Kiss Me Hardy/To Covet Glory - JJ's Game Specific Items

 

Whilst posting about recent games played using Kiss Me Hardy and To Covet Glory, I've had a few questions about the kit I tend to use with my games and recently I've added some new materials, so I thought I would highlight my preferred way of playing these rules and some of the ideas I've come up with to streamline play and make things as easy as possible for the players to just concentrate on moving the models and rolling bones.

Of course these are just rules of play, the old fashioned kind, with none of the fancy tokens and other components you get with some more modern offerings, but I guess 'just rules' understates the fact that they more than make up for that lack of modern day presentation, but they do, in my humble opinion, need a little preparation, which to my eye means personalisation.

All the kit in use during our Cape St Vincent Anniversary Game - On the table is the Wind Compass Rose, extra wind arrow, turning circles, wind gauge acetates, broadside gauge, activation chits and ship record sheets. plus rules quick reference sheets.

This preparation is important, whether you intend to play small, single ship actions and definitely larger ones, as a game is easily spoilt by a lack of items to make the play seamless and flowing and allow the players to simply get on with play, easily able to record damage, indicate that which would be observed by the enemy and all done in a timely way that gets as many turns of play into your game as possible, whilst keeping the granularity, context and story telling that KMH generates in buckets.

Carl von Clausewitz
The Philosopher of Lard and inventor of Wargaming Marmite
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_von_Clausewitz

For example the principle method of deciding who gets to do what and the order of when events happen in the game is card driven, harking back to dear old Carl von Clausewitz' description of war being the closest thing to a game of cards, in terms of its unpredictability, and all the associated 'friction', the marmite of wargaming, you either love or it seems in some cases hate.

The most basic requirement for a game of Kiss Me Hardy, generic activation chits, order tokens used in single ship actions and TCG games and sail/mast damage markers, to which I would also add strike test and struck markers. I have modified still further the sail/mast damage markers by indicating on it which mast has been lost (bowsprit, fore, main, mizzen and all/dismasted). These appear on the model rather than debris and show all players the damage carried and can be used to show which broadside is masked for firing (dismasted ship firing -1 modifier).

I love friction, and the problems it creates to a well laid plan, but I don't like shuffling cards, probably down to having small perfectly formed hands, definitely designed by Devine providence for painting and detailing small models and figures but sadly useless for playing cricket and especially shuffling cards. 

My Ship Record Sheets are designed to tie in with my markers, with two sets of broadside gun boxes shown bottom left, starboard and port, when hit on either side requiring multiples of two or more guns being lost, we mark off the same number of boxes with one less on the other broadside to indicate accumulated damage. Likewise should a mast go down the mast damage markers can be placed to show which broadside gets the -1 firing modifier to represent rigging covering gun ports.

The answer is chits or tokens, drawn from a bag. No need to shuffle anything, because at the end of blindly drawing the game tokens from said bag, you simply gather them all in and draw blindly again, creating a fast play turn around of game turns, so important when administering large fleet actions with multiple commanders and ships.

Mast Damage and Strike Test counters placed on the ship bases during play, to remind players which ships require to take a strike test and should they fail it, simply flip it over to reveal a struck marker, and sail damage, now refined to show which mast is down, and can be placed on the base side to indicate which broadside suffers a negative fire effect when firing, as I now record damage to both broadsides separately on my Ship Record Sheets. These have gone through a few incarnations and I back to back my strike counters, fiddly I know, but it saves time and messing about during a game and once done is done. The markers are deliberately small and discreet. The game is about featuring those lovely model ships from Warlord, not the markers. Aesthetics dear boy Aesthetics!

To compliment my chits, I have created a basic generic set of counters on a pdf, designed to fit and simply stuck on a 32mm diameter by 2mm mdf laser cut disc, which I paint with acrylic green (general events), blue (others fire and move) or red (British fire and move), creating the set seen above, and used to create battle specific sets seen in the picture below that require additional named commanders on the chits plus other additions, such as 'England Expects' and Admiral chits for activating signals.

The rest of the kit includes stuff common to other Age of Sail rule sets. The Wind Compass Rose and Acrylic Turn Circles, bottom right are available from Warbases and make a nice touch to any game. The Wind Attitude Diagram, bottom left, has been copied to acetate and is simply placed over the foremast of a model, lining the forward bow/quarter line with it with the wind arrow, above it, placed alongside the model in line with the Wind Compass to check attitude to wind, if in doubt. At some stage I will get an acrylic version of this from one of the mdf folks. At top are my battle specific chits all bagged up and my broadside gauge, see below.

