Scenario Design & Discussion

Here's another After-Action Report re-printed with permission from the author. For the first time since the Slag in de Java Sea in 1942 a joint UK/Dutch TF was going to war under Dutch command. Our mission was to prevent an invasion of the ABC-islands and reinforce them with marines. Initial operations went easy. Venezuala appeared to remain neutral and only some C130s were detected. US Navy recon units were out in force. I started flying my recon planes to find the two invasion forces that my intel had reported might be under way. I detected some patrol craft and a few separate destroyers and after 2 hours my recon plane was fired upon by a destroyer. The fi…

Here's a nice report from Liuzg150181 re-printed with permission: Taken from my blog entry: http://liuzg150181.tripod.com/blog/ "Perhaps almost always, a pc game session against a human player - especially up against a veteran with tactical and strategic cutting-edge - would be much more pulsating and exulting than against the built-in AI which is more often than not of absymal or haphazard performance. No, the game is not about killing whales using harpoons(so environmentalist please don't flame my blog!), or that matters. As clarification the 'Harpoon' game is air and naval combat simulation game based the board game conceived by former naval officer Larry B…

File Name: Follow Up 2013 File Submitter: Mgellis File Submitted: 6 Mar 2011 File Category: Scenarios DB Used: HUD3 Authors: Mark Gellis Battleset: No Information This is one of my first attempts to write a scenario for H3, using the HUD3 database. It's pretty simple, but still a bit challenging, I think. Please let me know what you think. Mark Click here to download this file

Here's another After-Action Report re-printed with permission from the author. The conflict started quite, French planes were buzzing overhead and I managed not to annoy them into hostility. I used the quite of the pre-dawn morning to drop Gurka's around the three Dessert Forts. Egyptians were not known for night-fighting after all. They were reinforced during the day but communication problems with my Indian friends prevented good damage reports, so as the conflict went on I supported them with flights of hunters in an attempt to breach the Forts to 50% damage. Fighters were dispatched overhead BP Torrey Canyon and the BP refinary. They strafed some dows …

The 124th NEW Harpoon scenario of the year! This scenario has been tested for compatibility with Harpoon ANW. PIRATES The Malakka strait, Sunda Strait, and Java Sea are notorious Pirate waters. Attacks have increased to over 200 per year. Often crews of attacked vessels are put overboard, the ship is quickly searched for valuables, and then sunk. Many pirates are individual criminals, but organised gangs have emerged who have excellent Intell, and have purchased some of the hundreds of obsolete Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, and Australian 1960s and 1970s gunboats. While Pirates have no chance against modern naval ships, the Navies in the region have…

Here's another AAR by Dave Steinmeyer. It is re-printed here with permission from the author. AAR: Beach Reconnaissance [spoiler Alert] A Harpoon 3 scenario By Herman Hum I plotted my course for the first Named Area of Interest (NAI1). It's the one that's furthest SE. My course took me N, then I turned and approached the coast at right angles. After a few minutes, I got my first contact, a goblin to the E of my start point. I never really got a track on him, and lost him shortly after. The next pair of contacts as I approached NAI1 were both a skunk and a goblin to the NW. Again, I lost the goblin pretty quickly. Then I lost the skunk. Next…

The 8th NEW Harpoon scenario of the year! Eyes and Claws (Act I) This is the sixth scenario of the PaSon battleset. These scenarios are designed for beginners. They presume that the USSR did not collapse back in the early 90s. In fact, the Cold War went hot and NATO and the USSR got their shoot out. They met with their best equipment and fought it out. All scenarios of this battleset use the same map, starting with using smaller parts of it. The complexity and thus difficulty of the scenarios increases steadily. Eyes and Claws introduces new tactical elements. You will learn how to coordinate aircraft with ships and submarines. Aerial ref…

I had a crazy thought... Why not have a competition for small scenario designs for the HUD-4? Each round would have some general rules but some room for creativity--e.g., "A French task force with two warships and one light combatant vs. two groups of three or four gun boats and/or missile boats, anywhere in the world." Or, "A German convoy with two warships and six merchants must make an opposed passage against a nation with one destroyer-sized ship and 6-12 aircraft to use against them." In each case, we're talking relatively small scenarios, with each side having only a few vessels and/or about a dozen aircraft. Designers have 24 hours to produce the scen…

File Name: The Battle of Bissau (1981) File Submitter: Mgellis File Submitted: 09 Feb 2013 File Category: Scenarios My fifth scenario of 2013... A revolution in Guinea-Bissau has put Americans at risk. With only days or hours before Americans are executed on trumped up charges of espionage, a hastily assembled task force must seize control of the well-defended city of Bissau. (I'm quite pleased with how this one turned out. It is definitely possible to win, but you have to manage resources carefully and play smart...or else!) Image: A U.S. Marine Corps Boeing CH-46 on the Guam (U.S. DefenseImagery photo VIRIN: DF-ST-84-09763, Author: TSgt. Mike Creen)…

The 260th NEW Harpoon scenario of the year! BALTIC BREAKOUT Instead of a peaceful transition in government, the Soviet Union, instead, undergoes two very violent and aggressive overthrows in one week. In the confusion during the change of government from communism to democracy and back to communism controlled by military leaders, a general war is started against NATO countries. Two key naval units, though, aren't told in time. The Admiral Gorshkov and the Chernova Ukraina are still docked in the Baltic shipyards. Though the whole world is caught off guard, the German Navy puts up whatever patrols it can. Most units are sunk in the initial att…

