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Greetings. This thread is about Age of Sail wargaming with individual or small crew representation. I have added this to Fantasy rather than Historical for broadness, though the broad ships and tech should be relevant for any small scale Age of Sail wargaming from the 16th to early 19th century; there is a particular focus on the Age of Piracy; both it's historical and its fantastical elements.
This thread is actually a request, intended to cover the following new releases in particular but not limited to:
1. Blood & Plunder An existing Age of Piracy skirmish wargame by Firelock games which with its current Kickstarter includes plastic pirates, marines and even 28mm plastic sloops. This is a major door opener as affordable easy to assemble age of sail warships in 28mm are new to the hobby. Yes I was unaware of 28mm plastic sloops until today.
You can get involved in the Kickstarter here.
Please note Late Pledges will terminate late July early August, but this also means a short wait for new backers at campaign prices.
2. Reaper Bones - Sophie's Revenge
Possibly too late to get one, this Kickstarter is in fulfilment. However you can back a second wave of Bones 5 here.
The reopened Pledge Manager will be open until September with fulfilment expected early 2022. They may run out of Pirate ships before then. I can now confirm that the reopened Pledge Manager, known by the community as Bones 5.5 does sell both pirate ships, the one above and the spooky glow in the dark version, both cost $125, which is above th price of the original Bones 5 Kickstarter but still a very good deal.
The community has been blown away by the size, scale and quality of this toy and this thread primarily exists to discuss how best to use it. Though you got me at '28mm plastic sloops'.
3. Printable Scenery - The Lost Islands A long fulfilled project that is available here.
The Lost Islands includes .stl files at reasonable prices for colonial dwellings, native/orc dwellings and Age of Sail vessels with strong fantasy elements. The larger the bundle the better the value. This is for 3d printer owners as third party print of these files will be expensive, and the larger pieces will not be practical for resin printers. A lot more work than the first two but has a lot of decent options and even interior plates.
Of particular interest is the rather good generic brig.
Also the Fluyt which can serve time and again as a suitable victim.
And this galleon which is 24" long.
None of the above ships have interiors, all are constructed solid, but you can print out textured interior plates for each ship.
4. Ainsty Castings Ships A veteran producer of resin and dowel age of sail ships. The trouble is it takes a lot of ships to make a varied game and these are expensive. however with cheap plastic mass produced models and the possible availability of very large plastic models, and 3d printed quality sculpts it becomes plausible and beneficial to top up a fleet with one or two commercial resin models to max out variety.
Ainsty Castings can be found here plus other websites.
Unlike many producers you don't find many discounts by going elsewhere, but Ainsty themselves do fleet packs for the extra committed.
Ainsty do three ships a Man-O-War, a Merchantman and a Sloop. Comperable era to the Blood and Plunder miniatures, and better prices with exception of the sloop.
5. Frostgrave - Ghost Archipelago An expansion setting and personalised rule set for skirmish level pirate exploration. This game is intended for warband level infantry combat, but with the recent influx of cheap ships it is time to think outside the rulebook and start planning for taking the action to sea.
If nothing else this game provides us with even more crew options.
THREAD PURPOSE
With an influx of new players wanting to play pirate ships, and we can all see the appeal we need an info thread on such topics as
- Ship identification. Both in terms of genre historicity and relative strength.
- Naval terminology and usage. We can all say 'Arrr'. But do we know our 'spars' from our 'spankers'; and do our eyes glaze over with confusion when we look at how to rig a ship, or run it.
- Practical gaming. How much rigging do we add and how much sail plan do we represent. How do we represent battle damage. Do we go for authenticity, or maximise room for our hands to move characters around the deck.
- Settings and scenarios. Are we going for historical researched battles or role playing One Piece ( I had fun with the latter), help and tips.
- Fantasy elements. There are rulesets galore on pirates, but things get more rarified when we add undead, or mojo or both.
This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at 2021/07/31 14:27:59
2021/07/16 20:01:58
Subject: Re:Age of Sail human scale naval wargaming.
Privateer Press Warmachine/Hordes cannon
&
Warhammer Fantasy Empire cannon
These are lumped together in the category of way too big. Fine for soft fantasy and with a double helping of rule of cool, but our ships are of modest scale for most part and simply do not fit soft fantasy cannon such as these.
