Best. Day. EVER! (In gaming terms, anyway. . . .) Part II

So after the Constitution versus Java fight, Mark decided he wanted to play this game again.  We took a break long enough for me to print some ship sheets, and then went back at each other again.

This time it was just a generic frigate fight.  I picked out two ships at random: A British 36 gun frigate (HMS Santa Margarita) with 12 pound main guns, and a French 38 gun frigate (Proserpine) with 18 pound main guns.  This is where things started getting interesting.  The random dice roll for crew/captain quality gave the French a regular crew, and the British a green crew.  So we have a more experienced French crew with heavier guns, but the British can reload and fire faster (2 phases to reload, opposed to 3 for the French).  So, can quicker firing but lighter guns make up for the differences in weight of metal and crew experience?

The random setup proved to be interesting as well.  By die roll, the British started in the middle of the table.  When setup was done, the French wound up behind them, with both ships starting at Easy Sail.  The weather was moderate, with the wind from the SE at force 4.  With everything ready, the starting situation looked like this:

An English frigate chased by a French one?  Hmmm.

With both ships at Easy Sail, we were both tearing along at 10 movement points each, which is anywhere from 4.5 to 8.8 knots, depending on how the ship is facing into the wind.  I quickly decided that being the chasee was not something I wanted to do.

"No Royal Navy captain is going to let himself be chased by a Frog!"

I started taking in sail, as I didn't want to fly by my opponent and have to claw my way back.  Mark, on the other hand, decided to stay at Easy Sail.  This helped me to decide on my tactics; I would shoot high in hopes of forcing more rigging damage onto him.  That should lead to a mast falling, and then the advantage would be mine.

As we continued to approach each other, I kept taking in sail while he kept pushing ahead.  He decided to turn away from the wind so as to give himself more maneuvering room, and to stay with me.

I got my first broadside off in the red phase of turn 2:

He, however, was able to use his extra speed and get in front of me for a broadside in the white phase:

 Fortunately, it wasn't quite a bow rake (ignore my gun smoke; we just forgot to take it off).  The end of the turn found us like this:

At this point, the maneuvers became quite confusing, with each of us trying to circle around the other.  Part of me wishes I had kept a track chart of the fight along with taking pictures.  I got off another broadside at the beginning of next turn, and caught the Frenchman on fire!

I think this is only the second time I've ever seen a ship catch fire.

I won initiative for the next phases, and made the Frenchman move first, as I wanted to see where this potential hazard would wind up.  It also allowed me to slip in behind him, and deliver an almost stern rake on the target.  Unfortunately, the angle just wasn't quite right for a rake.

Beginning of the phase.

"Pour it into them, boys!"

End of the phase.

I ended the turn by pulling away from the fireship again.  To Mark's great relief, he got the fire put out at the end of this phase. 

The next turn was more jockeying for position, as the Frenchman got in front of me and tried to pull away.

The chase went on for another turn while he tried to make repairs and get some maneuvering room.

After this, he decided to circle back and come towards me.

The maneuvering continued, and we managed to end the turn by getting the two ships fouled together.  I was unable to free us, so both sides prepared boarding parties, just in case.

Apparently I didn't take a picture of the red phase this turn, but nothing happened.

We spent an entire turn fouled together and drifting.  Then the French boarding party in the bow found an opportunity, and stormed aboard.

Apologies for the blurry picture; I was really nervous.

It was three factors of regular French marines versus 3 factors of green British sailors.  I had lost all my marines in the earlier broadsides, but much to my surprise the sailors took out one factor of marines.  He moved some sailors from the waist to his forecastle to reinforce for the next round.  We drifted for another three impulses.  The boarding action was inconclusive this time, but I managed to cut the two ships loose, and his boarding party retreated in the command phase.

I didn't take a picture of the ships in this phase, but it was just
more drifting.  Nothing particularly exciting.

At this point we were up to turn 10, and we rolled for weather changes.  While the weather didn't change, the wind did.  It veered from SE to due E.  This was not a good thing for either of us as you will see from the picture below:

Since we were both in irons, all we could do was drift backwards and turn until we were not facing into the wind.  Proserpine's marines were peppering Santa Margarita with fire this whole time.  Having no marines left, Santa Margarita couldn't respond in any way which was quite galling.  I think it was during this time that my 2nd Lieutenant and one of the Midshipmen were killed.

FINALLY, we can move again!

Once we could move again, it was time to start pounding each other. After the broadsides, Proserpine again turned into Santa Margarita as a prelude to another boarding attempt.

Although I avoided his collision attempt, it meant we were so close to each other that any movement would run the risk of fouling again.  Mark adjusted course slightly, and brought Proserpine alongside, and sure enough, we fouled again.

We exchanged broadsides, and each side readied boarding parties again.

Mark flung every Frenchman he could into his boarding parties, and now numbers began to tell. Santa Margarita had started the game with 8 crew boxes and 3 marine boxes.  Proserpine started the game with 12 crew boxes and 4 marine boxes.  By this point, I had only 5 crew boxes and no marines.  With the ships fouled side by side, he could try and board from fore, mid, and aft.  All I could hope for was that none of his groups had the opportunity to board; if they did, I wouldn't have the manpower to fend them off.  Clearly, this was going to be it!

