3 replies to this topic

[Cam0sam100]

I come here to share with you the tale of the recapture of Attu and Kiska.
Me and my group (mother wife and friend) have been playing an extended campaign game of GQ3 set in the North Pacific area.
We are all new to GQ3 and wargaming in general but we are well on our way to becoming seasoned naval commanders. We played a practice game set in February 1942.

Practice game setup: The Japanese are attempting to solidify their holdings on Attu and Kiska with the main goal of constructing an airfield on Kiska.
The American Forces are trying to build their own airfield on Adak island as well as building defenses and a stockpile of supplies.

With the fighting around Guadalcanal hot and heavy not much can be spared by either side for this inhospitable theater.


After weeks of searching, skirmishing, and one air raid the campaign is concluded as an overwhelming American victory. The climax of the campaign was a massive night battle between the battered American TF24 and Ad hoc Japanese force of remaining CAs and DDs.

Results and Lessons learned: with the USN in control of the seas the construction of a Kiska airfield is abandoned and with it any hope of holding the islands against an American invasion. The Americans on the other hand turn Adak into a strong position that will, when the time is right be able to support the effort to drive the Japanese off these little bits of US soil.
The lessons learned were many but here are two things: number 1 the weather of the North Pacific is a hinderance to say the least, "we are fighting the weather more than the japs!" Said the American commander after a full day of storms. The whole campaign lasted 3 weeks of game time ( there's not a lot of moves to make when the weather is too rough for air ops most of the time and the DDs have to heave to)
Number 2: Submarines are the bomb to play both as the sub and when performing ASW. We as a group have a love of all things that operate under the ocean and a large factor in choosing GQ3 was to play subs. We were not disappointed in that regard.

As I write this we are on day 3 of operation Landcrab which for us started on May 1st 1943 and the players have come out of the gate swinging. These 3 days have saw shore bombardments, surface actions, air raids, and many submarine/asw attacks. I will attempt to post a record of these events when I have time


Thanks

[Kenny Noe]

Welcome!   Look forward to your post!!  

[healey36]

I'm still trying to wrap my brain around your game group comprised of your mom, your wife, and another friend, lol.

 

It sounds like a terrific campaign involving all components (air, surface, and submarine forces). I look forward to reading more.

 

 

[Cam0sam100]

Thank you for the welcome!My group is very unusual and I am admittedly a little more excited about this game than they are but I thank the lord for them every day. They are good sports, history buffs ,and very competitive.


The Set Up


First the house rules:
1: aircraft range is doubled across the board, my homemade Hex map of the Aleutian's is not perfect and in the test we realized how short ranged the aircraft were. Doubling the range is excessive but easy for the players to do.

2: Home-brew land combat, I found the GQ3 rules inadequate for land combat and I wanted supporting the ground fight to be the focus of the campaign. It's not a pretty rule set, it involves determining combat power (men + supplies) and then rolling on a table based on the ratio of attacker to defender. High rolls are better so NGFS (naval gunfire support) and air support add up to 3 and 2 to the rolls respectively.

3: air search is much more abstracted, plotting a 15 degree air search for all the aircraft involved was too much to keep track of.


The time has come. Forces have been carefully assembled for the recapture of those damn Aleutian Islands.
USA
The US objectives in this campaign are obviously to land and recapture the islands of Attu and Kiska. This must be done in 3 weeks, we can't hold up all these forces in north when they are needed elsewhere. The American commander is also instructed to minimize losses. A main factor for launching this campaign is the morale effect that capturing these islands would have on the home front. That could have the opposite effect if too many losses are incurred. The American commander expressed concerns for her ground troops in the hash conditions of the islands, she was told that additional cold weather gear would take too long to procure and distribute, being quick will, in itself save lives in this battle, the American commander wanted her objection officially recorded.(Note the commanders concern for her men is heartwarming and a theme that effects every decision)

With all that in mind: The Plan
In order to capture the islands on time and as quickly as possible the American commander planned to land on Kiska and Attu at the same time. The reasoning was that the Japanese commander would probably consolidate everything on Kiska leaving Attu open for the taking. And the ComNorPac thought that Kiska would be easier to support because of land based planes from Adak and would therefore need less troops to conquer.
"That's a bold strategy Cotton let's see how it plays out for them."

If only one of the islands is captured and losses are low enough we will consider that a minor US victory.
Japanese Empire
Our Operation Landcrab is a little ahistorical here and by a little I mean a lot. I have a loose justification for this in my head, Yamamoto was not killed in the Solomon Islands, that is a very interesting change to history that is sadly lost on the rest of my group but oh well. Anyway the IJN has allocated a lot of resources to turn the Aleutian campaign into a bloody quagmire for the Americans. Including 3 Fleet carriers!

The Japanese objectives are quite a bit different from the Americans. The Japanese expect to lose the islands but the goal is to bleed the Americans white for their trouble. It's a simple objective but maybe a little too vague in hindsight.
The Japanese commander was told that the islands themselves only matter as a tool to inflict casualties on the incoming US forces. My advice was to focus on mapping out the enemy forces at first and be very selective in their engagements, get as many supplies on the islands as are available. When US boots hit the ground it's time to strike.
However the commander has not really formed a cohesive plan and (I fear that it's because of my vague objectives).
In general the plan is find the Americans and kill them.

That's the set up