War at Sea Battle Report 2: USN vs IJN

First off, my apologies for the lack of updates recently; I've been kind of busy with other stuff. 

The only games I've played were one game of Warmachine (my first in about a year) and a bunch of games of Battletech, which I just got started with.

There might be batreps for both of those in the near future, along with more Flames of War stuff as our local Infantry/Mechanised slow-grow league is getting started.

But for now, it's time for some Axis and Allies Naval Miniatures, since I got to play a couple of games of that this week and took pictures for one of them.

We were playing 100 points in the standard scenario, which plays nice and quickly.

You score points by capturing the three objectives on the centerline (worth 50 points each), destroying enemy units (worth their points value) and destroying all surface elements in the enemy fleet (worth 50 points once).

The first player to score 150 points by the end of a turn wins.

 I was playing a purely US Navy force, containing the following:

-2 Cleveland-class light cruisers (USS Montpelier stats)
-1 Baltimore-class light cruiser (USS Phoenix stats)
-1 Fletcher-class destroyer (USS Kidd stats)
-4 Clemson-class destroyers (USS Edsall stats)
-1 S-class submarine (USS S-37)
-1 squadron of SB2C Helldiver dive-bombers

I deployed them the way you can see above.

Since the Phoenix and Kidd have pretty solid AA, they would be forming their own group off my left flank.
The Clemsons whith their pretty anemic prewar AA would try to stick under the AA umbrella of the pair of Clevelands.


And across the table...

My opponent's Imperial Japanese Navy force, with a single loaner from an unexpected ally:

-2 Nachi-class heavy cruisers (Haguro stats)
-1 Agano-class light cruiser (Agano stats)
-1 Kuma-class light cruiser (Oi stats)
-1 Shiratsuyu-class destroyer (Shigure stats)
-1 Akitsuki-class destroyer (Terutsuki stats)
-2 squadrons of A6M5 "Zeke" fighters
-1 group of G4M1 "Betty" patrol bombers
-1 squadron of Re. 2001CB (Falco II) fighters

This force was divided into three attack groups, one pointed at each objective.
Agano and one Nachi on the left. (my right for the rest of the report)
Ooi and Terutsuki in the middle.
The other Nachi and Shigure on the right. (my left)

As I moved my fleet up, I immediately forgot about the relatively weak AA of the Clemsons and moved two of them away from the protection of the Clevelands.

My adversary decided to pounce on the opportunity by sending in bis Betties and Zekes, with the latter strafing the fragile destroyers.

While the AA gunners aboard these ships failed to drive off the enemy aircraft, their attacks ended up ineffective with the destroyers undamaged and the aircraft heading back to re-arm.

Meanwhile, the Japanese ships just move up towards their objectives.

In the next turn the Americans drive onwards towards the objective, keeping the Clevelands back a bit.
The Japanese mostly hide two of their groups behind the island, while the group on the left flank decides to stick together and secure the objective.

The US airpower decides that this is the moment to strike and the Helldivers zoom towards the destroyer Terutsuki, where the enemy AAA is weakest.

The Helldivers end up driven off by the Terutsuki's gunners.
Kuma's captain eyes the US cruiser he can spot around the island and decides to launch a volley of torpedoes. They strike true and USS Phoenix is rendered combat ineffective.
Her return fire seriously damages Terutsuki, but she remains afloat and operational.

The Clemsons in the center of the US formation can't spot any enemies to attack, but lay down smoke screens in preparation for the engagement that's about to happen.

That engagement does indeed happen on the next turn and both sides go all-in. The US destroyers push onto the objectives, whith the Clevelands and one of the Clemsons hanging back in the smoke.

The IJN fleet pushes straight into the maw of the US ships, whith Ooi and the crippled Terutsuki making a desperate torpedo run towards the cruisers.
The Nachi on the left flank also starts moving into the center, leaving the Shiratsuyu to capture the objective.

All of the IJN airpower is also directed to the Clemsons on the right objective, including their Italian loaner.

Said airpower proves effective despite furious AA fire by both Clemsons and the nearby Cleveland.
Both Clemsons are knocked out; one obliterated by the dive-bombing Falco IIs, the other by strafing from the Zekes.

