Old Gamers Never Die: Surviving the 'Beating the Odds' Scenario in 'Cold Waters'

 

© 2017 Killerfish Games

If you are a regular – or semiregular – reader of A Certain Point of View, you probably know that in July I purchased Killerfish Games’ 2017 submarine game Cold Waters from Steam. I had been wanting to get it for some time, but I waited till it was on sale; I didn’t want to shell out nearly $40 for a computer game, even if said game billed itself as the a spiritual heir to MicroProse’s 1988 classic, Red Storm Rising.

Like Red Storm Rising, Cold Waters has Training, Single Mission, and Campaign modes; unlike Sid Meier’s game, which is based on the late Tom Clancy’s 1986 best-selling novel, it gives players the option to play as an American, Soviet, or Chinese submarine commander in Cold War-turned-hot campaigns set in three distinct eras (1968, 1984, and 2000) in alternative histories which take a turning point in world affairs – say, the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in August of ’68 – and tweak it so that the two blocs that waged the Cold War find themselves in World War III.

I haven’t dared try any of the campaigns; Killerfish Games’ designers did some nice homages to Red Storm Rising in the design of the strategic transfer maps (the 1968/1984 Warsaw Pact/NATO scenarios take place in the same geographic area, after all), but I’m still not adept at using the mouse to move my sub from Point A to Point B on the maps.

However, after creating many “sandbox” Quick Battles during my first few weeks of playing Cold Waters, I have attempted to play some of the 1984/2000 Single Missions, including two sub-vs.-sub scenarios (The Duel and Iron Coffins) and two sub-vs.-surface ship missions, Junks on Parade, and Beating the Odds.

Although Junks on Parade is the last scenario in the Single Missions set, that’s the first sub-vs.-surface group battle I successfully completed. It is not the easiest mission in the game; players are assigned to command the USS Seawolf – the most advanced (and most expensive) sub in the fleet – but the battle takes place in the dangerously shallow waters of the Taiwan Strait.  This puts a sub commander at a disadvantage because fast attack boats[1] are creatures of the deep; operating a Seawolf-class sub in shallow water doesn’t give one much room to “run silent, run deep” to evade enemy anti-sub weaponry or detection by ASW aircraft and helicopters. It took me several tries to figure out which tactics work and which ones don’t. (Hint: Using UGM-84 Harpoons first when Chinese warships are around is never a good idea.)

Beating the Odds is a somewhat similar exercise involving an attack on surface ships, but it’s set off Norway’s Nordkaap (North Cape) in 1984 rather than in the South China Sea’s Taiwan Strait. However, it differs from Junks in Parade not just because the adversary is the Soviet Red Banner Northern Fleet, but also because there are no amphibious vessels (‘phibs) or merchant ships (“merchies”) to destroy.

The mighty Kirov. When this massive warship - the only battle-cruiser in service in any navy - was introduced in the early 1980s, it caused the Reagan Administration to reactivate the four battleships of the Iowa class and modernize them so that they could launch ship-killing Tomahawk missiles, as well as using their 16" guns from long ranges. © 2017 Killerfish Games

Instead, players command a Sturgeon-class boat of late 1960s-vintage (Sturgeons entered U.S. Navy service between 1963 and 1975 and were active until the early 21^st Century, when they were replaced by the Los Angeles, Seawolf, and Virginia classes) and attempt to penetrate the anti-sub defenses of a Soviet surface action group and destroy the nuclear-powered battle-cruiser Kirov.

Cold Waters randomizes the escorting group in each iteration of Beating the Odds, but Kirov is often accompanied by two other surface warships, usually destroyers of the Kashin and Kanin classes, but sometimes you will run into more powerful consorts to the powerful missile-armed BCGN, such as the Kresta I or Kresta II cruisers, and sometimes a sub will be added to the mix. Overhead, Ka-27 Helix ASW helicopters, and IL-38 May or TU-142 Bear-F ASW will drop sonobuoys to “hear” your engine sounds and make MAD passes to try and detect your sub’s magnetic signature.

IL-38 MAY ASW Patrol Plane

Another angle on the Kirov

Kashin-class ASW Destroyer

Kanin-class ASW Destroyer.  All images and game elements © 2017 Killerfish Games

 The trick to fighting in Beating the Odds is to keep in mind that even though your boat has four torpedo tubes like its successors in the Los Angeles class, you can only fire two wire-controlled Mk.-48 torpedoes at any one time. You can still fire Mk.-48s from the other two tubes but without the ability to direct them via wire controls. (Later classes don’t have this handicap.)

