Matrix Games Forums

This is a companion scenario to my previous "Drum Beat" scenario which was ASW oriented. This scenario assumes Soviet hardliners resisted the reforms of the Gorbachov administration and overthrew that regime in early 1989. US intel sources have detected the Soviet build-up for war over the past few months. Alarmingly it now seems the new leadership has convinced the Cubans to join in the war actively fighting NATO!

This scenario has a couple of quirks in it. Firstly your forces are not uniform in their proficiencies. Each squadron has a few high level pilots, a larger number of moderate skill pilots and a few neophile pilots (nuggets in Navy terms) Players are encouraged to pay attention to these differences. Secondly, most aircraft are unarmed at the scenario start. This was deliberate to allow the player to set up the strikes in a manner to their satisfaction. Lastly there are a number of Civilian units that you have no control over but are expected to protect.

Oh, and maybe a surprise or two

I was playing around with this scenario myself and realized that a considerable amount of tanker support was required. So I added two squadrons of KC-130 at Beaufort and three squadrons of KC-135 at Macdill AFB. In addition I moved the A-4s from Roosevelt Roads to Key West as they lack the legs to do anything from Puerto Rico. I also moved the Knox class frigate off South Carolina further south and made all the ships at Mayport immediately available

I like this scenario. The player has plenty of assets but a lot of them are second line for this era (F-4s, F-111A/D, and A-7s).

The uploaded file is updated

Bump - any one given this a go?

This looks like an interesting scenario. I hope to give it a play this weekend.

Went back and reworked this scenario. Changes:

1. Removed the EF-111 for a number of reasons including that these would be a high priority for use in Europe, they are a bit overpowered vs the Cubans, and to make it harder on the player
2. Edited the scoring (to be more precise actually added scoring)
3. Removed Naval Station Mayport. Instead two SAG built around frigates only are at sea.
4. Greatly reduced the number of P-3s available to give the Cuban naval a fighting chance


This is a busy scenario where the OpFor may not be challenging but there is a lot of them (Quantity has a quality of its own so they say). If you like scenarios where you feel like you are herding cats, this is a good one. New file in OP

Play testing this and there is a small little oops on my part. For some reason there is a single A-4 off the African coast. You will get a "aircraft crashed because it ran out of fuel" message. I will be sure to remove this in the final edit. No idea why I put a single A-4 off the African coast - I think the Gremlins did it