Gigabytes Historical Game Day - Part 2: Sharp Practice

Once the Kiss Me Hardy game wrapped up, I managed to get the table reset for a game of Sharp Practice. This one was a Napoleonic game based on the Dewey Lambdin Book, Troubled Waters.

In the book, Captain Alan Lewrie, RN, is in command of a small squadron. These include sloops, schooners and cutters below the rate. In the course of the book, he is dealing with spies as he operates off the coast of France. Near the town of Royan, there is a battery of guns guarding the mouth of an estuary that protects the river leading to the port of Bordeaux. A fort is being constructed at Royan but is not yet operational. Lewrie hatches a plan to take out the battery and then move on and destroy the fort that is under construction.

This is where the scenario picks up the action. Lewrie has commanded two of his vessels to land a force of marines and sailors to attack the battery. Guarding the battery is a small group of voltigeurs from a light battalion situated in the town of Royan. The battalion has sent out strong parties of men to search the coast for British sailors that have been getting water and firewood recently.

The sailors are from the a schooner and a sloop that are anchored off of the coast. The marines are from Lewrie's flagship.

The game had two British players and two French players. The British made good progress getting their men headed to the shore. They had three larger rowboats and two smaller ones. This enabled them to land their entire force without having to return to the ships. One group of marines, however, had some issues moving and remained stranded in the water with the one rowboat armed with a gun.

The French deployed their voltigeurs to block the British advance on the gun and opened ineffectual fire on the seamen on the shore. In return, Both the musket armed seamen and the schooner opened fire on these troops and basically neutralized them for the rest of the game.

The French sent out a runner to get reinforcements from the town this was accomplished quickly, but the reinforcements were distracted by the tavern in the village as they spent several turns there.

The next French reinforcement was in the form of three groups of chasseurs that arrived in the top left corner of the table. These troops deployed in a line and advanced through the woods. They lost formation and were picked apart by the marines and the guns from the the sloop.

By the time the second group of marines landed and the gunboat moved off, the French force morale was largely broken. The force from Royan barely played a part as their cards didn't show up before the Tiffin card until toward the end of the game. The French did have their own naval vessel arrive in the form of a single gun gunboat. This opened fire on the schooner and caused some damage but not enough to make a difference.

It was a fun game and played in 15mm. The ships were Sea Dog Studios models with three of the rowboats being Old Glory models. It was a fun game but probably needed some adjustments. Swapping the arrival order of the chasseurs and the gunboat may have helped. That would have distracted the ships from the infantry.

Originally the scenario was going to make the French vessel a small 4-gun sloop but I ran out of time to paint it. The gunboat, I think, proved to be a better help as it was equipped with a heavy gun.

Giga Historical Games Day - Part One of Three

Saturday, November 10, 2018 was a historical games day at Gigabytes Cafe in Marrietta, Georgia. William Thorpe did a fantastic job or organizing and getting games lined up for the entire day. He even got sponsors to donate prizes for a raffle that we were doing. Very impressed. He almost had the games running on time, but given the material he was working with (me included) that was asking too much of the poor man.

Starting at 10am I didn't leave until 7pm when my games finished and I was able to pack up. It was a great but exhausting day.

It was a terrific event and it was used as a fundraiser for Children's Healthcare of Atlanta. From what I gather, there were 16 games that went on throughout the day. I hosted two games: a Kiss Me Hardy variant and a Sharp Practice game. In both games I had a full table of participants and they were at least kind enough to pretend they were having a good time for my benefit. :) Well I had a great time anyway. I also did a poor job of getting pictures of the games as they developed. Half the time I just forgot and the other half the pictures were questionable.

The first game was a five player game of Kiss Me Hardy using some modifications that I made for ships under the rate. It was a quasi-historical scenario based on actions of the Georgia and South Carolina State Navies in the American Revolution.

The game began with a merchant brig anchored in the center of the table. This is a Sea Dog Studios 6mm Brigantine model. The dots that you notice on this mat are markings from an attempt to make a hex mat on the reverse side of the felt for a game of Bag the Hun. It taught me to never make my own hex sheet.

