My scenarios

HaroldHutchison

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These four scenarios use the HutchDB.

Avenge New York (AvengeNY.zip): Carry out tactical nuclear strikes on Yemen in retaliation for its sponsorship of a terrorist attack on New York using chemical weapons.

Bekaa Night (BekaaNT.zip): Carry out Alpha Strikes against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon.

The Run (TheRun.zip): Break the blockade of Sao Tome and Principe and reinforce the U.S. units already there.

The Hammerhead Incident (THI.zip): Destroy a French SSBN that is trying to deploy.

Good luck - look forward to the AARs.
 

Herman Hum

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Test run [Spoiler Alert]

I thought that I'd try to help you out with a test for your latest scenario, The Run.

Some comments:

1) I liked that you named each of the East African Union vessels. Why not think up some names for the Boghammer units?

2) Your tactic of trying to disguise the Boghammer vessels within the herd of fishing vessels worked for the most part. However, in the central area of the map, I think that they got separated.

3) The mission of the Boghammers takes them quite a distance from land. I don't know if this is normal tactic. AFAIK, I don't think that these vessels would venture more than 100nm away from shore and probably stay much closer. You might want to shift them so that they stay closer to Sao Tome or attack once the Amphibs arrive. I am pretty certain that they are not ocean seaworthy.

4) Your subs are pretty far away from the projected course of the Amphibs. They are only diesels and you have them patrolling some pretty big areas (100 x 100nm zones). I think that it is a huge area to patrol when they are usually creeping around at 2 - 5 knots. According to most players, they are simply 'manned mine fields'. If they aren't directly positioned to intercept the player, I think that they are simply too slow to attack unless the convoy runs over them.

5) You've got a pretty long transit mission to reach Sao Tome. Would you consider imposing a very strict time limit on the player? This might serve to make him run at very high speed and thus not spot one of the subs. By blinding his sonar, you might help the subs attack more effectively.

6) You've got a lot of aircraft searching for the task force. That's good tactics but would you consider activating some later on in the game? By staggering them, you can keep the pressure on the player throughout. During my test, I was able to kill them pretty easily at the beginning and this made for a pretty boring end as all the units were destroyed early in the game.

7) I saw that you had some Cheyenne aircraft on air patrol from the westernmost base. Now, these aircraft are unarmed so why are you launching a pair on the patrol missions? I think that they might be more effective and also increase their survivability by having them separated and on separate missions. By having them on the same mission, they are superimposed on one another and only takes an additional missile to kill both aircraft. By separating them, you force the player to chase down targets in two different locations.

8) The player forces are SUPER powerful. I'd suggest that you remove all three of the vessels at Sao Tome. Any one of them can easily kill the entire fleet of Boghammer vessels because their ships' guns easily outrange the Boghammers' weapons.

9) Myk had a good idea in his Makaze scenario. He imposed an exclusion zone around the AI home area. I think that you could also use this technique effectively. Draw an exclusion zone say, 100nm from the coast of Africa and not allow the player to penetrate it. Remember to specify this in the orders and give an explanation. This way, the AI can have his ships lurking behind the zone and impervious to attack. You could get them to venture out once the Amphibs actually get near Sao Tome.

10) Due to the unlimited ordnance, I think that there are far too many player assets. Reducing the aerial assets to one third of what you have available would go far to increasing the challenge. You might even consider removing ALL the aircraft from Sao Tome. This might make the player really need to work for his victory.

11) I hope that you might give a bit more description in the orders and scenario background. They are pretty sparse.

12) It's nice to see a new database. It takes a bit of use to get accustomed to how you have set up the new units and weapons. However, I think that there might be some issues in HutchDB.

12A) I had a couple of aircraft run out of fuel even when I had them turn back immediately when the AI said that they needed to return to base. You might want to see how the DB2K models this because I don't seem to run into this problem with it.

12B) The PGMs are pretty ineffective in my experience. I am glad that the aircraft logistics was de-activated because I certainly needed them! :) Now, I'm not saying that they don't work, but I certainly had to use lots of them. I don't know if you intend for this to happen. I used many, many SLAM II to kill the handful of Boghammer boats.