With the chits and markers came the need to produce a simple Ship Record Sheet, see the example above from our recent game of the Action off Start Point in 1793, that is generic in layout, easily stored in Excel, but that can turn out the stats for any ship using KMH or TCG and with all the factors that that ship will use when firing, testing morale and moving all brought together from the rules and on it for ease of use when playing.

Warbases - Kiss Me Hardy Turning Templates
Warbases - Compass Rose

Nymphe and Cléopâtre slugging it out in a recent game, with the former shown here bow raking the
latter and seeing a 'strike test' counter placed on Cléopâtre's base to remind us that she needs to test when the Strike chit is drawn, which if passed, as she did in this case, you remove it, if failed, you turn it over to reveal the enemy ship has struck her colours. Note the Warbase turning template in the background.

 

One aspect I was keen to alter slightly in my adaptation of KMH was the Firing Solution calculation for judging a full, partial or raking broadside, as I wasn't entirely happy with the idea in the original rules of using the body of the model, bow and stern to measure out the 15 degree angle of fire, or the raking assessment of a full on ninety degree plus or minus two degrees either side of the firing ship to stern of a target ship.

Arc of fire illustration - British Frigate vs French Frigate, Mark Lardas, Peter Dennis (Osprey)

This is all subjective I know, as we need a contrivance to allow for gun captains angling their cannons as shown above, that provides a common method of assessing a fire solution that is easy for the players to calculate at a glance but with an easy check to confirm should that be necessary.

My Broadside Gauge adopted and adapted from the old rule set
Form Line of Battle by Stephen Harrison and Robin Peck

I used to play a very simple but fun set of fast play age of sail game, Form Line of Battle, by Stephen Harrison and Robin Peck, which I still have my original copy of, published in 1987. 

It came with a set of simple items on card that you could cut out for use with the game that included the Broadside Gauge you see above, and which I have used in countless other games over the years to decide broadside and raking solutions, purely for its simplicity and to me seemingly reasonable representation of this kind of naval firing.

The Broadside Gauge in use in our Cape St Vincent game, seen top centre placed alongside HMS Culloden as the British assess an early broadside opportunity. If in doubt the laser is used to extend the line out to the potential target.

So the two angles measured out from a single point represent the arc of fire for a broadside to broadside 30 degree fire solution and a broadside to stern or bow rake, 20 degree solution with the centre point placed alongside the mainmast for broadside to broadside looking to have the mainmast of the target in the 30 degree angle for a potential broadside shot and with the stern or bow within the 20 degree angle for a rake.

My Target Lock laser pen, Mr Steve picked up for me at Firestorm Games in Cardiff. This is a really useful piece of kit for any naval game where firing can be quite often at long ranges and the need to check the angle over distance.

Having the full length of the target's base within the broadside arc determines whether it is a full broadside, with just the mainmast but only part of the ships base in angle determining a partial one.

For deciding the range to the target, I take mainmast to mainmast as the measure for a broadside and mainmast to the centre of the stern or bow of the model, with the whole length of the model in the arc for a rake with the additional requirement that rakes can only be delivered at short or point-blank range.

Close up, the fire solution assessment is very easily judged by looking, but for a ranged shot where the angle is in doubt the use of the old laser 'Target Lock' comes in really handy, by running the line out from the gauge held over the firing ship's mainmast to the target and is another piece of important kit that is always in my bag for these games.

Finally I come to my most recent addition to my kit and by no means less important, my brand spanking new range sticks, that will make tape measures being used to assess the range to the target redundant.

My new range sticks for Kiss Me Hardy

When running my Talavera project a few years ago using the fantastic Napoleonic computer moderated rules Carnage & Glory, I very much appreciated the range sticks we used using pdf markers produced by the rules author Mr Nigel Marsh affixed to pine wood strips, that saved so much time calling out gun and musket ranges to be input on the computer during combat calculations.

Ok so KMH doesn't need a computer to run things, but hey Nigel, if you're reading this, what about Carnage & Glory at Sea?

Anyway, the beauty of KMH is its simplicity of design in that gunnery is a case of find the range to determine the die score needed to hit, which remains a constant. The only thing that modifies the chance to hit is the number of dice you roll, based on number of guns, crew quality, first fire and other such factors.