Wizkids Deep Cuts Large cannon These are very big, but within the plausible range for the heaviest piece. 32pdr if ever I saw one.
I do recommend these for installation guns, and heroes might sneak one or two of these onto a ship that isn't designed to carry one, for player character use though, regular crew will be way to sensible to fire it unsupervised. Stranger things have happened in real life though.
Blood and Plunder Medium cannon Blood and Plunder uses small unrated vessels and an earlier time period, capping out at 1700. What is a medium cannon to them is a light cannon to most of the Age of Sail. These will do as deck guns for Sophie's Revenge and the larger Printable Scenery ships.
Blood and Plunder Light cannon and swivel guns Perfectly good as deck guns on smaller ships, such as sloops, and light enough to be maneuvered (slowly) shoreside. You will certainly not want to try to use any cannon larger than this with a shore party unless and solely if you are setting up the gun as a permanent shore emplacement.
Swivel guns have little to no portability, but have a lot of usability in close action.
Please note here the oddities of Age of Sail cannon use. A single 3rd Rate, just one of over a hundred in French or British service at the time, will have more guns and bigger guns than Napoleon's Grande Armee. The thief of Europe's 'Beautiful daughters' that terrorised a continent (Boney used them well) was comperable to the broadside of a single smaller rated warship. In naval terms a 12pdr is medium piece, and heavy piece ranges from 18-32pdr plus carronade and odd calibres, usually Russian. With exception of howitzers and again a few Russian guns the larger heavy foot artillery were 12pdr, and most horse artillery cannon with 6pdr or 9pdr.
Naval guns use naval carriage which is not designed to be moved much, but that aside most naval cannon are too big to be moved much at all shoreside. yes a heavy naval cannon could be given a temporary mounting to act as a siege weapon, this was done and is practical, but against anything faster moving than city walls will require a more nimble cannon to oppose. Only the lightest naval cannon are of use to a shore party as a tactical piece and even they will need to stay on road unless you could remount them on an army gun carriage.
This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at 2021/07/16 20:14:59
It doesn't but you could convert it a little to make it work Draw a smaller bore hole, or use it as a carronade and apply a bit of rule of cool.
The barrel walls are very thin as is.
The loader with the cannon ball could serve as a gunner for one opf the larger cannon.
I will be getting at least two, so I might as well get the Captain pledge.
these are Bermuda sloops not Sloops-of-war.
When we look at historical sloop armament we are looking at Sloops of War which are mini frigates. Typically carrying up to 18 lighter guns.
Bermuda sloops are sea worthy and are used as message and patrol ships but carried very little in terms of armament, and served better without armament at all.
You would not want to send any number of Bermuda sloops against a warship the size of Sophies Revenge.
You could make small gun brigs out of the brig models for Blood and plunder
Now when we apply fantasy we can mix this up a little, arm the sloops and use them as you will. Armed Bermuda sloops will be plausible as pirate vessels though, for running down and taking merchantmen.
The one advantage of a Bermuda sloop is its relatively high upwind speed and the narrowness of its tack, and the ability to man the rig entirely from the deck and with minimum crew. This is due to its sail arrangement which is the ancestor of the sail plan in pleasure and racing yaughting to this day.
It will be nice to add a few cannon, but the class is most dangerous as a boarding platform.
I was looking at Viking Carpenter ships only yesterday and working out comperable sizes, and actual ship classifications.
Still collating the data, but come to some interesting conclusions and suggestions already.
Overpriced, badly scaled, badly proportioned; cardstock decks. I like the masts though, made a much better attempt at a square rig than Reaper has.
Was never tempted to buy, but if one turned up second hand at a low enough price I would consider converting it, as the core potential is there. Especially if I can buy spare masts from Wizkids.
I would save my money and go elsewhere, especially right now.
If I was stuck with one I would try and make her a four mast, galleon rig with two square sail masts and two lateens with no topsail. You could manage that if Wizkids sold a pair of spare masts.
Alternately redo the masts from scratch as described above and apply the Falling Stars masts to a fat trading brig. I certainly wouldnt waste them, best part of the model
Orlanth wrote: Smokestack, do you have that scaling for me?
