Good news

I have a little bit of good news...

Earlier in January, I had purchased a copy of GQ3 - Fleet Action Imminent.  However, there was a problem - the charts were misprinted.  The charts had copies of the spotting (and other info) tables on both sides and no gunnery tables.  Kind of difficult to run a naval combat game with no gunnery info!  So, I placed an e-mail with the publisher - ODGW - who promised to have a new set of charts mailed to me.  After some patience, the new and properly printed charts have arrived.

I intend to do a side-by-side comparison of GQ2 and GQ3 in the near future.

I also need to write a list of ship minis that I need to purchase!

Naval Gaming news - 28 February 2009

James, at his blog - Olicanalad's Games - has posted a great series on a new ancients naval game - Fleet of Battle

There is a massive series of photos of WW1 German ships at the GameSquad forums - simply amazing!

Waffles

I am continuing to flit from rules-set to rules-set as I continue to work on my Tékumel project...

Since Basic Impetus, as a historical gaming set, does not have a magic system, I have been sifting through my other rules to help create a simple battle magic system. Unfortunately, this is (of course) leading me to consider other rules in total and not just a BI variant. I keep coming back to ChipCo's Fantasy Rules!. FR! has a well-defined magic system already. It also has a great flexibility in the army generation system. The combat system in FR! is more simple than BI, but that is not bad in my opinion.

There is another factor. FR! used 60mm squares for unit bases, whereas BI uses bases of 120mm in width and 30mm/40mm/60mm depths depending on the type of unit. It is my intention to use Litko as a source for the bases; their 3mm plywood bases should be sufficiently strong enough to support multiple 25mm figures and I do not have the equipment to adequately and easily cut my own bases of that thickness. Long story short, the FR! bases are cheaper than the BI bases, especially those of 40mm depth (the most common one that I would need) - Litko does not have the 120mm x 40mm bases as a stock item and are custom-cut, making them much more expensive. With the smaller size of the FR! bases, I 'might' need fewer minis also, hence I could come up with an army for less money with FR!

Sometimes, I hate making decisions! So, I am pondering yet another pivot in my course.


Please note - this is not a jab at Litko, I have ordered their fine bases before and will do so again.







I do like waffles also, with a bit of butter and maple syrup.


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Wargaming Tékumel, part 4

I sat down over the week-end and hashed out some of the basic unit formations that are typically used in Tékumeli battles and attempted to convert them over to the Impetus basing system. (These formations are found in the rules set Warfare on Tékumel, by Bill Faulkner, copies of which can be found on the TékumelMinis Yahoogroup.) Some of the formations just do not fit on the bases for heavy infantry in Impetus, but many do.

This formation is the 'Embrace of Nayári' (the base dimensions are in red). The ends of this unit project forward, and are meant to penetrate into or envelop an opponent.

'Blade of the Sword', a formation that has few ranks, intended to cover a wide frontage.

'Garment of Idéssa', a checkerboard or quinqunx-style formation. This one is a bit harder to portray on the Impetus bases, but maybe two bases in a Large Unit group would look better.

'Stone Mountain', your typical wargaming unit formation. I will probably reserve this formation to those units that are armed with pikes, to help alleviate any confusion with long spear-armed units.

'Teeth of Krá', where the unit is formed into wedges, in order to penetrate the opposing formation. This array, along with the 'Garment of Idéssa' above, are two types of formations that would never be used by the non-human Shén or Ahoggyá, who liken these fancy displays to 'silly human folk dancing'.

There is one other formation, preferred by Livyáni forces, that is a single large wedge. It is too large for a single base, but, if I ever procure a Livyáni force, could be represented by two bases paired as a single Large Unit. There is also one formation that would look best for missile troops; when I have a unit of archers ready I will use that at least once.

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Naval Gaming news - 17 February 2009

North Head Miniatures has announced the initial releases in their upcoming 1/3000 WW2 range (as reported on Tabletop Gaming News)

Wargaming Tékumel, part 3

I know that I have said this before, but I think that I have finally conjured up a solution to the rules situation for my Tékumel forces...

After a bit more consideration (only have been musing about this for - months!) I have put together enough pieces of my puzzle and will start organizing the troops for Basic Impetus.  There is enough flexibility in the rules to portray some of the unique aspects involved with Tékumeli battles - variable troop strengths and army set-up for example - without a great deal of complication.  I have finally grown comfortable with the use of markers for the units; just need to decide on a final version.  And, the rules are free at the Basic Impetus site.

I have quite a few ideas on making Basic Impetus a bit more Tékumel-like, and yes it includes pics!  I just need to edit some and I will post them here shortly.  There are several matters to contend with:

1.    Magic - Battle magic on Tékumel is a bit different from the norm.  You don't have one or two wizards trotting around blasting stuff.  Typically, you have two teams of priests, offensive and defensive.  The teams on opposing forces tend to cancel one another out until fatigue or bad luck occurs, with the results being catastrophic.  I plan to amalgamate several different ideas from various other games for this and make for a hopefully interesting side game alongside the main battle.

2.    Unit formations - In the official versions of Tékumel wargames, there are a great variety of unique unit formations that a cohort/legion could use.  I intend to attempt to imitate them, with only the base sizes of Basic Impetus as a limit.  I have some pics of these to be posted soon.  I do not plan to give any sort of benefit to these formations, since once I make the unit it can not be changed (one bad point about the single large base style of BI).  But, it will serve to give the battleground a slight hint of Tékumel.

3.    Army formations - Again, there are several army set-up formations that could be used.  Many of these are empire-specific, and I will translate them into use for BI.  If you array your forces in a given fashion, your general could receive a bonus to his Initiative roll.  A Player will not be required to do so unless you would like a bonus to your roll.  There are some formations that are despised by certain armies, and will receive a negative factor!

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Did not last long!

Yep, thinking about fantasy miniatures gaming again - I think it was actually my wife's fault.  Not too long ago, we watched the two recently released Narnia movies, and that really set my mind to task.  Those are some of the types of battles that I would like to put on the tabletop!  A variety of units, creatures, abilities, heroes, weapons, all together.

I'm also finding that the battle reports on Tim's Miniature Wargaming Blog are quite inspiring!

So, I'm not out of this yet.  Maybe I just needed some time away from the project, to give me another perspective.  The rules choice is still a problem, but I have no fear that I will come up with something...

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WW1 Baltic, part 1

While surfing around the 'Net recently, I came across this site:

World War 1 at Sea - Baltic

(link fixed 07.25.2009)

These pages have a great deal of information on the naval campaign in the Baltic in WW1. There is a brief description of the land campaigns in a chronological order, with notes on any significant naval actions that occurred during the same time frame. A lot of good scenario background can be found there.

That site will be the starter for a list of ships needed for my first scenarios. I need to read through the battles carefully to find an action that will have enough ships for a good GQ3 scenario for, say, 4 to 6 people (a typical convention participation game). The entry for 2 July 1915 is a good candidate...

Dazzle Camouflage patterns

The Rhode Island School of Design has a collection of 455 plans of dazzle camouflage as used on US ships in WW2; here are some dazzle plan samples

Naval Gaming news - 1 February 2009

Mongoose Publishing has posted a scenario for Victory at Sea: Age of Dreadnoughts (Heligoland Bight 1917) in Signs & Portents 65 - a free PDF download



A new, revised edition of Don Featherstone's Naval War Games has been published by John Curry



Panzerschiffe has released some new models in 1/2400