Harpoon: You Know When You've Been Tango'd - 1.51 ("The Big Red One", HDS III GIUK)

There is a popular brand of canned fizzy soft drink in the United Kingdom called "Tango" - I've had a few cans of it myself in my time. The most infamous adverts for the brand first aired in 1991 and involved a man drinking Tango then suddenly getting slapped on both cheeks by an orange-painted man. Kids started copying the adverts, there was an outcry and eventually the ads were changed to the guy getting kissed by said orange man.

The former experience was not entirely unlike my experience with the hard "can" that NATO calls "Tango" in this scenario.

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Harpoon Classic gets a major upgrade at 1.51. The interface improves dramatically; many buttons that you used to have to go to menus for can now be accessed from the main operational screen, there are a lot more alert sounds, your Staff Assistant is a lot more helpful and the music is of a somewhat higher quality. Another item of note is that when you go into the "Sensors" page via Full Report on a unit actively emitting, you now hear an ESM-style sound.

It's a lot easier to use than the older versions and a lot more enjoyable.

So, onto the scenario.

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HDS III is a group of four battlesets all based on one theme - a Third World War in 1990. "The Big Red One" is the ninth scenario (of twelve) from the GIUK set. BLUFOR's mission is to ensure that 1st Armoured Division (in three convoys) gets to the Wilhelmshaven area safely so that they can unload and join the fight in West Germany. These transports are being escorted by a variety of NATO ships, including the Tico Leyte Gulf, two Type 42s and some German PTMs. You also have a large number of land-based fighters and attack aircraft, ranging from F-15s to F-117s to provide CAP and SuCAP to stop land-based Warsaw Pact air and other targets from attacking your ships.

It's a very long scenario - almost two days in game time and took me a considerable time to complete in RL. It's also a large scenario, involving over 300 aircraft.

As soon as the scenario started, the alert noises came rapidly as my Sentry detected enemy aircraft taking off from airbases in East Germany. MiG-23s and MiG-29s...

As I've mentioned, this is a long (and large) scenario, so you're getting the edited highlights, a bit like Match of the Day without the catchy music.

I sent F-16s to intercept the MiGs and its now worth mentioning the new SAM and Aircraft AAW settings this version adds. You can now set the range that your aircraft and SAMs engage targets, the options being 75% of max range, 50%, 25% or "optimal". I eventually went for 75% after bad losses at "optimal".

As part of the initial response, I also launched an airstrike against a GDR airbase with F-16s and F-4s, being escorted by F-15s. At 2344 07 Feb (game time) I noted that aircraft kept on coming up.

It's noteworthy at this point in time that the F-16 did not possess a radar-guided AAM - an important point in Red Phoenix - which I noted "could prove problematic".

The early air battle was intense to put it mildly. I was having to scramble aircraft north, south and centre, hitting the intercept option on every contact and getting fighters to intercept where I could. I tried, where possible, to assign "superior" or equal" aircraft to contacts that ranged from MiG-21s to Su-27s.

I also discovered that AA-11s can be deadly AAMs and when midnight came around, I was 21-20 down on aircraft losses. Then I picked up a "Backfire" on my scope, with the nearest fighters over 250 miles away. I eventually took care of that one.

My initial thought about the Phantoms (the ICE upgrade for West Germany) was that they got destroyed if the enemy looked at them funny, but they soon proved their worth.

At 0010, I launched 12 Tomahawks from Leyte Gulf at Rhein-Main airfield, but only did 1% damage when they arrived at 0043. Two minutes later, Nordholz AB took out the first of a good number of attacking aircraft that it would take out with Patriots during the course of this particular battle.

Five Su-24MKs got close to the Leyte Gulf convoy (AGS) where the ship duly Standarded them to death.

One particularly dumb move on my part was sending 14 Phantoms to attack Sola AB loaded with iron bombs without ensure that the base defences were properly suppressed. I lost 6 on the way in, dropped 192 bombs for 16% damage and had the rest shot down on leaving.

The score eventually turned in my favour and I realised another important point - if you shoot down an aircraft that is attacking you with SARH missiles, you no longer have to worry about the missiles as they've now lost lock.

Other observations at this point included the discovery that the Tornado IDS has a "Standoff" loadout that only has a range of 5, the MiG-23MLD "Flogger K" can carry AA-11s in this database (on further checking, they did get them in RL in 1982) and that HARMs don't do a lot of damage to the rest of an AB, or as I later discovered, missile boats. That last point just seems odd.

I'd sent the Lynx helicopters with my two Type 42s forward on a fixed point patrol rather than keeping them in formation. At 0147 a sonobuoy picked up a "Tango" SS... 

Since I'd rather stupidly sent my ASW helicopters ahead, they were out of range of the Tango SSK, even on military power, they would not get there for a while. The quiet diesel submarine was however in range of Southampton's own Stingrays torpedoes. When I detected no less than six 53-83 torpedoes (the Captain must have emptied all of the tubes at once) heading from the convoy, I had no option but to fire two of the Stingrays from the Type 42.

It now feels appropriate to reference Red Dawn, which I recently watched. Taking out the Mi-24 is no good to Jennifer Grey after she's been mortally wounded by a 20mm cannon... So taking out a submarine after its launched torpedoes at you won't stop the torpedoes...

Anyway, my torpedoes missed. Southampton was hit and sank (new sinking music in this version) - another torpedo hit the T-AK Antares and slowed it to 5 knots. I took the advice to leave that particular vessel behind.

Not my best moment by any stretch of the imagination.

At 0028, after shooting down some more aircraft, including one that wandered a bit too near my Sentry, a chopper finally launched a torpedo at the Tango, along with another two Barracudas from a Seasprite just before it came into land on my other T42. As these were running, I had 16 HARMs heading from Rhein-Main all shot down before they could hit.

At 0235, two Barracudas acquired the Tango and one of them hit. Of course, most Soviet submarines have double hulls and this pesky thing was still rather viable... As it amply demonstrated 7 minutes later when it launched three more torpedoes. It was a race between my torpedoes and his to see which would hit first...

The answer was a draw, more or less. I lost Del Monte and its entire cargo of oranges, but the Tango finally went to the bottom. Not fully content to have claimed one merchie, the still running Tango torpedoes took another one as well.

The air battle was going a lot better - I'd destroyed 118 aircraft belong to the enemy as of 0303. Even the Phantoms were doing well and I had four Su-27 Flankers going for a Sentry being shot down by Patriot and Sparrow missiles.

At 0323, I realised what happens when you orbit a Sentry too near the front line (near Nordholz) without fighter escort - let's just say some West German kids were going to find some interesting debris.

At 0324, my other Sentry, over the North Sea, detected two surface contacts. "Tarantul III" missile boats...

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So, I had Tarantuls - in fact, three of them now, to deal with. While they were still a long way off, I really wanted to deal with them ASAP so they couldn't launch Sunburns at me (I don't honestly recall if I actually had any Harpoon-armed ships).

At the same time, I also discovered that Nordholz had emptied its SAM magazines, although these were reloaded six minutes later.

Once they had been readied, I launched four HARM-carrying Phantoms at the PTGs. Carrying 8 missiles in total, I thought these would do some damage. If I set off a 150lb bomb off on board a boat, especially one of the tin can, hit-and-sink variety that the USSR built in droves during the Cold War, I expect the thing to take some damage.

Not lose the radar mount only and not take any additional damage. Seems highly illogical to me.

I then did another stupid thing - send the Phantoms to intercept an aerial target, where they flew over the boats and were shot down by the Gremlins carried by the Tarantuls. Which of course don't need radar in the first place.

After MiG-25s tried and failed to shoot down the F-15s forming up over Nordholz, I detected a Kilo SSK... 

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I had absolutely zero intention of allowing the Kilo to get any shots off on my main group and sent two Seahawks after it. One of the SH-60s got into range and fired a Mk50 at it, while I lobbed two ASROCs at it (why did the USN get rid of those?) for good measure. The Mk50 missed and the other torpedoes vanished. I fired off another ASROC. Just as I did I got a sinking message anyway. Job done.

At 0436, a solitary Viper (that's an F-16. I defer to the pilots on that name) launched a pair of Penguins at one of the pesky Tarantuls (the word translates as "tarantula", which is appropriate, as they have a nasty bite, but are easy to step on). Personally, I'm wondering who decided to call a missile after a flightless bird best known for looking cute in cold climates, but I don't work for the Norwegian Navy. Anyway, after one missile was shot down by Gremlins (the Igla, not the creatures you do not feed after midnight, amusing a thought that may be), the other one slammed into "T301" and turned the vessel into a hazard for Danish divers.

At 0443, I got my 10 F-16Cs to launch Maverick missiles at the other two Tarantuls. Eight of them made their way through the targets to sink the two vessels. As they say in Schlock Mercenary, there is no kill like overkill. Threat dealt with.

My F-16s returned to base, jettisoning their unused Mavericks, which was honestly a waste. I could have sent them after something else. As they landed, they were shot at by AA-9s, which all missed.

At this point, I made one of my better tactical decisions. I don't remember why I did it, but I had some F-15s over Poland, where they shot down a A-50 Mainstay (called an Il-76TD in this DB). I noted that getting rid of that would help a lot. One of the F-15s was lost later, but the trip was worth it.

