Fleet update and hunt for the Bismarck (alt.)

I bought the Pacific Ocean last weekend. It's a lovely shade of blue and only cost me $22. What a bargain.

Another step in 'capacity building' so as to be able to work through, chronologically, all of the naval actions of the Pacific War. So too is the construction of 1/700 ships that has occupied much of my hobby time since my long latent interest in carrier actions was kicked into action in April. I have a goodly number now assembled (i.e. 'launched') and now being 'fitted out'.

Julian and Stephen came here yesterday and we played out an alternative scenario of the hunt for the Bismarck that Julian had devised. I took advantage of the cleared table and placement of my sheets to represent 'northern' oceans to do a photo shoot.

1/700 Japanese ships that I have 'launched' (made) since April, now being 'fitted out'. From port to starboard: Kongo, Akagi, Kaga, Soryu, Hiryu, Shokaku, Zuikaku, Tone, Haruna (fore) Taiho, Junyo, Ryjo, Furutaka, Kinugasa, Taiyo, Shinano, Kiso, Yahagi (aft).

I have also made my first scratch-build ship: HMS Tenedos. She was an Admiralty 'S' class destroyer of First World War vintage that did not have a long career in the 'Second War', having been sunk in the destruction of Force Z by the Japanese in late 1941 (better known as the sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse)*. As such, and since I could not find an appropriate kit, it seemed a perfect subject for scratch-building.

[*No she wasn't, I mis-rememebered. She detached and was attacked by Japanese planes, but was unharmed. Her sinking was in April '42 during 'Operation C' off Ceylon (Sri Lanka)]

HMS Tenedos scratch-built. Scaled image printed on light card, stuck around a hull cut from mdf, with plastic parts used for boats, guns, search lights and mast/flag poles.

The gaps for the water to come in (😳) are not as obvious to the eye as they are in these photos!

It's nothing like the fabulous pre-dreadnoughts that people like Ion and Jim build and I 'cheated' and used scaled, printed images on card as the basis, but I am pleased with the result, nonetheless. Some of the 'spares' that are provided with 1/700 ship kits were perfect for some of the 'fittings and fixtures', making adding those details much easier.

I have scaled and printed images to build HMAS Yarra and HNLMS Tromp as my next scratch-builds. Similarly these had brief careers in the Second World War. HMAS Yarra was involved in an heroic but ultimately doomed attempt to protect the Tjilatjap convoy, 'charging' at the larger and superior Japanese forces of three Takao class cruisers and two destroyers in a valiant but ultimately futile attempt to defend her charges that had been told to scatter. An amazing story in the annals of the RAN and one that I look forward to recreating on the tabletop.

Scaled sides and deck of HMAS Yarra, cut out ready to glue onto the mdf hull that I have cut out.

HNLMS Tromp, scaled and printed.

HNLMS Tromp was part of the ill-fated American-Dutch-British-Australian (ADBA) command which was effectively wiped out at Java Sea, Sunda Strait and second Java Sea as part of the Japanese sweep south in early '42. She was 'lucky' being badly damaged by the Japanese destroyer Asashio during the Battle of Badung Strait, she was sent to Australia for repairs and survived the war. Once again, I could not find an appropriate kit for this ship, so scratch-built it is.

Hunt for the Bismarck (alt.)

Julian devised a fictitious scenario for us to use as a further test/familiarisation with Seekrieg 5. The Bismarck and Prinz Eugen successfully evaded the Hood, Prince of Wales and co. and have made to the Atlantic in search of convoys to prey on. They found one, 'cept it has HMS Revenge and Cornwall as escorts. These RN ships head out to intercept the German raiders so as to protect their charges.

HMS Revenge ahead of HMS Cornwall, with Bismarck (to starboard) and Prinz Eugen aft or her 18 000 yards distant.

The ships engaged one another at 18 000 yards, pairing off as Bismarck-Revenge and Prinz Eugen-Cornwall. Julian and I played two turns of firing before Stephen arrived. Just as well as it took us a little while to re-calculate the scale for movement and ranges and then to get our heads 'into gear' with the charts, but after the first fire that we tested (from Revenge as it turned out), we were off and running and it flowed brilliantly from then on.

We actually, incorrectly 'fired' twice the number of shells in the first turn, so counted this as two. This produced effective shooting by both sides, with damage inflicted on all by all, most serious of which was a small fire on Bismarck and damage to her rudder. Yes, the rudder again, just like in the historic action!

Bismarck (to port) with smoke from the small fire in her superstructure.  One of her rudders was also damaged.

Fortunately, I was able to extinguish the fire on Bismarck and we happily proceeded straight ahead, so this did not affect the German side too much, for now.

The exchange of fire and hits continued. This time Bismarck managed to knock Revenge's 'Y' turret out of action (turn 3) and followed this by knocking out a boiler (turn 4). For her part Prinz Eugen, despite some of her shells passing through Cornwall's weaker armour, caused flooding to one of the latter's engine compartments and knocked out her 'A' turret.

