Wednesday, 7 November 2012

Harbour Raid - part 4

We left the action as rather a lot of British torpedoes streaked towards the Kongo.  I soon stopped tracking those which were clearly going to miss.  That still left quite a few, and John was soon making his helmsman work hard as evasive action was taken....
...but despite all his efforts two torps struck home!  This reduced Kongo to around half speed and she skulked off accompanied by the equally battered Isokaze. 
On the face of it a narrow Japanese victory as Kongo escaped and the Brits virtually all sunk, but plodding along at 16kts how long would she survive?  Even returning to the port for repair wasn't an option due to the damage done to the facilities.
From my point of view this was probably our best Fletcher Pratt game yet.  Things only got better when John gave me a related present he had found on a market stall for £0.50.  More on that soon.

Oh, and one more thing.  The sharks did get Lloyd.  But they threw him back.
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15 comments:

  1. Peter Douglas7 November 2012 at 12:48

    Tim

    You're mastering the art of suspense aren't you?
    Looks like a good game and good scenario idea.

    Cheers
    PD

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  2. Archduke Piccolo7 November 2012 at 12:55

    That remains me of the story of one fellow who floated in the Pacific with his crew for two days before being picked up. In that time he had been tasted, and rejected, by two different sharks.

    There are some who would call this 'lucky'. :-)

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  3. Anonymous7 November 2012 at 15:23

    A great report- I've enjoyed all the installments...

    cheers,

    Pete.

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  4. Tim Gow7 November 2012 at 15:55

    Peter Douglas
    I just know my audience! The basic scenario idea was taken from John Curry's book on the F-P game.

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  5. Tim Gow7 November 2012 at 15:57

    Archduke Piccolo
    It appears from your story that some sharks are fussy eaters. Who'd have thought it?

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  6. Tim Gow7 November 2012 at 15:58

    spprojectblog
    Good - I certainly enjoyed writing them. And running the game.

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  7. Geordie an Exiled FoG7 November 2012 at 20:59

    Glorious game and posthumous VC's all round

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  8. Peter Douglas7 November 2012 at 21:54

    Tim

    I may have to pick up that volume (or put it on my Xmas list).

    Cheers

    PD

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  9. Tim Gow7 November 2012 at 22:20

    Geordie
    I may have to start a medal table for regular players.

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  10. Tim Gow7 November 2012 at 22:20

    Peter Douglas
    It's a good read - even if you don't like the actual game.

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  11. Paul8 November 2012 at 09:37

    Great AAR Tim. A bad day for the Imperial Fleet however.

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  12. Tim Gow8 November 2012 at 13:33

    Paul
    Which imperial fleet? Arguably both!

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  13. Peter Douglas8 November 2012 at 13:45

    Tim

    Actually, your battle reports are having me want to take a look at the Fp rules. Plus I'm a rules junkie and an Old School wargames historian, so it's moving up my must have list. I have the abbreviated version in Featherstone's Naval Wargames but think that the real thing might be required.
    Cheers
    PD

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  14. davidcrawford1912 November 2012 at 03:24

    Just found the link to this AAR on TMP.

    As a fellow Fp gamer I have to say your game looks really fantastic. Using the pipe cleaners for the torpedoes is a great idea, one I'm going to pinch for my next game.

    Just curious... did you have models to represent the 8" shore battery?

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  15. Tim Gow12 November 2012 at 12:25

    davidcrawford19
    I had to build my own shore batteries for the Gibraltar Straits game (see report a couple of months ago), so I was able to re-use a couple of the guns. I'll dig them out for photos over the next week or two.

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