I lobbed no less than 60 Maverick missiles at Parchim, which did 42% damage to the airbase and lost two aircraft in the process. Not a bad exchange rate, all told.

At 0751, I detected two small low-level aircraft heading for group AGS - at a time when my interceptors were badly out of position... 

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The two low-level aircraft turned out to be Flankers, who were obviously going for the Sentry. A combination of F-15 fire (which I sent over very fast) and Leyte Gulf's SAMs took care of these particular intruders.

0834 saw three more surface contacts turn up - Nanuckha I corvettes. I sent F-16s to intercept them. After an initial attack with HARMs (one of which actually caused 17% damage), followed by others repeatedly missing, the Penguins finished off the vessels before they could become any threat.

I fast forwarded now- there were no more planes coming up. I also had two Phantoms run out of fuel and crash.

At 1419, I encountered another sub surprise. Missiles were detected on radar heading from AGS and I stupidly forgot to go to 1:1 time. Cape Johnson, a T-AK was sunk. I concluded that the attack came from a submarine and I was correct - an hour and a half later (1547) I spotted a Charlie I SSGN nearby.

I promptly jumped on it with four helos and an FFG-7. Eventually, the Charlie (which would still have been a threat due to its torpedoes) went to the bottom.

I was pretty much done. Aside from a 31-plane strike on Parchim that fired 54 Mavericks in the place and resulted in two F-16s being lost due to my not ordering them back fast enough, all I needed to do was wait.

At 1921, I hit minimum victory conditions, heard "The Star-Spangled Banner" and called it a day.

My losses: 4 ships, 102 A/C, 1 helicopter.

Red's losses: 6 ships, 3 subs, 188 A/C and three damaged airbases.

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With 1.51, Harpoon's playability has gone up considerably. I don't expect to see much more in the field of functionality until we hit WinHarp.

The next mission will be "Glidepath to War" from the original IOPG. That's right, I'm taking a casino for a ride.

Paralympics 2012

I managed to get tickets to the first athletics session of these games. A great experience and I'm glad I went.

The games have concluded apart from the (probably boring) closing ceremony tonight. We've done a spectacular job in hosting both sets of Games and hopefully the Paralympics will change attitudes towards disabled people. Because they're not really disabled, they've just got a bigger health problem than most people do.

Rio's going to have difficulty topping this.

Harpoon: 1.32A

The Sri Lanka Incident: HDS II IOPG

Clearly there was a severe problem with 1.32 for us to get a 1.32A, but I digress

The Tu-16 "Badger" bomber was exported rather widely by the Soviet Union and remains in service in its H-6 form in the People's Republic of China. The Soviets did a massive amount of modding to a type they considered a workhouse and the venerable "Badger" only went with the end of the USSR.

The "Badger" can be dubbed a slow-moving very large target that doesn't stand a chance against a half-way decent air defence. However, when you're not facing said air defence, say against a surface fleet or in your own airspace, it can be a devastating aircraft. In fact, for an opponent it's more annoying than Weebl's infamous memetic animation, which rather nicely sums up the aircraft's ability to create "mushrooms" if used in sufficent numbers. No wonder the Israelis give them special attention in 1967.

I have more to say about the Tu-16, but onto the scenario. India backs a coup in Sri Lanka, so the British decide to invade with their amphibious forces supported by two CVHs. My mission, in charge of a former British navy vessel that used to be called HMS Hermes is to stop them, basically by parking myself off the coast or as it later transpired, sinking them before they could even get there.

Not only do I have the Harriers on Viraat, I have some decent land-based air; including "Flankers" and "Badgers". In retrospect, this scenario looks tilted too far in favour of REDFOR. I have two submarines, export "Kilos"; so not too bad.

My orders state Weapons Tight, which means I can't start shooting people until they start shooting me. I commence with launching two recce Badgers and 3 Flankers. The former are going to seek out the amphib group to the south of India, while the latter are providing an off-shore CAP (ah, the repeatable patrol feature...)

The carrier group sets up a small CAP and an ASW patrol. I hold the rest until something develops.

Fairly quickly, I get an ESM detection via my recce Badgers that IDs itself as a Merlin and an AEW Sea King. This of course immediately gives me a ballpark estimate of where the carrier group is (I've clearly been hanging around American forums for a long time; I've got Americanisms slipping into my language).

As soon as the Badgers detect this, I run into a Mach 2 problem. A visual one that calls itself a Tornado F.3, which I then see launching Sky Flash missiles at me. The Badgers go down in flames. Like I said, can't handle a decent air defence.

Deciding that I need to deal with these Tornadoes sooner rather than later, I send the Flankers after them but they lack the fuel to make the intercept and have to RTB. So too do the MiG-25 "Foxbats", aircraft which are all speed and no range.

As I have a good idea where the enemy is, I decide to launch a fighter escorted reconnaissance in force with some of my Badgers. Hopefully the Flankers can deal with any fighter opposition until I get into a decent range and start lobbing AS-6s at them. Oh, yes...

The Tu-16s find a group of surface contacts and launch their high explosive payloads...

Of the 14 AS-6 anti-shipping missiles that were launched by the 7 Tu-16s, 12 were shot down on their way to the targets. I had allocated my missiles to the larger targets, figuring that they were amphibious targets or a carrier. Two missiles struck a single large target and send it to the bottom; this was revealed to be a Type 22 Batch 3 frigate.

Harpoon in the CE version groups its contacts by three size classes for detection purposes: Large, Small and Very Small. The H4 paper rules use five. For some reason, the 4,900 ton T22/3 enters the "Large" category. OK...

I launch another attack with 7 more Badgers from another airbase (IIRC) and during that approach, the Flankers approach two Tornadoes. The groups merge and fire missiles at each. All the missiles miss and the groups break away without loss.

However, I'm not prepared to let the Tornadoes go and pursue them, launching four more AA-10 missiles at the Tornadoes. In a further engagement, I destroyed the two RAF fighters, one with AAMs and one with cannon fire. The problem with the F.3 is that it isn't designed to get into dogfights unlike the much more agile (and surprisingly large) Su-27.

Back to bomber action. I forgot to turn my radars on and ended up launching the AS-6s bearing-only. The game has a nice feature for you to set the desired activation distances, but I think you're expected to have a good idea of rough ranges before you do it.

The British must been thoroughly surprised to see 14 supersonic missiles on their scopes. Eleven survived to actually go active. As a result of all this, I destroyed a Fearless class LPD. I actually had to look up the type in my High Tide annex, which shows what I know about the history of the Royal Navy...

Taking advantage of the 30-minute readiness time (would that even be possible in RL?), I launch another strike, this time going for the carrier... 

I managed to detect some fighters somewhere and launched ground-based Flankers to intercept them. Around the same time, my Badgers picked up a Type 42 destroyer on ESM.

Once I got into range, I launched my missiles, allocating ten at the CVH, as it was the bigger and more important target. The missile clock was six minutes until activation; which can be a very long time.

During this six minutes, one of my submarines hit the bottom in the shallow Gulf of Mannar (the bit between Sri Lanka and India); this would take a little while to sort out.

I only managed to hit one target with my Kingfish, but it wasn't my intended one. In fact it was Sir Galahad, an LST. That'll do. In retrospect, sinking that would have helped the Indians more than the carriers.

I had sent my Flankers in to do what might be termed "Airborne Anti-Anti-Sub Warfare", namely shooting down the ASW choppers that were protecting the carrier/amphibious group so my submarines would have an easier chance later. I managed to take down a Sea King AEW, although I was now in the AAW range of a group containing a carrier that packed Sea Dart.

I took my eye off the ball and lost two of my Badgers to Tornadoes, so I sent the Su-27s after the interceptors. The fight, one of the five Flankers was lost, then I lobbed no less than 30 missiles at the four Tornadoes. Yes, this could be termed "overkill", but as I destroyed all four in one go, it was worth it. I decided to launch another strike with the Badgers.

Things then developed in the east; one of my Kilos found a CZ target (these seem rather easy to find) and I ordered it to attack, but declined the suggestion to accelerate to 20 knots to close the range more quickly - fast gets you located and torpedoed.

A recce Badger D that I'd somehow forgotten about ran out of fuel and crashed; I didn't get a bingo fuel message.

The next strike was a failure; the 14 AS-6s failed to find anything and dropped into the ocean before they could find a target. Then the Tu-16s actually found the group, having wasted their missiles.

For some reason, which I think was impatience, I decided to ready six of my Sukhois with the LR Iron Bomb loadout and accompany them with Badgers carrying AS-6 Kingfish of the anti-radar version (the Kh-26MP). I was intending to use the Badgers to suppress the enemy SAM defences to allow the Flankers to finish the job, but I didn't do my strike timing right - in fact not at all. The Flankers managed to drop a total of 18 iron bombs at the Type 42/3 HMS York. At least five (the entirely of second batch and some of the first 13) missed entirely, but I did 65% damage on the vessel. Two of the supersonic jets were lost and I then ordered the group to RTB.

I had got a good idea of the location of the eastern British group, which consisted of at least another carrier and a Leander 2TA. That would be my next target...

