General

Welcome to the Harpoon Classic demo. This demo revisits a storied part of Harpoon's history via the USNI BattleSet. Pooners Brad, Tony, and Ralf, with the help of the beta testing team, have re-made the five original USNI scenarios. The scenarios take advantage of game capabilities added since the original USNI version of the game was released more than 20 years ago! Not only that, but the weapons of war more closely match the real-world weapons thanks to post Cold-War release of information and the hard work of Brad in the DB editing department. These are no longer easy, nor introductory, scenarios, be prepared! In addition to the ten USNI scenarios (there a…

Here are the links to the Tactics 101: HCE Shakedown series articles and discussion that have been posted so far ... Tactics 101: Naval Formations Part 1: The Fundamentals Part 2: Assembling a Formation in HCE Part 3: Shipboard Aviation Tactics 101: Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) Part 1: The Fundamentals Part 2: The Tools of ASW Part 3: The ASW Cycle Part 4: ASW in HCE ... to come Tactics 101: Strike Planning ... to be overhauled Strike Planning

HC - Harpoon Classic WinHarp - First Windows version of HC, prior to this was the original Harpoon game in DOS HC97 - Port of WinHarp to Win32, Windows 95 look and feel, added EC2000 battleset HC2002 - Bug fixing of HC97 HCGold - Further development of HC2002, added platform editor WestPac Beta - Beta version of HC Gold with a new battleset, Western Pacific HC2005 - What became HCE with some extra care and feeding HCCE - Harpoon Classic: Commander's Edition (later renamed to HCE) HCE - Harpoon: Commander's Edition (HC variant) HUCE - Harpoon Ultimate: Commander's Edition (HC variant, current HC version) BattleSet � - A collection of scenarios, maps,…

I'll try to remember to periodically post the release notes of the current (test) builds of the game. It would be nice if there wasn't a significant lag from a change to when the change makes it into the hands of non-beta players but that just isn't the arrangement at present. Hopefully having an idea of what we're working on will be a positive thing.

TACTICS 101: ANTI-SUBMARINE WARFARE (ASW): PART 2 - THE TOOLS OF ASW In Part 1, we learned the basics of naval oceanography, and in large part, how sound behaves in the subsurface ocean environment. Now, in Part 2, we move to the tools of anti-submarine warfare (ASW), the sensors, platforms, and weapons. Much of the material contained here is probably "old hat" to seasoned Harpoon players, and certainly generally available to anyone who is willing to take the time and effort to dig up the information. The purpose of this "Tactics 101" discussion, however, is to provide a workable foundation for those who may be completely new to naval warfare and its concepts. Pa…

TACTICS 101: ANTI-SUBMARINE WARFARE: PART 3 - THE ASW CYCLE In Part 1 of our discussion about ASW, we learned the basics of naval oceanography, and in large part, how sound behaves in the subsurface ocean environment. In Part 2, we moved to a basic examination of the tools of anti-submarine warfare (ASW), the sensors, the platforms, and the weapons. Now, in Part 3, we'll examine the ASW cycle, the methodology of detecting, locating, and attacking submarines. A. DETECTION, LOCATION AND TARGETING 1. Detection Initial detection of a subsurface contact, whether by active or passive means, is your first clue that there is a submarine in the area, …

This is my first go with Classic/Commander's and as I've not had years of 'Pooner experience, I thought it might be interesting to see how the game has changed. I'll add a post as I go through each version, playing a scenario in each one. Let's begin at the beginning, with the first Alpha build from 1988.

TACTICS 101: NAVAL FORMATIONS - PART 1: THE FUNDAMENTALS Although far more detailed than is necessary for the purposes of Harpoon Commander's Edition (HCE), Part 1 of this discussion about naval formations will help to establish the fundamentals and could be useful for other versions of Harpoon (principally Harpoon 4.1 paper rules) and other naval wargaming efforts. Part 2 will focus on the step by side assembly of a naval formation within HCE. Part 3, in turn, will deal with adding fixed wing aircraft and helicopters to a naval formation. So what is a naval formation? A naval formation is an ordered arrangement of two or more ships. Naval formations s…

TACTICS 101: ANTI-SUBMARINE WARFARE (ASW): PART 1 - THE FUNDAMENTALS In Part 1 of this discussion, we'll address the fundamentals of naval oceanography, i.e. the nature of the subsurface environment and how it impacts on anti-submarine warfare (ASW). A. FEAR GOD, DREADNOUGHT, AND THE SUBMARINE! The watchword of subsurface warfare, and by extension, anti-submarine warfare (ASW), is stealth. Submarines are absolutely dependent on stealth for both mission effectiveness and self-defense. The introduction of submarines brought about a new and revolutionary dimension in naval warfare, one that was measurable in fathoms. Compared to the heavily armored ironclads, dread…