So I now have my range sticks delineated into range bands with the die score required indicated, point blank 2 or more, short 3 or more etc.

The great  thing is that KMH ranges extend to forty centimetres and the pine wood finishing strips I picked up from my hardware store come in 240mm long x 16mm wide x 5mm thick, lengths that perfectly facilitated the production of six sticks, spray panted black and then sticking on my prepared range bandwidths, on both sides, as there is nothing more annoying than picking up a range stick only to find you are looking at the blank side and wasting time, twiddling it over.

Kiss Me Hardy - Facebook Page

If you like the ideas I've come up with to create my KMH kit then you can download the PDFs of my chit designs, markers and range stick graduations in the pdfs I've put together which I will post here and on the Kiss Me Hardy Facebook page, and feel free to grab the jpeg of the Broadside Gauge if you so wish.

JJ's Kiss Me Hardy PDFs - Chits, Markers & Range Sticks

Above all, I hope these ideas will help improve your Kiss Me Hardy games and get more ships out on the table.

JJ

The Planning and Preparation for the 225th Anniversary Game of Cape St Vincent, and Other Stuff! (Part I)

HMS Captain capturing the San Nicolas and the San Josef by Nicholas Pocock (RMG)

 

This post picks up from my previous one (see the link below if you would like to read it) looking at the time line of events that culminated in the pivotal Battle of Cape St Vincent of the 14th February 1797, changing the course of the war at sea in the French Revolutionary War.

JJ's Wargames - The St Vincent Campaign, October 1796 to February 1797

When sitting down to plan this particular battle, my process involved pulling together several strands of different work that had been done in the last two years whilst building my collection of 1:700th Black Seas model ships produced by Warlord Games.

Those other strands of work entailed playing several rule sets that were vying for my attention to use for playing small historic ship actions as well as the large age of sail games like this, with both sets of work informing the other, and once having settled on a choice to tailor the rules around the games I wanted to produce, which always involves an element of 'adapt, adopt, improve' to fashion a set of rules that creates the games that develops the narrative created in the historical accounts of those actions and battles.

JJ's Wargames - War by Sail
War by Sail was a strong contender for playing these 'big battle' type games.
I like a lot about these rules, especially the detailed gun layouts
and may well come back to these at some stage

This process is very subjective and for me tends to be a process of selection based on playability, fun with the inclusion of a certain level of detail and game mechanics that give the feel of the battles I'm looking to create, a by no means unique set of criteria to me but I hopes clarifies what I am trying to do.

I agree very much with the idea that the personal choice of rules is like personal choice in shoe size with absolutely no concept of 'right or wrong ', purely what suits one person to another being the deciding factor.

https://toofatlardies.co.uk/product-category/kiss-me-hardy/

In the end I decided to use 'Kiss Me, Hardy' (KMH) from the Too Fat Lardies and written by Nick Skinner, with my original copy dating back to 2003, so by no means 'new'.

Any look through the back posts on the Devon Wargames Group club blog will show that the rules are well used and understood from our previous games at club which commended them to my thinking, that and being a fan of the Lardy ethic of friction, friction and a bit more friction please to create the games I love, and Kiss Me Hardy having the merit of having been used before to run large games, such as Trafalgar, meeting that essential requirement as well.

The chit draw method (I use chits rather than cards as I can't be bothered with shuffling and dropping stacks of cards) of activation is probably my favourite way to play age of sail, generating the situation where a perfect plan falls apart because some idiot of a junior commander doesn't quite live up to your demanding expectations or the enemy have the temerity to do something different from the plan you had mentally assigned to them and then you just have to get on with it and come up with a new plan, rather like the real thing.

Important bits of my game playing kit, my chit draw bag, game specific chits and the old 'angle of dangle' laser table pointer.

However that said, KMH in its original form has evolved a lot over the intervening years, thanks to Nick Skinner and the playing community, with ideas developed in the multiple editions of the Lardies Specials.

These additions include rules around Command and Control, Signalling, Squadron Building, deaths of key commanders, campaign development, fictional and historical encounters and battles which includes the 1797 Battle of Cape St Vincent, and rule changes to allow for better play with small ships and more detailed differentiation between ships, with even a look at the time scale and move rates used; all this added over the years in articles written by Nick and others that I have accumulated and that form a treasure trove of ideas if rather spread about in various printed sources, than can be problematic for referencing anything at any particular time, in a game for example.

The cover and index to my KMH compilation of every article, update and additional rules for the original core set of rules which is now on version 1.6 and includes 138 pages.

