York Factory Again

It's been a hot humid weeken, so to cool down on Sunday afternoon I got out my Galleys & Galleons scenario for the action at York Factory in 1697, which is set in a frozen and fog-bound Hudson's Bay.

You can read about the first time I played it HERE.

I played it as written but with randomly scattered ice-floes ships could collide with and with the Charismatic trait on Owner's Love instead of Fireship. 

It's a fun scenario because, aside from the dangerous ice-floes and limited shooting ranges (because of the fog) both sides get a random set-up and random entry of reinforcements. The French started with two ships in play (Le Palmier and L'Equimaux), whilst the English only had the Dering. Two opposing ships actually started next to each other. 

Whilst L'Esquimaux quickly sailed to safety, Dering and Le Palmier exchanged fire. 

Le Palmier was damaged. 

Although they started with the advantage of numbers the English soon got the upper-hand as more of their ships arrived. The first was the mighty Hampshire. 

Soon they had all four ships in play, and a shift of wind gave them the weather-gauge as well. 

As teh English organised themselves the French finally got reinforcements in the form of their largest ship Le Pelican. Le Palmier moved up in support. 

L'Esquimaux engaged Royal Hudson's Bay, inflicting some damage. 

However the small French vessel received a shattering rake from Owner's Love.

Royal Hudson's Bay finished the job. Holed below the water-line and with it's tiller gone, L'Esquimaux struck. 

Royal Hudson's Bay then moved to engage the newlt-arrived Le Profond. 

Meanwhile Hampshire was working it way around the ice in pursuit of Le Pelican and Le Palmier. Le Wasp arrived in the vicinity as well. 

Royal Hudson's Bay and Le Profond exchanged fire, and to the surprise of the French the English ship struck. 

Le Wesp took one broadside from Hampshire and also struck. 

Hampshire took a risky course through some ice to head off the French ships, whilst Owner's Love came up aiming to engage Le Palmier. 

Owner's Love took fire from Le Pelican and Le Palmier and was soon on fire. She took no further part in the action, and eventually burned to the waterline. 

Hampshire moved up. 

Hampshire and Le Pelican engaged. Dering came up in support of the Hampshire, but Le Pelican fought both sides and Dering caught fire. They soon extinguished it, but the delay took them out of the fight. 

The two large vessels blazed away at each other. Both ships took damage and Le Pelican lost some rigging. 

Hampshire ran aboard Le Pelican and grappled. 

The crew of Le Pelican resisted bravely for a while, and it looked like there might be an upset for the English. But the Hampshire's crew persisted and the French ship struck. 

At that point I called the game finished, with the English gaining a marginal victory. They still had Hampshire and Dering, whilst the French has Le Palmier and Le Profond. All ships were damaged but the odds probably favoured the English. However it would take several turns before the two sides could properly engage, and I was running out of time to play. So I assumed that in the fog they'd break off and see to repairs. 

Ten Years Ago - February 2016

Ten years ago I got a 3D printer. They seem to be ubiquitous now - a few members of our club seem to have ones that are running full-time turning out terrain and armies - but back then they were pretty new. I had about a year's worth of fun out of it before running it simply became a chore. I understand they are more reliable now, but mine was constantly in need of having the nozzle unblocked or the bed recalibrated.

Anyway, after a couple of years I needed the space it occupied for something else and it went into storage. I got rid of it when we moved house a coupe of years ago.

But this month's time-machine takes us back to the time I first got it. 

More 3D Printing

Battle Of Hoth

Last night I got a chance to play Battle Of Hoth, which is a new boardgame using the Battle Cry/Memoir '44 system and covering the Imperial assault on the Rebel base at the start of Star Wars Episode V. Keegan had the game and (as a bonus) had painted all of the figures. Daniel, Keegan and I took turns playing. 

It ises the same card system as the other games, but each side has their own deck. In additon you can choose a leader for each side and the chosen leader adds three cards of their own to that side's deck. Each side has their own troop types. Both have infantry, although that of the Rebels only had three figures to a unit. The Rebels also have snowspeeders and laser cannons, whilst the Imperial forces add probe-droids and the mighty AT-ATs. Each have their special rules.

