More Enfilade Preperations

I finished up the last playtest for the Enfilade games I'm running/helping out with for Enfilade 2012. I'm planning on running two games this year, a Strait of Hormuz game using the Bulldogs Away rules and a War of 1812 naval battle on Lake Ontario (I was planning on a Vietnam air game, but it didn't work out, more on that later). You can see the Preliminary Event List at the Enfilade link or just click here for a direct link.

Last weekend Kevin and I ran through the Strait of Hormuz game (called "Tripwire" on the preliminary event list), but I didn't have my camera and didn't get any pictures (you can see some photos and a description at Kevin's blog). The game played out really well and I'm only planning on some minor tweaks for the real game.


My previous post had some group photos of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Navy (IRGN) ships, but here are a few more, with some comments about their roll in the test game.

The Thondor class is a decent little missile boat with four good anti-ship missiles. It doesn't have as good of secondary weapons as some missile boats (with only twin 30mm and twin 23mm guns), but they weren't really designed to get into gun fights. As I mentioned in my previous post, the PT Dockyard models are good, but I had a little trouble with the guns.

Thondor class in profile

Thondor class in 3/4 view

The C-14 "China Cat" boats did a job against the American LCS in our playtest. Gamewise, they have some limitations in that the C-701 missile used has command guidance, so only one can be fired/guided at a time). A lot of the stuff I've seen on the C-701 missile says that a radar homing version is available, but I decided to limit the Iranians for the scenario. Interestingly, a lot of the recent real photos I've seen of this class in Iranian service show them with rocket launchers mounted atop the cabin, which makes me wonder if the IRGN is having trouble getting the missiles. I really like the PT Dockyard version of this ship.

A trio of C-14 missile boats

The Tir class torpedo boats are interesting ships and models. There aren't too many countries that still use straight torpedo boats, especially ones without much secondary armament (the Tir only has an aft facing heavy machine gun). These didn't get into our game, but could be an interesting option.

Tir class torpedo boats

The Boghammers are just good at making a nuisance of themselves. In our game, they were able to get in some good hits on the smaller Allied ships (they have to be at close-range to really achieve anything) before being knocked out.

Boghammers underway

Yesterday, I had a chance to play out the War of 1812 Lake Ontario game. Originally, I had planned on running a Vietnam War air game, but work and other items kept me from finishing up my aircraft and other items needed for the game.

So, I decided I wanted to run something a little different and contacted my friend Mark to see about borrowing his Lake Ontario ships for a game using the Sail and Steam Navies rules, slightly modified for the sail end of the action. The scenario is based on the battle on Lake Ontario in early November 1812 where the inexperienced American squadron (with the corvette Oneida and six small schooners) tried to intercept the largest British ship on the lake, Royal George, before it returned to Kingston harbor. Historically, the Americans pursued Royal George for a couple days, before breaking off the action after coming in range of the shore batteries near Kingston. For my game, I decided to add in a couple more British ships to make the scenario more interesting.

The game started out with the Americans moving to try and cut off Royal George.

Americans enter the board

Meanwhile, Royal George was putting on sail to get closer to the shore batteries.

Royal George on the move

The Americans had split their flotilla into two groups; one with the four light ships that sped ahead to set up a blocking position and stop any reinforcements, the other group moved to catch Royal George.

The American light ships move forward

Royal George ended up in a precarious situation between the American lines, while the British reinforcements entered the board.

Royal George caught between the American lines

British reinforcements (Prince Regent - aft, Earl of Moria - forward) enter

Neither side had been able to do much damage at long range and instead of running for the edge of the board, the British decided to close and mix it up with the Americans. The Americans had the edge in number of long guns, while the British had the edge in shorter range carronades.

Earl of Moria closes on the American light ships

With the action moving to close range, the British advantage started to tell. In quick succession, the long gun on one American ship was destroyed and two other ships were heavily damaged and started to sink. With the American force whittled down, we decided to go ahead and call the game for the British.