A storm of torpedoes and gunfire follows, causing an insane amount of destruction.

Ooi and Terutsuki's run towards the Clevelands results in one of them getting knocked out, but they are also sunk in return by US gunfire.
The Nachi on the left flank obliterates the Clemson on the objective and severely damages the Fletches alongside it, but takes a crippling torpedo hit before the sunk cleveland finishes it off with its final volley.
Japanese fire on the right flank is mostly ineffective, only crippling the one remaining Clemson-class destroyer. The US do quite a bit better, crippling the Nachi on this flank and dealing some serious damage to the Agano as well.
S-37 tries lining up a shot as well, but whith the Terutsuki and her ASW weapons so close, the captain decides to be careful with his WW1-vintage boat instead.

At the end of the turn, the US side capture the middle objective while the IJN capture the one on the left flank. Both sides have also destroyed about 50 points of the enemy fleet. It's still anyone's guess who will win at this point.

In turn 4, the action converges on the right objective, the only one left to be taken.

Agano charges towards the remaining Cleveland, but said Cleveland passes her by, moving closer to the objective and forming the center of the US ships as they group up, with S-37 keeping away from enemy ships as she tries to move into a firing position.
Shigure also makes her way towards the action, getting within torpedo range of the battered Fletcher-class destroyer,
The remaining Nachi, crippled though she is, moves forward onto the objective, preparing to let loose with all of her guns and torpedoes at close range. That is when the spotters sound the alert; that squadron of Helldivers from before is back, and they've found their favourite prey - crippled enemy cruisers. Despite a valiant effort, their seriously diminished AAA proves insufficient to drive the squadron of dive-bombers off and the spread of bombs is deadly accurate, striking the ammunition supplies and blowing the ship sky-high.
At the same time, the Japanese Betties decide to stretch the limits of their craft's operating range to make one more strike against the remaining Fletcher. However, their AA crews are more alert and manage to drive off the bombers despite the battered state of their ship.

Having lost most of their comrades, Agano and Shigure attempt to avenge them with a furious barrage of fire. While Shigure's desperate attacks all miss, Agano's strike true. Her torpedoes manage to take out the remaining Cleveland in a single volley while her guns finish off the last of the Clemsons.
The torpedoes fired by said Clemson in return also proved lethal to the already-battered Agano, taking her out of action as well. Combined fire from the Fletcher and Cleveland also took out Shigure, leaving the Japanese without surface assets and making the US force the victor in this battle.

However, it had been a costly one; of the eight surface ships sent out, three of them cruisers, only a single battered destroyer made it back home.
Another point to note is that the S-37, massively hindered by her age, never fired even a single shot.


This was a pretty interesting game, although it turned into quite the slaughter as both of us pushed forward aggressively.
As the US player, I might have been able to win a long-range fight instead, but the early loss of the Phoenix drove me to attack to compensate, before the enemy ships on the left flank could rejoin the main force.


We played another 100-point game later that afternoon, where my opponent decided to take out my new Nagato-class battleship (worth 48 points) for a spin alongside a Nachi, a couple of destroyers and some air support.
In that battle, I decided to bring along the pair of Cleveland-class cruisers, all four Clemson-class destroyers, a pair of Fletcher-class destroyers, a pair of Australian N-class destroyers and a single British S-class destroyer.

Through a combination of smoke and effective torpedo fire, this force managed to take out every surface unit apart from the Nagato in two turns of fighting. Unfortunately, the Nagato's main guns obliterated one of the Clevelands on each of those turns, leaving me with a half-dozen destroyers facing off against a single post-Dreadnaught battleship with torpedo bulges.
In the end, they managed to sink her, although only a pair of ships (one of them crippled) survived the madness.


Based on my recent games with this system, I do think I'll be expanding my US forces with some heavier assets like tougher cruisers and some kind of battleship once I've painted most of what I've currently got. Some fighter assets would probably come in handy as well.
For the Japanese, some more light cruisers and destroyers present at the Java Sea are at the top of the list, although getting a carrier and some dive- or torpedo bombers would be nice as well.