(I know I'm simplifying history, deal with it) During WWII the Allied forces fought to keep the shipping lanes open, while the Axis fought to strangle it. Setup: Allied Warship count: Twice the count of Axis Warships & 1/2 the count of Allied Merchant ships Merchant ship count: Twice the count of Allied Warships Axis Warship count: 1/2 the count of Allied Warships Merchant ship count: None, or 1-2 raiders that look like the allied merchants... Rules: All Allied Merchant ships are to be in the water, circling the pond at all time. Axis objective: All Allied merchant ships sunk within predetermined (quick) time table. At least 1 operational warship, to "defend the motherland". Allied objectives: At least 1 merchant ship still operational after predetermined (quick) time table. At least 1 operational warship, to "protect the queen".
Good general premise to start with! In reality, you're probably going to have to go with whatever shows up on battle day. The 2:1 ratio of Allied:Axis may or may not be what you actually get, but that really isn't all that important. If the teams have advanced notice of the scenario, they can plan & make sure they get enough ships. If not, it's their own fault & they have to deal with it, just like 1:1 navies.
Justin, 10 minutes is not much time, especially in the Big Gun format. There are some ships that, no matter how much you beat them up, will not sink in a 15-minute sortie, and even among the ships that can be sunk it usually takes most of the sortie to sink. something like what you're suggesting would best be done in a 20 or thirty minute sortie, or continue until either all merchants are sunk or they complete a set number of laps without a time limit.
OK... I was more interested in the rest of the scenario; the concept was really to give it a truncated timetable. I modified it to those ends.
A slight variation on that idea, which would be very interesting with my club's current fleet disposition, is battleships and transports vs all others. If even a single transport completes 3 laps around the convoy course (about 15 minutes of straight sailing) then Team Battleship wins, otherwise Team Everyone Else wins. Battle continues until all transports are safe or sunk. Since the majority of active battleships in the WWCC are Allied (or French) and the majority of active other ships are Axis (or Italian) then it isn't changing history too much, and makes for a wide range of tactics and strategies to employ. It also fits fairly well into the WWCC's sortie-based battling style, so we can try that for one sortie and do regular sorties the rest of the day.
There is a new group in Arizona that is just making destroyers,subs,and convoy vessels for next year. I will keep you posted on how this turns out.