Overall, the game worked out really well and I'm happy with the modifications to the Sail and Steam Navies rules to make the game more sail oriented.

Enfilade is only a couple weeks away and I have a few more things to finish up. But overall I feel like I'm in a good position for the convention.

Painting Progress and Enfilade Preperations

Work has been keeping me busy the past month and I've been a little out of synch with my project painting and Enfilade preparations. But I've made some major progress over the past week and-a-half.

First up, I finally completed my version of the LCS-2 from PT Dockyard, although the LCS-2 model isn;t for sale any longer. I hadn't based the ship when I took these photos, but they will give you a good idea of how it turned out.

Port side view

Starboard side view

And a better view of the helicopter deck

As you can see, I used the photo-etch netting for around the helicopter deck. While it turned out looking okay, my experience with the photo-etch parts has pretty much convinced me that I don't want to use them again (I just don't have the right tools for working with the parts and I'm not sure that they added that much to the game model). I was hoping to find some decals to help with the helicopter deck, but ended up just painting the lines myself (there is supposed to be a circle in the middle of the deck, but I couldn't get it to look right and just painted over it).

The LCS-2 is going to be part of the Straits of Hormuz scenario I'm running with Kevin at Enfilade. In addition to the LCS and a bunch of Iranians (more on them later), the scenario will include mines. So, I picked up some naval mine markers from Fight's On!, the same guys that make the missiles I use in my games. They come 8 to a pack and paint up nicely.

Naval Mine markers from Fight's On!

The mine markers are around 1 inch in diameter and will fit with most naval miniatures (although they are probably too big for my 1/6000 scale stuff). Here is a photo so you can get an idea of how they compare to the LCS in size.

I don't think this is how the Navy wants the LCS to clear mines.

On the other side of the scenario, we have the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Navy. These ships are also from PT Dockyard and I picked up a bunch of them. 

Iranian boats: in front are two Boghammers, on the left is a Tir class torpedo boat, in the middle is a C-14 "China Cat" class missile boat, and on the right is a Thondor class missile boat.

The Boghammers are from a new mold and are one piece, so no assembly required. The Tir class torpedo boats came in 3 pieces; the hull, aft machine gun, and radar mast. Overall, these went together pretty easily. The C-14 "China Cat" missile boats had 5 pieces; hull, twin 23mm gun, 2 missile boxes, and the radar mast. The only issue with these was that I needed to putty up some holes in the missile boxes. Again, these weren't too hard to assemble. The Thondor missile boats were a little tougher. These ships had 8 pieces; the hull, rear gun platform, 2 missile boxes, the upper radar mast (the lower part was molded on the hull), a twin 23mm gun, a fire control radar, and the barrels for the twin 30mm gun. The Thondors proved to be the toughest ships to put together. For some reason, I was only able to get part of the guns to turn out. So, I had to dig through my "Spare Kits" box for the guns and fire control radar. The models turned out fine, but I was glad to have some extra parts around.

I'm a big fan of Dave's work at the PT Dockyard, but these ships aren't for everyone. The resin kits are usually not to difficult to work with, as long as you have some sharp knives and/or clippers to trim away excess resin from weapons and other parts. But the parts can be hard to cut away from the resin or get deformed while cutting. Many are small and can be a bit of a pain to assemble at times. For me it is worth the extra effort, but for newer modelers I would recommend getting some of the plastic or metal weapon kits that are sold by various model companies. It will probably make it a little easier to assemble these ships. 


Kevin and I are going to playtest our scenario this weekend and it will be interesting to see how each side uses their forces. We'll be using David Manley's Bulldogs Away! rules for the game. Unfortunately, I won't have my camera and won't be able to take photos of the playtest. So, here are a couple more shots of all the boats and mines together.

Comparing the size of the Iranians and the LCS

I'm looking forward to trying out the game, since I expect most of the players won't really know much about the ships the are commanding. It should be fun.

