Naval Battle in the Pacific - 1942 IJN vs USN

This will be my first After Action Report for General Quarters 3.3.  We took a small  Task Force sized fleet for both USN and IJN.   This took place in 1942, I did not add weather or aircraft/float planes into this scenario.  I focused purely on the surface engagement aspects of GQ3.3 but I promise I'll be doing more scenarios with the other aspects of the rules in future AARs.   Below is the Scenario Log and a Turn by Turn summary of the action.  Thank you for taking the time to read!  (Forgive my messy unfinished basement in the background)

Turn 1 – USN Task Force enters the battlefield from the SW corner with the Cruiser Division lead by the USS Northampton, USS New Orleans, USS Indianapolis, USS Salt Lake City at 10 knots at bearing 48 degrees NE.   The 4 Destroyer divisions increased speed to 20 knots splitting into 2 groups of 2 to intercept the Japanese destroyers.  The Left Flank consisted of the USS Dale and the USS Mahan, the Right Flank included the USS Ellet and the USS Jarvis.  

The IJN Cruiser force began their Naval bombardment of the Island fortifications with the cruiser division lead by the IJN Kinugasa.  This division consisted of the Light Cruisers Kinugasa, Aoba, Tenryu and Yuburi.   This bombardment was screen by a Destroyer Squadron of the Shirayuki, Hatsuyuki and Yunagi. 

With the Japanese destroyers moving at 20 knots to intercept the USN Task Force opened fire from the 8” guns on the Northampton and the New Orleans scoring massive hits on the Shirayuki taking out her aft X Turret, hitting a torpedo tube and starting a fire on her deck, breaching the Bulkhead causing flooding in the lower decks, and jamming the rudder to her Port. 

The Japanese Cruiser division began their bombardment with the 8” guns of the Kingugasa and Aoba and the 5.5” guns of the Tenryu and Yuburi with the only successful hit from Aoba hitting some field works.

USS Northampton staring down the IJN Destroyerr Hatsuyuki

Turn 2  - With no returning fire from the IJN Destroyers the USN continued to close the distance.  The US Cruisers holding 10 knots allowing the USS Ellet and USS Jarvis to move pasted the cruisers.  The US Destroyers both increasing seed to 30 knots and moving to engage the Japanese destroyers.  

The IJN cruisers continued their slow 10 knot crawl while bombarding the islands scoring 2 bombardment hits.

The Shirayuki unable to repair the bulkhead damage continued to circle to port with it’s jammed rudder and quickly flooding hull it’s speed was quickly reduced to 15 knots.   Shirayuki breaking off from the squadron the Hatsuyuki took command of the squadron on turned hard Port to prepare for a torpedo salvo in the US Task Force.

The Hatsuyuki in the distance taking on water with two fires raging on her deck

The US Task Force continued to pummel the Shirayuki with 8” shells causing another fire to break out on the deck and the ship beginning to list and then topple over into the sea.  

 

The Aoba staring down the central island with the US Task Force appearing in the background

Turn 3 – Shirayuki taking on water at listing badly she rolls over and sinks to the bottom of the sea.  The Americans have drawn first blood.  The remaining Japanese destroyers answer back the Hatsuyuki launches a spread of 4 Type 93 Torpedoes and the Yunagi Launches a spread of 3 Type 90 Torpedoes.   In an exchange with the USS Ellet the IJN Destroyers score several hits on the American destroyer hitting a torpedo mount,5” Gun Turret, and hitting the engineering room.   The Americans continue their advance towards the IJN Cruisers with the Dale and Mahan continuing a flanking maneuver to the rear of the destroyer formation.  The US Cruisers continue their shelling of the remaining IJN Destroyers.  Scoring more several direct hits.

Turn 4 -  2 Torpedoes from the Hatsuyuki slam into the Hull of the USS Indianapolis crippling the US Cruiser forcing it to fall out of line.  The US Cruisers change their heading towards the ESE to intercept the south sailing IJN Cruisers.  The Destroyers continue to trade 5” shells with the IJN launching a second salvo of Torpedoes towards the American cruisers.

Turn 5 – The Yunagi suddenly slows causing the US Destroyer Ellet to slam into the Starboard side of the Japanese destroyer breaching the hull the Yunagi sinking in mere minutes.   But the Yunagi does get off one last Salvo of torpedoes before sinking.  The Hatsuyuki launchs their last spread of torpedoes and changes course to return to the Cruiser division who has begun to engage the US Cruisers.  The Japanses cuiser launches their Torpedo spread towards the US Cruisers. 

Turn 6 – Facing fire from both Japanese Light Cruisers the USS Ellet is forced to withdraw from the engagement with severe hull damage and loss of nearly all their man guns.  The USS Northampton and USS New Orleans land several hits on the Kinugasa and the Aoba with fires breaking out on the Floatplane deck of the Kinugasa with their man guns but in the exchange the Northampton loses a secondary gun, and their aft main guns.  