To the southwest corner was a sloop from the Georgia Navy named the John B. As for the name, I am sorry, I couldn't help myself. During the game, I only heard one passerby groan when they noticed the name so I am guessing there is a dwindling number of Beach Boy fans left. The John B was a six gunned sloop armed with 6-6pdr guns. This model is a Sea Dog Studios 6mm Bermuda Sloop.

In the Northwestern corner was two small vessels from the South Carolina State Navy - the Defiance and the Liberty. Both were actual ship names but applied to different vessels. The Liberty was actually the name of a Georgia sloop. Both were very small vessels. The Defiance had a single gun in the bow and a stern gun on a pivot. The Liberty was a pilot boat with a single bow gun. Both of these miniatures are from Langton Miniatures 1/300th scale Napoleonic line. One is a armed ships's launch and the other is a British Gunboat. Excellent models that my painting does not do justice to.

To the Northeast was a Royal Navy galley Tamar. The Tamar was the name of an actual RN sloop that was very active off the coast of South Carolina but it was most certainly not a galley. It was a galley for this scenario as I didn't have a chance to make the ship that would have corresponded to it. It was an eight gunned vessel with 8-4pdr guns. No individual photos of this ship. But in the later pics, she is the only one with lanteen sails. This is a Warartisan paper model.

The last ship actually matched it's historical counterpart. The RN schooner St John. The St John had an extremely active career in the Revolution. It was involved in a number of actions including the Rebel raid on Nassau. It was armed with 12-4pdrs. It started in the southeastern corner of the table. Another model I don't have a good picture of. Which is just as well as I have dropped it at least 4 times and had to reattach its topsails and equal number of times. It is a WarArtisan paper model. Not the ONLY thing that happened to it when it was dropped from about 4' from the ground is the loss of one or two topsails that were fixed with the application of superglue. In the instructions, it mentions that rigging the ship makes it stronger. This is 100% true. Where I have rigging, it is much sturdier. I ran out of time to complete the job.

At the start of the game, the wind was blowing to the east which confounded the Royal Navy in moving towards the merchantman. The Rebels were able to move with great ease and quickly moved to intercept the merchantman.

The Liberty took a scenic tour through the rocks. One of the things I missed was pointing out that there was shoal water surrounding the rocks. The Liberty was so shallow drafted that it wouldn't have mattered anyway. But she shot through the rocks and spent a good amount of the game out of the action until the end.

One of the items that I was trying out was rules for "Flying False Flags". The Rebels weren't operating in a coordinated fashion as the Georgia Navy didn't know that the South Carolina Navy would even be there. The Royal Navy wasn't sure what any of the ships were. The Tamar and the St John were aware of each other, though. So I had a system of spotting test to determine friend from foe. It worked out mostly well. With the close confines of the space we had availible, it was obvious to the players who was who, but they were game for whatever the dice showed. Everyone was able to avoid a friendly fire incident but only just barely.

This run out of the rules with someone other than my 10 year old was very valuable. The early moves of the game can seem very slow. I am thinking of adding an optional rule to allow the first turn to be conducted in Inches rather than Centimeters to allow the ships to get into action faster. Also, the strike system needs to be adjusted from the base Kiss Me Hardy rules as no one passed a strike test during the game.

This shot is toward the end of the game where the John B has taken the Merchantman and was starting to be pummeled into submission by the St John. You can see the Liberty has made a come back and would sail circles around the St John before fleeing the table.

The scenario played out well. The Defiance menaced the St John for a while but one broadside put an end to her. Not unexpected for such a tiny vessel (a sailed ship's launch). The Tamar was beaten by the John B (turns out a father v son battle with the son as victor). The Tamar struck and had lost a mast in the fighting.

The John B went on to take the merchantman that had started to flee. Once the Merchantman was on its way to safety, the John B and the St John has a quick engagement that forced the John B to strike to the superior gunnery of the St John.

