Bismarck VASSAL module ready for beta

[goosebrown]

Bismarck Battle Scenario Nine - Allied Forces

A mixed force of British and French forces try to head off the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau from returning to port after their sinking of the Rawalpindi. The Allied forces, headlined by the HMS Hood and the Dunkerque with a small destroyer escort found the returning Germans in the North Sea and dashed in to avenge the Rawalpindi.

For this battle I took the Anglo-French side and started to close on the two battlecruisers with no time to waste.

My opponent, Schoenwolf, had the requisite elán and charged in to the fray.

The gods of the dice were with me as we made contact and in the first first salvo, Hood made 5 hits right off the bat on the Gneisenau (1,1,2,3,4,5,5,6,6,6) with 2 primary and 2 secondary hits and a critical hit with a followup roll of 3 which yielded an additional hull and primary on a critical hit. Dang! What a start!
The Dunkerque likewise got a 50% hit rate with three hits on Scharnhorst with YET AGAIN, a critical hit. Damage on Scharnhorst was a hull and a primary and then from the critical hit damage table, three hull hits and 1 speed reduction.

Dang.

Bob fired back and got one hit on Hood and Dunkerque each. A primary on Hood and a secondary on Dunkerque which fell to a tertiary hit because she had no secondary battery.

With the speed loss on Gneisenau, the German player stayed put and the Anglo-French force charged on as though to come gunwale to gunwale to board. At range of three hexes in the gunnary phase, Hood Fired an another rather incredible three hits on Gneisenau knocking out a primary, a secondary, and the torpedo mount. The Dunkurque dealt a hit to the torpedoes and then in a near critical hit, two hull and one speed loss on Scharnhorst. With another speed loss, the German task group was going to be stationary again.
Schoenwolf fought back like a demon, but the dice were not with him. this time he inflicted some AA damage on Hood and a hull hit.

At this point the log ended due to some French develtry.

In the next phase the Anglo-French group barreled in to torpedo range.

The gunnery phase was productive for the Germans with more hits now starting to refer damage to the hull on both battlecruisers. German return fire yielded some results but not enough to slow the allies down.
In the Torpedo Combat Phase, at a range of 2, let go with everything. That is, 4 torpedo factors from the destroyers and the Hood. (and they said that torpedoes on a capital ship were useless...) Two of the torpedoes ran true and struck the Gneisenau and wreaked horrific damage leaving her with just three hull boxes left.



Schoenwolf refused to give up even as he was becoming Schoen-seewulf.

At the constant range of two hexes, the combat ended when the Hood and Dunkerque dispatched the Gneisenau with the three remaining hull hits. The victory conditions met, the forces disengaged and the grognards headed to pet their cats and goats as marriners have done since time immemorial.

This AAR is from the upcoming release of Bismark Second Edition's VASSAL module. We are still correcting typos, but be on the look out for us to release it in the upcoming week.