The main deck is 27 squares long, 7 squares at its widest and 3 squares at its smallest. Total squares (not counting Steps) is 144 squares.
The gun deck is 25 squares long. 7 squares at its widest and 5 squares at its smallest. Total squares is 155 squares.
If square is 1 inch.
Thankyou so it does tally with the image below. I suspected it would but couldn't confirm if there were any changes to production.
Assumption 1 - One inch squares are approx 25mm, with 28mm being adult male human height. With fantasy that normally means 6', historical people would usally be much shorter but we can leave that aside. So let us confirm an estimated 5' square for the deck plan.
Assumption 2 - I will add one half inch for the hull as these squares are internal measure and because hull thickness will be wider at the keel which is where ship length measurements are made.
Measuring from the gun deck which is very close to the waterline I can estimate a ship length of 128' and a beam of 35' for the Sophie's Revenge. Now deck measurement will be bigger, and the total measure larger still because of mast spars and the bowsprit, but 128' v 35' is the measure we need.
Now some samples though first note designs varied in RN/European usage and Yankee built ships (a significant tech upgrade) were much larger and equal to a 4th Rate in reality. USS Constitution had a length of 175' and a beam of 43' and was only technically a frigate by internal classification and number of cannon.
All the following ships had similar rigging (ship rig) and sail plan and were broadly proportional to each other:
I will run samples from 5th Rate, through 6th Rate to Sloop of War which is the next size vessel down, let us be heretical and call it a '7th Rate' for purpose of thread and clarity of understanding.
I will provide a number of ships that straddle Sophies Revenge
Class - Rating - Armament - Hull dimensions at waterline - Nationality - First constructed/(model Manufacturer)
Amazon - 5th - 38 gun - 141' x 39' - Great Britain - 1780
'Sophie's Revenge' - ?5th/6th? - 20 gun* - 128' x 35' - (Reaper) * Can mount up to 32 cannon
La Malicieuse - 5th - 32 gun - 124' x 32' - France - 1758
Apollo - 5th - 36 gun - 122' x 38' - Great Britain - 1798.
America - 5th - 44 gun - 114' x37' - Great Britain - 1747
'Ship of the Line' - ?5th/6th? - 32 gun - 108' x 29' - (Viking Carpenter)
'Frigate' - ?6th/7th? - 16 gun - 108' x 29' - (Viking Carpenter)
Phoenix - 6th - 20 gun - 93' x 32' - Great Britian - 1742
Frigate - 6th - 22 gun - 90' x 37' - (Firelock Games)
'Frigate Mk2' - Non - 14 gun - 80' x 28' (est) - (Printable Scenery)
Greyhound - 6th - 42 gun - 76' x 26' - Great Britain - 1712
Cruizer class - 7th - 18 gun - 77' x 30' - Great Britain - 1797
At this point I have no recourse to claim Sophie's Revenger is a 6th rate for any other reason than number of cannon carried. One pack of ten cannon would bring her up to 5th rate armament and she is 5th rate size. Yes there was size creep but she has antiquated stern architecture and is not a Napolenic era design. As a 5rth rate of this size Sophie's Revenge will mass about 700 tons rather than the 400 initially estimated.
As for the Viking Carpenter ships. The Frigate is nominally a Sloop of War, but you could in fact should mod the model to add four extra cannon to make her formally a 6th rate. I am surprised when I read the number she looks smaller, but the model is as it is. The two decked vessel will up the vessel to 5th rate, and obsolescent two deck 5th rate design. It will go no higher and is not a 'Ship of the Line'.
The Printable Scenery frigate doesnt have interiors and if the .stl files are improved to add more gun ports this could serve as an early 18th century Sloop of War. As is it would be best classified as an East Indiaman, or other armed corporate venture vessel.
Those Viking carpenter ships are pretty cool. Does anyone here own any or have any experience with them? Their 32 gun ship of the line looks really nice
I don't and they are expensive for what they are, especially at this moment in time while the window to buy more Sophies and comperable price is open.
I bought that, then didn't know what to do with it. I your case I would turn it into a galleas, and add your cannon to a covered forecastle. Galleas had very few cannon mostly mounted at the bows, usually under cover.