Thus I sat down over a year ago to rewrite KMH for me and the chaps I play with regularly, to include all those additions into a new complete master copy of the rules, indexed for easy finding of any particular rule, plus some additions that I have play tested, taken from the ideas in other rules that were part of the original mix, that now includes for example fleet and squadron morale; and I see my new format as very much a living set of rules to which I have other ideas to add, and test, in games to see if they will fit and join with those already included.

The master list of Lardy Specials with KMH related articles that helped in my new rules compilation

The other key aspect of KMH that commended them is, thanks to articles such as Brian Weatherby's 'Messing Around With Boats' that was published in the 2011 Christmas Lardy Special, and his work looking at the scaling of KMH and better defining of ship characteristics, illustrating the ground (sea) scale approximating to 1:900 and a time scale at two minutes per turn, allows for no need to adjust the basic measurements laid out in the rules and the easy adoption of the turn circles and gun ranges for 1:700 models.

https://toofatlardies.co.uk/product/2011-christmas-special/

So what you see here is a culmination of that work which necessitated some new game tools married with the new collection of models that has now been played with using these updated rules built around the core of Kiss Me Hardy.

Part of my QRS rewrite indexed by subject and page in the rules.
The QRS also incorporates Chris Stoesen's 'To Covet Glory' small ship rule adjustments

In addition to a comprehensive indexed rule book I decided to write my own QRS having been dissatisfied with others I had downloaded from various sources, seemingly always finding that key rule  missing during game play and requiring reference to the rules.

My QRS is broken into the various sections covering movement, firing, boarding etc with all the rule notes linked to the page covering them in more detail within the full rules if required. 

My own experience shows that playing KMH produces that comfortable 'unconscious-competent' mindset very quickly, thus reducing dramatically, reference to either rules or QRS in equal measure.

Example of the Victory ship record sheet for Cape St Vincent with all the usual record data as well as the key crew abilities listed as a ready reference for this particular ship.

With the rules sorted out to my satisfaction I then turned to preparing my own Ship Record Sheets which having been play tested in a few games including at Clotted Lard have gone through a period of evolution to adopt suggestions for improvement by players using them and I am now happy with the current format which carries all the die roll modifications for firing, moving and strike test resolutions on the individual card saving time, having to reference them from the QRS, and significantly speeding up the process of assessing these key parts of any game, particularly during a large battle.

The Leeward Line Scenario played at Clotted Lard last year provided another opportunity to try out the new rules format to get things up to speed for bigger games in 1:700

As these record sheets were being play-tested I had been printing them out as required, but now I have a format I like, and that has proven itself under the rigours of a multi-ship games, I plan to laminate them on thick card ready for use in future games with the simple wipe of a cloth.

A sample page from my compilation of a hundred small actions, initially covering 1793 to 1801, which will provide ready to go historical scenario play set ups, married with the prose of William James explaining the situation that is presented, and contemporary artwork/maps (when possible) illustrating the vessels involved and where the action takes place.

In addition the new Ship Record Sheets work just as well for Small Ship actions using Sloops or smaller vessels and the To Covet Glory (TCG) rules from Chris Stoesen,

https://www.wargamevault.com/product/279600/To-Covet-Glory

and I am busy at the moment converting the Sapherson & Lenton 100 Small Actions into a ready to use format using KMH or TCG.

Scourge vs Le Sans Culottes from our game in January 2021 which started the plan to pull together these first one-hundred small scenarios around a set format using KMH and TCG
JJ's Wargames - All at Sea, Scourge vs Le Sans Culottes

This work started this time last year with a playthrough of the first action of the French Revolutionary War, Scourge vs Le Sans Culottes, 13th March 1793 with Bob and myself utilising ideas on how to play a game during lockdown with mobile phones and Zoom.

I put together a short video presentation of the scenario for YouTube, see link above, which gives a flavour for how these little actions are designed to be fought out, even with the checking out of a strange enemy sail flying false colours and challenging them with the signal of the day.

Each scenario will present the set up instructions depending on whether the game is based on a chase or meeting engagement and an indication of victory assessment based on the historical outcome and performance of the captains involved.

As I go I will use the Small Actions format of compiling my scenarios to do the same for the larger battles such as Cape St Vincent, so it should make setting up and running the games in future far less of an organisational chore and a very easy to run arrangement for club and other games.

