1 hour ago, Flavorabledeez said:

I'd also like to add that it should include rules for amphibious warfare (such as it was then), that way you could take ports and things. Also, an age of sail game could use a campaign as well.

FWIW, Ares Games (who publishes 'Sails of Glory') posted custom rules and scenarios allowing for all of those things (including a campaign) back in 2014...

http://www.aresgames.eu/13939

Sails of Glory!!

All the way! This is a cool game that has some great mechanics and captures that real table top strategy feel. Wind speed and direction, range of targets, even the musket shots of crew (that's what English Marines did, they sniped at the key personnel on enemy ships!).

This is a cool game that rarely gets played or even air time. I like the Ares people (they gave us the mechanics for X-Wing after all - see Wings of Glory).

As far as Naval warfare as a Miniature tabletop goes... this is it!

43 minutes ago, TheEldarGuy said:

This is a cool game that rarely gets played or even air time. I like the Ares people (they gave us the mechanics for X-Wing after all - see Wings of Glory).

Ehhh...what "mechanic" would that be?

Miniature games have been using templates for movement since, like, the early 1980s...

I take your point - even though the image says 2001.

It's not just the movement templates, but the hidden planning phase, and its overall vibe. That's it... the Vibe. The Vibe is the same as X-Wing.

I've been playing these games for over three decades, and I find X-Wing and Wings of Glory have the same feeling - that's all. I love X-Wing, and I love the FFG kit. My kids have each taken on various aspects of the FFG Star Wars, and I was so close to getting involved with the FFG GW stuff (because it actually seemed to be better than what GW was producing).

So, by extension, Sails of Glory has a two and three turn planning structure akin to Armada, but you have the added complexity of also working out whether the ship is going to alter the sails and which guns to load and with what type of shot.

I will also admit the Vibe isn't the same as Armada - the two are different enough to be enjoyable for their own mechanics.

On 1/28/2017 at 4:15 PM, Sbloom141 said:

I think Sails of Glory probably has it covered and that looks probably midway between X-Wing and Armada in complexity.

I would argue that SoG is more complex than Armada. At the very least, it's got way more fiddly bits.

You have to pick your move two turns in advance. The wind has the potential to shift every other turn, which affects your movement; anything from "moved too far" to "moved backwards" is a possibility is the wind goes against you. (note that it's not entirely arbitrary; you can see the possibilities, and chose to sail further from the wind to protect against a sudden shift) You have to pick commands every turn, to include shoot, load, put out fires, repair, raise or lower sail, pump out water, and drink rum. (yes, really - once a game, it heals your crew a bit)

It is my experience that ships get mission-killed quickly, because after a few hits, you have to spend your actions putting out fires and pumping out water, rather than shooting. A few broadsides, then pull away and run for home.

I like it, though. **** good times.

On 1/29/2017 at 7:32 AM, Maturin said:

I'll add my voice to those suggesting Sails of Glory as the go-to system for an equivalent game at roughly Armada's level of complexity.

Armada itself wouldn't feel quite right as a sailing game, as the maneuver tool is a bit too abstract when it comes to what these old ships were able to do maneuver-wise. Really, they had very limited options, something that SoG's movement cards replicates nicely, including taking into account wind direction.

Of course a user named "Maturin" likes Sails of Glory...

I would be mildely interested in an age of sail game but I would be extremly interested in a WW2 game.

Imagine carriers pushing squadrons with battleships and destroyers escorting.

4 hours ago, Swusn said:

I would be mildely interested in an age of sail game but I would be extremly interested in a WW2 game.

Imagine carriers pushing squadrons with battleships and destroyers escorting.

Harpoon.

Not a miniature game, but a real cool tabletop strategy game for the modern naval scenario. The US Navy used to use it in their training academy in Anapolis (wherever that is!) - that was back in the mid 90s.

Closest thing to ww2 naval is axis and allies naval minis and they can get quite expensive.

31 minutes ago, TheEldarGuy said:

Harpoon.

Not a miniature game, but a real cool tabletop strategy game for the modern naval scenario. The US Navy used to use it in their training academy in Anapolis (wherever that is!) - that was back in the mid 90s.

LOL...Harpoon...OMG, that's...mate, that's not a game, that's a lifestyle choice.

I mean, flat-out, you cannot play it two player. "Detection" is SO much of the game (because: obviously - it's pretty much 90% of modern naval warfare outright) that there is just no good way for two players to manage it. You need a third player as a 'referee' to determine which ships/subs/aircraft on each side can see which targets.

