Back To The Ice

I had some downtime at work yesterday, owing to a massive server-failure, so whilst I was waiting for things to get back up and running I replayed the galleons and icebergs scenario I still had set up on my gaming table. This is the up-side of my office and gaming room being the same.

I rejigged the layout (randomly, naturally, and only used three icebergs. In this picture you can see the wind direction (from the top left, and direction the ice would move (from the right to the left).

The French whalers opted to head straight up into the wind, towards the English, hoping to slip past them and then pass between the icebergs and the central island. This would involved them sailing close-hauled, but it was a reasonable risk to take.

Unfortunately once they had committed to this plan, the wind shifted and they were in irons. This forced them to use using their sweeps for much of the way - I gave them the Sweeps trait to represent their having a lot of boats they could use to tow the ships with.

The English galleons bore down on them.

A first raking broadside from the English caused only superficial damage.

But both galleons opened up on the lead French vessel, and in one turn pounded it to splinters, leaving it sinking - they both scored criticals for extra damage and a hole.

A French ship returned fire. It was ineffective at first ...

But a second broadside saw the one of the galleons take some critical damage.

The now leading French ship and the damaged galleon exchanged fire, and the French ship took some rigging damage.

The lead galleon swung about to board one of the French ships. As it bore down on its foe it fired its chasers, and managed to set its target on fire. Forced to grapple rather than risk the damage of a collision, the English ship was also now in danger of catching alight.

And did.

Fortunately the English were able to cut free and bear off, extinguishing their fire. The French simply abandoned ship, and their vessel soon exploded.

The lead French ship had now worked upwind of the galleon it was fighting, and was making sail to escape. the English turned to attack the next French ship.

A furious exchange of fire saw the French ship damaged and holed.

Meanwhile, the other galleon, having got badly out of position whilst extinguishing its fire, used its speed to run to the south of the island, then tack up the board to intercept the lead French ship.

Meanwhile the other galleon raked the French vessel it was fighting. It scored little damage ...

... but a series of confused orders then saw the English ship pile into an iceberg and sink.

The surviving galleon attempted to stop the escape of the lead French ship. It scored some damage, but the whaler was able to use its boats to head straight into the wind, leaving the galleon unable to follow it.

The French ship escaped.

The galleon used its speed to intercept the other whaler.

A couple of broadsides saw the French captain killed and the ship strike.

So whilst fortunes were mixed, the English won this one, sinking one French ship, blowing up a second and capturing a third. It was unfortunate that one of the galleons ended up decorating an iceberg, though.

Anyway, then the servers came back up, and I could go back to work ...