Wargaming: Goeben in the Black Sea

[BombTaxi]

Hi all

Inspired by parsifal's thread, I decided to pull out my little-used wargames and play a solitaire scenario, with an AAR here. I mainly play Avalanche Press Great War At Sea series. Quick intro from the publisher's website here:

GWAS Intro

I have selected a small, short scenario from GWAS: Mediterranean. Description from the scenario book below:



"Convoy Duty, 10-13 December 1914

Between 10 and 13 December a series of convoy battles took place as the Russian Navy sough to disrupt the flow of coal from the mines of central Anatolia to the munitions works of Constantinople. Goeben and most of the useful Turkish warships skirmished repeatedly with the Russians, who proved themselves eager to use their powerful new destroyers to win control of the Black Sea."

In this scenario, the Central powers win by getting two transports from Constantinople to Trabzon, and bombarding the port of Batumi for at least three turns. The Russians win by either scoring 24 VPs and stopping either or both transports from unloading, OR by sinking Goeben.

My strategy for each side is as follows:

Central Powers - Goeben will head for Batumi alone to make a bombardment, fleeing from any Russians she encounters along the way. Meanwhile, a Turkish cruiser and two gunboats will convoy the transports eastbound to Trabzon, hugging the south coast of the Black Sea.

Russia - a squadron of 5 pre-dreadnoughts will attempt to catch and kill the German battlecruiser, while 4 new Bespokoiny class DDs attempt to overwhelm the convoy escort and sink the transports.

This is a tiny scenario using just half of one of the game's two maps. Dispositions at the start are as below:



The Central Powers (Red) are in Constantinople, in the South-East corner. Trabzon is just out of shot to the right, and Batumi slightly north of Trabzon. The Russians (Blue) are in Sevastapol, ready to head south and intercept the Germans and Turks.

As I am playing by solitaire rules, the German ships movement is pre-planned for the whole game, and cannot be changed without aborting their missions. The Russians may move as they wish, but are subject to a die roll each time they move to determine if they move at the desired speed, and in the desired direction. This prevents solitaire from being utterly boring and predictable, and also represents admirals failing to comply with orders!

Day One (of Six) report coming soon...

[BombTaxi]

Day One wasn't too thrilling, unfortunately. The CP convoy edged along the coast as far as Zonguldak, with Goeben in close company - she will accompany them approximately 2/3 of the way to Trabzon before breaking off to bombard Batumi.

The mist that hung around at the start of the day slowly burned off, but the Russians, apparently confounded by poor intelligence and the skipper's vodka, circled ineffectually as they edged closer to the Turks. This is the one failing of the random movement rules - sometimes they really are random and send your fleets in circles!

Positions at the end of Day One (end of Turn 6):

[BombTaxi]

Day Two is marred my alternating fog and mist well into the night. The CP convoy continues to forge ahead, reaching Sinop. At dawn, Goeben will leave the transports and strike out east towards Batumi, while the convoy turns south-east and continues to hug the coast down to Trabzon.

Positions at the close of the day (end of Turn 12):