With the Liberty as the last Rebel vessel on the waters, their victory conditions assured by the merchantman's escape, it deftly dodged the St John's best efforts and escaped.

It was a well fought game. Top honors went to the captain of the St John who was our youngest player at the table. He was also a son of the Tamar's Captain as well. He captured two Rebel vessels and re-secured the Tamar. The Rebels also counted the action as a victory as they absconded with the gunpowder.

Rewarding his gallant victory, the captain of the St John was awarded with a 6mm Sea Dog Studios Bermuda Sloop. Ironically, the same model as the John B sailed by his brother who he happened to capture. (Players forgive me if I get this wrong) The St John was captained by Collin. The Tamar was captained by Tim. Jake was captain of the John B. Jim was captain of the Liberty and Chris (not me) was the captain of the Defiance.

One of the things I have noticed, is that I rarely take pictures of the gamer's during events. After Terry Haney's passing, this became evident as I went through a bunch of pictures of our games together and I didn't find a single picture of Terry among them. This one I hesitated to take since it involved a minor but I asked his Dad for permission. I wanted to show Brian over at Sea Dog the recipient of the prize.

I am going to stop for now and make another post on the Sharp Practice game and a third on the other events as this is starting to get long. Thanks again, William for a great event. I came so close to winning the raffle twice. :)

Better Pictures

Well the last pictures of my Langton fleet were... poor to say the least. I did a bit better this time. I broke out my blue felt and some rocks I have painted up.

For perspective, I also photographed them with some of my Sea Dog Miniatures ships. First up is the six gun Bermuda Sloop.

then I pictured them with the assembled but unpainted 10 gun brigantine.

After taking the picture, I got disappointed in having not finished the Brigantine. So I started work on it today. And managed to finish it even though I was supposed to be working on one of the Warartisan paper ships.

The ships are just about right in scale with one another. The Sea Dog ones have thicker spars than the tiny Langton ones and Don't really have a sail plan for them. But this is due to how Sea Dog expects them to be used. Their philosophy is that whatever sails you place on your model, 90% of the time, they will be wrong for what your ship is actually doing. Also, to represent damage in their game, you simply remove the masts that have been damaged. Having rigging prevents this from happening. Thereby the ships are more representational. But you can still see that the jolly boat would have no issue being placed on davits aboard the brigantine or on the sloop. The launch is for a slightly larger vessel such as their 18 gun brig of war. That is another ship I have that I need to get to work on at some point. Of the remaining 6mm line that Sea Dog has, I have a second Bermuda Sloop (6 guns) and their buccaneer sloop (8 guns). I do not have one of their 8 gun flush deck sloops nor the small boats. I may end up ordering some of the small boats sometime soon.

Speaking of Sea Dog, I am trying to purchase some more 15mm ships from them. Thus far, I have his Buccaneer Sloop and the Tripoli gun boat. I am talking with them about some of their older offerings and may have something in a week or two. More on that later.

But for now, I have enough small ships to get in a couple games of KMH with my adaptions to see how things go.

Painting Progress pt 2

I finished off three rowboats today. Also four sailors rowing. Below are some pictures of how they look.

The small boat is a Sea Dog Studios Dinghy. The middle one is an Old Glory Shipyard sailed rowboat. The large one is a Sea Dog Studios barge or whaleboat. I can't remember which. I am very pleased with how they have come out. Need to finish some more actual pirates but the crew were too tempting.

Ever Expanding Fleet

Having some ships on my desk has been great. I managed to paint up one of the dinghy's and my tripoli gunboat. I am tempted to add the lanteen sail to the Tripoli gunboat. I think that might look pretty good. And it would still be removable with the main mast.

I am really happy with the deck of the tripoli gunboat. I used a buff paint and washed it with a Vallejo wash. Granted, it looks good to my color blind eyes and may be hideous to everyone else. I think the benches on the dinghy are too light. They received the same wash and still stand out too much, I think. But they are ready for some crew.