Here you can see a lone Rebel infantry figure under attack by two lots of Imperial infantry and an AT-AT.

We payed four of the scenarios and some of those more than once. It plays very quickly compared to Memoir 44. mostly because it has a lower unit count and the board is smaller so units get stuck in much more quickly. 

This picture has all of the unit-types in it aside from the laser-cannons. The snowspeeders move quickly and have a lot of firepower at point-blank range, but can be a bit vulnerable. Probe droids are weak in combat, moderately hard to kill but, unless a scenario dictates it, they don't count for victory medals. 

AT-ATs are quite powerful in combat, and very hard to hit. However they are slow and can only take one hit. They could be killed by the first long-range shot directed at them, or resist shot after shot if the Rebels are unlucky. This one was brought down by three Rebel units playing the odds. 

There are several scenarios in the rules, starting with small couting skirmishes and then finishing up with the main assaults on the Rebel base. The rules also come with four mini-campaigns that link various of the scenarios together adding in special rules and advantages as one side gains or loses the upper-hand. So the designers have milked a lot of game out of one battle.

We played around eight games and the Rebels didn't win any of them. I don't know if the scenarios are weighted against the Rebels (Memoir 44 certainly doesn't pretend to have balanced scenarios) or if the Rebals are harder to play. Discussion on BGG suggests the latter - it just takes time to understand how to organise a Rebel defence or counter-attack, whilst the Imperials are fairly straightforward. The Memoir 44 approach of playing each scenario twice (swapping sides and aggregating the scores) is certainly the way to go here; can you lose as the Rebels less badly than your opponent? 

Having played it I can say that I enjoyed it, but I'm ot sure whether I'm desperate to own it. It is a lighter version of Memoir 44, which is no bad thing, but I'm not sure that, at this stage, it has enough depth to be worth getting. Maybe if more installments are produced covering other battles it might be worth getting. It doesn't feel like a game that's as versatile in terms of scenario design as either Memoir 44 or Battle Cry, but I can imagine if you're a Star Wars fan you'd find this a welcome addition to your game collection.

Update: I've added this image from Ralph showing a game in play, since it shows it better than the few photos I took:

Old Scenario. New Rules

Well, the rules aren't really that new. But having played out my British vs Dutch scenario the other day using Form Line Of Battle I wanted to see how it felt if I played it with Galleys & Galleons.

Galleys & Galleons isn't really that good as a set of rules for Napoleonic naval actions. Or not generally, anyway. But if you make a few compromises it works OK for small frigate actions and the like. And it's fine for tis action where the quality of both sides is about the same and the vessels don't vary much in size. 

Anyway, the ship setups were:

British

Flora - Q2 C3 - Square Rigged, Drilled Soldiers, Carronades, Trained Gun Crews, Chasers
Crescent - Q2 C2 - Square Rigged, Drilled Soldiers, Chasers

Dutch

Castor - Q2 C3 - Square Rigged, Drilled Soldiers, Chasers
Briel - Q2 C3 - Square Rigged, Drilled Soldiers, Chasers

Flora is dangerous at close range and its heavier guns give it a slight edge at longer ranges. Otherwise the ships are pretty much the same, but Crescent is smaller than the other vessels.

The approach moves were the same as the previous playthrough, but both sides held their fire until they were a little closer. With reloads costing an action it's a sensible move. You want that first broadside to be a full one if you can manage it. 

Castor opened fire first, lightly damaging Flora.

Both British ships engage Castor as Briel fails to come up in support

Castor took rigging damage, slowing her down. Briel fired a long range shot at Crescent and badly damaged her. Crescent's rudder was hit.

With Crescent struggling to turn into the fight, Briel and Castor could focus on Flora. Flora put up a great fight but eventually stuck to the superior firepower of two enemy ships. 

However Castor was quite badly damaged so Crescent had a go at salvaging things for the British. The extra cost of turning meant that it struggled though. 

Crescent suffered in the uneven fight. 