As I was readied my Harriers for an attack on the eastern group with Sea Eagles, the Badgers arrived in range and launched their AS-6 ARMs at the southern group on bearing-only; hopefully the British would turn their radars on and the missiles would home in on those.

The missiles finished off York then two hit Ark Royal, sending the carrier to the bottom. Those are powerful missiles. Very powerful missiles. If two can sink an escort carrier, no wonder the US spent so much on AEGIS...

I had sunk 4 ships and a carrier. Since I didn't know what my minimum victory requirement was, I had to keep going. Another two ARMs then took out Exeter, an earlier T42 model and there were six missiles remaining. However, they merely proceeded to land on some sharks rather than a target.

A group of MiG-25s shot down a Merlin in the southern group. I then ordered them to go VHigh and Reheat, before bringing them back to base as they entered the AAW range.

I discovered that the Harriers didn't have the range for the eastern group at this time so I would have to wait until it was closer; which of course meant that they would be in range as well.

This would ultimately not prove an issue. My Kilos got into range and Sindugash launched three torpedoes at the Leander. I felt it best to focus on the escorts. This resulted in the entire force popping up on my scope and a helicopter dropping a torpedo at me. My subs turned and crept away, but the torpedo missed as did the ones I fired.

My next note says "5 more radars sent at E group", which is a bit nonsensical. After that though, I launched 14 BOL AS-6s at the eastern group, which took out the Type 22/3 Campbeltown and Tobruk another LST, the latter sinking shortly after I left it. This was enough for me to get minimum victory and I called it a day at that point.

This was a very easy scenario for BLUFOR; the local forces are arguably overpowered here against a not particularly pro-active AI.

Harpoon 1.32

Cyprus: HDS II MEDC

After playing about with advanced SAM systems and carriers with enough planes for a small air force, this next scenario was a major step down in capabilities.

First to set the scene. In 1974, after the Greek military junta deposed the civilian government of Cyprus, Turkey (another nation prone to military involvement in politics), invaded the strategically important island. The result was a Turkish occupation of the northern third of the island, a country being created that only Ankara recognises and an unresolved diplomatic situation that impacts duty free allowances in the EU.

This scenario, set in 1994, explores a possible attempt by Greece to take back the island. I have a pre-programmed course for a group of Jason-class LSTs (this apparently can vary each time the scenario is loaded), which I can't really touch.

My air assets are limited in quantity and to be honest quality. I have only eleven fixed-wing aircraft, all shore based, and a single ASW helicopter in the amphib group (henceforth designated ACS). The shore-based aircraft are a bunch of F-104 Starfighters with two Sidewinders and A-7 Corsairs with iron bombs (the scenario designer said not to change the loadouts to give the A-7s stand-off weapons as it would break the scenario balance). Greece has not been at the forefront of military technology for over two millennia.

I have one Type 209 submarine with Harpoons in its tubes. This might be handy.

The ships are an even ruder awakening; on both sides. Most of them are hit-and-sink missile boats, FRAM destroyers from the Second World War and the aforementioned LSTs which are literally just ships with tanks inside. No Harrier carriers for me; most of my ships don't even have SAMs.

Then there's the MEKO 200s, which appear on both sides. This German design is probably the best surface platform of the scenario, but it's just a frigate with SSMs and 16 Sea Sparrows. It's better than nothing, but it's not going to stand up to concentrated attack.

I decide to keep my forces on their pre-set courses as the game begins, then made some minor sensor tweaks (although ACS stayed EMCON A). I rapidly get a contact; a large surface group north of Cyprus including a Sumner-class destroyer. These will need to be dealt with and I decide to initiate an airstrike to hit at the same time as my submarine attacks. As I start to launch my aircraft, I find that three of my F-104s lacked enough range to reach the target. I decided to use these as ground-based CAP, to be launched to intercept inbounds on my airbases. The rest headed for the ships.

As they started to form up for the strike, my ground radars detected a Turkish fighter, probably an F-5E Tiger II. I scrambled the Starfighters to intercept.

At around the same time, I detected a helicopter with my submarine and decided to launch my Harpoons as I was probably detected (I probably wasn't). The two Harpoons were both, rather amazingly, shot down before they could hit their targets.

Consecutively with this, ACS got painted with active radar and I switched on my radars after staff advice. In the Maverick/Sea Sparrow exchange that ensued, the Turks lost three Tigers for one hit on a LST that didn't do any real damage. Not a good exchange ratio.

The air-to-air F-104s went to military power then re-heat, making an intercept on the Turkish attackers, launching their measly six AIM-9Ls and missing with all of them. This caused the Turk to turn and run. A result of sorts.

I detected a Berk frigate south of ACS during this and lobbed three Harpoons at it. This sunk the vessel and the Israeli (I think) national anthem played.

I moved my submarine closer to the Turkish group and launched torpedoes as the airstrike closed in. I failed to factor in a run-time; it would take an hour in game time to reach the target.

The air strike was a disaster. SAMs took out all of my aircraft bar one A-7, which destroyed two patrol boats with iron bombs. I thought a frigate was out of SAMs and sent the A-7 to drop some more 500-lb bombs on it. Turns out it still had some. I should have put in the AG in at low level and gone after the weaker Sumner with the A-7. Give me Harpoons! Still, those were two missile boats out of the equation.

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I was unable to get my saved game back and so ended this version's play here.

Harpoon: 1.30

The world has changed; the USSR has entered the dustbin of history and a good number of naval units will be turning into scrap much faster than anticipated.

With superpower confrontation moved from "possible war" to "alternative history", Harpoon had to change its focus somewhat. I'll get onto some of the "small wars" stuff later.

1.3 brought the HDS1 group of 4 new battlesets, with new scenarios in the existing four areas (GIUK, NACV, IOPG and MEDC) covering potential conflicts that could arise from the "CIS 'Bargain Basement Sale of Slightly Used Weapon Systems'", to quote the description of HDS2 IOPG; one of Harpoon's best lines, up there with "The Ship of A Thousand Names" - as well as other things related to the events of the early 1990s.

We start getting a more "military format" order system with the HDS I battleset. We also get considerably more platforms.

It is worth noting that scenario dates are given in the orders, although the game clock seems very much linked to my system one for starting times. The scenario I chose was the first from HDS1 GIUK, The Svalbard Incident.

The date here is given as April 1998. The V-22 Osprey is present in this in ASW and transport forms; it would not enter RL service until 2007, although that was more due technical issues.

Playing the CIS (now there's a term that's somewhat fallen out of use), my mission is to attack and destroy a US amphibious group as it leaves the Arctic. Now the normal CIS approach to that would involve liberal use of "Backfires"; I don't have any.

My land-based air consists of 6 "Bears", 3 recce "Foxbats", 5 "Flankers".

I have two groups of surface forces. To the east is a "Krivak III" and three "Matkas". The III version of the "Krivak" was the KGB Border Guards version, which removes one of the SA-N-4s, the SS-N-14 and one of the 100mm guns, shoves the other one to the front and adds a helicopter pad with two AK-630s. The database describes it as "actually a better ASW weapon than either the Krivak I or II class", but I'm not hunting subs here and this proved to be rather poor in a surface-to-surface role - the Soviets never really went for helicopter AShMs, while the best surface weapon the class has, the "Silexes" are gone. The "Matkas" are the lightly defended fast attack craft loved by the Soviets; in other words, targets.

My other surface group looked a bit better. A lot better. A "Kresta II", another "Krivak", a "Sovvie" and... Kalinin. Yep, I had a "Kirov" to play with. This ship swapped out the SS-N-14s for SA-N-9 point defence missiles (or would have done if they'd been fitted in RL); considering that a ship like this would be a target of a good couple of squadrons of aircraft, it's a good decision.

Two diesel subs wrapped things off.

As I started, I noticed that my groups already had pre-set travel paths. I decided to leave these until I got a contact.

I then launched my recce Bears out on patrol. As I was dealing with an American amphibious group, I assumed Harriers would be present; a correct assumption. I set the repeating patrol feature, with patrols every 10 +/- 2 hours.

I also launched my three Recce MiG-25s for a search. Their ESM systems promptly detected a Seahawk hovering around.  Since these were ship-based aircraft, it became clear that the amphibs were nearby. However, I wasn't able to shoot the Seahawk down - as my MiG-25s didn't carry any weapons. Who designs a recce bird and doesn't give it a couple of missiles for targets of opportunity?

Then I detected fixed-wing aircraft. Harriers! My "Flankers" didn't have the range to intercept the Harriers, which was rather annoying, particularly in light of later events.

With this location, I vectored my "Krivak" group towards the general area. The Harriers got into Sidewinder range, the MiGs went to afterburner and ran for their base. Unfortunately, they ran out of fuel and crashed. That was stupid.

At the same time, my submarines detected an aircraft flying above them by their passive sonar. Since I couldn't do a thing about this and no torpedoes were being launched, I ended up ignoring the repeated detections throughout the scenario.

Then problems started to occur more serious than the loss of three MiGs - my "Krivak" group was about to run into some very tough opposition.

****

I was now about to discover that removing the forward SA-N-4 from the "Krivak" may not be an issue when dealing with refugees, but it is when you're dealing with Harriers.  I got inbound aircraft on my group. Aircraft that promptly launched Maverick missiles, which go just above Mach 1.

