Recalling the DANG Past

In my post Catching Up I mentioned that I was preparing for my yearly naval game, referred to as DANG (Dave's Annual Naval Game). Since I'm catching up on a few other things, I thought I would post a little information about previous DANG games.

DANG is a day-long (well really about 6 or 7 hours) naval oriented game and is typically a mini-campaign with several battles representing several days or months of a campaign. I get the ideas for the games from various sources, some printed and some just made up by me. One of my favorite sources was the old Naval Wargaming Review done by Nathan Forney. Naval Wargaming Review was a little gem of a publication from the mid-1990s covering naval wargaming in all forms (board games, miniatures, and even computer games) with scenarios, mini-campaigns, after-action reports and product reviews. It didn't have a very long run (I'm not sure if it lasted 3 years), but there was a lot of fun information for naval gamers. I've always hoped the Nathan would bring it back sometime (if anyone reading this knows Nathan, you should tell him to give it another go).

Here is the list of games we have played over the years, with a little information about each game. I don't have pictures for all of the games, but have included a few snapshots for those I do have.

2002: South Atlantic War 1982 This game used a modified version of the Lombardo’s Trident scenario from the Harpoon4 suplement The South Atlantic War. We used the Shipwreck modern naval rules and Figurehead 1/6000 scale ships to play out the battles. This game ended with UK victory, since most of the Argentinean fleet was destroyed (including Belgrano and 25 de Mayo).

2003: WWI Adriatic This campaign was from the Naval Wargaming Review game and covered the opening moves of WWI in the Adriatic with Austro-Hungarian fleet going up against the Italians, with a little British support. We used the General Quarters 2 rules with Figurehead 1/6000 scale ships. The Austro-Hungarians won this game with an early attack on an Italian port and later a night ambush of Italian battleship force, after which the Italians conceded victory. Nothing went right for the Italians in this game.

2004: Remember the Maine; the Spanish-American War in the Caribbean We used a modified version of the Strategy & Tactics game Remember the Maine for operational movement and David Manley's Fire when Ready rules and Panzerschiffe 1/2400 scale ships for tactical actions. In the game, both sides won some minor battles, but there had not been a decisive battle and things could have gone either way when we had to wrap up the game. This game was probably a little too ambitious and not enough people showed up to really run both sides effectively. 

Spanish Cruisers (and a destroyer) sailing out to meet the Americans

2005: The Relief of Wake Island This game covered the attempt by US carrier and transport task forces to resupply the Marines holding out on Wake Island, while the Japanese divert forces from the Pearl Harbor strike force for a second invasion attempt. We used the General Quarters 1 & 2 rules with Figurehead 1/6000 scale ships. While it was touch-and-go early on, this battle ended in a clear US victory as the relief force made it to Wake and with one Japanese carrier sunk and the other damaged during the battle.

My model of Wake Island

2006:Guadalcanal Nights This game covered the surface actions around Guadalcanal. This was another campaign from a Naval Wargaming Review issue and I believe it was the basis for The Solomons Campaign book from Old Dominion Gameworks. We used the General Quarters III rules (this was the first time many of the players had tried them) with Figurehead 1/6000 scale ships. This campaign was really too long for a one day event, but we still got through several battles. When we quit the Japanese had a small lead in points, but the game still could have gone either way.

Japanese (top) and American (bottom) battlelines approach each other off Guadalcanal

2007: 1973 Arab – Israeli War at Sea This was a campaign game of my own design, with the tactical battles being fought with David Manley's Bulldogs Away rules and 1/700 scale modern ships. The game results turned out pretty historical, with the Arab navies being basically destroyed by the end of the game, although the Israelis suffered higher losses than they did historically. 

Osa missile boats preparing to meet their fate

2008: Disputed Territory This was a scenario from the 1997 Harpoon Naval Review covering a territorial dispute between Australia and Indonesia with neutral shipping roaming through the area. We used the Harpoon4 rules with Figurehead 1/6000 scale ships (and some nice scratchbuilt oil platforms). In the end the Australians won a hard fought battle. They completed their objectives and didn’t lose as many ships or aircraft as the Indonesians, but they still had heavy losses. The victory was closer than it would have appeared.

Oil rig tender on fire next to a rig. 