One last group photo

Dressing Up My LCS-2

Last March I got one of the last LCS-2 models that PT Dockyard made. This year I'm finally putting it together and I'm hoping to use it in an Enfilade game.

I really like the way the hull looks, but it seemed a bit plain. I wanted to "dress up' the hull some and I really wanted to improve how the helicopter deck looked. I didn't think just painting some lines on the model would look that great. So, a couple months ago I started looking at the different brass photo-etch detail kits on the market. I found a set made specifically for the Dragon plastic LCS-2 kit from a company named Flyhawk, but I wanted to look around a little more to see if there were some other detail kits that would work. I looked around some more, but I was really interested in a kit for detailing the helicopter deck and nothing else looked like it would work. So, I decided to get the Flyhawk detail kit. I figured that it was the right scale (1/700) and even if things were a little off, they wouldn't be too far off.

The clean LCS-2 hull, ready for some detailing

I knew the Flyhawk helicopter deck brass piece was going to be a little off, since the plastic model had open hanger doors and the brass deck extended into those. But I thought I would easily be able to trim those off to fit my kit.

The photo-etch kit from Flyhawk

When the photo-etch detail kit arrived, I was happy and sad. The helicopter deck was longer and wider than expected. The length wasn't too much of an issue, since I could cut that back, but it was also about 2mm wider than the PT Dockyard deck. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out if I should just put the deck piece on as is or try to trim it to fit. After a lot of debating with myself, I decided to trim 1mm off each side (to keep the deck centered). It took a lot of patience, but I think it turned out okay.

Here are a few photos of the assembled LCS-2 model with the photo-etch parts attached. I wanted to post the photos before I painted it so that you could see where the photo-etch parts were added.

Port side view with photo-etch in place

Here is the troublesome helicopter deck. I haven't added the netting around the deck yet, I'll do that after I paint the hull.

The helicopter deck (with a little glare)

And the starboard side, which has the part that got stuck before I could straighten it out.

Hopefully the final paint job will hide the crooked ventilation panel

I'm thinking about adding some railing after I paint the hull too. But it just depends on how the ship looks when painted. Right now I think things are looking pretty good.

March already!!!

As I flipped over the calendar page to March earlier this week, all I could think was 'Yikes! What happened to February?'

I usually take a break from gaming in mid/late-January, but this year work kept me from doing much in February and I've really been neglecting this blog. So, I wanted to post a quick update on what I've been up to and what I'm planning.

To begin with I thought I'd post this Naval Wargamer 'What I Do" image that I thought was pretty funny (there were a bunch these going around for different wargaming types).

Plans for Enfilade - first off, I'll talk about what I'm thinking about doing for the Enfilade gaming convention. I know Enfilade is still months away, but the way February zipped by, I figure I better get working. Right now I'm looking at running (or helping to run) two games.

For the first game, Kevin and I have talked about what naval game to do for Enfilade and we decided we would run a Strait of Hormuz game with the Bulldogs Away! rules. The basic idea for the game is that Iran has shut down the strait by laying a few minefields and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Navy (IRGN) has been deployed to stop any attempt to sweep the mines. The U.S. Navy is other side and will deploy some littoral combat ships to sweep the mines and defend themselves from the Iranians. I actually would like to have more options for minesweepers, but I haven't been able to find any good ones in 1/700 scale. But, I have the LCS-2 from PT Dockyard (which is no longer available) and Kevin has an LCS-1 and he recently purchased a plastic version of the LCS-2. So, we have some interesting ships for the U.S. side. The IRGN will have the options of taking the lightly armed, but more numerous, Boghammers, the small C-14 'China Cat' missile boats, and the larger Thondar class missile boats.

C-14 'China Cat' test firing a missile

Iranian Thondor Class

There might be some other options for the IRGN too. I'm hoping we can make an interesting scenario of it. However, if our tests of the scenario don't look good or things in the Middle East change to the point that we don't want to do the scenario, we have decided that we will replace this with a WWII coastal forces scenario.

