Close Action

Josh and Gwen drove down from Blacksburg last night, and then this morning Josh and I drove up to DC for a Close Action battle with Mark Campbell (with the battle report onthe Battle Honors blog).

It's fun traveling with Josh. We had a variety of "You May Be A Redneck Space Marine" jokes:

• "Them critters was tyrannids? Ah thought they was revenooers. Well, reckon it's all the same."
• "You may be a redneck space marine if all your tanks are painted orange, they're all numberd 01, and they all play Dixie"
• "We wuz so poor, our chapter paint scheme was black and white. And we didn't have no black paint either."
• "You may be a redneck space marine if your Chapter Librarian is illiterate."
• "When I was growing up, we walked to school, barefoot, through waves of tyrannids that was chin deep..." 

We talked about D&D and other RPG campaigns he wanted to run, and monsters he'd designed for them. His monsters for the most recent campaign were designed to function together, with teamwork...it would have been nasty to go up against them. We want to do a Monster Hunters International campaign, and a Dark Heresy campaign, and a D&D or Fantasy Hero campaign, and....

Close Action: Battle of Cape Henry

Josh and I drove to Albert Parker's place in DC for a Close Action scenario, the Battle of Cape Henry. Full AAR at Battle Honors.

Close Action AAR

A USS Franklin-centric view of yesterday's combat is on Battle Honors.

Close Action: The Happy Return and Cape Henry

Tracy came from Hampton, and Richard from Fairfax, for Josh's last Close Action games before departing for Australia. Battle reports at for The Happy Return and Cape Henry at Battle Honors

AAR: Mars vs French Frigates

Josh and I got in a game of Close Action today, using the "Mars vs French Frigates" scenario. One British ship of the line is chasing four French frigates, which turn to give battle. Historically, the French squadron commander wrote off his slowest ship (which Mars captured) and sailed the other three away without fighting.
Remembering what happened in Pourvoyeuse vs East Indiamen, we decided that Josh would take two of the frigates; I'd take the other two; and we'd each write orders for Mars, with a die roll deciding which orders would go into effect each turn. This resulted in less trash-talking than usual, but I think it's the best way to handle this type of scenario.
The problem Mars has in this scenario is that the frigates all together have about twice the firepower and twice the ability to soak up damage. The problem for the frigates is that they have to coordinate well, despite very little ability to communicate. If they can maneuver so they all have clear shots on Mars, the frigates win; if they get in each others' way, Mars can take down one frigate at a time.
The frigates divided into two pairs, with one pair going upwind and the other downwind. Mars jinked upwind,  getting into firing range on turn 3, then sailed through the frigates, and back around, twisting and turning to try to get good shots. On turn 11, Mars turned into the wind but failed to complete the tack, and just sat there, immobile; on turn 13 she still couldn't make the tack--there was only a 4% chance to fail twice, but she did. Since she couldn't move, the frigates closed in, surrounded her and hammered her.
Getting clear firing lines with the frigates was harder than we expected; they got a total of 21 shots in 13 turns, including four on turn 13; when Mars was able to maneuver, the frigates were only getting in 1.7 shots per turn. In contrast, once Mars got in range, there was only one time that she wasn't able to fire.
We were amused to note that in 11 turns when Mars had meaningful maneuver options, Josh and I each gave Mars the identical order three times, and nearly identical orders a couple of times more.

The Price of Admiralty

Joshua was admiral for one side in a Close Action game today. One of the key points about Close Action is that normally both sides have several ships--three to thirty on a side--but each player only commands one ship. That means that in order to maneuver coherently, avoid collisions, and ultimately win, you have to work together as a team. Or, sometimes, you just have to be a disorganized mob but slightly less disorganized than the other mob.

Josh texted me a few times during the battle:

• 1:32     Seriously, why can't I be a team on my own?
• 3:07     I hate my captains SO MUCH
• 6:08     I have sent eight signals. Six of them have been variations of "Engage more closely." They didn't.
• 6:22     We won, 147 to 119. I don't know how.

I told him that now he knows how Suffren felt.