With the Matkas only equipped with "Grails" for their own defence, it wasn't surprising when a Maverick hit one of the hydrofoils and sunk it. Then the "Krivak" took a hit and was slowed down to 24 knots. I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and ordered the ship to head for Severomorsk at full speed.

Then another "Matka" proved that it was actually a bit more capable. As the Harriers closed, the ship shot down two of them! More Mavericks were launched and I turned my frigate back to help the "Matkas"; otherwise they'd go down very quickly. I also scrambled the "Sukhois" to try and intercept the Harriers.

Realising that the SA-N-5s were rear-mounted, I turned the ships around to bring their weapons to bear, but it ultimately didn't do anything. All the ships were destroyed by Mavericks, with multiple hits on the "Krivak III". I reflected that this wouldn't be so quick with my other surface group; they would put up more of a fight.

Happily, things were about to start going my way. The Su-27s arrived and launched medium-range AA-10 at the Harriers, which launched Sidewinders back. In the exchange of fire, I destroyed two Harriers for the loss of a single Su-27. I considered that an acceptable loss ratio.

A later patrol from the "Bears" and the "Flankers" found a Seahawk and an Osprey. They were operating without their radars on. Going active, I located surface contacts and found that they were in range of Kalinin's SS-N-19 "Shipwrecks".

The reporting name of the P-700/SS-N-19 is a very good one indeed. These are among the most powerful missiles in the game; very high speed, enough DPs to severely damage most vessels and with a huge range. I proceeded to launch all sixteen at the group; I could only fire four at a time, so it took four trips to the allocation screen. As I was launching, my air group had to level and lost the ships on radar; the last eight launches were bearing-only. 

Not that it really mattered. Once the missiles were in flight, I set an intercept course.

They would take nine-and-a-half-minutes in game time to get there; I used time compression until the last minute.

It's plain to see why the "Kirov" class was as feared as it was; it's a positive killer to everything that's not a carrier group packing AEGIS. The first salvo sunk an Anchorage class; not a new ship but still rather large The second did not appear to get anything; while the third took out a Large Slow Target of the Newport class. The fourth hit an already blazing target, I don't remember which.

I got the victory message and was asked if I wanted to play on. I chose to do so.

My submarines found a surface contact, but it was too far and too fast for them to make the intercept. A Tornado F.3 proved too far for my Su-27s to reach, turning and running as they arrived.

I then IDed another surface group, which included a British Type 22 frigate and a Canadian Iroquois destroyer. Then two Seahawks arrived.

They launched Penguin missiles at my group. I was a bit concerned; my orders said protect the BCGN at all costs. The SA-N-6 missiles launched but completely missed! My "Sovvie" was hit by two missiles, which merely slowed it down. The "Grumbles" were being particularly poor today; it took several of them to finally destroy the Seahawks.

I was asked if I wanted to leave the destroyer behind. I said no; as I needed the "Sunburn" missiles for the surface action. I would use them shortly afterwards on the 'phib group.

When we got into range, I launched my eight "Sunburn" missiles. Four of them went for the amphibious carrier Tarawa and four at another Newport. I didn't watch the flight in 1:1, something I now somewhat regret, because it's always fun to watch these anti-shipping attacks in real-time. Both vessels sunk, but not with a victorious Soviet anthem, but sad music. Perhaps more appropriate in a way; there would have been a lot of men on those ships.

With only an Over Head Projector (Oliver Hazard Perry FFG) left of the PHIBGRU; I turned my attention to the other larger group. A Lynx made an attack with its Sea Skuas. It made a hit on the "Sovvie" (which took all the hits that group got), but took a SAM of its own. Then the Canadian Iroquois destroyed one of my few Ka-25 "Hormones" with an SM-2MR.

The surface group turned to run; going too fast for the damaged "Sovvie", I had to leave it behind. Even then I couldn't keep up, so I turned for Severomorsk.

Then the enemy SAG turned to follow me! I decided to turn for a surface action (which might have a mistake), landing my choppers. I readied my "Flankers" with iron bombs and launched them; the range was too far. I decided to use them against the lone OHP when they'd been readied again.

Our groups got into range, a Charles F. Adams DDG started firing Standards at me... then the game crashed to desktop.

Oh well... 

Harpoon: 1.2

If I hadn't made an error at the beginning, this would have been a total victory. Instead I had to settle for a minimum one in what was largely a walkover.

Having watched a documentary on the Top Ten Fighting Ships where the Iowa-class battleship was rated the greatest warship type of all time (second was the Nimitz-class supercarrier), I chose a scenario from MEDC that featured one - Study 1.

My mission was to conduct "fire suppression" on the Lebanese coast, occupied by Syria. In practice this meant levelling a couple of airbases and a port with TLAMs and the 406mm guns on Missouri.

So, my force consisted of five ships; Missouri, a Leahy CG, a California CGN, a Kidd DDG and USS Farragut (DDG-37). All of the vessels had Standards for defence, but none of them were Aegis vessels, something felt to be rather unbalancing in this battleset (it's unbalancing in naval warfare full stop).

I decided that the best defence is a good offence, so I chucked my Tomahawks at a Syrian airbase. All 32 of them, which duly flattened the joint. The Tomahawks here appear to be the 250-mile anti-ship versions with a land-attack capability thrown in and not the thousand mile plus TLAM version. I also launched some of my ASW helicopters to patrol for any submarines in the area, even if Syria is not a country renowned for its prowess in submarine warfare. Or in other forms of warfare, as amply demonstrated in nearly everything from the 1948 Israeli War of Independence to 2007's reactor destruction.

In retrospect, using all 32 on a single base was a mistake; I should have spread them to the other bases. This prevented me from getting a total victory.

As I started up, I detected no less than 24 MiG-25s on my ESM. I decided that since I'd been detected, I might as well switch everything on to give me a maximum chance.

Then things started to get fairly easy. The MiGs didn't even attempt to run or accelerate; they wandered into SAM range and went down like grouse on 12 August. Recce MiGs, regular MiGs, it didn't matter.

Eventually, somebody launched some missiles at me; 4 AS-12 "Keglers", which would feature a lot in this scenario. My notes record my initial thought that I was dealing with SSC-3 "Shaddocks"; I was expecting some shore-based SSMs. I got none.

At about this point, I decided two things; I was going to need to use my Harpoons on land targets and that with this many fighter jets buzzing around, it was best to land my rather vulnerable ASW helicopters.

It now becomes necessary to complain about the AI in this version. This scenario is meant to showcase the potential problems the Syrian Air Force can cause close to home. Not when it comes in one or two at a time against a highly capable US force in aircraft designed to tackle heavy bombers and which handle like pigs. The AI had no idea of a mass attack.

This is not to say that I didn't have some slightly hairy moments; one missile in this first wave narrowly missed my battleship and there were others that were destroyed by Phalanx or splashed harmlessly. However, such was my confidence in my SAM capabilities that I was able to time-lapse some of my SAM engagements.

As I headed north, I detected a surface contact on radar. I decided to ready my Seahawks for a stand-off attack with Penguins, not desiring to get into a missile duel. They took a while to ready and I ultimately just forgot about them.

Three were three contacts at this point; heading at 30 knots. I determined these were probably not fishing boats (are there neutrals in this?) and decided to engage with Harpoons.

I was correct; they turned out to be four hostile ships - a "Petya" corvette and three "Osas". I lobbed Harpoons at them and three were sunk. What is the name of that sinking tune? Is it "Anchors Aweigh?" (which I only know because it was a corpse's ringtone on NCIS).

I decided to hold off on further 'Poons on the last "Osa" to let my BB have a go with its 406mm guns, having not used my guns before. Three shots were fired, but all missed. At this point, with no nice animations here (there is a hit flash, but I didn't see it), I lobbed a couple more Harpoons at this last ship and it sunk.

I continued north, intending to use my Harpoons on another Syrian airbase that I wasn't in range of yet.

As I headed north, I found another four surface contacts. I decided to engage these with Standards and guns, to save my Harpoons for later. When my recommendations came up, I removed the Harpoons and replaced them with Standards; somehow I managed to launch two Harpoons though. Again, same result.

When I finally got into Harpoon range of Damascus AB, I lobbed 16 missiles at it, fending off another missile attack. When this only did 13% damage to the installation, I realised that I was going to have to sail up the coast and level Latakia with guns.

After dealing with another attack, I decided that I might as well attack Beirut port (I'd held off believing that targets would "pop up" when I got there), which would give me the second base anyway. I launched 42 SM-1s in two waves at the place. Missile launch animations can take a while when you're launching that many missiles. Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh...

At this point, I decided to save my missiles; I was getting a tad concerned about running out of them. I fairly quickly destroyed the port; those guns are powerful!

When I didn't get a victory message, I double-checked my orders. I needed to destroy one hundred aircraft and I'd only got 74. So, I'd need to destroy Latakia as well to get the aircraft there.

I carried on up the coast, adjusting my formation to move Kidd up to the front as it had more SAMs. It's worth discussing that class here; originally intended for export to Iran, they ended up in US service after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. They are clearly powerful vessels and the large number of SAMs here proved very useful.