The second game I'm looking at is a Vietnam War search and rescue scenario. It is a scenario idea I've had on the shelf for several years, but never got around to running. The basic idea for the scenario is that a U.S. Air Force CSAR (Combat Search And Rescue) force of A-1 Skyraiders and a rescue helicopter are looking for a downed aircrew.

A-1 Skyraider "Sandy" used to support search and rescue operations

There will be some F-4 Phantoms in the area too, but they won't have a full weapon load and they will have a limited loiter time. The North Vietnamese will have some anti-aircraft guns, some ground troops, and several flights of MiGs (17s, 19s, and 21s). I'm planning on using the AirWarC21 rules, since I think they have air-to-air and air-to-ground rules, and are easy enough for anyone at the convention to get into.

Other stuff - In addition to making Enfilade plans, I've been slowly (emphasis on SLOWLY) painting up 15mm sailors (American/English and Barbary types) for my Age of Sail stuff. I'm not sure why I have such trouble painting figures, but I always have. So I do a little painting on the figures, wonder why they don't turn out exactly how I pictured in my mind, then I let them sit until I get over that and try again. But, here are a couple "in progress" photos. The Barbary Pirates are from Thoroughbred and the other sailors are from Minifigs (I also have a some sailors from Thoroughbred, but they aren't pictured here).

Thoroughbred Barbary Pirates in progress

Minifigs sailors in progress

I'm also following up on a long standing project to do models of American submarines. It has been pretty hard to find them in the same scale, especially for the early Cold War classes. But a company called OKB Grigorov is making 1/700 scale (my preferred scale) models of lots of Cold War subs. So, it looks like this project might be back on track.

Nautilus model from OKB Grigorov

Now I just need to make sure I get back to posting regular updates to the blog.

Drumbeat 2012

Drumbeat 2012 was held on Saturday at the Lake City Community Center. There were two gaming sessions during the day, with around six games in each session. I joined in a game of Sail and Steam Navies in the morning and ran an Action Stations game in the afternoon.

The Sail and Steam Navies game was a battle off Charleston, South Carolina, with a force of Confederate ironclads attacking the Union blockading force. The Confederates had the casemate ironclads Charleston, Chicora, and Palmetto State, along with a pair of spar torpedo boats. The Union had the ironclad frigate New Ironsides, ironclad Keokuk, double-end gunboat Octorara, 90-day gunboat Kansas, and ferryboat Commodore Barney. The Confederate goal was to sink a major Union ship, while the Union was just trying to maintain the blockade without getting hurt.

Confederate forces move out to meet the Yankees

I was on the Confederate side, running Palmetto State and one torpedo boat, and knew that it would be a tough fight. Basically all of the Union ships were faster than the Confederate ironclads and their gun armament was better or on par with the ironclads. The best bet for the Confederates to try an ram or use their spar torpedoes, but the speed differences were going to make that tough and since it was a daylight battle, we didn't expect the torpedo boats to get close enough to use their torpedoes. But we were hoping that we could catch the slowest Union ship, New Ironsides, with a ram or torpedo attack.

Union ironclad frigate USS New Ironsides

The game started out with the Confederates entering the map and the Union forces moving slowly. The nearest Union ship was the armed ferry Commodore Barney. I knew it wasn't going to be a good day when Commodore Barney was able to sink my torpedo boat in one turn and then shoot away my stack, reducing my speed. The little ferry then turned up the steam and sped away, taking only a little damage from my guns.

The sharpshooting Commodore Barney

At one point we were hoping that the Union forces would do some damage to themselves as New Ironsides passed between Octorara and Keokuk, but it turned out they had plenty of maneuvering room to spare.

New Ironsides passes between Keokuk and  Octorara

With my limited speed, I was basically left behind as the other ironclads charged the Union forces. The remaining torpedo boat was easily blown out of the water as it approached New Ironsides. Charleston traded shots with Keokuk, but neither ship could land any decisive blows. Chicora got close to the Union line, but concentrated gunnery from New Ironsides and Commodore Barney damaged the ironclad and slowed it down.

