Thoughts on Naval Map Moves

I am still reading Peter Perla's "Art of Wargaming" (slow but enjoyable progress as I generally get to read only five mins in the morning before I go to work) and I have got to the point in his book where he mentions a pivotal point in wargaming 'folklore' as in "the history of".

The advent of the true hobbyist use computers occurred as reported in Avalon Hill's The General magazine. This "shot that was (not) heard around the word (but set technology on a trajectory of what would surely follow)". The "What" in fact was  a modest garage 'crocodile-clip-battery-lamp' contraption "Heath-Robinson'ed" up to assist the 'Human Interactio'n of naval search grid for Avalon Hill's "Sink the Bismarck" board game.

This allowed a novel "gotcha" form in real-time playing double blind. Indeed the naval side of warfare and wargaming has lead innovation through "the mother of invention - necessity". This got me thinking of how I could network or link (in a manual sense) a collection of ships/task forces simply for a "Fog of War" naval chase (see below, the player's ship is in the central hex):

The threat detection should span outwards with a direction (aka the Compass Rose) and perhaps a distance, plus mode of detection (and time of spotting), Reinventing the wheel but interested to see if I come out with the same answers as I would have before I had read Perla's book! (If that logic makes sense). Watch this space,

I was thinking a "Sink the Bismarck" style of game in the near future although the Napoleonic or Ancient period might be a less challenging start.