Cruel Seas Final Game Against the Japanese

Colin came over so we could finally get around to playing the third scenario in the mini-campaign set in the Far East.


Scenario 3 Resupply
The Japanese must move their sampans and barges out of one river mouth and across an area of shallow water to a second river mouth.

Japanese
3 gunboats (replacements are Inexperienced).
4 x Barges
2 x Sampans
Ground support 2 x 57mm guns with inexperienced crews
Air support – 1 Dive bomber arrives from the Japanese starting edge (Turn 1 roll 1-2, Turn 2 roll 1-4 Turn 3 automatic) once a bomber has left the table/been shot down roll again in the next turn for a second bomber. 
NB, if the tanker was sunk in scenario 2, only one bomber is available.
A dive bomber will only come on on a roll of 1-2 and once an aircraft has left the table the Japanese must wait one turn before rolling for the next aircraft. If the aircraft is shot down there are no replacements. 

British
3 x Fairmile ML (replacements are Inexperienced).
3 x Vosper MTB (replacements are Inexperienced).
If the support ship was sunk in Game 1, replacement MTBs do not have torpedoes.

The water between the sandbanks and the coast is very shallow.  If any medium vessel (ie the Fairmiles) moves into the area it has a chance of running aground.
At slow speed it gets stuck on a 6, at combat speed on a 5+ and at full speed on a 4+. Once stuck the boat must make a command roll to get itself free.

After the two previous games the Japanese had one inexperienced gunboat and limited air support. The British had two inexperienced Vospers by a full load of torpedoes.

The end of turn 1. The Japanese are just emerging from their starting river in the bottom left hand corner (they have a 57mm gun placed at each river mouth). The British  Fairmiles are moving forward to engage the far 57mm whilst two of the Vospers are moving up to position themselves in front of the Japanese convoy. The last Vosper is cutting back to try and get a torpedo run in whilst the Japanese are still bunched up in the river mouth.

Colin got air support in turn two (he seemed to roll a lot of 1s and 2s for air support, he got at least 5 bombing runs in) but it failed to hit the target!

Having got behind the Japanese the Vosper launches torpedoes, just in time as a gunboat scores a direct hit, knocking off half it's HPs and inflicting a Critical Hit on the crew.
At the far end of the table, my Fairmiles neutralise the land-based 57mm for no loss.

As the Japanese move forward the inexperienced gunboat pulls across to engage the daring Vosper.

One torpedo runs straight through the Japanese, missing everything. The second hits the aft of a gunboat, but runs under the hull without exploding. Small boats are much harder to hit than tankers, I was starting to think my torps would not be of much use in this game.

With the crew unable to change speed or direction my damaged Vosper runs into a cross fire from the Japanese gunboats and, as expected, gets sunk!
I lose a second Vosper to combined long range fire from the second land-based 57mm and the leading gunboat. I also have to fend off repeated dive bomber attacks, but the Japanese bombardier seems to be having a bad day.
Overall it's not looking good for the British.

The Fairmiles move closer, engaging the gunboats in a head on duel. My leading Fairmile takes damage from two hits, but one of the little gunboats explodes under return fire.

One Fairmile attempts to bring all it's guns to bear on the oncoming Japanese by moving closer to the shore, but runs aground. It takes another hit from a gunboat and now badly damaged, but fortunately is just out of range of the land-based 57mm.

A broadside from the grounded boat and a lucky shot the the 3 pounder on a second Fairmile take out another gunboat.

The grounded boat switches to target the sampans and sinks one, while the other two Fairmiles gang up on the last gunboat, sinking it.
Joined by the Vosper, the now defenseless transports are rapidly taken out.

The end of the last turn. With just one barge still afloat we called it a day.
It is not as one-sided as it looks, two of the Fairmiles are down to only 1 and 2 Hit Points apiece. Just one more hit with even a light mg would have sent them beneath the waves.
And of course if just one of the dive bomber's attacks had hit it would have been a different story.