Using the ideas from 'Messing Around With Boats' by Brian Weathersby, and 'To Covet Glory' by Chris Stoesen, I have been better able to tailor the stats around the historical records of the ships involved in these small actions, to hopefully produce some really interesting replays of these actions

With regard to large battle management, anything likely to slow the turn around of each game turn had to go. and that included cards and any shuffling required with managing an activation deck, and so all game turn management is governed with a bag of chits drawn and played accordingly, with all the chits simply put back in the bag to recommence a new turn.

Other game materials designed to save time and effort during play, with wind dials and arrow for placement about the table to help assess wind on a particular ship when in doubt, together with, gunnery angle device, turning circles, game chits in green, activation chits red/blue in the bag and strike test reminder chits that are placed by any ship that might need to test later in a turn. Laminated ship record sheets complete the set up ready to go, together with an angle indicating laser pointer to check those rakes are really rakes!

The work on getting KMH ready for big games has been very much looking at time saving and ease of play to get more turns played out on the table and a game resolution, and so I now have a kit of other stuff, such as turn circles, strike test markers, extra wind indicators, angle of wind checking circles and firing angle predictors which with the use of the laser pen easily checks if the target is in or out of any given broadside.

Cape St Vincent Force Specific Activation Chits. These are simply mixed with game specific chits and command chits for signalling and simply drawn from the with not a card shuffle in sight.

So with the collection of models constructed and the rules given a bit of reshaping I am now ready to play big games such as Cape St Vincent, and indeed others, and am now very much interested in shaping those game set ups, a process for which I will cover in Part II of this post. 

More anon

JJ

Battle of Cape Finisterre/ Ferrol or 'Calder's Action' - 22nd July 1805

A brand new year started at the Devon Wargames Group this weekend and with a lot of optimism that slowly but surely things are and will get better, with at least the hope this year of getting a full calendar of events completed at club this year when compared with our late start last year

Keen to carry on playing games with my own lockdown project, the 1:700th collection of Napoleonic ships, I ran a Kiss Me Hardy (KMH) Scenario from the Too Fat Lardies Summer Special of 2006, entitled 'An Opportunity Mist' recalling the difficult visibility conditions that accompanied the somewhat indecisive Battle of Cape Ferrol or perhaps more commonly referred to as the Battle of Cape Finisterre or 'Calder's Action' fought in the summer of 1805 

If you would like to see how this game turned out then you can follow the link below to the club blog to see an AAR of our game.

Devon Wargames Group - An Opportunity Mist, Battle of Cape Ferrol

This post is designed to throw some light on to what led up to this battle and its aftermath.

The complex manoeuvring that ensued in the summer of 1805 is well illustrated by Mark Adkin's map of what would become known as the Trafalgar Campaign with the Battle of Cape Finisterre or Ferrol or Calder's Action, depending on your preference, shown occurring on the 22nd July.

On the 7th July 1805, HM Brig Curieux arrived in Plymouth, having been sent by Admiral Nelson from the West Indies after his fruitless pursuit of French Admiral Villeneuve's, Combined Fleet, there from the Mediterranean, carrying the latest news of the whereabouts of the enemy fleet, updated by Captain Bettesworth, commander of the Curieux, who had seen Villeneuve's fleet standing to the northward, some 900 miles north-north-east of Antigua on his voyage home and thus indicated they were heading towards the Bay of Biscay area rather than back to the Mediterranean, as Nelson had suspected. 

The confused indecisive skirmish that was the Battle of Cape Finisterre 22nd July 1805 comes to life on our table at the Devon Wargames Group for our first meeting in 2022

Devon Wargames Group - An Opportunity Mist, Battle of Cape Ferrol

Bettesworth hastened to the Admiralty in London, arriving late on the 8th July, to find Lord Barham, the First Lord had retired to bed and no one dared wake him, leaving his Lordship furious the next morning to find that seven to eight precious hours had been lost.

Admiral Charles Middleton, Lord Barham, First Lord of the Admiralty in 1805 - Isaac Pocock (Royal Museums Greenwich)
Similar to Lord Dowding's handling of the victory that was the Battle of Britain, perhaps Lord Barham is the unsung hero of the Trafalgar Campaign having the wit, even at the grand age of 80 together with a superior understanding of commanding naval forces over vast distances to undo all the machinations of Napoleon Bonaparte, unable to grasp the differences and difficulties in manoeuvring Naval Squadrons to that of Army Corps.