Fire Breaks out on the Kinugasa

Turn 7 – The fire between the US Cruisers and the IJN Cruisers starts to intensify.   The crew of the Kinugasa is unable to put out the fire as an 8” shell hits the a torpedo mount igniting a second fire.   The US Navy has the upper hand in the cruiser engagement at this point.

Turn 8 – With fires ravishing the Kinugasa two shells from the US Cruisers break the Bulkheads of Aoba causing flooding.   The USS Jarvis launches a set of torpedoes under the intense fire of both Japanese Light Cruisers.   Japanese at this point foresee a humiliating defeat trying everything they can to regain speed and withdraw from the engagement.

Turn 9 – Things are too late for the Tenryu as fire from the American cruisers rip through the hull and cause her to sink under the waves as well as the Hatsayuki which was badly crippled and starting to roll finally rolls over and sinks.  The IJN has now lost 3 destroyers, 1 Light Cruiser.  With the remaining Heavy Cruisers badly damaged.

Turn 10 – With one last ditch effort the Kinugasa and Aoba launch torpedoes but these torpedoes and the ones from the Yuburi earlier will all miss the US Task Force. 

In full withdrawal the IJN tries to escape the table with fires raging on the Kinugasa, and Yuburi

Turn 11 – This signaled the end of the engagement with the Kinugasa barely holding 5 knots with 2 fires still raging on the deck and the Aoba taking water fast.  Neither ship would make it back to the fleet as the Aoba would continue taking on water and sink not more than 30 minutes after the Americans break off contact.  The Kinugasa would see a no better fate forced to abandon ship she would need to be scuttled. 

Final Map of the Action (Roughly drawn)

Final score:

USN:   20 VP for the USN Successfully sweeping the islands sinking 3 IJN Destroyers, 1 IJN Light Cruiser and Crippling 2 IJN Heavy Cruisers. 

IJN:  Would score a lowly 6 VP.  Only able to maintain 4 turns of Bombardment on the islands and only managing to cripple 2 Destroyers and 1 Heavy Cruiser

2023 Projects

 Well we are already 6 weeks into 2023 and I'm overdue on a "What's going on in 2023" post.  We have one WW2 campaign planned with our local group.  

- Combined Arms - Guadalcanal Campaign based on Warlord Games "Combined Arms" system.   
       2x USMC Battalions with attachments in 15mm 3D prints from 3dBreed's March to Hell line.   Each         battalion is based on the army list from Fistful of Tows 3 for the later part of 1942 which would be a           D-Series Battalion.

       US Naval assets of late 1942 in Guadalcanal these ships will all be in 1:1800 scale and using the        order of battle from Old Dominion Gameworks "Solomon Islands Campaign"

- 15mm WW2 Russians for a Stalingrad game of Russians vs Romanians.  I have not picked the army list for this yet.  

The Guadalcanal project needs to be wrapped up this winter for a start date on the campaign after adepticon in April/May.  The Stalingrad project I'll in the spring for possibly doing that game over the summer or in the fall.  That depends on the timing for our Guadalcanal campaign.  Then later in the year or maybe even something I squeeze in during those other two projects is either Soviet Team Yankee or more Soviet Flames of War.  

Combined Arms: Into the Guadalcanal

 Several from my local gaming group jumped on the Combined Arms pre-order as soon as Warlord Games announced it.   Our group likes to bounce around from game to game, system to system, era to era in a somewhat unorganized fashion.  With that we were hesitant to jump into a major campaign that could take up the better part of a year.  Combined arms even with a shortened victory point end game threshold still could have 15 or more campaign turns each turn having the possibility of up to 6 engagements that could be resolved on the tabletop.  With that my copy bounced around my closet for weeks and months before I had the free time to put something together to run this game. 

Combined Arms was built around the Warlord Games WW2 family of games:  Bolt Action, Victory at Sea, Cruel Seas, and Blood Red Skies.  These games tie in not only with resolving engagements on the map but also are modified with the player cards.   These cards allow modification of the tabletop games with additional units, pregame movements, modified deployment, and so on.  Blood Red Skies being the only Warlord system we regularly play.  We will be modifying the campaign rules to interact with General Quarters 3 for our Naval Engagements and Fistful of TOWs 3 for our Land combat.  

 

We will be playing our campaign in Guadalcanal with 4 players.  2 Players taking the IJA/IJN and another 2 taking the USMC/US Army/US Navy.   Each pair will share an Initiative Card hand and work together on the map portions of the game before breaking off into tabletop engagements.  

More to come on our implementation of General Quarters and Fistful of TOWs to come soon.  If all the plans come together we will see battle reports after Adepticon in April.