I've been thinking about an idea one of the big gun guys (Katori I think it was) posted in the scenario section, and have modified it a little bit to simulate carrier raids. I'll throw my general idea out there, and see what everyone thinks. What I am thinking of is a carrier raid scenario, where each side has a carrier, in addition to the usual combat ships. Each side would have a base that they start from, with the object to "attack" the enemy base. The way this would work is, at each "base" would be some kind of opertions area: the place where the carrier is to launch and recover its aircraft. When "war" is declared, the two sides will sortie their carriers from the base, with whatever escorts are deemed sufficient/necessary. The carriers will move to the operations area to begin their "attack". Once in the operations area, the carrier captain will start a 5 minute timer. He must remain in the operations area for the duration of his "5" while his aircraft attack the enemy base and return to the carrier. If the captain does not remain in the operations area for the full 5 minutes, the raid is a failure and no points are awarded. If the captain remains in the area for the full 5 minutes, HALF of the total points value is awarded for sucessfully destroying the enemy base. When the captain returns to his own base, the other half of the points are awarded. Ships would be able to go on 5, then reload as necessary, and get back out there. Maybe if a capital ship (BB or BC) is in the process of reloading when an enemy carrier finishes a raid, that ship is "destroyed" and can't return to battle...perhaps even providing sink points! Cruisers and Destroyers should be exempt from this, and captains with "sunk" capital ships should be able to return to battle with a cruiser or destroyer "secondary ship" if they have one. This will leave the two fleets with a lot of strategy choices on how they want to accomplish the mission. Do they escort the carriers with their heavy fast battleships (since most carriers are 30+ knots, they my have to slow down for many of the treaty BBs)or maybe escort them with cruisers. Do they attack the enemy carriers with fast battleships, or maybe cruisers...or perhaps a combination? Slow WW1 dreadnoughts are not left out, as they are PERFECT for defense of their base. The carrier fleets will have no choice but to go to them and try to survive, which makes escort choice important. Maybe you send your whole fleet against their carrier and leave yours unescorted to fend for itself. There are alot of possiblilites and a role for every kind of ship that can be built. Maybe, you try to bait the enemy fleet into using up its ammunition, and going on 5, THEN sending your carrier in to bag the whole lot of them while they try to frantically reload! There are a lot of different strategies and tactics that the two sides could use to accomplish the missions, which I think could make things very very interesting. With the barnstormer boats PE hulls out there, the Axis has fairly easy access to "Seydlitz class" carriers, and when his Baltimore hulls are complete, I think they can be used for USN "Wright class" CVLs. I am pretty sure existing Brooklyn hulls are close enough to use for Independence class CVLs, and one of the guys in Canada has a mold for Courageous hulls...which were made into carriers! So, carriers for both the Allies and Axis should be fairly easy to come by should someone want to use them, and they would be extremely powerful in a game such as this. What do you guys think? Mike D