12C) I saw some odd stuff regarding sonar that I have not seen before with the DB2k. I detected a sub contact but I never saw any area of uncertainty. It simply sat there so I thought that it was confirmed contact. However, I sent 20+ aircraft to prosecute it and simply could not localize it. It turned out to be very far away upon later examination with the ScenEditor. Now, the reason that I think that it might be a problem with the Db is that it might be something to do with the Sonar values or possibly your noise levels for the sub. I don't know much about the Db but think that a sonar system should at least give me some kind of directional indication instead of just alerting me to the presence of a sub contact.​
13) How about leaving Sao Tome either undefended or very lightly defended and insert a facility to represent an embassy or something important. Now force the player to defend that installation from that huge long distance by making its survival a ViCond. LR CAP is going to be a real tough mission to execute.

14) Your current ViConds state that the player must protect 3 vessels from 10% damage. Do you realize that the AI could damage two vessels 99% and the player could still win? That's because all three need to be damaged 10% to cause him to lose. I don't think that this is your intent but that is how your ViConds are currently set. Because you've got Aegis vessels in the PhibRon, I'd suggest that you change the ViCond so that the player must protect the 1 vessel from 10% damage. The AI is going to have a hard enough time trying to get through Aegis as it is.

I hope that you find these suggestions helpful and not hurtful. It is your scenario to do with as you please and these recommendations should in no way be considered criticism. Thanks for sharing it with us. :)

Cheers
 

Divefreak

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Don Maddox said:
Are these already in the scenario archives or what?
I don´t think so because they still undercontruction and not rerady for play as far as I know.


And to Hermans post I#m wrong! :shock:
Regards René
 
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HaroldHutchison

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Herman Hum said:
I thought that I'd try to help you out with a test for your latest scenario, The Run.

Some comments:

1) I liked that you named each of the East African Union vessels. Why not think up some names for the Boghammer units?
I might, but patrol craft don't usually get names.

2) Your tactic of trying to disguise the Boghammer vessels within the herd of fishing vessels worked for the most part. However, in the central area of the map, I think that they got separated.
I'll just have to clutter it up with more fishing vessels, I guess.

3) The mission of the Boghammers takes them quite a distance from land. I don't know if this is normal tactic. AFAIK, I don't think that these vessels would venture more than 100nm away from shore and probably stay much closer. You might want to shift them so that they stay closer to Sao Tome or attack once the Amphibs arrive. I am pretty certain that they are not ocean seaworthy.
I'll look the scenario over later - see what I can rig up. I might just have a huge Boghammer rush at the two LCS.

4) Your subs are pretty far away from the projected course of the Amphibs. They are only diesels and you have them patrolling some pretty big areas (100 x 100nm zones). I think that it is a huge area to patrol when they are usually creeping around at 2 - 5 knots. According to most players, they are simply 'manned mine fields'. If they aren't directly positioned to intercept the player, I think that they are simply too slow to attack unless the convoy runs over them.
I wanted that to be a bit of a variable. I'll have to re-tweak the patrol zones, I guess.

5) You've got a pretty long transit mission to reach Sao Tome. Would you consider imposing a very strict time limit on the player? This might serve to make him run at very high speed and thus not spot one of the subs. By blinding his sonar, you might help the subs attack more effectively.
It's kind of a cross. There is a bit fo a fuel constraint as well. It's a long transit.

6) You've got a lot of aircraft searching for the task force. That's good tactics but would you consider activating some later on in the game? By staggering them, you can keep the pressure on the player throughout. During my test, I was able to kill them pretty easily at the beginning and this made for a pretty boring end as all the units were destroyed early in the game.
Believe it or not, I was using the 1/3 rule to get some staggering. I'll see about delavying some of the missions.

7) I saw that you had some Cheyenne aircraft on air patrol from the westernmost base. Now, these aircraft are unarmed so why are you launching a pair on the patrol missions? I think that they might be more effective and also increase their survivability by having them separated and on separate missions. By having them on the same mission, they are superimposed on one another and only takes an additional missile to kill both aircraft. By separating them, you force the player to chase down targets in two different locations.
This is from Liberia. Well, they are going to be short of resources. It's kind of a cheat to make things tougher for the American player. The EAU forces have to shoot first.

8) The player forces are SUPER powerful. I'd suggest that you remove all three of the vessels at Sao Tome. Any one of them can easily kill the entire fleet of Boghammer vessels because their ships' guns easily outrange the Boghammers' weapons.
I may keep the LCS. A little re-deployment might also make life... interesting.

