My group played a game of Naval Command yesterday, which turned out really fun. The scenario was an island assault, Marine Nationale vs PLAN. Each fleet was 2000 points, with no ships launched after 1980, and the objective was to land more ground troops on two islands in the center of the table than the other side. The French fleet was centered around an Ouragan LPD, escorted by a Colbert CG and two Tourville FFGs, with an Agosta SS to round things out. The Chinese group was centered around two Type-72 Yukan LHAs, escorted by a Sovremenny DDG, two Type-53H FFGs, and one Type-37 Hainan.
I thought I had the upper hand when I detected his Sovremenny fairly early, and crippled it with a spread of Exocets from my Colbert before it could get a single Sunburn off and also secured one of the objective islands with helicopter-deployed troops, but best laid plans, and all that. I still needed to kill those Yukans before they buried the other island in troops. So I clear out the blocking Hainan, dart my Super Frelons in to lock on the lead troopship...and can't make a damage roll to save my life. Seven freaking Exocets, it took to send that thing down! All of them locked on, only one got shot down, I just couldn't sink the damned thing! All the while, it and its sister ship are spewing out landing boats. In the end, it came out a draw, with each of us in possession of one island.
This was an awesome game, with tense moments one after the other the whole time. I swear, I spent the last three turns just a die roll or two away from victory.