Interestingly, the dinghy from Sea Dog Miniatures is the PERFECt size for a ships boat for the Buccaneer Sloop! It fits perfectly behind the mast.

I have an armed pinnace on the desk as well as two Old Glory sailed rowboats. I am really appreciating the Sea Dog Miniatures ships. They are a joy to paint. They are simple to build and the guns for the armed pinnace and the tripoli gunboat are interchangeable! They look more robust than the Old Glory stuff I have to compare them with. Now if I only had time to paint my sailors rowing from Peter Pig, I could really get moving. But there are not enough hours in the day.

Just finished a couple more small boats.

Buccaneer Sloop - Sea Dog Game Studios

I finally got around to work on my Buccaneer Sloop. The ship is beautiful. It is however bigger, scale wise, to my 26 gun frigate. This is not that big of a deal at the moment. I intend to get a few more 15mm ships from Sea Dog to round out my 15mm fleet. Probably the 12 gun Brig.

I just finished with the masts. The instructions were printed on a sheet of paper that was folded. So 1/4th of the page was the mast assembly. I hate to admit it, but I had to put on readers in order to make out what the measurements were. The next problem was finding a rules with measurements in metric. Every tape measure and ruler I could find in the house was in inches. I finally found a paper cutter with centimeters on it and used it.

What I like about this kit is that it comes with a special bracket to assemble the booms. It makes the attachment to the main mast so much simpler and sturdier than just super gluing them together. I wish they had something similar for the two spars. Those are just raw super glue joins. Speaking of the spars, I seem to have run out of dowel to complete the build. My largest leftover piece only measured 40mm and I need 70mm for the uppermost yard. I will work on that later tonight.

The hull itself was very clean. There were a few lines that needed to be trimmed around the gun ports. All in all, I am very impressed with the ship so far. The lack of spar is most likely poor planning on my part. That is all now sorted and the ship is ready for painting.

Which, I went ahead and did. Sorry for the poor picture of my messy desk. I painted the deck a beige Brown and the hull a chocolate Brown. The gunport area is a blue. I went with a lighter color for the gun carriages and ships wheel. The masts are a yellow ochre. The hull received a black wash to dirty it up. For a quick and dirty paint job, its not too bad. Also felt great to get something done.

I hope to work on the Tripoli gunship and some of the row boats next. The row boats are on my desk as I type. Maybe sometime this year, it will see the table in a game.

Naval Forces have Arrived

I just got the order I placed with Sea Dog Studios for some of their 15mm ships. I picked up a Triopolitan War Gun Boat, Two dinghies and two ship wreck markers. The ship wreck markers are nice and generic in that they are crows nests that stick out of the water.

The gun boat is very nice. These would have been equipped with a single lanteen sail. It has a bow mounted gun that is either a carronade or a long gun. It comes with a blank mount, a carronade and a long gun.

What to do with them? Well I will use them initially for my Napoleonics. I have a British Royal Navy landing force for Sharp Practice. Plenty of Marines and sailors ready to go. I will probably get some men rowing from Peter Pig and put them in the dinghies. I am seeing the gun boat being a tender for my 26 gun frigate. It will provide cover for the landing force. I need some more row boats.

Eventually, if my Brookhurst Hobby order ever shows up, I will use them for a Pirate game as well.

Sea Dog has a number of useful bits that they don't carry on their website. You have to look at their Facebook page and go through the pictures to see what they have. The scenic items are really nice. There are market stalls, furniture, barrels, dock pieces, and a fort. They also have some of the same in 28mm as well. Most of these items they drag to shows that they attend to sell there. They will let you order from them if you just shoot them an email.

I am not interested in duplicating my 6mm fleet in 15mm. I am only interested in small ships to support a landing force. Today. Who know what tomorrow holds.

The Fleet Expands

Just got in my Langton order from Waterloo Miniatures here in the US. These are 6mm or 1/300 scale ships. They all come with crew. The launch and the jolly boat come in sailed or rowed versions. I was looking to make civilian small craft out of them so I got the sailed versions.