There's not a lot else to say here. I thought I was facing a mass attack from Latakia, but it never materialised; I also realised that a number of aircraft attacking me came from Minakh; somewhere else that I should have Tomahawked.

I fended off all the attacks, although there were some near misses and then took out the airbase with just three salvoes from my battleship. Shortly after that, the Star-Spangled Banner played with the victory message and asked me if I wanted to carry on. I didn't really - I couldn't get a Total Victory.

I'd destroyed eight ships, 101 aircraft and three bases, damaging a fourth.

That scenario needs a decent AI to work; later versions will hopefully have it.
----
The next mission will The Svalbard Incident from HDS I; I get to play with a "Kirov" . 

Harpoon: 1.1+ 900502

"Ambush" - NACV

Let's just call this what it was; an unmitigated disaster. The only enemy units I destroyed were aircraft and a land base.

My mission was to attack a US carrier group heading for Iceland; with land-based "Backfires" and "Bears, along with a large number of submarines dotted along the way; including some SSGNs. I had the then-hypothesised air-to-air "Backfire" available with the AA-9 "Amos"; these would get a liberal use.

Failure to set the notification settings early on meant I lost my two "Okean" spy ships very quickly, although one did down an F/A-18 before it went.

I decided to eliminate Keflavik airbase quickly to prevent P-3 Orions etc. from using that and eliminating shore-based ASW coverage for much of the North Atlantic. I duly flattened it with a two-wave AS-6 attack (many were shot down, but enough reached their target) from my "Backfires", which I initially decided to not send against a carrier group.

My submarines had rather frequent weapon mount breakdowns, but their performance would have been poor anyway...

I launched some "Bears" to locate the carrier group near the Eastern Seaboard and it got an ESM reading on a Sentry. I launched air-to-air "Backfires" in an attempt to destroy it. Before they got there, F-15s introduced the Tu-95 to their missiles and I lost the contact.

An "Akula" and two "Victors" got a CZ contact and headed to attack it from long range; torpedoes then showed up out of the blue. The "Akula" was hit and I surfaced it for purely humanitarian reasons (I would do that with other subs too, but only a few before I stopped caring). The two "Victors" followed.

Shortly after this, nuclear release was authorised. Not that I actually managed to nuke anything...

I identified a submarine group and launched an SS-N-16 at it. I notice that the missile component is actually much slower than it would be in the later High Tide annex. This managed to hit and destroy USS Phoenix, a 688 that I believe appeared in Red Storm Rising. Checking the game status, I noticed that I had destroyed 34 aircraft at this point (Keflavik must have been packed...).

Then things went more than a little Pete Tong.


Taking out a land base for fighters and ASW aircraft doesn't ultimately do a lot of good when you're facing a floating air base with 80 aircraft (including the S-3 Viking ASW aircraft) and enough SAM defences for a small city.

Submarines started to go down in rapid succession as they were prosecuted by carrier-based aircraft with more tenacity than a womp rat. One of my subs launched three SS-N-16s at another sub contact; one missed, two were shot down before they could miss.

I lost my two "Oscars", although one took 7 hits to sink; the class is seriously resilient.

Most of my submarines were now gone.

In desperation, I launched some "Backfires" on high-level patrol, hoping to find an ESM signal. Two were shot down out of the blue and I then directed my entire force at the area.

The first lot were a mixture of "Bears" and "Backfires", a bit of a mistake. Ten Tu-95s went and I turned on my radars; I'd detected fighters and my air-to-air Tu-22Ms hurled AA-9s at the fighters. I managed to down some Tomcats with the long-range missiles.

The "Backfires" were split from the group (I don't remember why, possibly ease of use). They then hit bingo and were sent back to base. AIM-54s then shot up the "Bears" and I eventually lost them all.

Then I found a large surface contact. I launched a large number of AS-4s, an improved Spruance. These were shot down by AIM-54s.

The "Backfires" landed, re-armed and took off again- they were attacked by AIM-7s, with seven losses. I detected F/A-18s and shot down three with my AA-9s. I decided to follow the retreating Hornets back and then located a Belknap CG, as well as the carrier.

At this point, I launched the nuclear AS-4s, then turned for base. It was a thrilling moment watching the countdown clock as the AS-4 and AS-6 missiles sped towards their targets, hoping that some would get through. None ultimately did; with most being shot down by SM-2s and AIM-54s from sources I hadn't detected (I hate you, Cooperative Engagement Capability!).

I ordered the nearby subs to head for the group, which launched torpedoes from extreme range. Unfortunately, the contacts disappeared and the 54-minute Type 65 journey was for nothing. The subs were also lost.

With some of the fighters gone, I sent my Tu-22Ms for another go. I got a good fix on most of the group and launched. However, no missiles made it.

My third attempt saw most of my remaining "Backfires" destroyed. The fourth was only done with three air-to-airs and a bomber, which failed utterly.

With none of my subs able to get to the Iceland area (one had ended up off Gibraltar) and my bombers all gone, I hit fast-wind and ended the game when I saw that the enemy had achieved their minimum victory conditions.

Oh well, you can't win them all and I've learnt some lessons from this. The US investment in their navy in the 1980s really paid dividends; an attack on a CVBG would have been a lot harder in 1989 than in 1980.

Harpoon: 1.1

I was discussing with Tony about the lack of the vessel that became Admiral Kuznetsov in the earlier DB. The vessel is present here, under its present name (albeit spelt "Kusnetsov") and described as the ship of a thousand names.

I chose the Indian Ocean battleset and Invincible?, as Ark Royal retiring this Friday (12 November).

The mission here is to use a British carrier group, consisting of Invincible, two Type 42/3s, two Type 22/3s and a Type 23, along with a Trafalgar SSN and an Upholder SS to stop a Soviet surface action group reaching the Arabian Sea.

It appears the Soviet SAG is randomly determined. On first play, it included a "Slava". That game froze shortly after HMS Argyll got splattered by a bunch of "Sandbox" missiles that we first saw coming visually (I understand getting a Sandbox by visual means still gives people nightmares...)

I decided to operate my radars intermittently; about five minutes on, then five minutes off. I increased my formation zones to 20/40/80/160 and set ASW patrols, with a two-Harrier CAP covering a Sea King AEW patrol. To be honest, I'm not sure the CAP was needed; the Soviets didn't have any AAW capable aircraft.

The problem with the Invincible class that it doesn't have that many Harriers, especially as the type wasn't initially designed for STOVL. I had only eight on board; although this was due to the presence of the (rather handy) Sea Dart launcher that would later be removed.

There is a little satellite system codenamed KEYHOLE and it features in this game, giving one helpful hints as to where to look in a vast ocean. KEYHOLE gave me the location of a number of units in the SAG including a "Kashin", a "Kresta II" and a "Sovremmenny" (henceforth called a "Sovvie"). While these units wouldn't stay up there for long,

I had an idea where they were and so sent my entire group towards them, planning for a mass fleet action.

I actually first had a CZ contact from one of my subs, but since I couldn't identify the target, I decided not to risk a long-range Harpoon shot. I never did manage to launch anything from those subs...

The British used to have a rather good stand-off ASuW missile called Sea Eagle; it has now been retired. This was an option for Lynx, Sea King and Harriers; I used plenty of them.

With my two-plane CAP, I only had six Harriers to do the attacking business, but the helicopters would also help. I could safely launch from stand-off range of 50 miles; well outside the Soviet SAM umbrella.

As we got closer, I decided to launch a Harrier based air-attack using AMRAAMs against a Soviet ASW helicopter. This was rather like shooting fish in a barrel; but it's clear that the RN lost something when they retired the Sea Harrier back in 2006.

As we approached, the Harpoon missiles of some of my escorts came into range. Perhaps I should have held off on the attack until everything was in range and chucked one massive strike at them (although I don't appear to have had any Exocets, which made that strategy a bit stupid).

This is where the clear advantage between us and them came into play. Apart from the Sovvies, most of the ships were only equipped with SA-N-1 or SA-N-3a SAMs, which didn't stand a snowball's chance in a blast furnace against Harpoons.

I took down a Sovvie and a "Kashin" (IIRC) in fairly quick order. The Sovvie managed to shoot down a couple, but the "Kashin" didn't stand a chance. If you look at the "Full Report" of a damaged ship, you can see flame animations on the top-down view. An interesting feature.

A strange little tune played when these vessels sunk. When I listened through it on the third go, I found it was meant to be "Rule Britannia".

As our forces closed, the Soviets let off a small riposte; eight "Sunburns" from the Sovvie and later four "Styxes" for a "Mod Kashin" (the class classically called "Tattletales").

Rapid responses to this launch came from my escorts and the Sea Dart-carrying Invincible, with saw Sea Darts and Sea Wolves launching from their launchers in fun style. These proved successful in dealing with the seaskimmers and further Harpoons were fired back.

Then the Soviets tried a different strategy. Missiles were going to be used in different ways...

I probably should have changed formation earlier; I wouldn't have lost as many choppers. With inbound Harpoons heading for a "Kashin", the Soviet destroyer started to launch SA-N-1s. I realised that he wasn't shooting at my missiles, he was shooting at my helicopter. A Sea King had wandered over and the "Kashin" was taking shots at that.