Galleys make sense for undead and zombies can row all day. Hmm. I wonder why I didnt think of this earlier, an undead faction galleas will be a useful piece, while crossing the Styx is not something one needs to face often.
One tip. For smaller cannon I would suggest using chaos space marine vehicle accessory sprue pieces as cannon mouths. Galleas tended not to have particularly big guns. But your is undead so you could go bigger, how about a lot bigger. If you want a few meaty cannon use Empire cannon or mortars, shave off all the frilly stuff and add chaos iconography or skulls.
There are commercial chaos cannon most are very expensive. Though you can find some good entries in the not-Chaos Dwarf section of 9th Age.
https://www.the-ninth-age.com/community/lexicon/index.php?entry/2287-miniatures-infernal-artillery/
That is also stupid rare and expensive.
I wasn't going to mention it because adding a £200 vintage model as bitz for conversion is generally a bad idea.
It would be a questionable fit on the Stygian barge anyway.
I would go with an stl variant of the screaming skull catapult. You can replace the grill on the bow with the turntable and thus have the mount removable.
2021/07/24 19:59:58
Subject: Re:Age of Sail human scale naval wargaming.
Smokestack wrote: I assembled my Sophie’s revenge… though am thinking of calling her “Witchcraft”…
Call her the "Crusher"
Stand on that poop deck in battle, you will know why. The ropes on cannon were to cope with the huge recoil, and allowed the cannon to buck, but only so far. Crew injuries were common, you cannot tightly pack cannon, if you want to arm the poop deck, and there is no reason why you wouldn't consider it, add swivel guns or uncategorised man portable small cannon with negligible recoil, like a 3pdr.
hatches… any hatch cover that has something above it, is hard to fit, and has to be in a “half open” state as it can’t full open… so I did not add all the hatches…
I can explain this one. You have been very unkind to your Sophie and installed her gun ports back to front. Now tell her you are sorry.
Reaper stock image. You got the masts right though, Reaper are worse landlubbers than you.
cannons… the cannons themselves are pretty cool… but… you can’t put them on both sides of the gun deck… you have to remove the upper deck to put the cannons, as they won’t fit just though the hatches. So to get them In to the gun hatches you have to tilt the ship and squeeze them in… you can’t do this to both sides as one side would always have to be elevated.
This is something I have sympathy with. Sophie is a fine ship, but Reaper seperated the decks at the wrong place. I will be taking a long look at mine to see if there is merit in cuting both the main deck and the quarterdeck free from the hull timbers and glue hull timber to the deck below. I will not seperate the poop deck as the elevated space is not actually usable but confers a taller ceiling to the great cabin.
Looks like stern chasers, fore and aft, were not a consideration of the shipwright when her keel was laid.
Actually less of a consideration than it might appear. the pros is one place where you might find a freely positioned deck gun, in earlier centuries this would be a place for a long range culverin for a stern chase. But in reality that was just a waste of ammo. Later years would have a carronade on the prow, with a good traverse of fire.
Stern chasers were also from an earlier age. This is not a flush decked ship but it is not especially tall either. Sophie is no galleon. There is no room for a forecastle with permanent bow chasers, or a tall stern with room for sterm chasers. You could add some to the gun deck but it is a very bad idea, low prow gunports are just unpleasant, and low stern gun ports are just impractical. You need elevation to mount long range chase guns.
However the real issue is that there is room on a ship of Sophies kind, but sadly not this model for a pair of stern chasers. The gun ports are staring you in the face.
Spoiler:
There you go.
Due to the vulnerability of glazed windows in a combat situation the great cabin would be cleared of all furniture and the window frames would be removed. Also the wood panelling between the great cabin and the rest of tghe guin deck would be removed. All would be stored in the ships hold. Cannon would be rolled through into the great cabin to place additional two guns to the broadside, four on larger ships. These guns could easily be redirected as stern chasers. Each gun deck will have a similar cabin or wardroom, so a 1st or 2nd rate warship could redirect a dozen guns into stern chasers if it needed to retreat from battle, far more than any chasing ship could mount as prow armament. This is why trying to run down a battleship was a bad idea.
Sophie's stern is fully armed and operational. You will just have to indicate that in play by laying two cannon against the stern windows,rthough active play with the gun positioning is only possible if the play surface have walls that are are deck rather than ceiling fastened.
