Vassal Gaming To Date - Napoleon at Leipzig, 1805 Sea of Glory, Operation Battleaxe 1941, Pacific Fury Guadalcanal, 1942 & Sovereign of the Seas together with an upcoming Table-top Campaign.

So its been a while since I updated everyone on my Vassal gaming, with my last post optimistically entitled 'Part One' looking at Steve M's and my game of Napoleon at Leipzig game from OSG, which were just getting into back in September last year, see link below.

JJ's Wargames - Napoleon at Leipzig, Battle of Nations

Well lots of other stuff imposed itself on the blog content between then and now and it's only now that I've found time to sit down and review that particular game and a few others that have been played since and thought I might just do a round up of those games to get things back up to date.

So the Leipzig game proved great fun, but I'm afraid I failed to live up to the performance of the Emperor of the French, managing in my machinations of the card play to promote the Russian and Prussian Guard into the front rank of the Allied attacks south of the city after I had delayed the arrival of less able Allied troops tabled to arrive before them - doh!

The card play in the Napoleonic Battles Library Series can be a two edged sword and a cunning plan can sometimes come back to bite you!

Our Leipzig game at the close of play on the 16th October.

This proved a costly error as my Marie Louise's struggled to hold these elite troops in place as I was forced to rush Young Guard and eventually the 'Grumbler's' themselves to try and stem things.

Marshal Ney, managed a fine job imposing himself on Blucher, but all to no avail as things fell apart in the south.

In the end I was forced to capitulate at the end of the 16th October, as Steve not only forced my position in and around Connewitz with a well executed attack by Kleist and the the Prussian Guard, but also made sure the French were not going to get out of town any time soon as he bottled up my escape route by closing the causeway through Lindenau.

The key area around the south of Leipzig that cooked Napoleon's goose! This despite a masterful defence in the north by Ney giving the old warhorse Blucher a bit of a bloody nose

My centre in the south was well and truly busted with two corps demoralised after the heavy fighting in the previous two days, and the final attack on Connewitz capitalised on the hard fighting put in by the Allies during a day and a half of persistent rain that negated their superiority in artillery and forced them to take ground at the point of the bayonet. 

Well played Steve and an enjoyable game that we played through the best part of September and October and were joined in our 'game room' on a couple of our nights play by the design team that created the latest version of this classic game, which was fun sharing comments over the Vassal platform during play and having a few of our errors corrected, thanks chaps.

JJ's Wargames - Sovereign of the Seas, Compass Games

At about the same time as I was enjoying Leipzig on a Tuesday night, I was playing Sovereign of the Seas (SOTS) with Jason on a Thursday afternoon which we concluded at about the same time and I reviewed my thoughts about the game in my post looking at its wider potential for use as a table-top campaign engine, see the link above to that post.

One of our climactic battles in 1799 was the Battle of Aden, here showing the result at the end of the affair with the British triumphant. Note 'sunk' is just a game mechanic to indicate captured, taken or sometimes destroyed, with most defeated vessels being returned to the draw pot to return in future turns.

During our final rounds of play we did find a slight problem with the game and its spotting rules when fleets go looking for each other, in that part of the spotting calculations adds the number of ships in each opposing fleet to the Admiral's value, any friendly frigates nearby and either three or one die scores depending on if you are wanting to spot (1 x d6) or avoiding a contact (3 x d6). This works ok until the European player, often trying to avoid a contact, builds very large fleets that appear to negate most British attempts to find them even with Nelson on a rating of 4, especially when sitting on a lead in VPs and trying to see the campaign out.

We think we may have a fix for that problem, which I'll address at the end of the post, but decided to turn our attention to another naval war offering for the Age of Sail, namely 1805 Sea of Glory designed by Phil Fry and published by GMT.

I bought this game soon after it was published and it is a work of passion by Phil Fry and one I have been keen to play using the full campaign set up for the dramatic year of 1805, which Jason and I started just before Xmas.

Yet to be resolved, but it's June 1805 and the Channel Squadron have intercepted a lone French 74, that escaped from Rochefort into the Bay of Biscay, with the ships deployed on the battle-board (centre right). The Mediterranean is full of British ships (frigates and squadron markers above the Balearic Islands, with another patrolling the Gibraltar Straits, that followed in the wake the French Brest squadron, after it successfully raided Alexandria and escaped into Cartagena.

The cat and mouse game that is produces is a classic war at sea campaign with Jason, playing the allies

looking for the opportunity to move his squadrons to sea at the best opportunity when British blockaders have been blown off station, and with his admiralty orders predefining the destination and objectives of his squadrons.

For myself, running the British, the first months of this game have been all about manning and repairing as many ships as I can each month, finding out what Nelson meant about not having enough frigates, and trying to get into the head of the enemy and accurately assess where certain enemy units may be heading amid a flurry of dummy blocks designed to draw my hunting squadrons of the scent. Great Stuff! 