Shattered ,she soon struck when Briel grappled and boarded her. 

Both British ships struck, whilst Castor was badly damaged and Briel lightly damaged. 

Obviously with having played these rules so much over the past few years, this game ran a lot more smoothly than the Form Line of Battle version. The limitations of the rules didn't seem too bad either; I didn't feel the action suffered or felt a lot different from the other game. Combat is less granular, so maybe the game isn't as attritional

Anyway, playing he same scenario with two different sets of rules is an interesting experiment.

Form Line Of Battle

I've always described 'Form Line Of Battle' as my favourite set of rules for Napoleonic Naval, but I was surprised when browsing through this blog, I discovered that the last time I'd played it was over ten years ago!

Inspired by the announcement of a new 6th Edition, I dug out my 4th Edition (plus house rules) and set up a game. I actually repeated the setup for THIS SCENARIO in which two British frigates faced two Dutch frigates in the Mediterranean in 1781. 

The British have Flora (36) and Crescent (28). The Dutch have Castor (36) and Briel (36). Flora is heavier than the Dutch frigates, and also has a new-fangled weapon - carronades. 

In fact, whilst I remembered the carronades, I forgot that the Dutch frigates were lighter and had a penalty when shooting at Flora. It might explain the final result.

Anyway, here they are all set up - British to the left and Dutch to the right.

It took me a turn to get back into the swing of movement, and I found the wind-attitude tools a lot harder to use than the ones for Galleys & Galleons (which is, to be fair, pretty simplistic in its approach to wind). 

The Dutch opened fire at long range, not wanting the Flora's carronades hitting them close up. They scored a hit on Flora. I got back into the swing of firing too. 

Flora hit Briel at close range, scoring a hit. Ships took a lot of single hits, but even they slowly whittle down the broadside factor. 

The little 6th rate Crescent also damaged Briel. 

Flora attempted to cross Briel's stern, but couldn't manage it at close range. 

The initial exchanges of fire saw all ships with at least one hit and some initial broadsides burned. The Dutch formed up heading down-wind, and the British turned to follow. The Dutch were using unfired broadsides though, so scored some more hits on their opponents. 

However a misjudged turn by Castor saw the British with an opportunity to rake it from both ends. Crescent didn't manage it (but gave it a good hit on the stern quarter) but Flora managed a solid bow-rake. Castor was now fairly beaten up but, unfortunately, so was Flora who had taken more steady fire from the Dutch as the lines had closed. 

Briel had dropped out of the fight for a short period with a damaged wheel, but came back in with a vengeance, delivering a shattering broadside to Crescent, which left the British vessel close to striking. 

Crescent fought on as best it could, but Flora wasn't in a position to come up in support owing to a small change in the wind direction. Flora managed another bow rake on Castor, but the gunnery on both ships was now weakening through damage. 

Briel hit Crescent again, taking down a mast. 

And the Dutch got their act together and raked both British ships. Crescent was forced to a strike test, but passed. However it was now spent as a fighting vessel. Flora took more damage and was now very weak.

With Flora trying to turn back into the fight the Dutch focused on Crescent, and a pair of broadsides forced the small frigate to strike. 

With little effective firepower left the Flora's best option was a tactical withdrawal. 

The initiative card system worked well for both sides, opening up rake opportunities twice. The British didn't get much out of theirs, but the Dutch used their two rakes to pretty much finish off their opponents. As I said at the start, I did forget that as Inferior ships the Dutch got a -1 when firing at  Flora. It might have made a small difference, but I doubt it. The British were outfought.

These rules are wonderfully old-school and fiddly, but not too complicated. However the constant checking of sailing attitude got wearing, as did even the simple arithmetic of firing and then looking up a die-roll on a table. I think age is beginning to dull my ability to play rules like this. Or maybe it was simply lack of practice. I will give them another go though, maybe with some easier to use player aids. I do love the initiative system, with each side's three phases being intermingled, and the random movement is delightfully unpredictable and often frustrating, generally forcing you to use conservative movement options to keep your ships together and avoid collisions.