Old Gamers Never Die: A Perfect Victory in Sea Power’s ‘Hair Trigger Scenario’ Kicks Off My Christmas Celebration

Midafternoon, Tuesday, December 24, 2024, Miami, Florida

Since I am not working today, I decided to play Hair Trigger, one of the shortest – and easier – scenarios in Sea Power: Naval Combat in the Missile Age. Today the developer announced that a couple of new patches for the game had been uploaded in time for Christmas, with new ships added and a few bug fixes applied.

If you follow my occasional series of Old Gamers Never Die posts, you might recall that Hair Trigger is a player-created “mod” inspired by a scenario in Sonalyst Combat Simulations’ classic Jane’s Fleet Command, one of the inspirations for Sea Power. The mission is straightforward yet nerve-wracking: the admiral in charge of the Nimitz carrier battlegroup, currently steaming north of Crete in the Eastern Mediterranean, steps out for a quick 30-minute lunch break, leaving you in command.

Of course, the Soviets choose this exact moment to launch an attack. They send three Tu-22M Backfire bombers, each armed with AS-4 anti-ship missiles, aiming straight for your battlegroup. Adding to the chaos, one or more diesel-powered hunter-killer submarines are on the hunt, and a Red Navy intelligence ship (an AGI, or “spy trawler”) is shadowing your carrier and her escorts, relaying targeting data to the bombers and subs.

To make matters worse, civilian fishing vessels—two of which are Soviet—are mingling in the area, almost indistinguishable from the AGI. Their presence complicates your task because they belong to the same ship class as the spy trawler. Precision is paramount: sinking civilian vessels or downing airliners (Yep, there are three jetliners aloft in the unfriendly skies!)  would have dire consequences, giving the Soviet Union a propaganda victory, even if you manage to complete your mission and keep your fleet and air wing intact during your 30-minute command.

I have played Hair Trigger multiple times since the mod was created in mid-November. In the initial playthroughs, I was fortunate as the submarines did not approach close enough to launch torpedoes at any of my ships. It was not until my fifth attempt that a Kilo-class submarine fired at USS Vincennes (CG-49). Fortunately, this occurred shortly before the 30-minute time limit expired. Had the attack happened earlier, the Ticonderoga-class cruiser might have been lost.

Although this mission is considered one of the simpler scenarios, my scores have often been unsatisfactory due to various setbacks. These include mistakenly shooting down an airliner, sinking so-called “innocent” Soviet fishing vessels along with the AGI, or allowing an AS-4 “Kitchen” ASM to penetrate the Nimitz battlegroup’s air-defense perimeter and hit the carrier. While a single “Kitchen” missile would not sink the carrier, it still results in a mission failure as the fleet must be returned to the Admiral intact.

Today, however, I completed the Hair Trigger scenario with a perfect Decisive Victory score. I intercepted all three Backfires before they could launch their Kitchens, identified and destroyed the spy trawler, detected and sank a Kilo-class SSK using an S-3A Viking anti-submarine warfare aircraft, and avoided civilian casualties both in the air and at sea. Furthermore, I did not lose any aircraft, and I managed to record the gameplay using my Steam account’s application.

All in all, not a bad way to start the Christmas holiday.