The state of the British fleet at the end of May I 1805 with storm damaged ships, Bellerophon and Atlas, awaiting repair in Plymouth and the damaged Repulse still at sea with the Atlantic Squadron. To the far top right, quite a few ships still sit in ordinary in Plymouth and Portsmouth, awaiting fitting out and new crews brought in by the Press.

We are now into June 1805 and the first six months of play have generated French raids on Antigua and Alexandria and have seen three interceptions by the British with the Brest fleet escaping battle in the first but seeing two smaller squadrons intercepted, the first thoroughly beaten and the next, consising of just one French 74 about to be taken by the Channel squadron on patrol in the Bay of Biscay.

This is a great game and the administration side of running the fleets, dealing with damaged ships, appointing commanders to various squadrons, rotating in new ships brought out of ordinary, as well as trying to deal with the enemy is all here in this game and we are having a lot of fun with it.

With Leipzig concluded Steve and I decided to have a complete change of theme and returned to the Western Desert, this time in 1941 to play Operation Battleaxe, Wavell v Rommel, from Revolution Games, using the area system of WWII games started  by Avalon Hill with Breakout Normandy (BKN), a game we know well and love playing.

The game set up with the Empire forces yet to deploy onto the frontier, and with the Axis around and forward of Tobruk

This game has lots of similarities to BKN, but some key differences that sees a battle solution much more decisive and punishing than the often attritional battles modelled for the Normandy campaign, with the fighting often taking place in close dense terrain rather than the wide open vistas on the Western Desert.

June 16th Impulse Four: The Empire forces have pushed forward and grabbed key terrain on the frontier releasing Axis armour to come forward to deal with them.

This interesting game is one of two halves, seeing the Empire force launch its surprise offensive as the Axis focus on strangling the Tobruk defenders, only to see the taking of key victory point (VP) areas releasing the Axis armour to counterattack.

Thus the Empire commander has to decide when the point is reached to defend that terrain they hold and go firm in the face of Axis attacks to retake them, with both sides cautiously watching that their combats do not result in dangerous gaps that could allow a rapid penetration to yet more victory point areas lost.

The VP areas keep on giving once taken and thus the Axis must stop the bleed of VPs to the Empire from territory grabbed in previous turns.

The end of our first game and the Axis are defeated and forced to pull back from Tobruk losing key armoured assets in battles around Fort Capuzzo and Sidi Omar.

The game proved very entertaining and in two play throughs reached a climax by the second day of the offensive as the Axis were stung into a response as the Italians on the frontier recoiled or were destroyed in the face of British tank assaults.

However we both felt that the German panzer forces together with their anti-tank capability did not seem to be adequately reflected in the game, with poor British tank tactics, displayed by Churchill's Tiger Cubs charging massed lines of dug in 88mm and Pak 38 At guns, seemingly not captured in the combat resolution which we both struggled to match with our reading and understanding of this battle from the history books.

That said this is a nice rendition of this interesting early war desert campaign, with great graphics and other nice touches modelling this theme and made a nice change from Crusader and later offensives.

With Operation Battleaxe concluded in January, Steve and I turned to another interesting offering from Revolution Games, Pacific Fury, Guadalcanal 1942, another area based game but with an entirely different theme, focussed on the naval and land struggle between Japanese and American forces to take and hold the strategically important island of Guadalcanal in the Solomon's campaign of 1942.

The map set up for the start of Pacific Fury Guadalcanal, with both fleets ready to be deployed onto their respective operations tracks, seven boxes to be played through each of four months August to November. Henderson Field is in American hands on the Initiative Track, and the Japanese player builds task forces first, then the American player, who then deploys (sorties) onto the map first.

This game along with 1805 Sea of Glory are perhaps my favourite choices played so far since my last Vassal update and very cleverly recreates some of the issues the respective naval commanders of both sides faced in the decisions around force deployments in and around Guadalcanal in support of land units struggling to gain ascendancy and control of its vital airfield.

This game is all about anticipating what your opponent is likely to do and to try and outwit his deployments, called sorties, with those forces of your own, hence task force construction using the aircraft carriers, battleships and cruisers of the respective fleets, placed in the right order on the Operations Boxes that decides the order task forces can 'sortie onto the map is vital.

Game one, turn three, October, with the Japanese controlling Henderson, which has suffered a bombardment or air strike (indicated by a red X) and seeing the Americans needing to land troops with two transports to shift the marker two spots in their favour at the close. Oh and should a transport get sunk in the effort that shifts the marker back one in favour of the Japanese - Great Fun!  Note TFA US transports escorted by heaps of battleships and cruisers on the Operation Boxes, coming on next, set to come on last, hopefully once the Enterprise Task Force Carrier in the South Pacific Ocean has dealt with the opposition to allow an unopposed landing. Note also a Japanese TFC coming on last foreboding a carrier battle at the close. Normally during game play these opposing deployments are hidden from the opposition but shown here for illustrating game play.

Task Forces come in three flavours, Task Force Carrier (TFC must include a carrier either Fleet or Light), Task Force Bombardment (can only be composed of battleships and cruisers), Task Force Assault (TFA must include one or two transports and potentially battleships and cruisers). In addition the Japanese player has a special TFA, the Tokyo Express representing their fast destroyers able to move into Ironbottom Sound and land troops at night and departing before daylight.

