High Seas Fleet 1

High Seas FleetSecond Edition

The First World War at SeaAugust 1914 - November 1918

Edited by

Ed Kettler and Larry Bond

with Scenarios by

Larry Bond, Chris Carlson, Michael W. Harris, Terry Sofian,Mal Wright, Stuart Rees, & Ed Kettler

published by

The Admiralty Trilogy Group

Copyright ©2000, 2018 by The Admiralty Trilogy Group, LLC.

All rights reserved. Printed in the USA. Made in the USA.No part of this game may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the pub-lisher.

Fear God & Dread Nought is a registered Trademark by Larry Bond, Christopher Carlson, Edward Kettler, and Michael Harris for their WW I tactical naval wargame. The Admiralty Trilogy is a registered Trademark by Larry Bond, Christopher Carlson, Edward Kettler, and Michael Harris for their Twentieth-Century tactical naval gaming system.

The designers of Fear God & Dread Nought and High Seas Fleet are prepared to answer questions about play of the game system. They can be reached in care of The Admiralty Trilogy Group, PO Box 1372, 5238 Port Royal Road, Spring-field VA 22151, and at AdTrGroup@aol.com. Visit their website at http://www.admiraltytrilogy.com.

This version of High Seas Fleet, 2nd edition, has been updated to include all corrections from errata through September 2018

Maps by Steve Pancrazio

Cover: Hochseeflotte der Kaiserliche Marine, colorized by Irotooko_jr

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High Seas Fleet2Dedication

ToEdith D. Copp Kettler

Staff Sergeant, USMCKorea

1925 to 1994Semper Fi, Mom

Special thanks to the hard working team of scenario designers: Larry Bond, Chris Carlson, Michael W. Harris, Charlie Spiegel, Stuart Rees, Mal Wright and Terry Sofian. They supported each other, sharing research materials, filling in details and gaps in the scenarios, and greatly strengthened the overall quality of High Seas Fleet. The depth and breadth of sce-narios is a testament to their dedication.

Thanks to Larry Bond for his guidance, A. D. Baker III for research support, and to Steve Pancrazio for his efforts in re-executing the scenario mapst. Thanks to Christoph Kluxen and Steve Thorne for their help in checking the scenarios.

Photographs were kindly provided by Erwin Seiche in Austria, Alister Greenway in the UK, Colin Duell in South Africa, and Guy Derdall from his Battleships, Carriers and All Other Warships site at http://www.warships1.com.

As always, an overwhelming debt of gratitude to my wife, Mercy, and children, Ron and Erika.

The naval history bug afflicted Ed Kettler at an early age: his father was a US Navy petty officer and his mother a Marine NCO during the Korean War. A wargamer since age 10, he started his career as a game designer with South Atlantic War, the Falklands War supplement for Harpoon. He was a beta tester for all of the Harpoon computer games, and designed battlesets for Harpoon 2. He is the editor for the Command at Sea supplement Steel Typhoon, contributed scenarios to Rising Sun, designed the CaS Referee’s Guide and contributed to rules development. He is technical manager on large-scale software projects for a major integrator for his day job.

Chris Carlson is one of the lead designers of the Admi-ralty Trilogy series of tactical naval wargames. He has been involved in wargaming in general and naval games in par-ticular, since he was a wee lad. He is a former naval officer with a mechanical and marine engineering background. Al-though a former submariner, he is a true battleship fanatic and an ardent admirer of Admiral Sir John Jellicoe.

Michael W. Harris is a dedicated historian and longtime member of the Admiralty Trilogy design team. An avid fan of wargaming, he has been interested in strategy and tactics since he first learned to play chess as child with his father. He is a former naval surface warfare officer and was a battleship turret officer on board USS Iowa. He is also a prolific scenario designer having researched and developed many of the scenarios in High Seas Fleet.

Stuart Rees is a serving officer in the South Australian Police. Stuart and his wife Mary have one child and live on the coastal fringe of Adelaide. He has been interested in na-val history for over 20 years and regularly hosts wargames at his home. His interest is firmly in the coal burning era, but he has studied many other periods as well. He has travelled widely. His scenarios in this publication are based on interesting situations he read of during his research and which he felt would make good manageable wargames. He is a strong believer in wargames being fun as well as his-torically correct and is well known for the amount of effort he puts into his scenarios.