The S-125/SA-3/SA-N-1 series isn't a very good missile these days. It may have bagged an F-117A back in 1999, but that was more luck and stupidity than quality. Even c.1990, it was rapidly becoming obsolete (cf. Operation El Dorado Canyon- OK, that was an export version).

It took about eight missiles before the Sea King eventually went down. Another chopper or two would be shot down later.

The Soviet ships then started hurling the "Goas" at my two Type 22/3s, which had run out of Sea Wolf missiles.

The AI at this point then decided to do something a bit stupid. It launched Sea Darts that it could have more effectively used.

Basically, whenever an SA-N-1 was launched, the Sea Darts on board HMS York and HMS Manchester, my Type 42s, would try to shoot down the SA-N-1s. However, due to the short distance that the "Goas" had to travel and the long distance the similarly-fast Sea Darts had to cover, they simply weren't able to reach the attacking missiles in time. They'd have been better used against the attacking SAG!

A lot of the missiles missed. However, some slammed home. With one of my frigates taking serious damage, I decided to move it to the back of the formation, followed by the other one later on.

Both, however, eventually sank under heavy fire from the remaining Soviet ships.

The "Kresta" and the (extremely obsolete) "Sverdlov" went down in due course. I was basically chucking Sea Darts at them as the range closed - and decided, wisely, to move Invincible to the rear of the formation, lest she get too close and take damage; she eventually ran out of Sea Darts. The Sea Darts proved highly effective; while they weren't doing much damage, they were far more accurate than the SA-N-1s.

I was also launching off air strikes at every opportunity. At this close range it was basically a case of taking off, launching missiles then landing again. I'm sure that the crew would complain about the sortie rates I was enforcing on them...

With only one "Mod Kashin" left, clearly crippled, I decided to close in with my Type 23 and finish it off with guns, but it went down before I could do that.

I was expecting a victory message; I didn't get one. Clearly I had to find the subs.

KEYHOLE gave me the location of an Alfa to my east and I sent the force over there, along with my two subs. Fixes were gained and lost, but eventually helicopter-launched torpedoes from the Sea Kings managed to send two Alfas to the bottom. They are rather noisy subs, it should be remembered. This was done with liberal use of time compression.

The rest of the battle was spent sailing the task force towards the Arabian Sea, with a few ships running aground and frequent weapon breakdowns. Oh, and I lost four Sea Harriers due to a lack of fuel.

The clock ran out and the game was a draw. Subs are notoriously hard to find. 

Not quite Fiendishly Good, but heading there (Review: 'Doctor Who', "The Ghosts of N-Space", 1996)

 

 

Unlike in the US, the tradition of audio drama continues in the UK, with large numbers of them produced every year by the BBC, mostly airing on BBC Radio 4. Colin Baker did a Doctor Who audio in 1986 called “Slipback” (which I’m going to review) and Jon Pertwee did two before his death in 1996.

 

I’m reviewing the second one, “The Ghosts of N-Space” (broadcast in January and February 1996) as part of my Eleven Faces of Who series, being the first of my two Pertwee works. This was written by former producer Barry Letts and directed by Phil Clarke.

 

It’s a lot better than the Argo Tom Baker one that's for sure.

 

Summary

 

The Brigadier’s Sicilian uncle is concerned about ghosts in his ancient castle off the south of Italy and asks his nephew over to take a look. The Brig calls in the Doctor. Meanwhile, Sarah Jane Smith is in Sicily with inept photographer Jeremy Fitzoliver, on holiday (no not that kind of holiday) to try and write a novel as no-one is accepting her stories about travelling with the Doctor. She sees the Brig and follows him to Mario’s island. As they investigate, they discover a history-spanning plot by an evil sorcerer to access a mysterious spectral dimension called N-Space, while a metal-armed Mafia boss is trying to acquire the property from Mario with menaces.

 

Plot

 

This is a 6x25 minute tale i.e. a six-parter classic Who story, with cliff-hangers and so-on. There don’t appear to be any reprises, but these might have been edited out of the CD release – this story probably needed to have them kept to be fully understandable. Some of the resolutions to the cliff-hangers are a bit poor all in all.

 

This is a multi-setting story, set on the same island in 1504, 1818 and 1975, with the Doctor and SJS travelling between the times (and N-space) as the story goes on. There’s more TARDIS scenes here than in some whole seasons and the whole concept is one that DW does too rarely in my humble opinion.

 

The plot involving “ghosts” and alchemy takes a while to get going, while the Mafia side-plot actually is relevant. Ultimately it all comes together in the final part, but there is quite a bit of unnecessary padding and Sarah Jane pretends to be a boy, which is frankly unbelievable [Bob. – Ed]. Some distinctive pseudo-science turns up here and my notes reflect my wondering if the method of entering N-Space wasn’t in fact The Rite of AskhEnte. There’s also a strong Catholic air to this tale – N-space is Purgatory to a great extent – and we even have the Inquisition turn up. I wasn’t expecting them… [You’re this close to being fired – Ed.]

 

I would make a further note here that there is no watershed on BBC radio and some strong language features in this.

 

Sound design

 

Superb – the BBC have a long history of radio drama and there is very little to fault with it. It’s clear from  the plot that the BBC would never be able to do many key parts of this tale on television (even now you’d have problems with the budget), but you’re brought into it. The commentary by the characters that is a requirement for this medium isn’t too forced.

 

One noticeable oddity here. Peter Howell does the incidental music for this one – and this has his theme arrangement in it. This is a bit odd to begin with, but it grows on you and there’s not too much of the music in here.

 

The regulars

 

In a way, there’s a certain sadness to this tale – all three stars are now in the next world.

 

·         The Third Doctor: This is Jon Pertwee’s final appearance as the Third Doctor (final released one at any rate) and he does the job wonderfully, carrying the role off with just the right combination of haughtiness, flair and alien behaviour. Sarah Jane even is regaled with her own version of the “flower story” from “Frontier in Space”.

·         Sarah Jane Smith: Lis Sladen here is playing an earlier version of the character, not the more mature one of later years. While she does a good job, her material isn’t as good as it could be and she at times comes across a bit ineffectual.

·         The Brigadier: Nick Courtney turns in another fine performance as the UNIT commander (although the rest of UNIT doesn’t appear). He demonstrates fine leadership, a distinct unflappability and a general “Oh, really Doctor?” attitude that makes his character so well-loved.

 

The guest cast

 

This is a full cast audio drama. Main villainy duty goes to Stephen Thorne, who has experience in powerful and demonic for this ‘verse and turns in a reasonable performance here, in more than one role. Even if the Mafia boss is straight out of Central Casting.

 

The rest of the guest cast are a bit more uneven. Mario is stereotyped and hard to understand, the Mafia guys are just as stereotyped and the gangster’s girlfriend character Maggie not only sounds like Trillian from the TV version of THHGTTG, she’s actually played by Sandra Dickinson (who did that role, was born in the USA and is also Georgia Moffett’s mother). One guest character is ultimately not necessary to the plot.

 

Jeremy Fitzoliver deserves special mention. The character is deliberately clumsy and ineffectual, only doing two actually good things on his own. If the aim was to get me to dislike him, it clearly worked.

 

Conclusions

 

Well above average, but this would have been even better in five parts and with some less clichéd guest characters.

 

7/10

Harpoon: 1.0

I moved onto "Gauntlet" and switched sides. This mission involved me having to attack a merchant group of three generic merchies (all the merchies are of one type here) with a "Victor II", two "Nanuchka III" corvettes and six "Floggers".

As soon as  the "Victor" got a rough location on the group, I launched long-range torpedoes at it. They took about an hour in real time, but the results were worth it. I launched more torpedoes as I got closer.

The first ship to go was a British Type 22 and the Soviet national anthem played in cute MIDI form to celebrate my victory (it does go on for a while, but you can stop it).

I eventually sunk two merchants and got minimum victory conditions. I was asked if I wanted to play on for total victory.

When the "Victor" went out of range, I sent the surface ships after it. They were attacked by what appeared to be Harpoons and the missile animations started. They shot the missiles down; the SA-N-4 is great in this game.

They turned to pursue the group (which I only had the location of the SH-60 in at this point), using their superior speed. Eventually they got into "Siren" range. The "Sirens" were all shot down- I should have fired them all at once rather than a few at a time. I wasn't too concerned about individual target identification.

At around the same time, my six "Floggers" launched, flying at 650 knots (tad fast for a cruising speed). They had AS-7s but maybe fired one before they were all shot down by a very sharp USS Boone. They used SA-N-4s on the remaining merchant, then I think time ran out.

Nearly total victory was mine.

It's another Galloway gaffe!

This time he's insulted disabled people.

The man is clearly unsuitable for any political position of responsibility. RESPECT needs to get rid of him.

'Doctor Who' Season 16 (1978/9): Six Faces of Adventure

The Doctor wonders if he should move a certain something one foot to the left

 

Season 16 would be another difficult one for the Graham Williams/Anthony Read partnership. In fact, the script editor left after this run. There were further industrial relations problems at the BBC (the first story’s production featured a demarcation dispute over whose job it was to light the flaming torches on set) as Britain was hit by the Winter of Discontent, with widespread strikes, most notably among refuse collectors and undertakers, ultimately forcing the minority government of Jim Callaghan out of office in a no confidence vote – the subsequent election was won by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservatives.