I am a bit confused why you were not able to put the cannon in the lower deck gun ports. I have reread what you have written several times and I just can not get my head around the problem.
Imagine Dungeons & Lasers sets except where the walls were attached to the ceiling and not the floor. Not quite as useful now!
Edit. As I was typing this was demonstrated ably by Smokestack.
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/07/24 20:10:04
Smokestack wrote: You were right. I went back and fixed them... well most of them. There are 3 that were too tight to get in...
Use tweezers to loosen the connection perhaps.
As you have fitted them twice once they are all the right way around would leave them in now, and undercoat and paint them in place. Open the portholes before you spray and give each one a little wiggle with a cocktail stick immediately afterwards.
2021/07/28 08:29:18
Subject: Re:Age of Sail human scale naval wargaming.
Awkward though it would be, could you remove the cannon barrels, glue the carriages down, put the deck and walls down and then reinsert the barrels?
If you did that you will never be able to open the decks, it would be a screaming waste.
You could also glue the cannon to the hull, so they lift off with the main deck, but while that would free the space you couldnt interact with it. Both options mandate having a ship with gun ports open despite having moving gun ports and separate cannon.
I think the only solution that frees up the space for active play it to separate the main deck from the hull piece below it. This will likely cause structural problems for the model, but they can be resolved with supports on the deck below. I will continue the masts down through the gun deck to the base of the model, that will provide a lot of structural support. Hull ribbing with magnets or dry pins can fix the hull timbers to the underside of the main deck.
Also this would require a careful review of the mode. Smokestack, can you picture the two deck pieces side by side, no masts or other items, then show them both again with the main deck upside down.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Flipsiders wrote: Does anyone have suggestions for places to learn more about naval/shipmaking terminology, as well as the Age of Sail/Piracy in general? I've recently taken an interest in the subject, but I'm not too sure where to go next. Recommendations for good pieces of media in the genre would also be appreciated!
I can give you some pointers to start. Frankly I think you would be better just looking at cutaway diagrams of ships rather than trawling through a book.
This resource is a database of all commonly known age of sail vessels collated from original reports, plans etc. I cannot guarantee its completion and much of the information will be of no use to us, but it gives strong indication of progression of scaling.
The naval rating system, as employed by the Royal Navy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rating_system_of_the_Royal_Navy Useful for ratios of warship classes. Different nations would have different systems but a vessel is commonly identified by how the RN Admiralty would identify it. This is practical as the RN had employed the greatest number and variety of prize vessels, and these definitions persist today.
This would also work for plausible non historical ships. Should a RN officer see Sophie in his eyepiece he might estimate her as a 5th/6th Rate frigate and note such in the log. Should she be taken as a prize she would enter either category based on armament. Her size would strongly point her to being a 5th Rate if main deck armament was included, or a 6th Rate otherwise.
These three instructional videos give a primer on how to sail a large fully rigged sailing vessel. The below would apply to any multiple mast vessels with square rigs and is entirely relevant then as now.
Basic sailing of a full rig ship
Turning your ship under unfavourable winds
All the above could be and would be undertaken while engaged in active combat.
All sailing would be handled by the Sailing Master, an officer outside the chain of command, who would give orders to rigging crew for each stage in a manoeuver. The Captain would then be able to concentrate on speed and heading and fighting the ship.
On an active warship the Captain would also give direction via his officers to the Gunner (a ship would have one gunner, or one per deck) who would calculate trajectory of shot and order the cannon to fire. Anyone wishing to pass an Leiutenants examination* must be able to operate as ships Gunner and Sailing Master both, but do not occupy either role. Both Sailing Master and Gunner were often non commissioned veteran crewmen.
Some game reviews. I have listed two that give a creditable nod to realism in game physics and capabilities or real vessels - though only up to a point. Though in fairness anything other than a top down command simulation will likely involve compressed time and quality of play features. Especially if you want to RPG an age of sail game, unless you want the players to be twiddling thumbs in port for several months after every naval engagement, so expect 'healing surges' (by another name).
This should do . You could instead read some long books, and will be better off as the period is well documented and the above will not give you the mentality, only a documented eye witness account will.