For their part the British ships inflicted minor damage on the Germans (turn 3) and most of their shells missed their targets (turn 4). Accumulated damage was building up on the British ships and the German commanders were confident that the action would soon come to a successful conclusion.

'Twas not to be. The British found their targets again, taking out Bismarck's D battery and temporarily suspending command with a hit to the bridge (both Admiral Lütjens and Captain Lindemann unharmed). Prinz Eugen was not spared, losing 'C' turret.

The pounding went on, each on the other, but, a chance shot from Prinz Eugen produced a magazine explosion on Cornwall. Stephen had rolled a 01, yielding table 100 as the damage effects table. Just like at the historic Denmark Strait, except that it was a hit from Prinz Eugen on Cornwall rather than Bismarck on Hood.

Ka-

boom! HMS Cornwall's magazine explodes.

Thick, black smoke soon filled the air.

This left Revenge alone, now with only two effective turrets with which to respond.

Furthermore, the damage to Revenge was increasing (she had reached tier 10, the top level in Seekrieg). The ship was falling apart, fire control gone, command suspended, crew casualties mounting and then, uncontrolled flooding. She settled in the water and would sink, 20 minutes later, the order to abandon ship having been given and carried out.

Having dispensed with the British ships, the Germans planned to go in search of that convoy. Or at least, Prinz Eugen would. Bismarck had also suffered from hits and accumulate damage. In addition to her damaged rudder and 'D' battery being out of action, she had flooding in some of her compartments, resulting in her listing to starboard. She would make for port in France, hopefully protected in her progress by a cordon of U-boats, but with the Royal Navy and Air Force sending out 'everything' in hope of intercepting her. 

Once again we enjoyed greatly the sensible detail and narrative aspects of Seekrieg. They are 'involved', as I have mentioned previously, but not difficult. There are a lot of dice rolls; to hit, hit location, damage, possible critical hits (damage effects) and which specific damage effects table is to be consulted, but they are dice rolls with a purpose (and two D10s read as a percentage), not merely grabbing a handful of dice and counting 5s and 6s, or whatever, in a completely random manner.

Details

Rules

Seekrieg 5 (2004). Seekrieg https://www.seekrieg.com/Seekrieg5IntroPage.htm

Ships

1/6000 scale Figurehead Ships.

Operation Z or planning Operation AI: constructing the Kido Batai (2) the pleasure of little things

When I first began acquiring these 1/700 models, I wondered why there was such a range of prices for, seemingly, the same model of the same ship. Then I realised that some are more detailed than others. Fujimi in particular seem to specialise in the detailed end of the spectrum (with associated higher prices), but even within the same manufacturer there are standard and 'deluxe' versions of the same kit.

Being a cheap skate and only wanting 'wargame standard' models, I purchased the cheapest kit that I could find for each of the ships. As I became aware of the differences and since I was struggling to find any of the 'basic' versions available, I decided to splash out and purchased the Fujimi version of Soryu—added incentive was that is was available at a discounted price 😁. I have enjoyed and at the same time struggled with construction of this more detailed kit. 

The added detail comes in the form of more and smaller parts to the kit that provided a more accurate and detailed representation of parts of the ship. Part L48 is an example. These are fire controllers which go on each ack-ack platform, and elsewhere.

A section of the instructions showing placement of two of part L48.

Here they are on the sprue. Tweezers for size. Other detailed parts on this sprue include the ladders at the ends of various gangways around the top of the hull, below the flight deck (parts L16–L32).

There were 21 pieces of part L48, the little darlings, to glue on to various platforms and other fixtures below the flight deck and a couple on and near the island. Fiddly in the extreme, but they were not as difficult to fit in place as I had thought they would be when I saw the size of them. The nature of the polystyrene cement, which becomes 'tacky' almost immediately was a great aid to this, allowing one (me in this case, haha) to simply drop them on top of a dot of glue and then slowly and carefully adjust the position and make sure that they were vertical. Remarkably none of them went 'ping', propelling out of the grip of the tweezers, flying across my table never to be seen again. This has happened several times with parts from each of the other kits that I have made—particularly the wing floats of the float-planes, which were the smallest parts (2–3 mm long) that I had handled prior to L48. Perhaps I was especially careful when handling these controllers? 

Fortunately, most of the models that I have made are of the ilk of the more pragmatic Aoshima Hiryu.

Note the little vertical bits moulded on part A7, a more stylised representation of the fire controllers!

There was some added detail in the Soryu kit that I decided not to attempt:

I wondered at first what the millimetre sized parts on these small sprues were. A small information box at the end of the instructions exclaims: "Upgrade parts for precise reproduction of machine guns!"

I later saw the photo on the outside of the box: "Includes 25mm machine guns (triple, twin, and single), bulletproof plates, and ammunition boxes".

Nah. Too small and fiddly for me. I stuck with the basic, moulded version of the machine guns that was provided (part F2).

While pleased to have bought one of these more detailed, Fujimi, 'proper scale modellers' models, I was equally pleased that I only bought one (plus the two Kongo battleships that I had already built and which were far less fiddly).

With the six carriers built, it's time to stop building and do some painting, for a needed change of pace! 😁