Some Royal Navy Ships

 

I have enjoyed play testing the TFL Naval rules so I recently decided to finish off a couple of more ships. I already have quite  few brigs so I focused on the one 3rd and 5th rate that I had yet to assemble. I was lacking Royal Navy ships as my primary focus when playing Black Seas were the Spanish. Not sure why in retrospect but it is what it is.

The ships are easy enough to assemble and paint and I have applying the sails down but rigging is still a challenge. I have noticed that some of the rigging is not necessary and I am not a purist so it was ok to leave some off. I also had no interest in attaching the rat tails. I am pretty happy how they turned out.

I still have some work to do on the rigging of 4 or 5 more ships but that will have to wait until I get to Montreal.

Black Seas-Pitched Battle

Yesterday myself and Adam got in a game of Black Seas at the Hobby Bunker in Wakefield. It was nice too see Adam and to get out for an in person gaming session. Although we have played a few games of Black Seas, it was also the first time he got to see my Spanish fleet as they had been trapped in Montreal for almost 18 months because of the pandemic.

We decided to go with the Pitched Battle Scenario from the rulebook, this is a 2000 point game played on a 6x4 sea terrain. I played the Spanish and Adam the French.

Spanish Fleet

Admiral Juan de Lángara

1st Rate w/ Lucky, Sturdy, Boarding Nets, Master Gunner

Two 5th Rates w/ Sturdy, More Carronades

5th Rate w/ Lucky, More Carronades

Two Brigs/ Sturdy

6th Rate Xebec w/ Sturdy

French Fleet

1st Rate w/ Sturdy

Three 3rd Rates w/ Sturdy

Two 5th Rates w/ Sturdy and Streamlined Hull

So we got on with it, Adam has played a lot and I have not played this ruleset for close to 2 years so I had to be cautious. As you can see, I went with pretty defensive attributes with Sturdy and upped my firepower with More Carronades. My 1st Rate was going to be my main offensive ship so I added a couple dice re-rolls with Lucky and Master Gunner.

We got in a very good game lasting around 3 hours, I had a lot of fun. It was touch and go for a while as my 1st Rate staying in the action and delivering some devastating firepower, but my overall lack of offence with my small ships eventually ended up with a clear victory for the French.

Here are a few photos I took of the actions.

Well played Adam, we are hoping to get in a game of Devil in the Wilderness next. Looking forward to it.

Black Seas

 

On Monday night, P-Y came over to my apartment and introduced me to the new game from Warlord Games; Black Seas. Many years ago I bought the Trafalgar ruleset from Warhammer Historicals, with it came some small metal ships, I think 1/2400 scale made of metal. I painted a couple of the ships, which I found quite difficult to assemble and really got no where with it. It all got packed away. At the same time I did buy a sea terrain mat with some islands which was really quite nice. It got stored away and I forgot about it. A couple of years ago, Adam introduced me to some WWII wargaming, but I found the gaming experience was overwhelmed by the book-keeping so I pretty soon lost interest.

It was with some reluctance that I talked myself into buying the Black Seas starter set. I am not an enormous fan of the Warlord Games rulesets, I find Black Powder a little boring and Bolt Action just has not attracted me. I suppose, I am too much of a TFL fan. Anyway, P-Y showed me a couple of ships he had done and it looked like an interesting change from paintng terrain and figures, so I said why not.

The little ships are beautifully made and are very easy to put together. They are fun to paint, I decided to go with the Spanish, I like the sky blue and red details but at the same time all ships were different and one has a lot of latitude on what colours to use. The rigging was quite a challenge (I think it took me 3-4 hours to rig a 5th rate yesterday), but I did get a lot of satisfaction out of the task. Once put together they do look rather nice.

I was not even sure if I was going to play the game but after watching a couple of videos, I said why not so I invited P-Y over. Well I have to say the game is enormous fun, there is really no book-keeping and the rules are completely intuitive. You can also easily scale the accuracy of the simulation up but the game stil remains quite simple to play. I have to admit it was probably the best new gaming experience I have had and I have gone through a lot of different rulesets in my last 15 years of wargaming. A lot of it was probably due to P-Y but interesting enough he has only played 2 games so that says a lot about the ruleset itself.

We played a 5th rate and 2 brigs aside and waht follows are a few photos. I really was just trying to learn the rules, so got in collisions and barding as well as movement and fireing. It was a lot of fun, looking forward to my next game and the release of the Spanish flotilla in mid December!

  

P-Y's 5th rate

 

A very bold brig boarding my 5th rate.

I also finished painting up the painting the Frigates and Brigs starter box today so here is my small fleet. I have to touch up some of the colours but that is about it.