* You could buy a commission in the Army, you could not buy a commission in the Navy. The nobility tended to gravitate towards army command roles, which was also better for handling domestic order. Middle classes gravitated towards the Navy as it allowed promotion based on merit.
As for pirates, most operated under a democratic system. Pirates elected their captain and could vote one off if he overly risked the crew or failed to provide booty, which was divvied under a share system.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/07/28 09:14:40
I am super excited right now. Just received my shipping notification for Bones 5. My Sophie is on her way.
Now I am determined to free the hull from the main deck, and also free the quarterdeck and poop deck as one unit from the stern upper.
I am equally determined not to mess this up, it sounds like a scary job as I could quite easily ruin my Sophie. I will be examining the model in detail before I begin.
Now it is my turn to ask some advice. I want to separate the deck with minimum damage, I dont know if that means a fine knife or a razor saw.
Anyone know more?
Grumpy Gnome wrote: Sorry, Orlanth I was not clear. My suggestion for a possible option to glue the carriages was based on the idea of not gluing the barrels, so they would be removable to allow the deck to be removed as well as allow gun port covers to open and close.
But ultimately I think this is more work than worth the effort.
You cant easily switch action between decks this way and will either have to split the ship or keep it whole in display with long transitions between. However you could do so with the gun barrels off and the gun ports closed for optical benefits, and then reattach the guns post play.
Maybe this is what Reaper intended. First thing I will do for you when my Sophie arrives (today!!) is test the cannon and see if the barrels stay in unglued.
If you do this you will need to carefully pencil mark the position of each gun port on the gun deck hull rim, and use wood glue to glue down the first gun. so it stays in place while assembling the main deck, but is easy to adjust. Once that is correct glue the gun next to it correctly and work down the deck. You will have no choice but to glue down the guns on a gun deck as you will not be able to slot in barrels unless the guns were secure point to apply pressure.
It sounds workable but clumsy, so I will be looking at cutting the deck instead,
Nice to see this, thank you. I think this model needs an underdeck armature.
From the image it may be possible to keep the quarterdeck separate and model the aft section below deck.
If I am reading this right the main deck is false under the quarterdeck. On sloops and some earlier ships the decks are at split level with the stern decks being at half height above/below the adjoining decks. This does mean multiple smaller stairs.
Therei s an openable door so we can capitalise on that and cut away the rear section of the main deck under the quarter decks and reset it at the base of the model. Then model in a side hatch leading forward to the hold. The forward has the main deck leading straight down to the orlop deck and this cannot be modelled with a waterline kit. But you could make a great cabin for your sloop.
I wonder if the model includes a variant with a single flat deck and no split level elevated quarterdeck. This would explain the wood texture on the whole deck.
Piece 8 might include a significant elevation as there is no separate piece to cover the arch of piece 9.
Sophie is as long as three plastic sloops.
Hull length at waterline being the usual measure.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
pancakeonions wrote: Super stoked about that Blood and Plunder starter set, all in HIPS! Maybe the two sloops could give Sophie a run for her money?
Unlikely
Not likely at all. Even if they tried to pull the same stunt as Cochrane they are just too small. HMS Speedy was a brig-sloop, very different though still a small vessel. These sloops could get under Sophie's guns, literally, but could they do any damage when there? Cochrane boarded and won at 4:1 odds against, but even he, or Nelson, would more than struggle against 20:1.
Sloops were common pirate vessels, and too light to be hunted down efficiently. However frigates are fast ships, faster than sloops against most wind directions. In a pirate campaign you have a sloop, fight other sloops and merchantmen, and if you stay in one place too long Sophie turns up for a boss battle. Which generally means 'it is too late, you should have moved on'. The sloops are frankly more useful than Sophie for miniatures gaming which while a good base for a pirate themed campaign needs other big ships to fight.
What you could do is have the PC's on Sophie yet depict actual battles at a completely different ship scale, so you can have anything from cutters to 1st rates floating about, while the adventurers command a 5th/6th rate, which is about right for a heroic adventuring captain and crew.
However if you have a Sophie and two sloops on the way, what next to consider? I would be looking at a brig next. Maybe a plastic brig is just over the horizon, it would be a logical next step. Do both of those and anything else would be a luxury you don't really need to depict at 28mm.