Close Action AAR

Al Parker hosted a Close Action game in Annandale, with Josh and I taking the French, versus Al, Richard, and The Other Al as the British, in a scenario set around 1748 and using the 12-direction movement rules in Bloody Red Flag. Unfortunately I don't recall the name of the historical action it was based on, or of the English commander; I believe the French commander was du Bois de la Motte, and the historical outcome was pretty much a draw.
Three British ships, three French, with nearly equal point totals. Josh took the lead (Alcide) and rear (Arc en Ciel) while I had the flagship (Magnanime); the Brits are Plymouth, Worcester and Lenox. The two squadrons start in line ahead, approaching each other head on, with the British slightly downwind.
I gather that in the actual battle, both sides sailed ahead and fired as they passed, then turned around and did it again, rinse and repeat. In the game, however, the two English leading ships turned around immediately, presumably so the French wouldn't catch them before the biggest English ship could catch up and join in. The French line got rather extended in pursuit, but the English did nothing to attack Alcide before the others caught up.
On turn 8, Alcide cut downwind of the trailing English ship, took some fire, and suffered a "wheel shot away" critical hit. My ship also suffered the same crit, which means we can only pivot once per turn instead of twice. It makes us a lot less maneuverable. The consequence is that three turns later, we both collide with an English ship. It costs Magnanime some rigging; Alcide suffers the worst possible rigging loss, then gets a "mast may fall" critical, rolls badly, and loses another mast. She's basically dead in the water. Fortunately we're positioned such that we have targets and can get off some effective fire, and the English don't have good shots. Richard's ship Worcester can't shoot at us at all, because our ships are too close to an English ship; wargamers might take the shot and risk hitting a friend, but real captains wouldn't, so the game doesn't allow it.
I point out to Richard that he has a good shot at another English ship, and switching sides could greatly enhance his retirement. South of France, south of England, which one sounds better? The other Al says "English cooking!" and we reply that's another argument in favor of France. French weather is better. French wine. Al Parker points out that the English have Stilton and cheddar; I riposte that we French have over 200 kinds of cheese. French women. The other Al says "But they don't lie back and think of England!"; the rest of us realize that this is a telling point in favor of France. Richard is looking awfully tempted, but (perhaps due to the fact that the game doesn't actually allow switching sides) he resists.
On turn 12, Alcide forms boarders, which is rare, but she's fouled with Plymouth, immobile, and no longer has a target, so Josh figures he might as well try it. Unfortunately he takes enough casualties from cannon fire that the crew's morale drops and they refuse to attack. He sends them back to the guns. Richard still doesn't have a shot; visions of courts-martial dance in his head.
Superior French tactics begin to overcome the maneuverability disadvantage. By turn 18, Lenox is surrounded; she's the biggest English ship but has taken a lot of damage and her gunnery has dropped off a lot. Plymouth is still close to the action and taking fire, while Worcester moves around the furball and finally has a clear line of fire. On turn 19, Alcide aggressively drifts ("how do you drift aggressively?" Watch Josh, he can show you) down to sandwich Lenox with Arc en Ciel on the other side, while Plymouth unwisely closes on Magnanime, which has twice the firepower. Worcester mulls the increasingly attractive option of  running away, and justifying it with "Someone had to survive to to report what happened."
We called it at that point due to time. Final tally was that the English squadron had lost 2 mast sections, 3 hull and 4 crew, total nine sections; the French had lost 4 masts, 2 hull and 2 crew sections, total eight. It was a narrow French victory, although we had a clearly superior position and would probably have has a greater margin of victory if the game had continued a few more turns.

A good scenario and a fun day gaming.

Spanish Treasure

Josh and I played a quick game of Close Action tonight, the Spanish Treasure scenario from the original scenario book. Four British frigates have intercepted the Spanish treasure shipment, which is also four frigates, and invite them to surrender; the Spanish decline, and the fight is on. The two squadrons start out parallel and at close range. Despite the fact that both sides have four frigates, the British are better quality and much stronger, at about 180 points vs the Spanish 80. On the other hand, the victory conditions favor the Spanish, who can win by inflicting enough damage on the Brits; they can eke out a draw by having a single ship escape. I played the Spanish, Josh played the Brits.
On turn one, my rear two ships attempted to sandwich the rear Brit ship; unfortunately I guessed wrong about his move and my rear ship collided with him and fouled, giving him a point blank bow rake and essentially dooming my rear ship. My lead division moved upwind to open the range from his two leaders.
On turn two, my lead ship narrowly avoided colliding with his leader; if I'd been going any faster, I would have gone crunch. As it was, I merely sailed into a point blank bow rake, but his fire didn't hurt me all that much. His second ship did collide with mine, losing a mast and fouling. I raked him, doing a little damage; his return fire, a half broadside, was a critical hit, setting my ship on fire. The damage from the destroyed a mast and a hull section, and in moments I found that my best ship had gone from a perfect position to having three of her four crew sections either dead, disorganized, or fighting the fire. My third ship took a stern rake from his third, only a half broadside but still enough to take a mast down; and my fourth was still fouled and took a beating from his fourth. My marine sections were deadly marksmen, but that wasn't enough to turn the fight.
On turn three, my #3 ship went back to help #4, although the real intent was not to stop and fight, but to fire one broadside and then run and try to escape. Unfortunately Josh's third ship turned around and gave chase--it was the obvious thing to do, but I'd hoped he might have sent it to reinforce his two lead ships. Not that they needed reinforcing, with my second ship crippled and my lead ship outgunned by two to one (and being on the short end of a 2:1 duel was my best fight in this battle).
I might have been able to get my #3 ship off the board, technically "escaped", although there's no question the British would have been able to catch it; there's also a possibility that with a few lucky shots, I might have been able to do enough damage points for a win. However, given the hour, I decided to call it a night.