I run into this situation quite a bit, but fail to see why it is the way it is... so would someone please enlighten me? The situation is where an AI base that I wish to attack has had its radar knocked out, has no attached land AA/radar Units, and has no formation air patrols with active radar (as evidenced by the following: - The Report display for the Base says, "Other damage - Sensor" and Land Units: 0 - Friendly air groups having SEAD and AAM loadouts give the "No released weapons ... for Land attack" message when commanded to attack the base (thus implying that there are no active land-based radars and no formation air groups on the base). Yet, the Range Ci…

i've come back to Harpoon recently and i was wondering is there any way to get v2003.15 for HC2002 gold? many thanks, fhyndoh

I am trying to run a scenario that says it i running version 7 and my game is version 6. I use to remember how to fix this, but i no longer remember. Thoughts?

In harpoon CE i cant engage hostile air units while they're in my engagement envelope.When i order a unit to attack air units within range i get the message "surface to air attacks air handled automatically " i never understood why this is not possible,sometimes red fighter planes fly really close to my ships and the ai never fires a shot!! Can someone exlpain this to me?

When attempting to lay out courses for my surface or sub groups using the "visual aids" of the map, I often find later that I have inadvertenly laid the course over a shallow or even a small land mass - which was unseen when laying out the course, even if I used rather extreme magnification. I've also noticed that the visual indications of water depth often do not seem to be consistent with the depth reports at specific groups, that is for example, two groups may be near each other over a large area on the map where the water color is a consistent light blue, yet one group reports water depth as intermediate, while the other's report says VDeep. So, my question is…

Hey: After playing the Ultimate edition a few times, I have come to one of two possible conclusions (somewhat related): 1) I suck or 2) The computer rocks. For example. 3 Flankers vs 6 Tornados. I'm protecting an E-3 and in no mood for playing so I let the Flankers have it: 9 SkyFlashes, or three per flanker on average. The flankers, being the argumentative buggers that they are, answer with four radar missiles themselves. Now to my mind, 3 missiles per aircraft is pretty good odds. Yet somehow the flankers get 100% hit rate and all bar one of my missiles miss, the flankers go off and retreat with a mission well done, drinking Vodka all the way back (no statist…

Once again, please explain it to me like I'm four. 1) Does ECM necessarily always mean jammers? 2) How does the human player turn them on? 3) Under what circumstances does the AI turn them on? 4a) Does the lightning bolt indicate the jammer or the jamee? 4b) How can you tell who's being jammed by whom? 5) Is there a way of cutting through jamming? 6) How come my Prowlers are usually the first casualities in a group to SAMs? Thanks, Larry G

TACTICS 101: NAVAL FORMATIONS - PART 3: SHIPBOARD AVIATION In Part 2 of this discussion on naval formations, we added the ships and submarines of the Reagan carrier strike group (CSG). Now, in Part 3, we'll move to the task of adding the CSG's aviation assets, namely, its fixed wing and rotary wing (helicopters) aircraft. When it comes to adding shipboard aviation to the mix, assembling the formation is much the same as it was with ships and submarines. However, the aircraft we are now hoping to add must firstly be added to (or associated with) a particular ship that is already part of the formation. This is because that aircraft will be based aboard and o…

I have bought HCE recently and I have some questions about this game. How do ATA and DATA works? Is it Loadout DATA something you should add to Plane DATA to get a final modifier or is it the maximun DATA that any plane can reach when it is loading this type of Loadout? Where are airbone cannons? How can I edit them?

Are there cases where a tanker or tankers are not supposed to break off after completing re-fueling? I'm curious because most times, after completion of re-fueling, a dialog will appear asking whether to separate the tankers from the group... but sometimes, this dialog does not occur, and the tanker(s) remain attached to the group. I'm wondering whether this is a normal occurance, due to some special circumstances, or if it may be a bug that I should attempt to capture? I've had this happen every so often, but I don't see any particular difference from the cases where the tanker-separation dialog does appear, so I'm curious what may be the reason for this. (Inci…

Feel free to ask questions about the HCE demo here. If you don't have the demo, see http://harpgamer.com/harpforum/index.php?showtopic=3446 For those of you running the full HCE product the demo showcases additional scenarios in the WestPac battleset (though they are available here at HG for separate download). The demo also has the USNI scenario remakes that are not yet present in the full HCE game. Suffice it to say you might have interest in the demo even if you have the full game. Many thanks again to Ralf Koehlbach for remaking USNI #3 and for extensive testing of the other remakes. Brad (CV32) remade USNI #1 & #4 while I remade #2 & #5. Bra…