Today was one of those days. I woke up at 3:15, and could not get back to sleep. At 5:00 I began drinking coffee and reading Chernow’s Washington. It didn’t put me to sleep either. I loaded the car last night. I started the car, and headed out at 6:30, stopped for a breakfast sandwich and Americano at Starbucks, and hit the road for Chehalis. Traffic was fairly light. and I pulled into the Vet’s Museum at 7:50. I laid claim to a table and immediately began setting up. By 8:45, I had four excellent choices to run the game and we got started.

The Force Z game is played in five waves. In each of the waves there is either one squadron or two squadrons, 7-9 planes or 15-18 planes. Their goal is to deliver their ordnance while surviving as much damage as possible from the shipboard AA fire. The Japanese win by sinking the British ships. Anything less is a loss.

It didn’t take long to find four volunteers for the game. Vic, Dale, Joe and Jessica all were the Japanese mad bombers. Wave one was eight Nell bombers with 250kg bombs ready to drop them on the Repulse. They dutifully flew over the ship in column, and each plane dropped two bombs inflicting one hit that caused minor damage. The players could all learn what it was like to move, turn and take AA fire. The Repulse, in the middle of a violent made half its inadequate AA fire unavailable for the first wave, and inflicted some minor damage to the attacker

The second wave was a bit more challenging. The players get two squadrons of planes to run. They’re Nell torpedo bombers. The torpedo attack rules are more limiting. The bombers must be at low level. The attacks must be made at speed 7 or less until they drop their torpedoes. Torpedo ranges are critical and pre-measuring isn’t allowed. Bombers can’t launch in a turn in which their planes are turning. But torpedoes are the money in this game. Bombers flying two miles high just don’t hit much, so it’s the torpedo luggers that have to do the hitting.

Wave 2 attacks the Repulse from the Southeast corner of the table. Lots of great discussion between the players about which chances to take. They decided a straight in strike would be best and with four torpedo hits, who’s to argue.

The players had some decisions to make. The board entry put them closest to Repulse. Would they attack there? Would they maneuver planes to both sides and attempt an “anvil” attack (raises the chances of a hit. Would they try to shift the entry location and tempt the fates that all planes would get there on time.

For the time being their decision could wait. At the beginning of the game they rolled on the Getting Started table which had three possible outcomes, all kinda bad for the Japanese. They rolled the Interception option. The British had 11 Brewster Buffaloes waiting 90 minutes or so away to come to the aid of the Force Z if called upon. In the Getting Started table, a die roll would direct the Buffaloes to intercept Wave 2 off table, with a die roll against each squadron. Jessica’s die roll directed both attacks on Lt. Take’s squadron and he paid the price. Two planes were shot down, and two were so badly damaged they couldn’t continue. Lt. Takei would be bringing 3 planes to the table instead of 7. The Japanese could have rolled differently and broke up their attacks or created unfavorable sea conditions making it harder to hit, but got the interception instead.

Lt. Takei’s survivors and Lt. Ishihara’s nine planes stuck with a plan to attack Repulse directly. Though they had planes damaged in the attack, none were shot down before their torpedoes were launched, and one was shot down as it was exiting the board. The Repulse was not so lucky and suffered four torpedo hits. But it wasn’t just the hits. It was the die rolls on the damage table that were 7,7,8,8 on the D10’s the game uses. Anything 7-10 does critical damage, such as flooding, rudder jams, loss of AA or internal explosions. The Repulse was left in pretty bad shape, in a sinking condition and loss of most of her AA. Eeep.

There was an actual lull of almost an hour between waves two and three. I meant to have a British damage repair roll. I wasn’t prepared (as in, I forgot,) but that will be something for a future game.

12 of the Bettys in Wave 3 targeted Prince of Wales. The Prince actually shot down two of them, but as you can see, five torpedo hits left her paddling for her life.

Wave three was two full squadrons of Betty torpedo bombers. Bettys actually lugged heavier torpedoes but I just didn’t think a distinction was worthwhile. They approached from the west, or mainland side of the Gulf of Siam. Five targeted the listing, sinking Repulse, while the remainder attacked Prince of Wales. By the time they departed the Repulse had taken five more hits, and the Prince of Wales engineering was wrecked, she was listing and the game was pretty much done.

Overall, I was incredibly pleased with the game. It looked great. It played easily enough. The mechanics of movement, anti aircraft fire, bombing and torpedo attacks worked well. The torpedo damage was really bloody, but the die rolling for the Japanese was really hot and I can’t do anything about that.

But one of my goals was to get the Japanese through all five attack waves and we only made it through three. So here are a few things I’ll do for the next play test.

1. Move the Prince of Wales a little closer to Repulse. That way the Japanese can still gang up on one of the ships, but it’s more likely they’ll be able to support each other with AA fire.
2. Put two British destroyers on the table. There were three destroyers as part of the task force, though they seem to have played little part in the Dec. 10th attacks except for rescuing survivors. I have rules for the destroyers. They are mostly a distraction and contribute little to the AA attacks, but they’re something.
3. Probably the big change is making the torpedo attacks harder to hit. Don’t have a problem with the damage, but it seemed like they were hitting at a rate of about 40% which is about twice the rate historically. It’s easier to judge the short range distance on the table from the long range, so hitting on the table has to be more difficult. At the current time hitting is possible on a 7-10 unless there are subtractions for angle or damage. I’m torn between hits on 8’s or 9’s.

Another playtest on the 28th at Wizard Kings. I’ll need to organize. Looks like the PoW’s mast needs a repair. But looking forward to it.

Just one last word in praise of the Chehalis Veteran’s Museum. First, for our group, it’s a terrific venue for a game space. It isn’t huge, but it could easily house our three or four games we ran each period. It’s comfortable, not too warm, lots of room to spread out. We had 32ish folks there at one time. It wasn’t loud, which is what often happens with a bunch of old guys who don’t hear well. I didn’t spend time in the museum itself, but I have and it was great. Lots of great stuff to see including exhibits on women in the service during WWII. Some might call that woke; I just call it history. It’s equidistant between Portland and Seattle and we had a nice turnout from both areas. We’ll be back in August, and I hope to be there too.