9) Myk had a good idea in his Makaze scenario. He imposed an exclusion zone around the AI home area. I think that you could also use this technique effectively. Draw an exclusion zone say, 100nm from the coast of Africa and not allow the player to penetrate it. Remember to specify this in the orders and give an explanation. This way, the AI can have his ships lurking behind the zone and impervious to attack. You could get them to venture out once the Amphibs actually get near Sao Tome.
Haven't figured out the nav zones yet.

10) Due to the unlimited ordnance, I think that there are far too many player assets. Reducing the aerial assets to one third of what you have available would go far to increasing the challenge. You might even consider removing ALL the aircraft from Sao Tome. This might make the player really need to work for his victory.
I'll see what I can do.

11) I hope that you might give a bit more description in the orders and scenario background. They are pretty sparse.
Noted.

12) It's nice to see a new database. It takes a bit of use to get accustomed to how you have set up the new units and weapons. However, I think that there might be some issues in HutchDB.

12A) I had a couple of aircraft run out of fuel even when I had them turn back immediately when the AI said that they needed to return to base. You might want to see how the DB2K models this because I don't seem to run into this problem with it.

12B) The PGMs are pretty ineffective in my experience. I am glad that the aircraft logistics was de-activated because I certainly needed them! :) Now, I'm not saying that they don't work, but I certainly had to use lots of them. I don't know if you intend for this to happen. I used many, many SLAM II to kill the handful of Boghammer boats.

12C) I saw some odd stuff regarding sonar that I have not seen before with the DB2k. I detected a sub contact but I never saw any area of uncertainty. It simply sat there so I thought that it was confirmed contact. However, I sent 20+ aircraft to prosecute it and simply could not localize it. It turned out to be very far away upon later examination with the ScenEditor. Now, the reason that I think that it might be a problem with the Db is that it might be something to do with the Sonar values or possibly your noise levels for the sub. I don't know much about the Db but think that a sonar system should at least give me some kind of directional indication instead of just alerting me to the presence of a sub contact.​
I've datalinked the SLAMs. I'll see what the deal is with that. Had a similar problem reported on the Mavericks.

13) How about leaving Sao Tome either undefended or very lightly defended and insert a facility to represent an embassy or something important. Now force the player to defend that installation from that huge long distance by making its survival a ViCond. LR CAP is going to be a real tough mission to execute.
Might not be a bad twist...

14) Your current ViConds state that the player must protect 3 vessels from 10% damage. Do you realize that the AI could damage two vessels 99% and the player could still win? That's because all three need to be damaged 10% to cause him to lose. I don't think that this is your intent but that is how your ViConds are currently set. Because you've got Aegis vessels in the PhibRon, I'd suggest that you change the ViCond so that the player must protect the 1 vessel from 10% damage. The AI is going to have a hard enough time trying to get through Aegis as it is.
A lot of the missile stuff has been baselined from H4's Annexes D, G, H, and S. I'll double-check those.

I hope that you find these suggestions helpful and not hurtful. It is your scenario to do with as you please and these recommendations should in no way be considered criticism. Thanks for sharing it with us. :)

Cheers
No problem. I'll tweak and get a new version up by the end of the week.
 

Herman Hum

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HaroldHutchison said:
I'll look the scenario over later - see what I can rig up. I might just have a huge Boghammer rush at the two LCS.
Here is a suggestion on how you might be able to preserve the Boghammers.

When the Boghammers are overflown, they are easily identified as hostile because they open fire on the aircraft with their machine guns. You might consider unloading their machine gun ammo and just leaving them with their Rocket magazines. In this way, they will not reveal themselves to be hostile until they actually open fire on a USN vessel. And, according to your ROE, the USN is only allowed to return fire. Their machine guns are usually pretty ineffective, anyways, so you won't be sacrificing much ASuW power. I have tested this technique and it does work.

Also, you can create separate sides for different Boghammer vessels/groups. By making some of them neutral to the USN, the player cannot indiscriminately destroy all the Boghammer units that he encounters without sacrificing the game by firing on Neutrals.
 

MikMyk

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Well even if they are not hostile they are still Boghammars. Given there are no known neutral Boghammars in the region most players will deduce their intent (particularly if you have a gaggles of them crossing over 100nm toward any known surface group).

My suggestion is to add some neutral Bogs or go with a new or different type of gunboat (zhuk's maybe) that are prevalent to the region. Add a whole lot more neutral traffic and divide them up to arrive at the same point of contact around the same time. You might also want to look at where these boats can operate as speedboats only tend to operate so far out to sea. You have points on your map where your group must past so some nice opportunities here and there.
 
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