You could use the gundeck as a stand in for the main deck of a fat merchantman to take as prizes with your sloops. Beyond brigs and merchantmen there is nothing you need to depict in 28mm. If fighting from Sophie against anything that is a challenge to her you need to depict the battle in multiple scales with only the home side depicted in individual or small crew scale, and all OPTOR being ship models facing against your frigate token and whatever allies she has around.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/07/30 23:26:54
2021/07/31 13:35:15
Subject: Re:Age of Sail human scale naval wargaming.
Grumpy Gnome wrote: Sophie could be run undergunned, ....... perhaps a decent target for a pair of sloops.
Or perhaps a well gunned ship but crippled on a sandbank like Blackbeard’s flagship was.
Or a Royal Navy 5th Rate caught at anchor in a tight harbor with too many crew on shore leave.
Or a privateer in the middle of sacking a port with only a skeleton crew aboard.
Indeed Grumpy Gnome, there are many ways to even up a scenario. I was just taking the ships at face value.
not unreasonable considering you have suggested she is an older ship refitted, and as a also under crewed merchant trying to save on wages,
Sophie being a refitted older ship is based on three factors, her exact armament, her general architecture and her stern architecture.
The design is reasonable, if we allow for standard features omitted from the model but presumed to be present, but in my opinion somewhat ahistorical. What gives her away is the late 18th century prow design versus the presence of a stern balcony and general architecture reminiscent of 17th and even 16th century ship design.
I do not consider this a problem frankly. Age of Sail ships had a slow evolution in design and I shouldn't have to go far to find a real ship that looked somewhat like Sophie.
Older is a relative term as the classic Age of Piracy is centered at the late 17th century, with the Age of Privateers being a century earlier. Wheras when we look at ahistorical naval vessels they are nominally rated according to that late 18th century/Nelsonic Era, which is the high point of the Age of Sail with regards to fleet action.
But yeah, eventually I would like to get something equal, or close to equal to Sophie’s Revenge, to playtime part of her nemesis.
A second Sophie will set you back $125 plus taxes. That is still a bargain. I am strongly tempted. I will then mod the second vessel heavily. One option is to scratch build a deck extension to turn one into a 4th Rate. Would be a tad short, but not excessively so. 4th Rates usually ran at about 145' by 40', about 10% bigger, excluding height. In any case will be waiting for the inevitable .stl mods for this vessel. The optimum answer will be to have the additional deck as a fully removable, so I would have two 5th/6th Rates with option to upgrade one to a 4th.
Sadly nobody else is making anything comperable, unless you go backwards and select a galleon, or pick up the Viking Carpenter 'ship of the line' which is an obsolete/17th century two deck frigate.
Edit: I have a copy of the Black Seas rulebook that I have considering using as you have suggested for running the ship to ship fights largely with then use the 28mm ships more for boarding and RP.
There are lot of options for Age of Sail vessels at 1:600 or smaller scale.
In all honesty all else you need at this point (Sophie and a pair of plastic sloops) at 28mm is a brig. That is the link ship between the sloop and frigate sized vessels. I only recommend a second Sophie because the price is so ridiculously good still.
If you want an earlier period, or fantasy, go back rather than forwards, so Sophie is ultra modern rather than an obsolescent, and pick up a galleon. There are a surprisngly large number of options available.
2021/08/01 21:30:28
Subject: Re:Age of Sail human scale naval wargaming.
Everyone. I have updated the OP with additional information.
Smokestack, I am sure that ship was made with love.
Now to Sophie. My Bones 5 arrived yesterday afternoon and I had patience enough, barely, top keep Sophie boxed up so a friend could help unbox her. Very nice, I do think I will be able to free the hull from the deck but it will be tough and there are sacrifices to make. The vessel was only partly misassembled, one half of the lower hull is 1mm out of true. It is visible but fixable. I suppose I got lucky, it could have been much worse.
I knew the ship was big, but wasn't prepared for what I saw. Pictures do not do her justice. Measures given do not give her justice. Seeing the monster for myself, that does her justice. She is a big ship. Threw some cold water on my dreams for a fleet, but maybe not enough to prevent my buying a second one.
2021/08/28 08:27:20
Subject: Re:Age of Sail human scale naval wargaming.
Worth the wait Grumpy.
