Destroyer Question

[regiamarina]

My mates and I had another game last night and we used the new destroyer rules again and they worked quite nicely. However one question did come up. The new optional rules for evade say that it costs a flat 3" of movement, but what happens if you can't go that fast? In the game a Fuso class battleship suffered 2 engine criticals reducing it's movement to 2" we decided that evade would cost half movement for anyone moving 3" or less. Just wondering whether anyone else has encountered this when trying this new rule out and how they solved it.

[TheDreadnought]

If you don't have 3" of movement, you can't do an effective job of evasive action. So you just don't get the option.

Under the current rule you have to have at least 2" of movement available, so its not much different really.

So which specific variant of the new destroyer rules did you use? Can you give us a little more detail about how they worked out?

[regiamarina]

Cheers Dreadnought. Just an additional query to your answer wouldn't you need at least 4" of movement then to be able to take effective evasive action? As it costs 3" if you only had 3" of movement you would evade but stay on the spot, or can you do this?

We were using the 10+ to hit and the 3" to evade movement cost in this game.

We initially tried out just the 10+ to hit for a few games and this does make a difference though destroyers were still taking a long time to get into battle and weren't achieving much if they evaded. The last few games we have added the 3" cost for evade and found that it still gives the destroyers enough speed to evade and make good time across a board to have an effect on a battle.

Generally we have found over the last few battles that we have come to fire less at destroyers when they are at long or extreme range and we wait until they are at medium before they are targetted, especially by secondaries under 20". We have found that once within 20" the destroyers tend to get hit pretty hard and usually most are still torn up or sunk before they can launch torpedoe's effectively. Very few runs get to within 6".

Destroyers are still impacting the game as they are drawing fire away from larger capital ships. We haven't used the modified damage for guns yet.

Overall we are finding the 10+ to hit and 3" cost for evasive manouvers is a perfect remedy for destroyers. These rules allow the destroyers a better chance of having an impact on a game without them being overpowering. And most importantly they also fit the spirit of the rules which is to keep it relatively simple but still have a good flavourful ruleset that gives a nice feel for WW2 naval combat but doesn't breakdown into fiddly minute rules and charts.

Hope this helps you thrash out the rules.

Martin

[toastar]

I played my first 2 player games today, all my games up until now had been solo, and we used the 10+ hit and 3" evade rulings, and the first game it seemed to be JUST the trick to keep it as balanced as possible. All four people (players and observers) seemed to be happy with the results. We didn't have any non plausible happenings, in fact, the destroyers that did make it to fire their spreads did so unsuccessfully, but it still 'felt' better.

Two side notes.

First, in my first Solo run through of the rules, playing First Bismark scenario. Picture this. Turn two, Hood rolls perfect for a single hit (which I believe was somewhere around a Ten Plus another 8+?) which in turn penatrated with a roll of a ten, which is turn rolled a Ten/Ten on the critical to ignite the magazine of the Bismarck. Yea. I screamed and woke my wife up....fun times!

Second point, just wanted to thank Steel Dreadnought from FINALLY getting me away from War at Sea. This is JUST what I needed, and I am demoing the game Today for 8 more War at sea players, playing as teams. Two ships each. I'll keep you all posted!!

[warchariot]

Eight players, good for you. Hey, I like the Avatar too.

[toastar]

Quick update on the game today:

First time being a ref. for this game so it was slightly slow starting, but once everyone got the basics of plotting their movement and main battery targets everything started to flow. We had a lot of fun and much metal was sent to the bottom of the sea.

The most interesting point of the day came from our grizzled War at Sea vet, who got all of us into WaS to begin with; his controlled ship was the Prince of Wales, and he was squaring off head to head against the Scharnhorst. (Fictitious scenario) whilst the other cruisers and BB's danced around each other these two quietly eyed each other across 50+ inches of sea water throwing Xlong shots back and forth. Finally moves were made and they entered into the med/long range bands where he was 'flabbergasted' that the Scharn had a higher armor sv. and ''better'' guns than the prince, because the scharn could fire longer. I explained to him about the way that Dread and company calculated armor values, and also that the scharn (to my knowledge) had longer barrels, resulting in better range. He wasn't happy how his Prince was performing until late battle when he got one broadside in Med range. His 9 damage 11 base pen guns made short work of the poor Scharn. I didn't hear a peep from him the rest of the day.

All in all I had at least four of the members who played suggest that we play it again soon (as in next week) and only one grouchy teacher who thought 'it was too complicated for sat. afternoon'.....

So thanks again for the system, and I look forward to posting pics for my next AAR!

[shigure]

I guess you will have to assign the grouchy teacher some homework (to read the rules) before the next game. Sounds like most everyone had fun.

[admiralgrafspee]

Apr 10, 2011 3:41:40 GMT -5 toastar said:

Quick update on the game today:

First time being a ref. for this game so it was slightly slow starting, but once everyone got the basics of plotting their movement and main battery targets everything started to flow. We had a lot of fun and much metal was sent to the bottom of the sea.

The most interesting point of the day came from our grizzled War at Sea vet, who got all of us into WaS to begin with; his controlled ship was the Prince of Wales, and he was squaring off head to head against the Scharnhorst. (Fictitious scenario) whilst the other cruisers and BB's danced around each other these two quietly eyed each other across 50+ inches of sea water throwing Xlong shots back and forth. Finally moves were made and they entered into the med/long range bands where he was 'flabbergasted' that the Scharn had a higher armor sv. and ''better'' guns than the prince, because the scharn could fire longer. I explained to him about the way that Dread and company calculated armor values, and also that the scharn (to my knowledge) had longer barrels, resulting in better range. He wasn't happy how his Prince was performing until late battle when he got one broadside in Med range. His 9 damage 11 base pen guns made short work of the poor Scharn. I didn't hear a peep from him the rest of the day.

All in all I had at least four of the members who played suggest that we play it again soon (as in next week) and only one grouchy teacher who thought 'it was too complicated for sat. afternoon'.....

So thanks again for the system, and I look forward to posting pics for my next AAR!

I guess the other moral of the storey is that WaS stats are far from the ultimate historical authority on ships!

[regiamarina]

I gave up on anything historical coming out of WaS a long time ago.

[TheDreadnought]

Yeah the Scharnhorst was actually pretty nasty. If they'd ever done the gun-refit on it, it would have been a better battleship than the Bismarck.

The KGV's on the other hand were treaty compliant battleships built on a budget. Servicable, but the most lightly armed modern battleships in the world, and not super-well protected either.

If your teacher friend finds Battleship Row too complicated, maybe be should try Clash of Dreadnoughts instead. The WWI version of Naval Thunder is somewhat simpler.