Terry Sofian has been interested in artillery and fortifica-tion since an early age. This interest was developed by his father, Perry, a field artillery Captain and part owner of Ashe Ordnance Works, a cannon reproduction company. Terry has served as both a National Guard Artilleryman and a Navy Reserve Gunners Mate. He holds a Master's Degree in Biology, works as the lead instructor at a nuclear waste cleanup site and is a volunteer firefighter/hazardous materi-als technician and an evidence/body recovery diver. He has a beautiful and intelligent daughter named Kelly. Terry has written for the Admiralty Trilogy and several other games.

Mal Wright has been involved in the Australian wargames scene for over forty years. He is married, has seven children and is a retired police officer. He has spent a considerable time researching and lecturing in military history with a specialty in WW I. His origins in the hobby were through naval wargames, although he later diverged into other areas. He has written for many publications and his naval scenarios have been widely used and translated into several languages. He provided scenarios, conducted training wargames and lectures for the military in Australia during the 1970s. He has lectured to students and ex-service organizations. He has provided advice to a previous Minister of Defence, including situations wargamed to see the effect. Some of his maritime art is aboard the Austra-lian warship Anzac and he provides illustrations for other sources including the cover of this work. He has published a series of books on Commonwealth WW II naval camouflage.Sample

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High Seas Fleet 3Foreword

The second edition of High Seas Fleet has many welcome scenario additions to deepen the tactical diversity of condi-tions for gaming World War One naval engagements.

In particular, I was delighted to read through the very thorough and well-structured Jutland scenarios. The battle was, interestingly, first featured in the curriculum of the U.S. Naval War College at Newport in 1916, within months of it being fought on the North Sea. Admiral Sir John Jellicoe had provided his insights informally in very early June to his friend Admiral William S. Sims (who had been the War College’s President before the outbreak of war). The gaming of the battle was seen as an effective tool to stimulate tactical insight, speed of reaction and clarity of command and com-munications.

Future commanders like Chester Nimitz and Ernest King had both intimately studied and gamed the battle to be able to directly take their insights from gaming the battle to engaging its lessons later at sea.

The updated High Seas Fleet remains an invaluable con-tribution to the exploration of tactics command and control.

Nick JellicoeThe Battle of Jutland Centenary Initiative

www.jutland1916.com

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High Seas Fleet 5

* = hypothetical scenario

Table of Contents PageDedication & Acknowledgments 2Foreword by Nick Jellicoe 3Table of Contents 5Editor’s Notes 6The Balance of Power 7Alfred von Tirpitz Biographical sidebar 9Naval Chronology of World War I 10Jackie Fisher Biographical sidebar 13Opening Moves First Blood 5 August 1914 A minelayer is caught in the act 14 Gunfire in the Moonlight 6 August 1914 1 on 1 light cruiser action 16 Escape From Messina 8 August 1914 Battlecruiser, cruiser action 17 Gulf of Finland 17 August 1914 Minelaying sortie meets patrol 18 The Broad Fourteens 17 August 1914 Light cruiser, destroyer action 20 Trawler Phobia 20 August 1914 German cruiser, destroyer raid 22 The Battle of Heligoland Bight 28 August 1914 General fleet action 24 The Auxiliary War 14 September 1914 Armed merchant cruisers 27 Colonial Convoy 5 October 1914 Convoy escorts against raiders 28 Destroyer Action 17 October 1914 Destroyer flotilla action 29Battllecruisers: What Price Speed? Sidebar 30 Battle of Jaluit 28 September 1914 von Spee collides with the Japanese* 31 Battle of Coronel 1 November 1914 Small fleet action 32 Death of a Raider 9 November 1914 1 on 1 cruiser action 34 Battle of Cape Sarych 18 November 1914 Black Sea battleship action 36 Battle of the Falklands 8 December 1914 Squadron-level action 37 Battle of Cape Town 12 December 1914 von Spee raids Cape Town* 40Raids and Landings 42 Minutes of Misty Madness 16 December 1914 Hartlepool Raid 42 The Cuxhaven Raid 25 December 1914 First carrier air raid 44 The Battle of Dogger Bank 25 January 1915 General fleet action 46 Dardanelles Overture 25 February 1915 Ships bombard coastal forts 49 By Ship Alone 18 March 1915 Ships force passage through straits 53 Battle of Gotland Islands 2 July 1915 Minelaying sortie meets patrol 56 Battlecruisers! 21 August 1915 Battlecruisers meet in the mists* 58 Battle off Durazzo 29 December 1915 Cruiser, destroyer action 60 Raid on Durazzo 27 January 1916 Cruiser, destroyer raid on port 62The Battle of Jutland 31 May 1916 Massive fleet action 63 The Run to the South 66 The Battle Fleets Engage 68 Recommended Reading 73War at Sea Blind Man’s Bluff 19 August 1916 Fleet action* 74 The Otranto Barrage 15 May 1917 Cruiser, destroyer raid 80Operation Albion 84 Kassar Reach (Kassar-Wik) 12 October 1917 German MS escort meets Russian defenders 85 Return to Kassar Reach 14 October 1917 Russian patrols engage German BB 88 Gulf of Riga (Moon Sound) 17 October 1917 Battleships and escorts engage 90The Final Acts Heligoland Bight II 17 November 1917 Counter-minesweeping operation 94 The Final Sortie 20 January 1918 Battlecruiser vs. monitors 99 Adriatic Destroyer Action 22 April 1918 Raid on the Otranto Barrage 100 Austria’s Last Hurrah 11 June 1918 Battleship and cruiser action* 102Bibliography 105Great War Phonetic Alphabets Sidebar 106

