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I have just started a campaign game with Deaniks ( Dean) . 2 day turns PBEM. Scn 42 Empire - No CV at PH.

I thought it would be interesting to write a AAR about just one ship in this case it will be the surface raider Admiral Sheer commanded by Cpt.Theodore Krancke.

The Indian Ocean has always been a bit too safe for the allies... in AE.

Here is the opening position where AS and support ships has evaded the British so far and is awaiting orders from Berlin regarding its future actions against the allies in the Indian Ocean in particular. This ship is part of a wider deployment of MG units that will appear during the game, including some historical bases / U Boats and few aircraft.

The British in particular have plenty of surface units that would like to try and engage this ship as soon as possible. So we have to be careful. Because of the high ammunition usage for surface raiders (causing sudden disengagements) and the availability of support ships I have pimped up this ship slightly (ammo/TT). Also allowed higher cruising speed in general for modern BC and CB.

I thought it would be interesting to see how it goes. Hope some of you will join me for this adventure with the Kreigsmarine.

Interesting mod, but my teutonic sense of order forces me to point out a few spelling mistakes - "Scheer" not "Sheer", "Deutschland" not "Deutchland" and "Krancke T." instead of "Araki H." [;)]

Btw, IRL Krancke left Scheer in June 1941 after a promotion to Rear Admiral and to a desk job, new skipper was Capt. Wilhelm Meendsen-Bohlken.


Oh, and "Oerlikon" instead of Oerikion".

OK and thanks - well pointed out. I will make a note of this for a future patch. Lucky in the alternate history Krancke stayed on

BTW the appointed leader when you go to the TF its commanded by Krancke. I do not know why it picks a Japanese commander for the ship when you go to that screen see below??? I am sure I selected K for the TF?

Tks for the interest to follow up.

Do you think name changes will work if patched while game in progress?

7 - 8Th Dec.
We are advised to head South and look toward the DEI.


Until we see a bit more of the RN it is not good to be within recon range ... Hopefully they will waste units to look for us.
Even that is useful.

OK Dec 14th Night - First Victim a nice TK .

The next moves Dec 15-16th 1941

Strange - You would think at 5000 yds we would use the 5.9 inch guns but we used TT and 11.1 inch. Also 4.1 inch AA - which we should not use at all....


At the bottom of the screen is AMC Thor

Her sister ship was defeated by a force of British cruisers. It will be interesting to see if she runs up against the Boise and Houston.

Can we see a screen shot of her support TF?

Yes Ok next turn there is one AO and the other is AMC operating as a separate raider.

I will also post the ammo situation

OK more action coming

And more - knew this would be a good spot for hunting - Got to watch out for the Dutch !

DEC 17TH

And we stop short of more booty - here are the planned moves.

We have been joined by 3 SS.

Then we move away to meet the oiler.

Just hope there are not big surface units ahead.

The next day everything starts in a very promising way. But disaster is looming.

Firstly the large allied TF searching for Scheer find the oiler !

(no idea what causes the graphics issue)

The end 4 modest bomb hits - two on the belt - thought i would get to run away then the last trips the Magazine - no survivors . "Somthing bloody wrong with my ships today..."

That is pretty weak armour for a 500lb GP bomb to penetrate and explode the magazine.

According to Wiki only about 40mm deck armour?
I had the stats as 40mm deck and allow 10% or slightly more durability as a modern design in my mods. So was 70 instead of potentially 60 - did not help.

Other mods are similar - or worse stats. Thanks for commenting.

Deck armour may not be uniform, there may be more armour over the really vital areas but that is hard to model in this game.