 

Tom Baker almost left the show – he wanted more control over the creative direction of Doctor Who, which Williams (who felt Baker had been there too long) was not prepared to grant. Eventually, the whole thing was sorted by Head of Drama Graeme McDonald bringing the two parties together – Baker signed a new contract, not getting any of his demands.

 

In addition, Baker managed to provoke a dog owned by a guest star into biting him on the lip during a gap between filming of the first story, “The Ribos Operation” – the injury is visible for a number of episodes of the run and he had to wear a plaster for publicity photos.

 

Not only that, Williams was implementing his planned season-long arc, for what was going to be the 15^th anniversary season, which meant a lot of planning and a bit less flexibility in running order if a story ran into problems.

 

In comparison, the incident during “The Power of Kroll” involving a bunch of nearly naked guys having to either take chemical showers at RAF Bentwaters[1] or have their skin scoured at a hotel to remove waterproof green make up (because the make-up artist forgot to order the removal stuff) was light relief.

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Season 16’s overall arc involved something called “The Key to Time”. A powerful being – in fact more powerful than the Time Lords, called the White Guardian tasked the Doctor with finding the six segments of a mythic artefact that could control the universe. The Key to Time needed to be put back together to allow for balance to be restored to the cosmos… and kept out of the hands of the evil Black Guardian. The segments were disguised as various objects and the Doctor was given a Tracer device (an expensive and prone to breaking prop) to track the segments, then convert them into their proper form. To avoid spoilers, I won’t reveal what the segments are here.

 

The Doctor couldn’t do this solely with a robot dog (even though the K9 prop was upgraded to make it more reliable), so the White Guardian impersonated the Time Lord President and brought a young (by Time Lord standards) Time Lady from Gallifrey to assist the Doctor. The original plan had been to bring Lis Sladen back as Sarah Jane Smith, but she declined the offer, hence a new and highly memorable companion arrived…

 

Book Smart Beauty – Romana I

 

Romanadvoratelundar, or Romana for short (it was that or “Fred”) is one of the best-loved companions in DW, spoken of in the same breath as Sarah Jane, Jo or Ace. In her first incarnation,  Romana was a Grace Kelly[2]-style ‘ice queen’, bright, haughty and lacking in practical experience of the universe. She was also a superb dresser, although high heels aren’t always best in this gig and even the Doctor noted her attractiveness.

 

The choice out of three thousand applicants for the new role was Yorkshire-born Mary Tamm (1950-2012). Tamm, of Russian and Estonian descent[3], had come to prominence through appearing in The ODESSA File[4] and The Likely Lads. Tamm was highly popular, but was initially reluctant as she didn’t want to be another damsel in distress. In the end, she chose to leave after one season as the character went that way in her opinion.

 

Following Doctor Who, Tamm appeared in a whole lot of guest roles, some films (including one that saw her killed off by Sylvester McCoy) and even computer games, appearing in video for Privateer 2: The Awakening. She recorded a chunk of Big Finish, including a series of audios with Tom Baker, that will be released in 2013.

 

Mary Tamm died of cancer in July 2012, aged 61. This sad news for the fandom was made more tragic when her husband Marcus Ringrose suffered a fatal heart attack a few hours after her funeral.

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This was yet another six story, 26-episode run. While the Key to Time hunt plays a role throughout the season, each serial can be watched on its own without too many problems. The stories are a bit less jokey here, with the BBC telling Williams and the directors to remember that they were making a fundamentally serious show. The quality is reasonable, except for two clunkers at the end.

 

I recently bought the box set of this season on DVD (in a sad coincidence, it arrived on the morning of the news of Mary Tamm’s death), so a re-watch with reviews is a possibility. My memories of this one is that most of the run is good – except the last two.

 

The Ribos Operation (4 parts)

 

Ribos, a mediaeval-tech-level world where the seasons last for years. Two confidence tricksters are planning to sell the planet to an exiled tyrant. Little do they know that they actually have the first segment of the Key on them…

 

Bob Holmes’ witty, atmospheric and enjoyable tale starts us off in style, with a rich story, a great “Holmesian double act” and Baker turning in a great performance, along with Tamm, who got on well with him from the get-go.

 

The Pirate Planet (4 parts)

 

The Doctor, Romana and K9 land on what their systems say is Calufrax, but is actually a planet called Zanak… a planet that isn’t your normal sort of planet.

 

The writer’s name on this one alone is highly notable – Douglas Adams. The author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in most of its various forms worked on this at the same time as the first THHGTTG radio series and a number of references to Hitchhiker’s turn up in the show here and in other stories by other writers – also, the plot of the third novel, Life, the Universe and Everything was based on a rejected script for this show.

 

It’s typical Adams, with lines like “I’ll never be cruel to an electron in a particle accelerator again” and a whole bunch of outlandish concepts – a lot of trimming was needed to get this workable[5]. It’s a very good story: the guest cast are great, as are the regulars.

 

This story has never been officially novelised – Adams never got round to it before his death in 2001.

 

The Stones of Blood (4 parts)

 

The TARDIS crew arrive in modern Britain, near a stone circle that is attracting the attention of a cult and a not-so-mythical ‘goddess’. To make it worse, some of the stones move…

 

The 100^th Doctor Who serial (Part 4 of this was broadcast in the anniversary TV week – the anniversary falling on a Thursday), which was due to feature a birthday scene for the Doctor until Graham Williams vetoed the idea as too self-indulgent[6], “Stones” is a dark, strong tale with strong horror lashings – including the nasty death of two campers just to up the tension. It arguably flags a little near the end, but I like this one a lot. The consistent videotape use throughout helps with this one.

 

The Androids of Tara (4 parts)

 

Political intrigue abounds on Tara, a world of android doubles where a Princess looks exactly like Romana…

 

Featuring Mary Tamm playing no less than four roles, “Tara”, a pastiche of The Prisoner of Zenda[7], is a swashbuckling tale that puts the key hunt to a minor status (Romana in fact collects the segment in Part One). With location filming at Leeds Castle[8] and a dastardly villain in the classic mould of dastardly villains, this is an enjoyable tale with a lot of love – in most quarters. I believe I actually read the Target novelisation before seeing this on TV.

 

The Power of Kroll (4 parts)

 

A struggle is going on between the natives and the crew of a refinery on the marshy planet Delta Magna. Not only that, the natives’ god, a giant squid called Kroll, is starting to awake.

 

Robert Holmes had one or two misfires during his career on this show, especially when he worked under restrictions. This story, his last until 1984, is definitely one of them, with Holmes told to incorporate the then largest monster in Doctor Who history into the adventure. Poor set design (the set designer never worked on the show again), a questionable scene involving an attempted sacrifice of Romana, a cameraman getting bad advice that wrecked a vital split screen effect and poor acting by most of the guest cast pop this one into the ‘clunker’ territory, with Holmes’ weaker than usual script not helping here.

 

K9 does not feature in this story – the marshy terrain was a no-no for him. However, due to another actor having to pull out, John Leeson stepped in front of the camera to play Dugeen, his only on-screen appearance as an actual actor.

 

The Armageddon Factor (6 parts)

 

The Doctor and Romana are caught up in a centuries-long nuclear war between the planets of Atrios and Zeos. It turns out that an agent of the Black Guardian is manipulating events…

 

This Bob Baker and Dave Martin tale (their last one together) should have been a big epic climax – it’s more of an epic clunker… Bad acting, an overly long story and a final climax that’s ultimately a huge let-down render this the worst story of Season 16.

 

Arguably the most noteworthy guest star in this one is one Lalla Ward, who plays a pivotal role in this (she’s a bit wooden here, but there’s arguably a reason for it). Yes, we’ll be seeing her again very soon.

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1978/1979 also marked two further milestones for the show in the US. Firstly, the show was shown for the first time on the PBS stations, where it obtained a cult status, especially among students. A previous airing on Time-Life in 1972 had been unsuccessful – the network seems to have not realised the episodic nature of the show and moved it around the schedules too much.

 

Secondly, Who One in Los Angeles became the first US Doctor Who convention.

 

Back in the UK, this run got 8.6 million viewers on average. Again a sizeable hit, things were going to be getting much better, but not due to any of the show’s actions. Industrial action was about to have its biggest impact on Doctor Who.

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[1]A now-closed American fighter base (its career included operating A-10s and an Aggressor squadron), Bentwaters now possesses a museum and is also a regular location for filming.

[2]Grace Kelly (1929-1982) while considered one of the most beautiful actresses of all time, had a surprisingly short career, only doing eleven films, three for Alfred Hitchcock. At the age of 26, she married Prince Rainier, the ruler of Monaco, the small principality on the French Riviera and retired.

[3]Tamm’s parents were in fact refugees from Estonia, which had been forcibly reintegrated into the then Soviet Union.

[4]Film adaptation of Frederick Forsyth’s second best known (and excellent) novel, published in 1972. The plot, set in 1963, is about a German reporter trying to find a concentration camp commandant, Eduard Roschmann, the “Butcher of Riga”, who is plotting to provide Egypt with the means to destroy Israel. Roschmann really existed – he was exposed as a result the film and arrested by the Argentine police, but jumped bail, dying in Paraguay in 1977.