Without waiting to dress, he jotted down a note of what he considered should be done, stating;

'My idea is to send the intelligence direct to Admiral Cornwallis (Commander Channel Fleet) who may be directed to strengthen Sir Robert Calder's squadron with the Rochefort squadron and as many ships of his own as will make them up to 15, to cruise of Cape Finisterre from 10 to 50 leagues to the west. To stand to the southward and westward with his own ships, at the same distance for 10 days. Cadiz to be left to Lord Nelson.'

Barham had decided to strengthen his forces at the likely decisive point designed to unhinge French plans to dominate the English Channel by decisively defeating and destroying one of their key squadrons, that of Villeneuve, at the expense of abandoning the blockade of Rochefort. However he failed to clearly reveal this intent to Cornwallis who clearly failed to recognise the importance of Calder's mission by informing Stirling and thus Calder on his arrival.

Calder's Action living up to its billing recreating the confused action in the fog that were the key characteristics of the battle.

Devon Wargames Group - An Opportunity Mist, Battle of Cape Ferrol

On receipt of this new information, Cornwallis immediately ordered Stirling to join Calder which he did on the 15th July and as soon as the French in Rochefort realised that Stirling was no longer blockading the port, Captain Zacharie Allemand led his squadron to sea bound for Ireland in compliance with his orders to create a diversion. Napoleon had changed these orders, wanting Allemand to rendezvous with Villeneuve off Ferrol, but his new orders arrived after the French squadron had left port and thus Allemand would not take part in any of the upcoming actions.

Barham's planned interception took place almost on the exact position predicted on the 22nd July with the advance squadron of Calder's fleet consisting of the frigates Egyptienne, Sirius and the 74's Defiance and Ajax out ahead of the fleet in two columns, when, towards noon, the mists parted to allow men in the crosstrees of HMS Defiance to spot strange sails far to the south-west.

Captain Richard Durham and his officers excitedly scanned the horizon with their telescopes, identifying the strangers as the enemy and signalling first twenty-four, then later twenty-seven ships of the line and frigates in sight, and Calder ordered his fleet to bear to the south-west and clear for action.

With sixteen miles separating the two fleets it would take a further five hours sailing at about three knots in the slight breeze before the closest ships would be near enough to open fire.

It was not until 13.00 that Villeneuve's lookouts on his leading frigates reported the approach of the British fleet of twenty-one sail at which the French admiral hoisted the signal for his three columns to form a close hauled line of battle on the Spanish leeward squadron led by Admiral Gravina in the Argonauta 80-guns.

Map adapted from Naval Warfare in the Age of Sail - Tunstall & Tracy

The decks were cleared for action and the ships closed up to half a cable (100 yards), riding a heavy swell and passing through thick patches of fog, that only parted sufficiently at 15.30 to allow both commanders to get a longer and more informative look at each other.

At about 16.30 Calder appreciated that if he maintained his current course, with the two fleets only about eight miles apart and with the Combined Fleet heading north, the enemy might escape and so he signalled the fleet to tack in succession and come round onto a northerly course, surprisingly he did not consider tacking together and thus speeding up the whole progress to the north.

Map - The Trafalgar Companion, Mark Adkins

At about the same time as Calder ordered his fleet to head north the British frigate Sirius 36-guns, operating well ahead of the fleet, found herself at the rear of the Combined fleet heading towards the French frigate Sirene, herself towing a captured treasure galleon, reportedly valued at 15 million francs; a tempting prize for Captain William Prouse who on closing with the Sirene came under fire that so alarmed Villeneuve that his rear was under attack caused the French admiral to order a change of course by wearing south, back towards his rear, thus causing both fleets to return to approaching each other from opposite directions.

The change of course had a sobering effect on Captain Prouse aboard the Sirius as his attempt to seize the treasure ship was abruptly halted with the looming shape of the 80-gun Argonauta suddenly bearing down from out of the fog and causing the British frigate to make a hasty retreat, with the Spanish honouring the code by not firing a single shot at the much smaller British ship.

However the Argonuata soon found herself otherwise engaged as at around 17.30 the 74-gun Hero under Captain Alan Gardner complying with Calder's signal to 'engage the enemy more closely' yelled to his ship's master to tack immediately to larboard, thus bringing his starboard battery to bear and followed by the following ships in the British Van Squadron and from which position our game progressed, as seen below.