TFC's can only operate in the open seas of the South Pacific Ocean and Eastern Solomon's, conducting carrier battles with enemy TFC's in their sea area and launching airstrikes against opposing groups in adjacent areas including Henderson and TFB's and TFA's they can catch in and around Ironbottom Sound. The slot is immune to such attacks and allows the Japanese a secure deployment zone from them.

Only TFB's and TFA's can enter Ironbottom Sound and The Slot, either fighting opposition task forces, bombarding Henderson and or landing troops. If at the end of a two tur combat resolution one side or the other occupies Ironbottom Sound and the force has transports, they immediately land before the force withdraws to its respective base at either Truk or Espiritu Santo.

End of November, Game One and an American Victory having fought back in October to take Henderson and hold it with two TFB's in Ironbottom Sound supported by the Hornet TFC a Japanese TFB and TFA held a bay in the slot. 

The latter operation is key to winning the game as troop landings enable the initiative marker and control of Henderson to be moved in either direction according to who landed the troops, which will always be the player who does not have control at the time and with that aspect of the game likely to change should control shift, say from the Americans to the Japanese.

Thus the other naval deployments are all about keeping or taking control of the Henderson marker, with ship losses nothing to do with victory, if the marker should lie in the control of either player at the conclusion of the November turn.

Some folks seem to struggle with that concept, but I rather think it reflects very well the position of both sides, to come out on top in this defining campaign, pretty well no matter what the cost in ships and men, with the result of this campaign shaping the direction of the Pacific War, with large numbers of major ships lost by both in the actual fighting, which would see fleet and light carriers, battleships and numerous cruisers written off the orders of battle for both sides.

Finally Jason and I are going to start another Sovereign of the Seas game this time trying out the idea I presented in my post back in August last year to use the game as a table-top campaign battle engine, using the 1:700th collection of model ships to resolve the combats we generate in our game and translating the results back into it.

Having played the game as a straight board game we have a pretty good idea as to what it will generate in terms of engagements and the addition of bringing in players from club to fight out those engagements and then translate them back into the SOTS will, I think, make for an interesting campaign system.

In that vain I have composed some simple tweaks to facilitate such play that also sees the use of the 1805 spotting rules adapted to our SOTS game as well as the use of Kiss Me Hardy to resolve the action.

We now have a date in the diary at the end of this month to start things off in 1793 with the commencement of the French Revolutionary War and we will play the board game on Vassal with a Zoom link and an invitation to players in the club interested in playing the table-top actions to join us if they would like to follow the play, which will generate our first battles of the war.

Needless to say I will update the blog here and on the Devon Wargames Group as to our progress.

More anon 

JJ

Mohawk Campaign Game - Scouting Mission Playtest

Just before the Xmas break I was busy getting my Jaegers finished off for my Mohawk collection 

JJ's Wargames - Mohawk Valley Collection, Jaegers & Militia

and in the process of pondering all things AWI Mohawk Valley ideas, as I am want to do, I came across a video review on YouTube illustrating a playthrough of the Mini-Game, Roger's Rangers by Decision Games and written by Joseph Miranda, which after a little bit more research on Boardgame Geek, I picked up a couple of copies, one for me and the other for my FIW enthusiast and mate Steve M.

Boardgame Geek - Rogers Rangers

The video link can be followed below with Centurion's Review showing a playthrough of the Scouting Scenario.

Centurions Review - Rogers Rangers

Of course I immediately spotted the problem with the game in that it is focussed on the right theatre in North America and with a similar theme but very much on Roger's Rangers and their role in the French Indian War, but, I thought might, with a little tweaking, work just as well recreating the adventures of Butler's Rangers and the King's Royal Yorkers in the American War of Independence.

Readily adapted artwork from the Perfect Captain AWI game served for my new counters to represent the two forces engaged in this theatre

Thus I sat down to play with this little project, to make the necessary tweaks with the map, units and cards to put the game into Cyberboard where I could playtest it to see if the idea would work or not and I thought you might like to see the results and how I got on.

When I say tweaks, that included a redesigned map, new counters to represent the different troop types and some changes to the Mission and Operations cards to change the descriptions to being more appropriate for this theatre in the AWI together with artwork to compliment the theme. The rules of play are however as written so once those aspects were done the game was ready to test.

My redesigned game map to represent the AWI frontier

So with the module finished over the Xmas break I decided I would start playtesting in January and for those unfamiliar with it, I should explain if you haven't followed the links above, that this is a solitaire game with the player running the Rangers force or in this case Crown forces and the system generating any opposition that you might bump into as you strive to complete one of four missions, which if playing the full campaign can be linked one after the other, Scout, Rescue, Frontier Raiding and the Big Campaign.

