Battle Report: Castles in the Sky: Mirror Match

 

It is winter time here, and that is not a great time to be outside in my area.  However, it is a good time to be indoors playing miniature wargames!  Today I was teaching someone how to play Castles in the Sky.  Therefore, we used a simple Mirror Match between my Austro-Hungarian force and the Royal Navy.  This would give them a good feel for how the game was played.

Forces:

Dual Monarchy

Tegethoff Class- Com 3

Zenta Class- Com 3

Huszar- Com 2

Royal Navy

Queen Elizabeth Class- Com 3

Warrior Class - Com 3

Bullfunch class - Com 3

I didn't even bother giving the ships names or Captain names today, just went by the class to make it easier for them to find it in the book.  

Mission

A simple Patrol mission.  We would use Armor Loss to determine the winner.  The Fleet that lost more Armor would be the loser.   

Set-up:

We played on a 36MU by 36 MU board.  1MU was 1 inch.  For terrain we had three random cloud banks at altitudes 1, 2, and 5 respectively.  I used my ocean mat because it is easy to transport and looks good.  

The two fleets were on a crossing pattern both coming from the North side.  The Brits were up high and mid speed, with the A-H at Mid-speed and mid-altitude.    

Maneuver

As is normal for new players, they turned their Destroyer and came straight at me as fast as they could get it to go.  The British try to turn into Melee up close, while the Dual Monarchy try to lure them away with their cruiser, but it fails to draw them out.  Air torpedo attacks prove ineffective from long-range.

Battle

The British fleet closes the gap fast.  They tank heavy fire from the Tegethoff and the Queen Elizabeth bears down on her prey.  Her forward guns spew fire thanks to a good command roll that let's them go first, and a poor one from the Dual Monarchy deprives them of any Orders.  The Tegethoff is damaged in the exchange.  

The next round, the Tegethoff tries to duck under the guns, but it is not enough.  A full Fire for Effect Broadside plows into her stern, but the Austro-Hungarian captain used a Brace Order to avoid the worst of it.   However, the trailing Destroyer also manages to sink a hit into the Tegethoff.  

There is a very close range gun duel between the Warrior and the Zenta and Huszar.  The British cruiser takes the worst of it, taking a real hit.   

Both the Tegethoff and the Warrior explode!  They are packed in close to the enemy ships.  The Zenta and the Huszar manage to weather the explosions without damage, only Friction.  

End Phase

The Zenta moves to evade the British.  However, the Bullfinch is all over him.  The Huszar moves to protect their cruiser.  However, a torpedo still gets through and hits the Zenta for 1 damage and jamming her rudder.  

With that, we called it a game.

Conclusion:

British Victory!  10 AV to 8 AV

Well, the Queen Elizabeth came out the better Battleship this round.  That +5 at close range for Power.... yikes.  However, I made the mistake of trying to go toe-to-toe with it.  Once I was in the kill zone, realized the mistake; I could not get out of it in a timely way.  

Secondly, usually when someone sends their Destroyer way out ahead I easily focus fire on it and kill it.  I was not able to do that this time because it got behind me and I had to keep my guns focused elsewhere.  Normally, the Destroyer charge never works, but this time it did!  It was a thorn in my back all game.  

I only managed as well as I did because of a lucky strike from my Zenta.  That was a desperation move to bracket the Warrior with Cruiser and the Escort that could have easily backfired on me.  I know from experience that the Warrior can dish out a lot of pain on an enemy Cruiser.  

A relatively quick, fun game as I tried to get some new blood into the game.  With chit-chat, set-up, and take down this one lasted about two hours.  Enough time to drink a warm cup of tea, too.    

The biggest problem is the difficulty of getting models here in the states.  It can be a chore to track down a US distributor with stock.  I usually use Scale Creep Miniatures and have had good success.  There are not even a ton of 3D print options out there either.  The best bet is probably to use Dystopian Wars models or scratchbuilds.  This issue is also slowing down my development of the follow-on game; Mobile Fortress: Verdun.  

Until next time!                  

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