Devon Wargames Group - An Opportunity Mist, Battle of Cape Ferrol

The rather confused and certainly indecisive battle that followed would last about three and a half hours with the firing ceasing at about 21.00 with the failing light and gloom together with Calder's signal to break off combining to bring the fighting to a close; with the Spanish squadron having taken the brunt of the action, with Villeneuve's own flagship Bucentaure only suffering six casualties and the eight ships behind her taking no real part in the fighting.

The Spanish would see two of their ships captured, and 1,200 of their men taken prisoner whilst most of the 480 casualties were among their surviving ships a fact that would lead to much recriminations between the allies afterwards and see Villeneuve make a dramatic reorganisation of his squadrons to include both French and Spanish ships when they next met the British under Nelson off Cape Trafalgar in October.

Both admirals claimed success, and indeed Calder had captured two enemy ships with light casualties of under 200 men, with Calder's dispatch the next day declaring that it was;

'A very decisive action which lasted upwards of four hours, when I found it necessary to bring up the squadron to cover the captured ships.'

But with Villeneuve rather 'gilding the lily' by reporting;

'The enemy then made off. He had several vessels crippled aloft, and the field of battle remained ours. Cries of joy and victory were heard from all our ships.'

Calder would face a court martial, not for what he did, but rather for what he failed to do, allowing difficulties to persuade him not to resume the action in the following days, with both admirals sailing away from the area on the 25th having let each other move out of sight of each other and with Calder heading north to rejoin Cornwallis whilst Villeneuve sailed south-east for Vigo to replenish supplies and carry out repairs before heading south to Cadiz and the decisive Battle of Trafalgar nearly three months later.

Admiral Sir Robert Calder

Calder's trial lasted three days between 23rd to the 26th December 1805 held aboard the 98-gun three decker Prince of Wales and presided over by the Commander in Chief, Admiral George Montague delivering its condemning verdict after a rather lengthy and laborious preamble;

'the court is of the opinion, that the charge of not having done his utmost to renew the said engagement, and to take or destroy every ship of the enemy, has been proved against the said Vice-Admiral Calder; that it appears that his conduct has not been actuated by cowardice or disaffection, but has arisen solely from error in judgement, and is highly censurable, and doth adjudge him to be severely reprimanded, and the said Vice-Admiral Sir Robert Calder is hereby severely reprimanded accordingly.'

Sir Robert Calder never received another active command but was promoted to full admiral by seniority in 1810 and later appointed Commander in Chief at Portsmouth in 1815, dying in 1818 at the age of seventy-three.

Sources consulted for this post:

Far Distant Ships - Quintin Barry

The Trafalgar Companion - Mark Adkin

Naval Warfare in the Age of Sail - Brian Tunstall

The Battle of Trafalgar - Geoffrey Bennett

Clotted Lard 2021 - Devon Wargames Group & Too Fat Lardies Weekend

This weekend I was at the club involved in our annual Lardy gathering Clotted Lard which for myself, started on Friday night as I and other club members assembled at our venue to arrange tables for the next day before retiring to the hotel-pub in Exeter to join our guests staying over for the show for a swift pint or two.

The next day started at 08.00 setting up the other room as game organisers arrived and set up their tables ready for a welcome address together with some housekeeping announcements and the usual group pictures, before I set off touring the two games rooms to sit and join each game in turn to try and capture the look of the action for our show report; together with a video clip below which I think shows what a Lardy event and especially Clotted Lard feels like when you're in the room and everyone's deeply involved in their game and having fun.

For a full report of the show together with pictures of all the games then just follow the link to the club blog:

Devon Wargames Group - Clotted Lard 2021

Having taken the morning session to gather my pictures for the show report I was doing a 'hot table' as I think my American readers would say, typical of a US Convention, as I swapped with Andy Crow who ran the Bag the Hun game in the morning to set up my Kiss Me Hardy, Leeward Line scenario with the Warlord collection of 1:700th ships.

The warm-up game I ran in July at the club really paid dividends as I was able to take the time in between to really tweak the scenario and make sure the player aids and record sheets worked much better on the day which allowed the game to really get going and we played through to a conclusion.

One aspect I wanted to include was a measure of a clearer winner in this microcosm of a much larger battle and so settled on the idea of basing the criteria as if the two formations were in fact very separate squadrons from the larger fleet action that was going on around them.

The dogfight underway as the Santisima Trinidad and the French 74-gun Fougueux open fire on the Royal Sovereign as she attempts to cut the Combined Fleet's line. Meanwhile the 74-gun Belleisle has passed behind the Fougeueux, delivering a stern rake on her as she passed, and is now swapping broadsides with the 74-gun Spanish Monarca on her starboard quarter.

