destroying three F-5As and six of those beautiful piston-engined aircrafts (which later proved to be totally useless). However, the main problem came from the west. I was waiting for the bombers from Cam Ranh. Instead, my Tomcats detected some strange cruise missiles. They were flying very low and very slowly, looked like some kinds of Soviet Tomahawks. The Tomcats were not enough to shoot them down, so American and Filipino F-5s took off from the airports of Luzon. The missiles were easy to kill (Sidewinders and even guns were very effective against them), but they were difficult to detect by the Tomcats' radars, and the Hawkeye was still on the ground. One missile got through to Cubi Point and destroyed something (I can't remember). And I could not detect the place where the missiles were launched from. The P-3 doing the ASW near Luzon was ordered to fly to the west, and it finally detected the Soviet SSGN by its IR-sight (!). Flying a bit closer, the Orion dropped a sonobuoy and identified the submarine as a "Yankee Notch". Two torpedoes were enough to sink it. But the missiles appeared on the radar again... Was there another SSGN here? One of my sonobuoys much closer to Luzon found an SSGN, but it was a Charlie-I, not a Yankee Notch (an easy kill for the Orion). After shooting down this salvo, no more missiles were detected, so those ones had already been launched before sinking the submarine.

Preparing for the revenge

Both the Soviet AGI and destroyer shadowing the CVBG got some Harpoons to the face. The Vincennes accelerated to flank speed in order to reach the other ships. The Tisdale stopped the investigation of the wreck, collected her inflatable boats and headed for the carrier at flank speed. On the way she destroyed that suspicious looking trawler with two Harpoons. The Japanese P-3 and another P-3 from Guam followed the Soviet fleet. One ASW P-3 was ordered to cover the northern side of the CVBG (the Oscar still had torpedoes), and another one to sanitize the area around the replenishment zone. The crew of the CVBG wanted to take a revenge on the Soviets for the USS Gridley, but they did not have any aircrafts armed against ships, and rearming would have taken many hours. However, they called the Air Force base on Guam, and they just happened to have three B-52s being armed with Harpoons (8 missiles per plane). What a miracle! But first I had to get rid of the Soviet aircrafts and AEW helicopters. All Tomcats and Hornets were ordered to take off when they were ready. They approached the enemy fleet and started to shoot down the Yak-141 Freestyles with Phoenixes, Sparrows and even Sidewinders. The Soviet pilots were stupid enough to leave the SAM coverage of the ships, and 10 of their aircrafts were destroyed, and another two got seriously damaged. Only two of my Tomcats got damaged by AA-11 Archers, and another one flew too close to a ship and was shot down. This may have triggered something, as all the aircrafts took off from the Minsk - inculding Yak-38 Forgers. They were probably the worst combat aircrafts ever produced, but they could still shoot down my Orions, so the MPAs were withdrawn. By some reason, the Forgers did not try to chase them. Instead, they flew a circle around the Soviet fleet. I ordered my last pair of Hornets to take off, and they shot down six Forgers with Sparrows and Sidewinders, proving the Forgers absolutely worthless. The AEW helicopters were a bit more difficult to shoot down, because they were always flying close to the ships, but the Phoenixes did the job. Everythnig was prepared for the revenge at morning.

To be continued...

[Gunner98]

They were probably the worst combat aircrafts ever produced,

They have a lot of competition for that title [:D]

I give you the F7U Gutless Cutlass

[Gunner98]

Anything else on this one guys? Plan to wrap it up this weekend.

[Gunner98]

OK this one is a wrap.

Thanks for all your help guys

[Ilya78]

OK, let's finish this one...

MORNING

Eye for an eye

Finally, the B-52's took off from Guam at dawn. They approached the Soviet fleet at max. altitude and launched their Harpoons. I targeted the Chervona Ukraina (this was the closest ship) and the carrier with 12-12 missiles. The Soviets did not use the radars of their ships, so they were completely unaware of the doom creeping towards them. However, everything suddenly changed when the first Harpoon approached the enemy cruiser and switched on its radar. The Soviets desperately tried to jam the missiles, then started firing at them with everything (SAM, CIWS and even guns). Only four missiles hit the Chervona Ukraina, but that was enough. Eye for an eye! However, the enemy fleet was an full alert now, with all of their radars turned on. They shot down one Harpoon after another (the CIWS was very effective against them), and none of the missiles could hit the carrier. This was my mistake, I should have launched the carrier's missiles earlier or concentrate everything on that ship.

Balzam for the wound

There was a lonely ship to the southwest of the enemy fleet that looked like a merchant ship. However, a returning Tomcat identified her as the Prybaltika, a Balzam class Soviet AGI. I didn't have anything to attack this ship, except for my submarine, the City of Corpus Christi. She was way too far to launch a Harpoon, so she accelerated to 32 kts, and launched a torpedo towards the empty water (to avoid the "torpedo tube reloading bug"). Meanwhile, one of my sonobuoys to the east of the replenishment zone detected a very slow and very quiet submarine - an SSK. An Orion and a Viking was ordered to fly there and one of them killed the submarine. And finally, the Harpoons were launched towards the Prybaltika. Two of them were enough to sink the ship.