An example of one of my theatre-themed
Mission Cards and the subject of the first play test

The Mission Cards drive the set up and objectives for each game and in the example above, the game I am reporting here, my loyalist force under the command of Sir John Johnson are tasked with moving into enemy territory from one of the staging posts, either Fort Oswego or Fort St John, to recover the 'Intel' represented by one of seven objective counters randomly placed on the map and hidden from view until revealed when my force enters the area.

Of course some of those other objectives can aid or hinder my march to find the Intel counter and so every time one is turned over adds a little moment of anticipation in the game, in addition Ops (Operations Cards) can also help or hinder this process.

Two examples of Operations Cards that can get revealed each turn of the mission and in this case alerts the player to the possibility of contact with the enemy. Note the Alert Level being higher makes this more likely.

To achieve each mission, Operations Cards are required to allow it to continue, and this mission starts with six, which are used up each turn of the game mission, and can be lost because of events or equally gained in the same way. If you run out of ops before returning to base with the objective, the mission fails.

In addition I also need to build my force with the 8 RP (Recruit Points) allotted and take necessary gear to help my men achieve success, and these all cost RP and I am limited to 3 units represented by the Command factor, although my leader, Johnson is a free addition to the force.

Gear, in the form of boats and the green objects help to overcome likely obstacles during the mission
and the objective counters give each mission its purpose.

The numbers on each unit counter refer to combat factor (left) and movement (right), with the former requiring a die roll equal to or less than to defeat an enemy unit and the latter determining how many spaces on the map can potentially be moved to on the march, determined by the slowest marching unit in the column and special terrain such as Rebel Forts or Mountains that force the column to stop despite their move allowance.

Rebel units are simply deployed to the map when generated so don't require a movement rate but just have a combat factor, and commanders are counted as elite units giving a plus factor to the Tactical Superiority die roll which determines who shoots first and also have a Combat Factor of 1 (Crown) or 2 (Rebel) to simulate their small ability to influence the battle at that level should it become required.

The game test set up with six operation cards ready to drive the game and my loyalist force starting in Oswego

The screen shot above shows the module set up ready to go with the Scouting Mission, with seven objective markers placed on the map from Unadilla to Castle Town and up to Crown Point.

The Alert Level, indicates how ready the Rebels are for an incursion by Crown Troops and indicates how many troops might oppose me if I bump any on my route

My RP level is at zero as I have purchased my force of Kings Royal Yorkers, Butlers Rangers and Mohawk Indians and am taking the Long Rifle and Hatchet as my gear, attaching them to the latter two units, intending to start my march from Fort Oswego to Unadilla before moving into the Mohawk Valley.

Turn One - Arrival at Unadilla

So armed and ready my little force made its way south from Oswego via Lysander and stopped at Unadilla, having moved two areas, the furthest the force can march with the slower moving King's Yorkers in company

On arrival, the first Op Card was turned and it was not a good start, revealing my march had been spotted by Oneida Indians allied to the rebels, thus raising the Alert Level to two and reducing my remaining op cards to just four and barely into enemy territory.

On the positive side my arrival allowed the release of loyalist prisoners held in the area and adding an RP to the pot and the potential to raise more men and gain more equipment if needed.

The force then marched on to Fort Hunter, with the added threat of Rebel strongpoints in the area which causes Crown troops to halt the march immediately on entering the area.

Turn Two - Arrival at Fort Hunter

The subsequent Ops card was a rebel attack on my Ranger Camp which as I hadn't built one had no effect, and the turned objective marker revealed farms and homesteads which were burnt and destroyed, gaining me a further RP, which I forgot to record but will include in the next mission, as the march continued to Fultonville offering the opportunity to return to Oswego, should I fail to gain or, worse still, loose further Ops Cards.

Turn Three - Arrival at Fultonville and Rebel Ambush

Fultonville revealed the Butler's Rangers Op Card, which I at first put to one side in anticipation of using it later if required, only to find the revealed objective counter heralded a Rebel Ambush, now with the Alert Level at 2, setting up two randomly picked Rebel units, revealing Riflemen and Militia waiting on my march route.

Rebel Riflemen and Militia attempt to ambush my force, but the Butlers Rangers Ops Card helps to ensure victory for the Crown.

Thus I decided to play the Butler's Rangers card immediately giving my troops the automatic gain of the Tactical Superiority, meaning my chaps got to fire first with my KRRNY and Butlers hitting on 4's or less on a d6 routing the enemy before they knew what hit them, whilst also gaining me one Ops Card for winning the skirmish. 

Emboldened by my victory I decided to press on with the mission and head back up the valley to Fort Hunter ready to face events in Turn Four with my two remaining ops cards.

Turn Four - Return to Fort Hunter and the Battle of Fort Hunter

Needless to say my bold move to go back along the Mohawk Valley deep into Rebel territory was a risk with only one op card left and too far away to get back into Canada, and indeed the Rebels were waiting for me with a column sent out to hunt my force down now that they were aware of its presence.

The Rebel Army Ops Card immediately moved the Alert Level up further to 3 and required a die roll to see how many Rebel Units would oppose me revealing the three seen above, with a tough force of State Levies, Rebel artillery and militia in support.