Thus the Combined Fleet squadron, composed of elements from the Rear Squadron and Squadron of Observation were deemed as one under the control of Spanish Admiral Alava leading in the Santisima Trinidad, and likewise the British under Collingwood.

With these formations delineated, relegating French Rear-Admiral Magon as Alava's second in command on his flagship, the 74-gun Algeciras, I allocated a Fleet Preservation Value (FPV) to each ship, with each third rate valued at 2 points per ship and a first rate or flagship valued at 3 points. 

This idea of Fleet Preservation, that is that a fleet, like a land army, doesn't fight on to the last man or ship, like wargamers, but will attempt to break off when losses cause a break of confidence.

This idea then of Fleet Preservation is not mine and I know I harvested it from another discussion forum for use at a later time, so apologies for not remembering who to credit for this simple but effective idea.

As the Royal Sovereign and Belleisle go about their work, the Mars under Captain Duff can be seen further back, preparing to move in after opening fire on the French 74-gun Pluton

The total Fleet Preservation Point Value of each force then equated to 13 points for the British and 16 points for the Combined Fleet, which allowing for a loss of 25% for the Franco-Spanish and 50% for the British equated to 4 points for the former and 6.5 points for the latter.

Thus the Combined Fleet Squadron under Alava would be likely defeated with the loss of more than two of its 74 gunners or one of the flagships and a single third rate, with loss defined as being caused to strike, sink, burn up and explode or captured through boarding and with a dismasted vessel counting one point less in the total, i.e. a flagship dismasted equating to two rather than three points off the total.

HMS Mars opens fire on the Pluton and sets her helm to pass behind Admiral Magon's 74-gun flagship Algeciras as to her starboard side HMS Tonnant, Colossus and Bellerophon approach menacingly like sharks moving in for the kill with the Spanish 74-gun Bahama dangerously separated from her consorts.

This simple calculation would determine when a particular force was likely broken, to the extent that a test would normally be taken at that point in the game with the roll of a d6 adding the quality rating of the commanding admiral, +1 for Collingwood and 0 for Alava and Magon, should the latter find himself in command, needing 5 or 6 for the squadron to stay in the fight and with failure seeing the Combined Fleet for example, attempting to disengage and move to the leeward table edge, only shooting back if fired upon, and obviously, likely captured at the end of the scenario if prevented from escape by British ships on their leeward side.

In addition, with the role of admirals influencing the morale of their respective squadrons, I wanted the potential for their loss through death or wounding to have an effect, so included Nick Skinner's 2005 Trafalgar Scenario,  'Death of Nelson' rule to allow for all the admirals involved to test if their respective flagship suffered 'High Officer Casualties' as a special damage hit.

As our game progressed the Combined Fleet got the majority of their ships to deliver extreme and long range broadsides at the British rigging in the approach phase with the Royal Sovereign for example reduced from a base speed of 12cm to 8cm plus 2d6 cm for having a quarter wind, because of damage recieved in her rigging from the Santisima Trinidad on the approach. 

However as anticipated the delivery of stern and bow rakes by those British ships that managed to break into the Allied line added to by other British ships pouring in close range broadsides reduced two Spanish and one French third rate to floating wrecks with fires breaking out on two of them.

Fire breaks out on the Spanish Monarca which she managed to extinguish prior to her striking, after being pummelled into submission by the Belleisle, astern of the hard fighting Fougeueux.

Inevitably the two Spaniards struck and the British went for the killer blow by grappling the battered Fougeueux, and boarding her, winning the first round of melee to capture the Frenchman's upper-deck, whilst pouring in a point-blank bow chaser shot, which missed, as she attempted to get the French ship to test for a strike.

The final twist of the game came as we prepared to head off to the pub as the Fougeueux, then managed to come storming back with what remained of her crew of 'Elite' Sans Culottes to push the Royal Sovereigns back to their own bulwarks and thus still fighting when we ended the game.

However it seemed likely that another strike test caused by the next round of firing would see her strike eventually, breaching the Combined Fleet's four point threshold and a likely failed FPV test and so I called the game in favour of Collingwood's column.

If you want to give this scenario a go with the adaptions I have added then just follow the link below for the scenario briefing together with the orders of battle and ship record sheets.

Kiss Me Hardy - The Leeward Line Scenario