 

The film starred Jon Voight, with Tamm taking on the role of his girlfriend Sigi.

[5]Also Douglas Adams was renowned for missing deadlines.

[6]The cake had already been ordered at this point, so the cast and crew naturally ate it.

[7]1894 novel by Anthony Hope about an English gentleman who is persuaded to impersonate the abducted king of Ruritania at his coronation – there have been a lot of adaptations and homages over the years, with this tale having a lot of similar characters. A working title for this serial was in fact “The Androids of Zenda”, but the BBC were understandably concerned about copyright issues.

[8]In Kent, not Yorkshire.

Harpoon: Alpha 891212

The second Alpha is far more playable. It takes a while to get used to the interface. I was surprised that the ship that became Admiral Kuznetsov doesn't feature in this Alpha. I noticed that the firing arcs are clearly shown for each weapon in the DB page; they don't feature in later DBs.

I chose "Dawn Patrol", the first mission and a bit of a classic among 'Pooners. It's certainly changed over the years.

My force consisted of 4 Storm PTGs, an Oslo FF and a British Leander. I chose to have my two frigates light up their radars and headed north at about 15 knots.

The ocean is a very big place and I managed to miss the two "Nanuckha IIIs" entirely. I got one SOSUS contact, turned back to head for that then lost it.

I continued in the general direction, but the time ran out and the game was a draw. No shots were even fired.

Onto the first full version.

Neil Armstrong 1930-2012

It is reported that the first man on the Moon has died.

 

I’ve had a long interest in space travel and the Moon landings are a pivotal moment in that, as well as all human history. Armstrong wasn’t just a ‘lucky guy’ – his actions during a difficult landing saved Eagle from crashing and his decision to avoid the spotlight afterwards speaks volumes to the man’s character.

 

When we get a permanent facility on the Moon, it should be named after this man.

 

Rest in Peace, Mr Armstrong.

Banning abortion doesn't stop abortions - it just makes them more dangerous

The Republican platform for the 2012 presidential elections calls the banning of all abortions except for when the woman's life is in danger. While Romney supports an exception for cases of rape and incest, this platform.

Have they learned nothing from when abortion was illegal? Women still got abortions - they just did them in secret, under poor medical conditions that cost many of them their fertility at best and their life at worst.

I don't like abortion - however, banning it is not the solution here.

Doctor Who reviews for Season 33/7

I will be doing reviews for the new season of Doctor Who. However, to avoid spoiling our American players, these will be posted nine days after UK transmission.

Harpoon: Alpha 880916

The first thing I realise is that this is an old game. I have to hit space to get past the initial screens; a click won't work. Also, the graphical area is pretty small.

I took a look at the databases. Only a limited amount of stuff, but a very interesting view of the world back then. Everything has cost estimates, which is something you don't get today. The drawings were used in the Battle of Brunei MBX; it's a very interesting style which has an old school charm.

I couldn't find my orders; it took me a while to find out what side I was on and I couldn't refocus the map.

Being unable to really do anything, I decided to give up and move straight onto the next version.

Harpoon, a walk through the versions

I'm going to be posting my Harpoon Ultimate Edition play through reports here in future. I'll start with the initial one and then work my way through.

This is my original introduction from November 2010:

This is my first go with Classic/Commander's and as I've not had years of 'Pooner experience, I thought it might be interesting to see how the game has changed. I'll add a post as I go through each version, playing a scenario in each one.

Psychic Convention (Book Review: 'Doctor Who: Instruments of Darkness')

As I continue through the “Eleven Faces” series, I’ve had to expand from stories I haven’t seen (as I’ve seen pretty much all the complete classic ones) into the expanded universe, which I’ll call EU from here on in, of Doctor Who. This review is of one of the original tie-in novels, published during the “wilderness years”, when the show was not on TV.

There are four essential groups of 1989-2005 original novels (and the odd novelisation of something else) starring the Doctor, all paperbacks:

• The New Adventures (NA): 61 novels published by Virgin Publishing from 1991 to 1997[1], nearly all starring the Seventh Doctor.
• The Missing Adventures (MA): Also by Virgin Publishing, these 33 novels released from 1994 to 1997 , plus the stand-alone Who Killed Kennedy? from 1996, which is generally counted among them. These cover the first six Doctors.
• Eighth Doctor Adventures (EDA): BBC Books’ 73 book series covering further adventures of Paul McGann’s Eighth Doctor, running from 1997 to 2005. 
• Past Doctor Adventures (PDA): BBC Books’ 1997-2005 series featuring the first seven Doctors (mostly). 75 novels were released.

The BBC ended their classic novel series when the current run of the show began to focus on novels in that setting, but have recently restarted it with a Second Doctor novel and a new novelisation of the not-transmitted Season 17 story “Shada”.

These novels, aimed at an adult audience, expand the continuity in many ways (some of them controversial, such as Time Lord reproduction). There is no official statement on canonicity of any EU work and fans are allowed to pick what bits they want from them, in essence[2]. They have also added a large number of additional companions who have become popular among the fandom and appeared in other EU works, such as the Big Finish audios – most notably companion to the Seventh Doctor archaeologist Bernice “Benny” Summerfield, who not only got her own novel series, but also her own audio one.

Acquisition notes

I acquired the Gary Russell[3] 2001 novel Instruments of Darkness, the 48^th PDA, in 2006 at a Doctor Who event in a London department store. Colin Baker (the Sixth Doctor) was there and I purchased a novel starring his Doctor for him to sign. Lovely gentleman, by the way.

I’ve finally gotten round to reading it…

Where we’re at

Instruments of Darkness is a Sixth Doctor tale set nearer to the end of the incarnation. The Doctor and Melanie “Mel” Bush (a fitness fanatic with a propensity to scream a lot) have been travelling together for a while. Before the Mel met the Doctor for the first time[4], he travelled with two other companions, one of whom, Evelyn Smythe makes her sole PDA appearance here – she had previously featured in Big Finish.

This tale is a sequel to The Scales of Injustice and Business Unusual, the latter by Russell as well, featuring a number of the same characters.

The plot  

I’ll quote the blurb in full. Seems best really.

The leaders on planet Earth think that the Magnate is a mysterious 'shadow Government' that controls the world. It isn't. The leaders believe the Network to be a ramshackle, paranoid outfit of European anarchists who will eventually blow themselves up. They won't. The leaders believe that if there are humans who can control things with their minds - ESPnets - they're few and far between, and not worth worrying about. They're wrong. The leaders believe that one minute after midnight on 31 December 1993, a new year, full of promise, will begin. They're wrong.

The Doctor and Mel arrive on Earth just days before New Year. An old friend has been kidnapped and taken to France. And two murderous enemies are setting up a new life in the Peak District. Which of these threats should the Doctor deal with first? And why is his old travelling companion Evelyn Smythe using her knowledge of the future to make a fortune from chocolate cake recipes?!

What works

• The opening of this novel, involving a mysterious albino turning up at various points in American history and with a few deaths along the way, sets up a nice air of mystery that slowly becomes clear along the course of the 287 pages. It’s clear from the get-go this is a grown-up tale (with an attempted rape in the first chapter).
• The Sixth Doctor (who just needs a decent script) shines in this tale, with his wordiness and general pomposity coming across nicely.
• In addition, so does Evelyn. Evelyn is a non-traditional companion, in that she’s an old lady and retired professor, who can operate with the Sixth Doctor as his intellectual equal, unlike Peri and Mel, the screamers of this era. She gets some brilliant stuff here and a wonderful bit on the problems of knowing the future.
• There’s a rather great James Bond reference in the book, as well as a general atmosphere of ‘heart attacks’ and spy action.
• You don’t need to have read the previous two novels to understood this one.

What doesn’t
 
This is a tale involving extrasensory perception (ESP) and mind stuff like that… I have a problem suspending my disbelief when it comes to things like that. Yes, I know this is a show with time travel and things bigger on the inside.

• Also this is a continuity-heavy novel, with lots of references to the previous books and other EU stuff like C19, a former British alien defence agency. One character is implied to be an old companion who oddly enough features in another work I’ll be reviewing. Not one for the casual fan this.
• It’s hard to follow the plot at times and to keep track of some of the characters. It also seems a bit oddly paced and the climax lacks tension. 
• There is more than one historical error – possibly deliberate – such as Eurostar operating in 1993, when in our world it opened in 1994. This irked me a little. 
• Finally, what’s this whole thing with albinos and mysterious powers? The only thing really special about them, as TV Tropes points out, is a greater risk of skin cancer.

Conclusion

Competent, but not brilliant. There are better – and arguably worse – PDAs out there.

6/10

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[1]The rights went to the BBC after the 1996 TV movie, but Virgin were allowed to publish the remaining ones in the series.

[2]Especially as one lot of EU can contradict another.

[3]Editor of Doctor Who Magazine from 1991-1995 and Big Finish producer until 2006, he is now a script editor on the main show, although that role is less prominent than it used to be. An actor as well as writer, he has done quite a lot of books.

[4]He met her for the first time in “Trial of a Time Lord”, but that was further ahead in her personal time stream.