The 54th new scenario of the year! The sixth installment of "The Cyprus Affair" battleset has been released. NEW WORLD ORDER SERIES: THE CYPRUS AFFAIR CAMPAIGN #2 When the NSC made good on its promise to deliver SA-10 Grumble SAM systems to the Greek Cypriots in the spring of 1995 despite Turkish protests, the stage was set for another conflict in Cyprus. The presence of the advanced weapons shifted the delicate balance of power as it put nearly all aircraft operating from the Turkish side of the island at risk. NATO was embarrassed when regular Turkish forces stormed the island a few months later. It had not been aware of Turkey's intent to rec…

AAR Hugo's Folly #1 Flight of the Governor -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hi Herman talked Eds and me into trying our hand with scen#1 of Hugo's Folly. This scen is made by Herman, tested by me for the PlayersDB. So I did have an unfair advantage of knowing the scen. I played Netherlands. Intel said an invasion by Venezuela of the Dutch ABC-islands was imminent but I was not authorised to fire first. My mission was to bring my fleet to St Maarten and to extract the Governor and millitary staff by Fokker plane and helo's. Thinking it over I decided the politicians in The Hague were dreaming if they thought…

The 38th NEW Harpoon scenario of the year! The Svalbard Incident Following the demise of the "Evil Empire", the West believed that the "Red Threat" had completely evaporated. However, those same Western governments failed to anticipate the profound effects that hunger and poverty would have on the people of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The government of the CIS, faced a hungry populace on the verge of rebellion, realized that the West either could not or would not provide the massive capital outlays required to end the depression within the CIS. This left the government with the belief that only two options remained: allow the …

The 273rd NEW Harpoon scenario of the year! TRADE BARRIER The rise of the European Community in the mid-1990's had a dramatic effect on the political and economic divisions in the world. Following the prolonged recessionary period which ran rampant throughout the world during the early 90's, the EC was the first economic body to rebound and the recovery was astonishing. What some felt was retribution towards the United States for "forty years of tyranny," the Community took steps to ensure that the Western Hemisphere took a back seat to the new world economic superpower. Soon enough, the EC's actions against the United States and Canada led to d…

The 283rd NEW Harpoon scenario of the year! Nicobar Vengeance Friction has been growing between Indonesia and her neighbours. Amongst other issues, Indonesia claims that other nations have been illegally fishing in her waters while other nations accuse Indonesia of not doing enough to reduce piracy. Four days ago, an Indonesian submarine in the waters between the Nicobar islands and Sumatra sank an Indian merchant vessel that it mistook for a commercial fishing boat. Sixteen Indian sailors were killed in the incident. Author: Herman Hum With over 93,000 PlayersDB scenarios downloaded in the last 31 weeks alone, the PlayersDB has proven…

File Name: Mauritania Madness 2017 File Submitter: Mgellis File Submitted: 17 Jan 2012 File Updated: 27 Jul 2012 File Category: Scenarios DB Used: HUD 4.0 Official Release Authors: Mark Gellis Battleset: No Information China has armed a West African nation with ships and planes in return for oil. Now that nation is viewed as a threat to E.U. shipping... Click here to download this file

AAR MP: Matrix Siege -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This morning I played Matrix Siege against Rene Haar. Matrix Siege is an old Harpoon Classic scene converted to ANW/PlayersDB by Herman Hum. It covers an exercise in the Kattegat between two US warships and about 15 European light frigates and fast attack craft. Rene chose to play Europe and I played the US. I launched my Cobra gunship to start recon took both ships out of the formation and moved them independently south at speeds I hoped would make them mistaken for neutrals. Rene switched on the radars on his Norwegian patrol boats and although …

File Name: Defending Dili (2018) File Submitter: Mgellis File Submitted: 23 May 2013 File Category: Scenarios My 17th ANW/HUD-4 scenario for 2013... In the near future, a civil war is raging in East Timor. Indonesia has formally recognized the rebels and Australia is concerned it will enter into the conflict. The Australian government makes the decision to move forces into the area and to protect the city of Dili if Indonesia decides to attack. Image: Two RAAF F-18s (Source: U.S. Air Force photo by Senior Airman Matthew Bruch.) Click here to download this file

The 46th NEW Harpoon scenario in the last 12 months! Sea King to Chile Incident One of the most mysterious events of the war happened on May 16th, when a Sea King was found burning and abandoned near Punta Arenas airbase. The British claimed a 500nm navigation error but, after the war, it became clear that SAS Special Forces had been planning a raid to take out the Exocet-armed Super Etendard aircraft which had sunk Sheffield and Atlantic Conveyor. Speculation on the nature of this operation still ranges from SAS-Hercules aircraft landing on Rio Grande airbase in order to destroy the planes on the ground to the setting up of covert radar facilities t…

SPOILER ALERT AAR Old versus new #2, Part 1. Before starting the game, I always explore the scenario [Where is what] and make notes on paper; I launch the aircraft I need in the first stage [mostly, available AEW/EW/ASW and fighters] and re-arm aircraft if necessary; I plot course for the naval taskforces and submarines, plot ASW-missions with the formation editor, etc. etc... It is always a challenge to engage the massive and technical advanced Armed Forces of the USA. In this second [of 3] scenario, I play Europe. This scenario is btw, one of my favourites: +++ Here are the Freek’s orders: #2.0 BATTLE FOR EUROPE This is the secon…