Battle of the Leyte Stronghold

Before dawn I got the message that an uprising had broken out on the southern islands of the Philippines. The rebels built a stronghold on the Island of Leyte, and the government asked for my help to locate the base. I still had a Hawkeye and a Tomcat on Luzon (the other aircraft had already been sent back to the carrier), so I ordered them to fly over the marked position, but they could not find anything. I just didn't get he idea that the Orion's IR sight can be used to find ground targets, so the two Filipino area surveillance aircrafts took off from Luzon. One of them found something to the southwest of the marked position. Then found another thing. Then another. When the pilots realized the situation, they were above the rebel stronghold and their aircraft was shot down by a SAM. Every aircraft armed against ground targets took off from the airports of Luzon. F-5s, trainers, piston engined nightmares and the wonderful Broncos. The other surveillance aircraft tried to find the targets for the attackers, but it flew a bit too close to the base and was hit by a SAM, destroying one of the engines and the IR sight. Too bad, my attack aircrafts had to find their targets by their own, and they could hardly see anything. However, the F-5s and trainers could destroy some AAA and SAM sites. Only the F-5s had the range to return to Luzon, so everyone else had to use the nearby airfield (which was too small for such many aircrafts, so most of the planes had to land on other islands). I lost two trainers to SAMs, but one of them spotted something during landing. It was similar to the mortar group seen earlier on Luzon, so one pair of the arriving Broncos was ordered to destroy it. The other Broncos launched their rockets to the stronghold. They could hardly hit anything and the aircrafts were constantly exposed to the enemy SAMs. Then I realized that those SAMs were old Soviet MANPADS, which could not target very high and very low flying aircrafs. So the Broncos descended to treetop level and started shooting the enemy with their guns. They were very effective and it was very satisfying to watch the raging Broncos. They could find the targets easily from this height and only one of them was shot down by a machine gun. After some assaults the rebel stronghold ceased to exist and the Broncos could land on the nearby islands. Everything is good if the end is good.

CONCLUDING REMARKS

- This was the most frustrating scenario I have ever played in Command. That cruise missile attacks against the airports was a complete nightmare.
- The Miguel Malvar had reached the wrecked trawler by morning - and nothing happened. I didn't even get some victory points. It could have been fun to see some action with this old ship.
- What is the role of the Pelicano? Why is she hostile from the beginning? Does she have something with the wrecked trawler?
- The Orions could reload their sonobuoys at any airport if they hadn't used their torpedoes before. All the world's airports are full of sonobuoys! This is a bug which was very useful for the "Mozambique Madness" scenario and for this one as well.
- I have already mentioned the torpedo tube reloading bug.

Wow! A Baltic Fury #3 playthrough is in progress. That scenario is small enough for my old laptop. I had to leave it for a while, but I hope I can finish it soon. Cheers!

[Gunner98]

Thanks Ilya78

The update has a few more elements to do with the Malvar and the Pelicano.

Hope you enjoy Baltic Fury 3,

B

[maverick3320]

Just finished this scenario. Couple notes:

-All the US ships survived without a scratch; the Tico CG that was separate from the group to start (can't remember the name) never actually even fired a SAM, although the CVBG group was basically out of SAMs by the end of the Soviet ASM barrage.

-With 8 hours left in the scenario I tried to throw a combined USAF/USN attack at the Soviet SAG (CVBG?) with 10x Hornets (12 HARM, 8 Harpoon), 2x EA-6Bs (2 HARM), 3x B-52 (24 HARM), and 4x P-3C (16 Harpoon). As best I can tell I didn't scratch the paint on a Soviet ship (I started looking back through the message log but about 8 million SAMs were fired so I gave up). About halfway through the scenario the Soviet ships started running NE at high speed so I didn't have time for a follow up strike.

-I never did find any rebels in the Phillipines; I tried flying multiple recon assets over the stated area, but all I got for my trouble was a bunch of MANPADs fired at me. Never did spot any ground forces.

[Gunner98]

Thanks maverick3320

The best way of finding those rebels is with a P-3 using its FLIR.

Those Soviet ships will be back for another fight later in the campaign. No reason for them to hang around once their ASMs are gone.

B

[maverick3320]

ORIGINAL: Gunner98

Thanks maverick3320

The best way of finding those rebels is with a P-3 using its FLIR.

Those Soviet ships will be back for another fight later in the campaign. No reason for them to hang around once their ASMs are gone.

B

Yep, my mistake - for some reason using a P-3 for land recon never crossed my mind. Oops!

Makes sense for the Soviet ships to bug out. Got me thinking about what Soviet naval doctrine actually was at the time. After one big strike from American aircraft the ships would need, at the very least, some sort of replenishment, which would be challenging in the Pacific with Japan on one hand and US CVs on the other. I wonder how irreplaceable those ships actually were to the USSR leadership...

[Gunner98]

I wonder how irreplaceable those ships actually were to the USSR leadership.

By anyone's measure, a Kirov and a Kiev class ship are valuable units.

Overall, the Pacific is a secondary theater in Moscow's eyes, and the Fleet is a tool to achieve political aim. So these units are not invaluable, but they are not much good sitting at the bottom of the sea full of harpoon holes.

Certainly to the Commander Far East TVD, they are critical - once the initial gambit is thrown he will need to reconstitute his fleet in being. His job is to tie down forces, primarily US forces - there is not much in the way of Army, two Divisions, a few Brigades etc and they are a long way from Europe. Air forces are an issue, within the five numbered Air Forces in PACAF with over 300 aircraft - tiny compared to Europe but it takes effort to keep them busy and demanding more reinforcement instead of offering up assets to the main fight. But the USN has massive force in the Pacific - 7x CVBGs, the better part of 2x MEFs, hundreds of ships. So to tie these forces down (and they are already dispersing with Nimitz moving to the Atlantic, Iowa in the Med and Saratoga in the IO), the Soviet Pacific Fleet needs to remain potent.

So that is why these guys were on a 'Shoot & Scoot' mission.