Maps: The Mediterranean 4 Admiralty Patrol Zones 107 The Adriatic 108 The Baltic 109

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High Seas Fleet6Editor’s Notes

Putting together the scenarios for an Admiralty Trilogy product is usually a labor of love for one or two people who enjoy naval history and detailed work. When we decided that we were going to work on the World War I project, we had a surplus of volunteers who wanted to write pieces of the scenario guide, and so I was selected to be the editor-in-chief and to get a plan in place. Thanks to the Internet, we were able to assemble a global team of designers who worked together to produce a wide variety of scenarios which, we hope, covers the breadth of the naval conflict between 1914 and 1918. • Chris Carlson, Virginia, USA • Michael W. Harris, Virginia, USA • Ed Kettler, England/Texas, USA • Terry Sofian, Missouri, USA • Mal Wright and Stuart Rees, Australia

The scenarios are a mix of historic and “what if” or “nearly happened but...” actions from around the world. Fictional scenarios are noted as such in the Operational Situation section of the scenario, and in the Historical Outcome. Some of the scenarios are unbalanced and difficult, if not impossible, to win by destroying the opponent, but the victory conditions allow for equal chances to win. Nobody ever said war was supposed to be fair. Sometimes survival is a victory.

In addition to the famous actions at Dogger Bank, Heligoland Bight, Coronel, Falklands and Jutland, we have included a wide range of lesser known engagements in the Mediterranean, Black, Adriatic and Baltic Seas. These are usually smaller than the North Sea battles, and make great learning scenarios to develop an understanding of the rules.

There are a lot of sources of information on World War I naval actions, and we have listed our sources in the bibli-ography. Paul G. Halpern’s A Naval History of World War I from Naval Institute Press is one of the best, a treasure trove of actions to play, and I used it throughout the editing process to verify details in the scenarios. Where possible, we have used official sources to ensure accuracy. Despite all of the sources, it was sometimes impossible to ferret out all of the details, so some estimates have been made to provide a complete scenario. If you have detailed information about a spe-cific action and it conflicts with what appears in this guide, please drop us a note along with your sources and we will get it corrected.

Ed KettlerPlano, TexasNovember 2000

Introduction to the Second Edition It is hard to believe that seventeen years have passed so quickly. We are now in the centennial anniversary years of the Great War, and this second printing has benefited from many new information sources available on the web and in new books. The declassification of the Naval Staff Monographs is a key example; these were created in the immediate postwar year’s and provide a lot of the background of patrols, intelligence, politics and decisions that led up to the battle scenarios in this book. This printing also benefits from improvements in style, graphics, cross checking and experience gained from other Admiralty Trilogy products in recent years. We hope that you enjoy this version and recreate some of the greatest naval battles in history.

On-line support for the Admiralty Trilogy is provided at ATG at www.admiraltytrilogy.com where updates, contacts and key information are posted. We can be reached by email through adtrgroup@aol.com. We always answer our mail.

HMS DreadnoughtNaval Annual 1907

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