Also: it ships with basically no 'ship cards' at all, but instead AN ACTUAL ENCYCLOPEDIA of data on weapons, sensors, ships - where you assemble the ship sheets, yourself, based on the refit date of the variant of the ship you are running.

I mean, seriously, they give you this as the 'ship details'...

...at which point, you look up all the weapons, sensors, etc, to fill out the 'ship form' for each ship...

...to play the game!

(Oh, did I forget to mention that there is basically no point to any 'tabletop' component to it? As all record-keeping is handled on paper, and the ref is providing you details on who can see what, in context of bearings and ranges to ships...you basically just plot everything out on paper to "play" the game.)

If all that seems a little intense - I mean, it's an AMAZING simulation, for sure - they did do a PC game version of an early release of it (current version is Harpoon 4.1, IIRC this was based on Harpoon 2) back a decade or so ago. Theoretically still supported, so should run on modern PCs.

We use to play Harpoon for three or four days at a time. Yeah, the technical data was so cool.

There was a game that was involved with Central America; it involved CIA Insurgency units, commandos, each military unit from the various countries from the region. That came with one of the Jane books, and a copy of the CIA world fact book. Stuff was awesome back in the day. "Here you go little Johnny, here's the formula for napalm. Run along you scamp, and don't attack your sister with it."

1 hour ago, TheEldarGuy said:

We use to play Harpoon for three or four days at a time. Yeah, the technical data was so cool.

There was a game that was involved with Central America; it involved CIA Insurgency units, commandos, each military unit from the various countries from the region. That came with one of the Jane books, and a copy of the CIA world fact book. Stuff was awesome back in the day. "Here you go little Johnny, here's the formula for napalm. Run along you scamp, and don't attack your sister with it."

FWIW, I do like the games that attempt to simulate things - but as I've aged, have started to see a lot of the silliness of the excessive detail. Seekrieg was almost the worst - ship-to-ship naval warfare, but breaking ships down to individual compartments, and tracking the results of each shell in each salvo through them, it just...

I mean, it became detail JUST FOR THE SAKE of detail. There was so much effort put into 'simulating' things, of which nobody could possibly know the actual impact of.

Instead, games that work to try to capture more the feel of the topic being simulated - maybe obfuscating some details, grouping other things together, to instead give you a good impressive of what the COMMANDER AT THE TIME would know and be thinking and creating strategy from...vastly better.

And, FWIW, I do think 'Sails of Glory' does a very good job of that.

And there are TONS of great games out there that do that. A recent favorite is the (solitaire, amusingly enough) '... Leader' series from DVG. For example, their Hornet Leader (covering Carrier Air Operations)

...or even WW2 sub simulation...

You should really go get War in the Pacific then. It could keep you occupied for decades on a single game. I mean that literally.

5 minutes ago, Kubernes said:

You should really go get War in the Pacific then. It could keep you occupied for decades on a single game. I mean that literally.

Ah, for myself, I tend to shy away from the PC games. Different formats for different things - when I'm PC gaming, I like something that pushes my system a bit, and have lately been doing a lot of Planetside 2 (of all things). For anything where I'm particularly interested in understanding historical nuance...boardgames, for that!

Of course, there are some great tabletop games, too! I've been meaning to try Fire in the Sky...

Oh no, I was referring to the board game that isn't based on the PC game. The game is a lifestyle.

Here's a little board of just the allied charts! There's charts for everything too.

Has this thread just become boargamegeek@war?

From the early PC days, there was a game called Midway (I think), and the player could be the US or Japanese fleet, each with their own goals and resources. for an 8 or 16bit game it was so cool. All the tech readouts for all the ships of the two navies from 1943 to '45. Came with a handful of disks and everytime you changed to a new tactical view, map or display, it required the disks to be swapped (so glad the HDD arrived, my two FDD barely managed).

I'm surprised no-one's mentioned Warhammer Trafalgar. It's sadly no longer available, but it was an excellent ruleset for simulating Napoleonic-era naval battles, being a decent balance between getting things right while still being pretty easy to play. Most importantly, it just felt right...

Locally we played it with 1:2400 rather than the recommended 1:1200 models, but it was perfectly possible to do a full Trafalgar-style fleet battle with it, and the faction rules certainly made them play in different ways on the tabletop.

11 hours ago, Hedgehogmech said:

Warhammer Trafalgar

Holy ****. I've never wanted to play a Warhammer game before, but now I'm gonna have to go see what I can find.