I was getting close to catching up with the action when we decided it would probably be better to retire back to the city.

The only ships sunk were the Confederate torpedo boats. The Union wooden ships had taken some damage, but Chicora was really in bad shape. It was sort of a draw, but the Union did maintain the blockade, so they really won the battle.

In the afternoon, Kevin and I ran a quick Action Stations game. The game wasn't too elaborate, since I wasn't sure if there would be anyone that wanted to play in it (last year a lot of people left Drumbeat after the morning session and I thought that might happen again). The game pitted four British MGBs against four S-Boats. The S-Boats were returning home after an attack on a convoy and the MGBs were there to stop them.

Before starting the game the German forces had to choose how they attacked the convoy. This would determine how they entered the map for the scenario and if they had to check for damage from the convoy escorts. The Germans chose a method that gave then a boost in the victory conditions, but would have them roll for extra damage and that would somewhat scatter their boats, so they would enter the map randomly. But the Germans did have some luck with their random entry rolls, with two boats entering at the same area at the same time, while another boat entered in a different location on the same turn, and the final boat would enter on turn 3. The British had two types of MGBs, one armed with a 2 pdr automatic mount and a twin 20mm mount, while the other had five single 20mm mounts, and started out in the center of the map, waiting for the Germans to appear.

The two S-Boats that entered together were able to run up the side of the map without too much problem. They did exchange fire with a pair of MGBs, but didn't take any damage. They also did a machinery hit to the closest MGB, which stopped any pursuit. These S-Boats were able to make their way off the map without any further incident.

The other S-Boats were close enough to support each other, but would end up facing all four of the MGBs. Once the boats sighted each other, the Germans went to maximum speed to break through the MGB line. The boats on both sides were travelling so fast that flares weren't helping out much, so the British decided to turn on their searchlights to make it easier to hit the S-Boats. The S-Boats were taking a few hits, but nothing that would slow them down. It looked like they were going to make it out when a 2 pdr finally connected and started a fire on an S-Boat.

The S-Boat burns brightly

This was when the German's luck failed them. The burning S-Boat continued to take damage and then had a fuel explosion that basically stopped the boat dead in the water.

The other S-Boat had two MGBs in hot pursuit and was getting close to the board edge when it started taking hull and machinery hits that slowed it down. It traded shots with its pursuers, but couldn't do enough damage to shake them. It ended up being sunk near the board edge.

S-Boat (center) under attack from pursuing MGBs

The overall game was a minor German victory (because of the initial convoy attack option), but everyone agreed that the Germans couldn't take too many more victories like this one.

Even though I was playing or running games all day, I did take a little time to grab a few photos of some of the other games at Drumbeat.

The morning session had a large Black Powder Napoleonic game with Austrians taking on the French.

The view from the French right flank

The Austrians wait for the French attack

A close-up view of the Austrian infantry

The French move on the Austrian guns

Wes Rogers ran a Seven Years War game (I think he was using his own rules).

The British line ready for battle

A cavalry engagement on the flank

There was a Sword and the Flame game. It sounded like it didn't turn out too well for the Soldiers of the Queen.

The British surrounded again

A Force on Force game with U.S. Marines going up against insurgents. It was run in the morning and afternoon, but I didn't hear the results.

Humvees move toward the objective

The NAGS group also ran DBA games throughout the day.

DBA in action

In the afternoon, there was Black Powder English Civil War game.

Pike and shot ready to advance

And a Tactica 2 game with Romans against the Pontics.

The Roman line ready to advance

Overall a good day for gaming.

Civil War Naval Book Reviews and Year End Post

As part of my research for the Up the River mini-campaign, I read through a couple short histories on American Civil War naval actions and I thought I'd share my thoughts on these books, along with my thoughts for 2012.