Fortunately Sir John Johnson and the Long Rifle capability of my Rangers gave me +2 to the Tactical 

Superiority die roll which I easily won and all my units defeated the Rebels in quick succession to award me a battle victory and two additional and highly valuable Ops Cards to continue the mission.

It seemed as if fortune was favouring the brave and so Johnson's little army moved on to Ballstown, where the next Ops Card announced the Mohawks thirst for revenge and the possibility of further Indian allies joining the column, but sadly a die roll of 4 revealed that this Indian warband was busy elsewhere.

Turn Five - Ballstown and Success! Loyalist supporters meet the column to pass on the vital intel.

However Johnson's luck continued as the objective counter was turned to reveal the sought after Intel and the force could now focus on the challenge of getting back to Oswego and completing the mission.

With just three Ops cards left Johnson decided to avoid the Mohawk Valley on the return march, with the two Rebel Fort areas only slowing the march and increasing the risk of interception, and instead head back down the Schoharie Valley at Fort Hunter and try to get back via Unadilla.

Turn Six - Return to Fort Hunter and avoidance of Rebel Army

Fort Hunter proved yet again a dangerous place to march past as the third visit saw the turning of the Rebel Attack Operations Card that required me to roll a D6 higher than the Alert Level of 3 to avoid a battle, which was ideally what I was looking for and needles to say 'lady-luck Fortuna' duly obliged.

Surely now with just Unadilla between my troops and sanctuary at Oswego there would be nothing to prevent Sir John returning with the valuable Intelligence reports.

Just when you think this game is easy it seems to throw in a few more surprises as the next Ops Card turned on arrival at Unadilla announced a possible Rebel Ambush and similarly to avoid it the D6 roll needed to be higher than the Alert Level 3.

Yes, get in there! 

What a conclusion to this first mission and successfully achieved allowing progress on to the next Mission, 'Rescue', following the Intel revealing that Loyalists were being targeted to join the local militias at the risk of imprisonment and confiscation of property on their failure to enrol.

Turn Eight and Sir John's little force makes it safely back to Oswego with the Intel following quite an adventure along the Mohawk to Ballstown.

The end of the mission was completed with one Ops Card remaining and a Recruit Point in the bank both of which are carried over to the next mission.

This first mission was great fun to play and suggests lots of possibilities for using with the Mohawk Valley Collection of figures going forward and I look forward to showing how I get on in the next one entitled;

In addition the simplicity of the basic game invites further tweaks to the set up to perhaps vary the threat posed by the Rebels and raise the anticipation levels a bit more  - more anon.

Sovereign of the Seas (Compass Games) on Vassal and Boardgame, Table-top Application

Any wargamer worth their salt, if they are into building collections of figures or models eventually turn their mind to campaigning with their collection, and occasionally, time permitting, some of those ideas see the light of day.

As this blog illustrates, I am a keen boardgamer as well as a table-top figure/model wargamer and see it as another aspect of the hobby that often also offers the potential to be used as a campaign engine to bring context to our table-top games, and whenever I play am always conscious of that potential in a game.

The main factors that can influence that potential for me is how easy is it to translate what happens on the table to and from the board and where is the time and focus likely to be, as many boardgames will carry a level of detail and minutiae that is not required or desirable when it is simply being used for context in the tabletop world. 

Collections of models such as this offers the potential to think about campaigns!

However that balance is often a fine one, because if the boardgame is too simplistic it might not capture the feel of the period that you are representing on the table.

Needless to say with my mind very much focussed on the age of sail in recent months my eye has cast itself over the boardgame offerings in this subject and sadly it is a much under represented sector of the hobby, with little in the way of grand strategic naval games for the age of sail and with WWII naval predominating in games such as the old Avalon Hill game Victory in the Pacific and of course War at Sea.

The old WWII titles from Avalon Hill inspired my interest in Sovereign of the Seas for age of sail

I have looked at the offerings from Jay Waschak and Phil Fry such as Victory by any Means (VBAM) and his own GMT game 1805 Sea of Glory, which have bag loads of detail and period feel but seemed to me to be perhaps a little too complex in their mechanics on several aspects of this period, although 1805 is perhaps the better of the two but I think if used for a miniatures campaign would see more time spent on the game mechanisms and their admin rather than on the movement and command of the model ships.

To quote the Too Fat Lardies, 'Making things simple does not imply simplistic' and the clever mechanics are the ones that incorporate all the detail and simulation that capture the essence of a period or historical theme in a very simple to use formula that keeps the game in that sweet spot of historical simulation but a fun game to play

Thus I have both VBAM and 1805 and, as well as being glad they are available, enjoy the attention to detail, but they are just not what I was looking for; but at least the naval gamer with a different opinion to me has some options here with these two offerings in what is a very sparse area indeed.