2009: Action off Tunisia This game covered the fights between German/Italian light forces and British/American coastal forces off the North African coast. This was another campaign of my own design. We used the Action Stations rules with 1/600 scale ships to fight the tactical battles. This was a very tight game, but the Axis players pulled out a slight victory in the end since they were able to get some vital convoys through the Allied gauntlet.

A pair of Dog Boats (Fairmile D) heading for a German S-boat

That gets you up to date on the DANG games. I'll being posting more about this year's game soon.

Museum of Flight Recap

We had the NHMGS game day at the Museum of Flight in Seattle on November 6. I'm a little late in getting my report in, since none of my pictures turned out and I got a little busy during the week. Luckily Dale Mickel took a bunch of pictures and I've "borrowed" some for this post. You can see all of Dale's pictures here.

The 6th was a rainy day (so surprising for Seattle) so we were expecting a good number of visitors at the museum. We had a good turnout of NHMGS members (around 25 people), the information table was set up, and all the games were ready to go when the museum opened up.

NHMGS game tables under the Museum's Blackbird

During the morning session we had an air racing game (using my home brew rules), a 28mm World War II game, a 15mm World War II game, a World War I air game (using Wing of War), and DBA games going on. All the games drew viewers and questions from museum visitors. The Wings of War and DBA games even had a few visitors sit down and play some games.


Air Racing nose-to-nose

In the afternoon, the DBA and 15mm World War II games continued, while a 20mm Spanish Civil War and 10mm World War II Tobruk game were added to the mix.

DBA under the Blackbird

I spent most of the day at the information table, talking with the museum goers and generally making a nusance of myself.

Side view of the information table

Overall, it was a good day for NHMGS at the museum. We had a chance to show off the hobby to the general public, play a few games, and everyone seemed to have a good time. We expect to be back next year (mark your calendars now).

A couple other NHMGS members (Kevin and Dean) posted their own impressions of the Museum of Flight game day and you can read them here: Kevin and Dean.

I should be returning to some naval gaming topics with my next blog post.

Sad News

My favorite baseball announcer, Dave Niehaus, passed away yesterday. Dave was the primary radio play-by-play announcer for the Seattle Mariners from their first game in 1977 through the end of the 2010 season.

I'm not a native to the area and didn't grow up following the Mariners, but when I moved to this area and started listening to the ball games, Dave was the voice I associated with the Mariners. He was the one constant with the team.

For me Dave Niehaus became more than just a local baseball announcer, he was like a favorite uncle who would invite me over and then tell some great stories. During the summertime his voice would go everywhere with me, whether I was working in the yard or gaming with friends.

Dave did more than just describe what was happening on the field, he described everything that was happening at the game. He provided descriptions of not just the sights and sounds of the ballpark, but what it felt like to be there. He had this wonderful ability to draw you into the whole game experience making you feel like you were sitting next to him. He was truly one of the great storytellers and made you feel like you were part of his small select group of friends.

Dave always made it fun to listen to the game, even when the Mariners weren't very good, which was more often than not. He rarely complained about how the team played in the same way a normal fan would. But when a player (or the team) wasn't putting out their best effort he would say something, which was pretty rare for a team employed announcer.

For me his passing is really like losing a member of the family. Summer will not be the same without Dave Niehaus. Good-bye Dave, we will miss you.

Catching Up

After starting up this blog I told myself that I wanted to try and get a new post up at least every couple of weeks. I thought that would be a good (and easy) goal to shoot for, but after not getting a post up for more than a month, it seems like I was wrong. Well, hopefully I will be able to change that and get back on a reasonable schedule for updating the blog.

Over the past several weeks I haven't been working on much hobby stuff, but here are a couple things that are going on that I want to pass along.

First off, NHMGS (the Northwest Historical Miniatures Gaming Society) is putting on a Game Day at the Museum of Flight in Seattle on Saturday, November 6.

NHMGS has been running a game day at the museum on and off for the last ten years. There will be five game tables and two gaming periods. The games will cover a lot of different topics; not just air related games, although there will be several of those. Right now the games include: air racing, World War II air and land action, World War I air action, and ancient battles (using DBA). Additionally we will have an information table with reference books, rules, and miniatures on display.

It is always a good time and we are expecting around 25 NHMGS members to be there to show the flag. If you are in the Seattle area on Saturday, you might want to stop by the museum and have a look or even stop and play. You can find out more about getting to the museum at their website.