Needless to say, he tried to board from all three sections.  The boarding attempt from the forward section was repulsed, and he lost a crew factor.  The boarding attempt from the waist was successful, and the fight was on.  Although he didn't cause any casualties to my crew, one factor was forced back (in this case, that means out of the waist section).  With that, my forces were outnumbered 3:1, which meant that they had to retreat.  The center of Santa Margarita was now in French hands.  The aft boarding party from Prosperine didn't find an opportunity to board.  The situation was now dire, as you can see:

I wasn't able to cut the two ships free from each other, so we would be bound together for another turn.  At this point, I struck my colors.  I might have passed a command check, but the lack of crew meant that I would not be able to hold off the French if there were any more boarding opportunities for them.  Even if I were to succeed in regaining control of the waist, it might mean there were not enough men left to man the guns and sail her.

In looking at the damage after the battle, it became clear that, between my fire and the damage from our foulings, Proserpine was so cut up aloft that she could not have chased me had I tried to disengage.  Take a look:

In contrast, Santa Margarita was nowhere near as damaged:

So, there you have it.  Two more British defeats; one completely expected and one that (maybe) could have been avoided.  One thing I learned from this:  It's easy to see why everyone went to 18 pound or heavier guns for their frigates.  The 12's I had were easy to handle, but just didn't hit hard enough in the final analysis.

If you read the earlier post, I said there were three games.  After these two, Mark brought out his Blood & Plunder pirate game and we played an engagement in that.  I managed to win that one.  Maybe I should give up my navy captain's license and become a Hollywood pirate instead!

Best. Day. EVER! (In gaming terms, anyway. . . .) Part I

As readers of the blog might suspect, I don't get to play naval games as often as I would like.  So, when I have a chance to get TWO games in on a single day, that's something that I jump at!  Actually, it's three games but I'll explain that later.

Mark, who is one of my oldest friends, came into town specifically to play some games.  As he wanted to learn Post Captain, I decided to set up a simple frigate action.  My go-to war for this is the War of 1812, usually one of the engagements of the 44 gun frigates as they are the best known.  Now playing one of those scenarios as the British is like having your teeth pulled without anesthetic, so I always give the new player the American ship.  For this one, I chose USS Constitution versus HMS Java.

The starting position looks like this:

Java bearing down on Constitution.

With Mark being new to this set of rules, I expected he would sail along,  or slow down and wait for me to run down towards him.  What I didn't expect was this:

Yep, a tack.  As his very first maneuver in his very first game.

He decided to tack his ship and turn towards me.  It's not really as crazy as it sounds; with an elite crew, Constitution has an 83% chance of success (1-10 on a D12) and I'm still far enough away that if it isn't successful he has time to recover.

1-10 and he rolls a 7.  No problem.

"Well, this Yankee looks like an aggressive customer, eh?"

So we continued to head towards each other.

And then, he slewed to deliver a broadside at me.  I wasn't too worried about it, because I had already started to turn and deliver mine.

It turns out that I should have been worried, because out of a 9 box broadside (5x24 LBR, 4x32LBR carronades) I took 8 hits!  Yes, 8 and he was shooting high.  I didn't think to take a picture of the damage dice, but it was bad.  The mizzen topgallant went over the side due to a critical hit.  That cost me 4 rigging boxes, and I rolled another 4 rigging boxes for damage.  That triggered a rigging check at the end of the turn.  I failed that, and the mizzen topmast went over the side.

That's a lot of wreckage in the water.

The next turn didn't make things any better for the Royal Navy.   Between my maneuvering and the mizzen in the water dragging me around, I had a chance for a return broadside by the white phase of the next turn.

I inflicted a little bit of damage, but nothing like the pain I was feeling.  At least I was striking back, or so I told myself.  Then, it happened.  The combination of my maneuvering (and pivoting around the wreckage) and his maneuvering, ran us into each other and fouled the rigging.

Since these were batteries that had not been fired, both side's gunners went to work right away: 

At 25 yards with an elite crew and first broadside it's almost impossible to miss.  In fact, he didn't and all 9 salvos hit home!  The devastation was most impressive.

For anyone not familiar with Post Captain, this is how those damage rolls would break down:

And this is what my ship would look like with no damage:

At this point, Constitution sailed away so she could repair some damage, and I continued to try and cut away wreckage.  I got the mizzen topgallant away, but the topmast proved to be more stubborn.

All I could do was run straight downwind due to the wreckage, try and keep passing command checks to keep the ship in action, and watch Constitution come stalking back down towards us.  I finally got the mizzen topmast to go away, but then failed another rigging check, and this time the fore topgallant mast went into the water.

While I had a broadside loaded, I could only have fired half of it, due to the wreckage blocking the forward part of the ship.  When the command phase arrived, Java finally decided she had enough, and struck her colors.

It's a very historical outcome, but it still stings a bit.  At the end of the fight, Constitution looked like this:

and poor old Java looked like this:

Mark liked the rules so much he wanted to play a second game right away.  Since this is already a pretty long post, I've decided to break the day into two parts.  Part II will cover the second battle and maybe a little extra too, depending on how long that post turns out to be.