The global nature of the war at sea is beautifully captured in the map for Sovereign of the Seas with the clever use of bordered sea areas replicating the various global wind patterns that help govern the movement of fleets and squadrons across the seas and oceans, with the various key ports and harbours shown on the map together with detailed boxes of their repair and defence capability together with their allegiance covering the Seven Years War, American War of Independence and the French Revolutionary War, around the border

However I wanted to have the possibility of running large naval games within a 'wider war' context incorporating fleet management and the global nature of the First Great War that was the character of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic years, and Sovereign of the Seas (SOTS) from Compass Games seemed to offer that potential, bringing to it much of the design concepts of those earlier Avalon Hill WWII offerings but with very much an age of sail twist, and for those interested in earlier periods such as the Seven Years War and American War of Independence a chance to apply this game to those periods as well.

In addition, using Vassal, seemed to me to offer the opportunity of playing and coming back to the system around the table-top actions that the game might generate with a possibility of it modelling the small wall against commerce waged by the frigates and sloops together with the war of control and force projection waged by the great fleets, as well as overcoming some of the criticism of this game about counters being rather large for the map, amongst others.

The Allied (France, Spain and Netherlands) Fleet pools of ships and admirals that provide the source of the ships and commanders that will be parcelled out to the various squadrons in the different bases at the start of each year.

Of course the only way to test the potential of the game was to play it and to see why some people love this game and why others less so, thus with my mind very open to possibility, I got together with Jason, another friend from the DWG, who is also very good at quickly dissecting games and how they play, and explaining to him my thinking, we started to play about eight weeks ago, starting in 1793 and working our way to 1805, the core years of the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic era.

With a quick die roll I took command of the Allies and Jason the British Royal Navy and we started the steep part of the learning curve with any unfamiliar game by working through the steps of game play which get repeated for each year of play, starting with randomly selecting the core of ships and commanding admirals from a national pool as seen above and then distributing them among the six squadrons for the British, French and Spanish/Dutch squadrons, with the option for the Russians to turn up as well.

One of the key parameters I use for estimating a game's design is how quickly and easily I and the other player/s move from unconsciously-incompetent play to unconsciously-competent play where you start out not really knowing what to do or how to do it, to that exquisite feeling when play becomes intuitive and the rules and strategies are married into the way you play, and we have quickly started to move through that learning curve which gives the game a big thumbs up from both of us.

My French fleet squadron display for the end of 1795 with a lot of damaged and sunk/captured ships following a dramatic clash with the British in the Caribbean. Note that I have admirals commanding with the Royalist flag on their counter as well as Revolutionary admirals as commanders such as Martin were around at this period and so we included them in our options for both sides, as the British would have commanders such as Howe and Gell left over from their hey-day during the American war.

The French start the war on their own in 1793 but are soon joined by the Dutch in 1795 and the Spanish a year later, and to better capture the feel of the early war I added some of the Admirals included in the game for the American war to the mix with a note of retiring them as required such as Howe and Hotham who packed in in 1795.

The basic game play consists of six steps repeated for each year with;

Step One, the creation of the base force of ships and commanders established for any given year, representing the combat ready ships drawn from a larger pool of ships, with the balance representing ships left in ordinary or still being built and admirals unemployed and left on shore, lobbying their respective admiralty and friends for a job later on.

With the base force established the ships and commanders are distributed among the various bases and allocated to a particular squadron, for which it will have a small counter placed next to that base, seen around the edge of the map and, should it be successful in getting to sea, be placed in the sea area that it gets to through movement.

I am of course simplifying the description, as there are considerations later on about repairing damaged ships and demobilising down to a core collection of ships each year before adding a random number to bring the fleet back up to strength, looking to keep the better ships in commission, as well as putting less able admirals back on shore and hopefully having more able volunteers turn up to replace them, with the gradual process of producing a fleet of the best ships and commanders that you can use to achieve your war aims.

The first step of movement sees the frigate markers for the Allies and British get placed in key sea areas around the globe, with alternate placement, starting with the British. Note the various squadron markers set up in their corresponding base for the upcoming year, 1798 in this case.

Step Two, sees the movement phase as the frigates and various squadrons are used to put into effect those war aims, which to my mind is very well modelled by the game by awarding victory points accordingly to encourage the players to use their forces very much like their historical counterparts.

For the British, the war objective is very straight forward, clear the enemy's fleets from the world's oceans whilst protecting commerce from enemy cruizers and the home islands and other key territories from invasion. 

They can achieve this by making sure they have the only squadron or fleet of heavy ships at sea in a given area at the end of a year's turn of play, that effectively prevents the enemy from doing the same either with frigates or an enemy squadron and scoring points for doing so and by intercepting enemy fleets and squadrons, bringing them to battle and sinking or capturing as many of their ships as possible scoring points for the effort. 

Of course certain sea areas are more sensitive in British strategy than others with a victory point (VP) allocation awarded to the allies should they get control of them commensurate with that importance, i.e. the British home waters having a VP of  9 with invasion of Britain and Ireland a distinct possibility if the Allies get control, only slightly more important than the sugar islands of the Caribbean with 8 VP. Control of all VP sea areas only awards those VPs to the allies and not the British.