Second, I am preparing for DANG (Dave's Annual Naval Game) 2010. Every year since 2002 I've run a naval mini-campaign for my friends between Christmas and New Year’s Day. We've had some interesting games in the past, ranging from the Spanish-American War, to World War I in the Adriatic, to World War II and modern actions.

After the first couple of years I started to let people vote on the game they wanted to play. I would come up with a list of around ten potential games and let everyone vote on what they wanted to play. This year's voting was done at the start of October and was done in two rounds. The first round had ten games and the second round had the top four games from the first round.

This year's winner was the 1571 Lepanto campaign.

The game will cover the last large-scale galley battle in history. In the mini-campaign I'm planning on trying to cover the approach to the battle and the main battle itself, with some options for both sides. Although if players make different enough choices from their historical counterparts, the battle may not happen at Lepanto but somewhere else. I'm planning on using the "Christen Fire and Turkish Fury" rules (this is a naval variant of the Fire and Fury rules by David Manley) and the Figurehead 1/2400 scale galleys. I've got my order for the figures in at Strange Cargo Games and I'm just waiting for them to show up at my door.

Finally, following up on my Age of Sail stuff. I'm still working on the ships and the gunboat and cutter are about half-painted, but other, non-hobby, stuff has kept me away from finishing them. I'm hoping to get a little more work done on them before I get heavily into painting for the Lepanto Project and will post pictures when they are done.

A couple more Thoroughbred ships and some updates

In a previous post I gave a review of a couple Thoroughbred kits I had gotten through e-bay. This time I'll cover a couple ships I ordered directly from Thoroughbred.

First up is the One Gun Schooner kit (EN03). I really liked the look of this ship on the Thoroughbred website and it fits in with the smaller battles that I'm planning.
Out of the box, I was a little surprised at how small the kit really was (the box is even small). The ship size isn't really an issue for play, I was just wondering how many figures I would be able to fit safely on the deck.

Thoroughbred One-Gun Schooner kit

This kit is a two-masted schooner and comes with all the fittings for the masts and a central pivot gun. The gun can be a 24 pound long gun or a 32 pound carronade. There aren't too many parts for this one, so assembly should be easy. I was sort of hoping that I would be able to swap the guns so that I could have a little flexibility when playing with the ship, but I don't think the guns/slide mount will be stable enough for that.

Overall, I like the kit, although the schooner will be dwarfed by most of my other ships.

The other kit I bought was the Mediterranean Felucca (EN12). The Felucca is a medium sized ship (although it is one of the larger ones in my little fleet), but similar to types used all over the Mediterranean. This is another ship that I really like the look of. The raised stern really provides a distinctive look and I think this ship will be great for some one-on-one battles with the Americans or supporting some gunboats at Tripoli.

Thoroughbred Felucca

The kit comes with eight long guns and four swivel guns. There aren't a lot of parts, but assembling the masts looks like it may be a little more work than the other kits. Again, it is another nice kit from Thoroughbred.

Finally, I'll finish this post with an update on the Thoroughbred kits I previously reviewed. I finally assembled the cutter and gunboat and I took a couple pictures of them to post here before I primed them for final painting.

The cutter assembly went pretty well. I added all the fittings without too much trouble, but I decided to leave the gun ports off the finished kit. Mainly because they just seem like they would be too easy to knock off during game play. I may try to put them on later, but I think the completed version will look just fine without them.

Cutter stern view

I haven't added the carronades yet (I want to get the deck painted first) and masts will come after mounting the guns. I did test fit the mast and found that I needed to drill out the mast mounting hole a bit so that the mast would slide in properly.

Assembled Cutter

After looking at the assembled hull, I thought that I may have put the catheads a little to far back on the hull. But no one will probably notice during a game.

Here are a couple shots of the assembled gunboat. It was really easy to put together, with only the rudder, guns and grates to add to the hull.

Assembled Galley Gunboat

I was originally going to not glue the guns on the slide, just to leave them free to slide back and forth, but they really weren't stable and needed to be glued down to stay on the slide. I did leave the slide pivots free though, so the guns can be aimed all around.

Gunboat profile

After taking these pictures I primed both ships and they are now ready for painting.

I'm going to be playing a test game with both the Away, Boarders! and Prevailing Winds rules soon. I will post my impressions after playing in my next blog post.