The Civil War at Sea, by Craig Symonds

Craig Symonds has several good books on Civil War naval topics and this book provides a good overview of all the aspects of the naval war. The book starts out with a discussion of the ships, guns, and other technologies for each side of the conflict. Symonds does a good job of explaining the strengths and limitations of each side and the impact of new technologies. The book then goes into chapters that cover the Union's blockade strategy and Confederate blockade runners, the Confederate war on commerce, naval forces on the western rivers, and operations against the major Southern port cities. The book does a really nice job of explaining the difficulties the Union had in coordinating ground and naval forces to implement the overall strategy, but it doesn't skimp on the view from the Confederate side.

The Civil War at Sea is a short book, only around 200 pages, but pack a lot of information into those pages. This is one of the best one-volume books on the naval portion of the Civil War that I have seen and I would recommend it. It is a good book for people just starting to read about the subject or for those that want a single reference book. For gamers, it provides enough information to create your own scenarios, historical and hypothetical. Overall, lots of good stuff is in the book.

Mr. Lincoln's Brown Water Navy: The Mississippi Squadron, by Gary Joiner

This book provides a good general history of the Union naval efforts on the western rivers. It provides information about the organization, ships, and men of the Union riverine navy. There is some good discussion about evolution of the Mississippi Squadron from a few ships under Army command to a full squadron under command of a Navy flag officer. The book covers the major and minor actions for the squadron, there is a whole chapter devoted to the Red River campaign, along with the action of the Navy's blue-water squadron that captured New Orleans and came up the Mississippi.

Mr. Lincoln's Brown Water Navy is a short book, around 225 pages, and is an interesting read. While the book doesn't go into great detail about the different ships in the squadron, it does have lots of information about the different battles and minor actions that can be fodder for gaming ideas. This is a good book, but I would only recommend it if you have an interest in the riverine battles. However, I do think it is a good complement for Symonds The Civil War at Sea.

Plans for 2012
While it seems obligatory for gaming bloggers to write something about plans for 2012, I have to admit that I really haven't made any. There are things that I want to work on (it is really an unending list), but I'm sure there will be stuff the pops up at the last minute that will draw my interest. With that in mind, here is a short list of the stuff I'm thinking about for 2012.

15mm Age of Sail ships and figures: This is an on-going project that I really need to get back to. I've got several ships and lots of figures ready to paint, but for some reason I just haven't been able to motivate myself to go back to them. It would probably help if I could find a set of rules I really like. The new 18mm line from Capitan Miniatures look interesting and I'm sort of hoping they find and American distributor. But I really need to finish up the stuff I have before buying more.

1/600 and 1/700 scale ships: I'll continue to expand my line of WWII and post-WWII ships for small scale actions (using Action Stations and Bulldogs Away). I really like this scale and the battles I've come up with are usually a lot of fun. I will probably add a few ships for Enfilade games and to round out my collection. I would like to see more modern Chinese ships in the scale (Are you listening P.T. Dockyard?) and some others for doing hypothetical battles in the South China Sea and Spratly Islands. Additionally, I should get back to the Raid on St. Nazaire project that Kevin and I have talked about.

Grab Bag: I need to go through my miniatures box to see what is there. I keep thinking I would like to get back to doing some air battles, but don't have anything specific in mind right now. Kevin and I are also tinkering around with the idea of playing some small space battles using the Galactic Knights rules (yes, I know I bought a Super Galactic Dreadnought at Enfilade 2011, but I'm not sure how deep I want to get into this). There are also a few other things kicking around, but I doubt I will get to them in 2012.

Wishful Thinking: One project I have always wanted to do is a modern submarine game. I've collected a lot of the 1/700 scale plastic model kits (which only provided a limited number of submarine types) and over the past few years I've been watching the growing line of 1/700 scale resin kits from OKB Grigorov. They have actually come out with a pretty extensive range of Cold War and Post-Cold War submarines (U.S., Soviet/Russian, British, and German). 1/700 scale might be a little too large to actually game with, but it could be fun. That is, assuming that I could find a set of rules that worked for that scale. So, until I find some extra time and money, this will just remain on the "Wishful Thinking" list.