The close up of frigate deployments for 1798 helps illustrate mine and Jason's different strategies, with the British six frigate counters having one in home waters two off Brest and Toulon and one in the Caribbean, thus helping to protect Britain and the Sugar Islands whilst making it very difficult for an Allied squadron to get to sea past a blockading British opponent without being spotted and brought to battle. Meanwhile the Allied four frigate markers (three French, one Dutch have gone to areas designed to force the British to deploy squadrons against them and hopefully keep them away from the main battle fleet deployments, whilst offering the chance of commerce raiding points at game end.

For the Allies, the war objective is all about mission driven objectives with squadrons despatched around the globe to take control, even if temporarily of key sea areas thus facilitating land operations against neighbouring coasts and islands and if left unopposed allowing large numbers of Allied frigates and small ships to dominate trade routes in a key area of British friendly ports, only fighting the Royal Navy if forced to but preferring to achieve the mission before returning to base without risking valuable ships in battle.

Our situation map at the end of 1798 with Allied fleets (Spanish) in the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal, with the Madras based British East Indies squadron failing to get to sea and both Allied squadrons managing to evade a search by a British squadron led by the man himself, Lord Nelson who sailed on into the Pacific to intercept and vent his wrath on a small French squadron I dispatched to the area as a bit of a distraction force, which sadly worked!

Thus the Allies get less points for destroying Royal Navy ships, with the emphasis on sea area control by their squadrons or and/or frigates, with the later possibility of an immediate knock out victory if they control British waters in any year after 1802 to 1804 representing a Napoleon led invasion force having got across the Channel.

Following frigate placement, the various squadrons get their chance to get on station, with the British leading off. Movement is not automatic as we play the weather rule that can force some squadrons to remain in harbour, such as happened to the British Nore Squadron, allowing my weak Dutch to break out and head for the Baltic, not wishing to draw a major British unit against them by provoking an action in British home waters.

Opposing frigate effort in the Caribbean would seem to offer the potential of resolving this situation on the table as a small ship action.

This part of the game is a brilliant 'cat and mouse' affair as the British can easily bottle up Allied squadrons, only two areas away from their base, giving them an 'on station' spotting advantage and with a blockade of a powerful squadron in say the Bay of Biscay and Western Mediterranean, together with a capable admiral and a couple of frigates, to make sure no one slips past, force the Allies to stay put; but if, often through the failure of a British squadron to put to sea, the Allies can send out fake squadrons (squadron markers that have no ships) that draw other British squadrons away, or get into an area with a large squadron and a capable admiral, able to avoid detection and forcing a failed intercepting British squadron to keep on moving to another area, then the map, after all squadrons have moved, can look like the one above, with the Allies sitting on a useful points haul.

The Battle or should that be Action in the Galapagos Islands, see the map above, at the close of 1798 as Nelson rounds up a marauding French squadron, capturing the L'Orient , but seeing the other two disabled French ships evade back to the Spanish port of Lima, and with the British losing the Royal George in the exchange of fire (We only allow a maximum of three ships to engage one enemy and Jason had a terrible game with the dice and should in most cases have taken out all three French ships, but only caused disablements in the first round of combat forcing the affected two French ships to withdraw to a friendly port.)

The game cleverly, through its mechanics, produces occasional big battles similar to those that occurred historically, and thus between 1793 and 1798 we have had just three squadron size battles including the one above with the other two being an Anglo-French battle off Halifax in 1794, and a major British victory together with a significant clash in 1795 in the Caribbean, again a significant British victory both of which have seriously pegged back the Allied points total, and 1798 should have added to British laurels but for the success of the Spanish evading Nelson in the Indies, and as mentioned, Jason’s atrocious die rolls when it mattered, or rather the fortunes of war.

The number of big battle occasions is important, as in reality these events were surprisingly and relatively rare and organising a clash to be run on the table-top is an event for the players so as a game organiser you would want to keep things manageable, with a few significant big battle clashes mixed in with the occasional frigate action, and this game seems to offer that potential in buckets.

The Battle of Halifax 1794, our Glorious First of June and one of three clashes between 1793 to 1798, with the French overwhelmed by a powerful British fleet, the pegged back territorial success elsewhere.

Step Three is the combat phase of the game as illustrated above and resolves the situation where one side has manged to intercept the other and forced an action or more rarely where both sides have looked for an action, and is resolved on the battle board, as illustrated above, with opposing ships battering each other with multiple dice looking to cause hits, damage and possible sinking/capture or disablement forcing a break off and return to port or elimination from the order of battle.

The straight forward representation of combat, using hits received compared to a defence rating gives a very easy to translate picture of the damage a ship has received should that need to be translated back from a tabletop refight to the game and used to help model the repair phase that follows.

Large battles in SOTS would be very easily translated on to the table-top but with the added tactical nuance that a simple battle board cannot hope to reproduce.

However there is plenty of scope for the table-top representation to include the manoeuvre options and tactical set ups that cannot easily or best be represented in the simple battle board game mechanic that works fine for the game but would be only enhanced by refighting the forces on the table and providing for a much more nuanced result.