A break for something a little different

In addition to naval gaming, I also enjoy a good bit of air gaming. So it is always exciting when I get a chance to see warbirds and modern aircraft up close. I had a chance to do that this weekend.

On Saturday I attended the Tolling of the Boats memorial ceremony for my local group of submarine veterans (you can see some more about that on the submarine veterans blog link to the right). After the ceremony I took a trip down to Boeing Field (where the Museum of Flight is located) to take a look at one of the newest fighters in the US Air Force, an F-22 Raptor.

While it was behind a chain-link fence, it was close enough that I could get a good look and a few pictures.

Here is a shot of the nose of the F-22, with the F-15 that accompanied it into town.

Here is a nice side-view of the fighter.

The rear-quarter view, with a little more of the F-15 in the background.

And a little more of the tail end, with a portion of the chain-link fence.

I am really lucky to live in a place where one week I can be looking at Navy ships in the bay, while watching the Blue Angels, and then a couple weeks later getting a glimpse at one of the most advanced fighters in the world.

Now back to your regularly scheduled naval gazing.

Looking at Rules: Limeys and Slimeys

In the final installment of my rule overviews, I'll look at the Limeys and Slimeys rules. (I wanted to include a photo of the rules cover, like I did with the other overviews, but there really isn't a cover. So, enjoy this picture I found while searching for sailing ships on the Internet.)

Limeys and Slimeys
Limeys and Slimeys is an older set (copyright 1990) of quick-play naval rules. I think they were originally included with ships from the miniatures line of the same name. You can still get the rules, crews, and some ships from GFI Minifigs in the US (look under the 15mm Renaissance heading for the figures and rules). The rules are about four pages in length and there is a two-sided quick reference sheet. The rules do have some suggested values for hull, rigging, and crew sizes. In addition to the play area, miniatures, measuring devices, you will need a number of six-sided dice, and a way to record hull and rigging damage. Unlike the other rule sets I've been looking at, the small crew sizes in Limeys and Slimeys let you use 1 figure for each crewman (the largest ship they suggest is a 14 gun ship with 24 sailors and 4 officers, to which you could add in 8 Marines with a Marine officer).

The turn sequence is pretty easy: Roll to see who moves first, First player moves, shoots, and resolves boarding, and then the next player moves, shoots, and resolves boarding.

Movement is done in two legs at a rate of 3 or 6 inches per leg (depending on how you are facing with the wind). Turning is done in increments of 45 degrees after a movement leg and there is a rule for tacking through the wind (with the chance of getting hung in irons). One interesting twist is that you can actually gain speed after your turn if you put the wind at your back.

Gunnery can happen any time during the moving player's turn (no opportunity fire here). Guns are basically classed a long guns or carronades. Long guns shoot out to 24 inches and do one point damage for each hit. Carronades can only fire to Short range (6 inches), but do double damage when they hit. There are three basic range bands: long (24 inches), short (6 inches) and Point Blank (3 inches). When a player is ready to fire, they roll one die for each gun firing, check for hits, and then roll damage for each hit. When a ship loses all of its Hull boxes, it sinks. I couldn't find a rule for morale checks, but the reference sheet mentions that a ship must make a morale check (1-3=strike, 4-6= fight on) when all the officers are killed.

Boarding is handled by closing to Point Blank range and trying to grapple with an enemy ship (they get a chance to un-grapple). If the grapple is successful (or the ships were fouled in some other way), you can send any crewmen not involved with the grappling to the boarding party. Both sides add up their figures, with Marines and officers adding two points and regular sailors adding one. Then a die is rolled, the number is multiplied by the total for the crew, and then divided by ten. The side with the lower score loses that value in crew, Marines, and Officers. The loser is pushed back one 'deck' with ships usually having two decks. If a crew loses the last deck, the ship is captured. If the attacker loses any round they are pushed back to their own ship.

Limeys and Slimeys also includes rules for anchoring, repairs, and small boats.

Overall it packs a lot of information into the four pages of rules and it looks like it would play nicely. If you want a quick play set of rules, these look like a good way to go. Here is a short list of the pros and cons I saw with the rules.

Pros: fast playing without much bookkeeping and the rules enough period flavor to work. Probably a good set of rules for convention games.

Cons: Not much differences between guns and it seems like ships may be sunk pretty easily, but that is just my impression without playing.