I have taken a long look at deck separation and think it can be done, but it is a big task. Consequently it has been put off in favour of many other Bones related builds and painting.
Sophie was a must buy for salt insurance, which is a weird purchase psychology but does work, and I do not regret the spend. However I will likely wait for my plastic sloops before delving into 28mm age of sail properly.
I am skeptical too, if you cut free the decks from the hull, excepting the waterline timbers, you will have more manageable sections to heat and reset.
Long time away from this thread, and the information I have is limited and belated.
However at Salute last month I did see Blood and Plunder, tried the same, asked a lot of questions about the rules and saw the new 28mm Sloops.
Now a caveat, the sloops I saw were the resin ones but the demonstrator was able to confirm in detail any size and content differences between those and the plastic sloops.
I am now thoroughly looking forward to them, they are mush larger than I had imagined and have a lot of playable deck space. To think that a basic pledge to Blood and Plunder will net backers two.
If anything the limitation is in the number of crew miniatures, we will need more, not only to man the ships but for general gaming in this genre. Crew sculpts are solid and versatile.
I didn't back Bones 5.5 though, could not afford it, and while I should have picked up at least ten more cannon I decided I had spent enough already.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/12/15 19:40:50
I would go with a full rig, scaled down for convenience. No progress has been made on my Sophie but it is well down the list of things to do, and was bought as 'salt insurance' anyway.
Nevertheless I did a fair bit of thought in the rigging. Here is where I am at so far.
1. Take oyamaru casts of the spars and castle plates, I will need three to four times as many spars (see step, 6) and twice as many castle plates as provided.
2. Cut the base of the masts provided and remove the magnets, glue the bottom sections of the masts, sans magnets to the deck below, The masts will run through the ship and should be depicted on each deck, and the support will be needed once the replacement masts are made.
3. Take several sections of wooden dowel to match the girth of the masts, bind them with string in places and add the magnets to the bottom of each mast. Add the castle plate and then add a second mast in front of the first bound with more string (and glue). A good wrapping of string and shaping of the mast heads to a square section will be all that is needed to make the masts look good.
4. A third mast should be added atop the second, but I might make the second mast tall enough for two sails. Thus abstracting down the rig.
5. Add magnets to the masts at the position of the spars. I will stick with the 'traditional abstract of three sails per mast, most miniature wargaming ships used this standard rather than the more accurate six. Basically you get a main sail, topsail and topgallant, the upper two sails being on the second adjoining mast
6. assemble the spars from smaller wooden dowels and add sails of thick paper sealed with mod podge.. You need two copies of each spar both magnetised, one with a billowing sail and one with a fully furled sail. You could use the spars provided and two additional castings instead (step 1). Spars do rotate, but again abstract sailing ships have sails forward at all times in one of two states, furled and unfurled. Copying this is normal and greatly simplified the rig.
7. I will include one jib mounted on wire that I can attach to a connector on the bowsprit and foremast. I do not recommend adding stay sails as they will compromise access to the ship. I might add two or more jib sails to the single piece. When furled the jib sails can be hauled down and do not need to be represented.
8. I will include a spanker, likely a later design spanker with a flat spar. I might also remove the mainsail from the mizzen, which was sometimes done as it interfered with the spanker. A Spanker should rotate around the mizenmast to a good angle on either side, as this was the spankers main job and the sail was unique I will keep this functionality.. A furled spanker is lowered but, the lowered spar of the spanker will be set artifically high so as not to inhibit model access to the poopdeck. The spar will have two sails magnetised for it, one furled and one billowed. I will make the sail symmetrical so it can be removed and reversed to follow the rotation of the spar. This is a bit of a hack but will allow a good approximation of function including variable numbers of sails to set while maintaining a simplified rig that does not interfere.
9. Net rigging on the mast castles will be retained, of simplified, the net rigging running to the deck will have to be magnetised and set on a bar that can be attached. I might however just omit net rigging, it looks better with it but adds to the complexity of the model and reduces access too much. With exception of a simple wire jib line all other rigging will be absent.
Done this way I should have a usable playing piece players can command and set, and also understand as this simple ten sail rig is a greatly thinned down variant of a full rig.
If anyone is after a galleon rig do as above but replace the mixxenmast sail plan with a lateen.
There you go.