You also should not use Harpoon missiles early in the battle; as a matter of fact, it’s better not to use them until the endgame in situations where you have destroyed the escorts and badly damaged the primary target with Mk.-48 torpedoes. Firing missiles from underwater reveals your position as the rocket booster leaps out of the water and arcs skyward trailing a plume of flame and white smoke. This not only alerts the Soviet ships’ skippers that a missile is inbound, but also gives the enemy a convenient aiming point for his own anti-sub rockets, depth charges, and torpedoes.

A Mk.-48 torpedo streaks toward its target. Actual screenshot from a Beating the Odds session. Note the wreck of a Soviet warship on the sea floor just above the right-hand Heads-Up Display (HUD) showing the status of the boat's four torpedo tubes. Tubes 1 and 4 have active wire-guided torps in the water, while Tubes 2 and 3 are loaded.  All images and game elements © 2017 Killerfish Games

You also need to be patient and use great care in penetrating the Kirov’s defensive perimeter. Firing torpedoes at sonar contacts with only partial target motion analysis (TMA) solutions can have good results, but the thermocline (or “layer”) that separates warm ocean water from cold and surface ducts create variable audio detection conditions, so targets may be actually closer or further away from you than the initial data shows. That means that your torpedoes will either become active too soon (thus giving enemy vessels their first warning that you are there) or too late and miss the target by a wide margin.

Also, stealth is your best friend, especially if the game generates a scenario where you are in front of the Kirov surface action group and it’s heading in your direction. In such a setup, the best thing to do is “lay chilly” and wait till the Soviets have been properly identified by your sonar crew and are in the “less than 10K yards” kill zone for your torpedoes. 

A stunning view of an IL-38 May in flight over the battle area. The May is the Soviet counterpart of the U.S. Navy's P-3C Orion and has the same ASW patrol role.  All images and game elements © 2017 Killerfish Games

As I said earlier, even though the environment and mix of targets is different, playing the South China Sea-set Junks on Parade mission taught me many of the techniques I use in Beating the Odds. Prior to my first victory in Junks on Parade, I had the unhelpful habit of firing Harpoons even before I had done a proper TMA and generated a good firing solution on the ships overhead. I’d let fly with my missiles, only to get a shower of enemy rocket-assisted and air-dropped torpedoes for my troubles. (This is partly due to my not bothering to read the PDF manual for Cold Waters; if there is something that I miss from boxed games for Windows is a physical manual. I used to read manuals for such games as M1 Tank Platoon, Silent Service II, and Red Storm Rising before I booted up a game session.)

The Kirov. hit by a Mk.-48 torpedo from a Sturgeon-class boat, attempts to evade a second torpedo in a session of Beating the Odds.  All images and game elements © 2017 Killerfish Games

Fortunately, the deeper waters off Norway allow you to use local sea conditions to evade both detection and enemy torpedoes a lot more efficiently than in the shallow waters of the Taiwan Strait. So by mixing the lessons learned aboard Seawolf in Junks on Parade and adjusting my knowledge to the conditions in Beating the Odds, including the fact that Sturgeons are limited to the use of two wires at one time, I accomplished the mission’s goals of (a) sinking Kirov and (b) surviving to tell the tale.

It wasn’t easy; the AI that “commands” the Soviets is not stupid and acts according to actual Red Navy tactics from the Cold War era. The ASW helos and the IL-38 May do their very best to find and sink you before you put a dent on the Kirov or her consorts, and the battle-cruiser, while she is not a dedicated ASW ship, still has a powerful suite of sonars, anti-sub torpedoes, and RBU anti-submarine rockets to hunt and kill you. On more than one occasion, I have ended Beating the Odds with a badly-damaged boat. I have also been sunk twice, even in battles where I avoid making the mistakes I made when I started playing Cold Waters in July.

Death of the Kirov!   All images and game elements © 2017 Killerfish Games

Of course, I have not played Cold Waters as often as I played Red Storm Rising in the late Eighties and early Nineties, but right now it is my favorite game. I love the graphics and sound effects, and even though I have a long way to go before I can play the game’s three Campaigns, I am improving as a player and sub skipper. 

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[1] In naval parlance, submarines are never referred to as “ships.” Even if you are talking about an Ohio-class missile submarine with the ability to nuke an adversary back to the Stone Age, you refer to her as a “boat.”