I went ahead and labeled the picture so you could see what each of them are. These will match up well with the Sea Dog Studios Brigantine and Bermuda Sloops that I have. I may use the British Gunboat as a pilot ship for a scenario that I am working on. What the heck, lets describe the scenario.

July 1775 - Off the Coast of Tybee Island, Georgia Colony

The Rebels have intercepted communications detailing the arrival of gunpowder and arms that are to be sent up the river to supply Loyalist units and to bribe the indians to fight for the British. Letters from the British Governor of Georgia have been intercepted that detail the level of rebellion in the colony and have been replaced with false letters assuring the crown that the colony is under firm crown control. Georgian Militia and Naval units meet up with South Carolina Continentals meet off the coast of Tybee Island in preparation to intercept the cargo of powder. The Georgia Naval element consists of the Schooner Liberty of 10 guns under the command of Captain Oliver Brown. He has a crew of fifty men and a company of Georgia Militia (20 men) to act as Marines under the command of Captain Joseph Habersham.

The South Carolina contingent is floating on two barges with twenty members each of the 1st South Carolina Regiment. These were under the command of Captains Barnwell and Joyner. The barges had a naval crew of 6 and 9 men respectively.

The Governor of Georgia sent word to British Florida that the powder shipment needed to be defended. St Augustine dispatched HM Schooner St John to wait for the packet ship from England. The St John was under the command of Lieutenant William Grant and mounted six guns. Lt Grant was an active captain and ran down three ships while waiting on the packet from England. But he missed the arrival of the packet ship Phillippa. (possibly a brig due to the amount of cargo she was hauling)

The Phillipa arrived on the 8th of July and was immediately spotted by the Rebels. The Phillipa anchored off of Tybee Island to await the arrival of a pilot boat to guide her up the Savannah River. When the pilot boat arrived (possibly named Little Carpenter), the rebels moved in to attack. SC infantry fired on the Philippa and demanded her to surrender. They boarded both the pilot ship and the Phillipa and took them to Cockspur Island where a force of 300 South Carolina Continentals were waiting to unload her cargo. The cargo was divided between Georgia, South Carolina and the Continental Congress. The Rebels managed to seize 16,000 pounds of powder, seven hundredweight of lead bullets and a large number of firearms meant for the Indians. The Georgians and South Carolinians divided the plunder between them and departed. Of South Carolina’s portion, 4,000 pounds of powder was delivered to Congress in Philadelphia. Of the 9,000 pounds seized by Georgia, 5,000 pounds were similarly sent to Georgia. The Phillippa was sent on to Savannah on the 12th of July and returned to its master.

Period Map of Tybee Island from https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/c1/1a/a2/c11aa2f3c233f4fd3f7ff526696f6964.jpg.

I want to try this out using two different sets of rules. The first is my modifications to Kiss Me Hardy that handles ships below the rate. The second is Sea Dog Studios "SailPower 2.0" rules. Both should handle the scenario rather well. The only thing holding me back is my painting slowness. I want to include some land elements in the scenario particularly Cockspur Island since there are all of the SC Continentals waiting there.

The scenario is a modest size one
British Order of Battle:

Ship	Guns	Crew	Marines
HM Schooner St John	6x 3pdr guns	30 crew	0
Packet Ship Phillipa	2 swivel guns	20 Crew	0
Pilot Ship Little Carpenter		10 Crew	0

Rebel Order of Battle:

Ship	Guns	Crew	Marines
GA Schooner Liberty	10x 3pdr guns	50 Crew	20 Marines
SC Barge 1	-	6 Crew	20 Marines
SC Barge 2	-	9 Crew	20 Marines

Anyway, this is what I am working towards. I have most of what I need for the scenario already. I am thinking of having random shipping appearing that will need to be spotted. The entrance to the Savannah River was very active with shipping at this point in the war and would continue to be throughout the war with privateers from both sides prowling the water ways.