Given that we have been playtesting the game, the battles should not be seen as representative of those we might have generated had we known, as we do now, the better way of playing or avoided the errors of play we definitely made, harking back to my earlier comment about being unconsciously-competent.

As well as fleet scale actions we could both see how the game could generate a context for bringing a small frigate action to the table adding yet more drama to the game overall.

That said the possibility of generating table top actions in a context of the larger war is definitely a possibility with SOTS and seeing the number of such actions replicating the historical actuality, with the frigate-effort/commerce raiding mechanic allowing for the odd ship to ship small action to also be brought to the table to resolve the advantage in Victory Points gained or not as the case may be.

The last aspect of the sea combats and area occupation resolution phase is the possibility of naval squadrons occupying areas next to enemy ports capturing them by naval landing operations, resolved simply in the board game by both sides rolling a dice and adding their senior naval commanders rating or the repair/defence factor for the port being attacked and comparing results with the attacker needing a higher score to succeed, but also providing an opportunity for a land based table-top skirmish should that be preferred.

Martinique, with a British control marker on it, falls to a successful naval assault in 1798 as the British got control of the Caribbean. Note the placement of squadron markers next to the ports they have returned to, with the defeated Brest Squadron C repairing in Lima. In the movement phase, squadrons who fail to sail or who opt to remain in port are placed on the port square to show that has happened. 

Step Four sees all the activities of the year after any combats have been resolved generate the victory point totals for the two sides and adjusting the overall total accordingly.

Our map at the end of 1798 with all the squadrons returned to an appropriate port, seen placed besides that port around the edge of the map and the victory point total adjusted at the bottom, and our frigate activity markers placed along the top of the map ready for deployment in the next campaign year

When first reading the rules for this game, I couldn't see how the British wouldn't stop Allied gains in sea area control, simply by making sure they were in the key areas or intercepting Allied squadrons at sea that managed to evade their blockade, but playing the game has shown all the problems that both sides have to contend with when you don't know what the other side are up to, intermixed with the problems of moving ships around the world in an age of wind driven vessels subject to the vagaries of weather.

The Allied points tally at the end of 1798 slightly favouring a marginal Allied victory on 39VPs and all to play for.

Steps Five & Six are the last two admin parts of the game that sees decisions about where at sea squadrons will base themselves with the next year in mind and looking to be in the best possible place to operate from, combined with decisions to repair certain key ships damaged in battle or storms and those that will simply be added to the demobilised pile and returned to the in ordinary pool hopefully, or not, to return to the fleet in a later draw down.

We have both really enjoyed playing the game and have come up with ideas for home rule mods to retire commanding admirals in line with their historical careers as well as restrictions on some of the better British admirals such as Nelson and Troubridge, who weren't available as senior commanders until the latter half of this period and perhaps should be represented at half their total command ability when they first arrive as junior commodores in, for example 1797, for Nelson rating a +2 command ability instead of the +4 he gets as a full rear and vice-admiral from 1798 onwards.

These very able British commanders make a big difference to the British abilities to go to sea and to intercept.

The British Fleet Pool and the ships shown from the pool in their readiness for war by rating in 1793 with those that were added in the later years covered by SOTS

Before starting this playtest I sat down and took a look at the representative counter mix of the respective fleets and was very impressed at the orders of battle that obviously does not have every ship available for the period, but does contain many very recognisable ones and in a proportion of rates that readily represents the forces available to the navies of that time

Our campaign is now on the eve of the Peace of Amiens and to represent the peace talks succeeding earlier or later we roll a dice from 1799 onwards to see if the next year will be the peace, but our roll determined the war will continue on into 1799.

As with the British pool above I took a look at the Allied fleets and grouped them similarly to find an equally well represented group in the right sort of proportion of rates to model the respective fleets

This game is a much better game than some commentators would give it credit for, and despite some of the production faults in the map and counter size and the poor proof reading of the rules that has left some mistakes in the final product we have discovered what other commentators have noticed, that there is a very clever and entertaining game in SOTS and one that has much to offer the table-top community wanting to bring some context to their big and small games.

The Vassal option for playing the game overcomes many of its hard-copy issues and we are looking forward to picking up next week to resolve 1799 in the French Revolutionary War at Sea.

Sources relevant to this post:

Boardgamegeek - Sovereign of the Seas

Compass Games- Sovereign of the Seas

Next up on JJ's: Carrying on the nautical theme, the six sloops are now finished and have gone to the yard for rigging out, so I will be showing you how you can make these conversions look for the British, French, Spanish, Dutch and American navies or even to double up as merchant sheep in wolves clothing.

The six sloop conversions ready to be rigged this weekend

In addition I've been doing lots of walking and making the best of the summer sun in the last week or two with two walks on Dartmoor exploring its amazing scenery and historical 'ruins in the landscape', and Mr Steve and I have been out battlefield exploring, carrying on our journey back to the 17th century and to the dark days of the English Civil in the company of like friends Sir William Waller and Sir Ralph Hopton as we pick up where we left off at the Battle of Landsdowne Hill and follow the armies to Devizes and the Battle of Roundway Down.

More anon

JJ