Santa Catarina

Played a Close Action game, hosted by Tracy Johnson in Newport News. The scenario was #3 "Santa Catarina Island" from the Monsoon Seas book. In 1777 the Spanish and Portuguese were at war, and the Spanish occupied Santa Catarina, off the southern coast of Brazil. The Portuguese sent as squadron to challenge the Spanish, but historically, the Spanish squadron declined to come out and fight; they just sat there, protected by shore batteries, until the Portuguese sailed away. Today's game presumes that the Spanish took action. I was selected to be the Portuguese commodore.

One of the key factors in this game is that none of my subordinates were experienced players. Aside from my lead ship, nobody did anything drastically wrong; however, there were times when I had to maneuver in ways that weren't ideal, simply because that was the only way I could be sure my teammates wouldn't accidentally run into me. It was a subtle effect, but it had a major influence. I also have to say that I was dismayed when I realized exactly what I had to work with. At one point I sent out the signal "Portugal expects every man will do his duty"--an obvious play on the most famous naval message in history, Nelson's signal at Trafalgar. Not one of my teammates knew what I was talking about.

The Portuguese had five ships, a little smaller than the Spanish but with better crews and better maneuverability. The Spanish had six ships. Both sides started close hauled, with the Spanish downwind of us. My plan was to send our first two ships around the head of their line and attack from both sides; their plan, as I later heard it, was to avoid that by having their lead ships curl around and head back in the direction they came from. As it happens, both plans worked. We kept formation better at first, but both sides broke up when first contacting the enemy. After some confusion, we reformed line and the enemy had two parallel lines. Since you can't fire through friendly ships, normally this would mean that their downwind line wouldn't have anyone to shoot at; however, our lead ship bravely (foolishly, suicidally) sailed into the midst of them. He got pretty thoroughly shot up and set afire, which he entirely deserved. Fortunately the Spanish admiral collided with one of my ships and that distracted the enemy enough that my errant captain could put out his fire and limp off. A few rakes, combined with low Spanish morale, forced their flagship to surrender. Time was called at that point, after 18 turns. It would still have been a pretty even fight if we'd continued, but as it was, we'd captured an enemy ship and that gave us an edge in victory points, 65 to 44.

 Starting position, with five Portuguese under full sail near us, and six Spanish with battle sail in the distance.My ship is the Santo Antonio, in the center of the Portuguese line. Note the wind direction marker at the head of the Portuguese line.

 Halfway through the game. All five Portuguese (white labels) and the leading three Spanish ships (yellow labels) mill around in disorder, trading shots. A fourth Spaniard, lowering sail as he finally gets into gunnery range, comes in from the right. In this picture and the next, the wind is blowing the same direction as we're looking.

We've reformed a line, although I've had to sail farther than I wanted so as to be sure Belem didn't run into me. Ajuda, left of the turn card, was pursuing the Spaniard in the far left but guessed wrong as to when he'd turn. The Portuguese ship on the far side of the Spanish line is about to take fire from three ships; however, the Spanish flagship Poderoso has just collided with Belem.

The situation at the end. In this picture, the wind is from the left. Poderoso has struck; the Spaniard at the upper right has turned into the wind and is in irons; just below him, the Spanish America has been stern-raked and is leaving the battle. However, two of the Spanish ships, upper left and center right, are just getting into action and are essentially unscathed. 

Battle off Ushant

We drove to DC today for a Close Action game, with the scenario being a hypothetical action between French and British squadrons off Ushant in 1782. I don't have a copy of the scenario, but it was seven Brits (including a 98 gun flagship, two 64s and four 74s) against seven French (a 100 gun flagship and six 74s). The French had an advantage in firepower; the British had an advantage in position and more experienced players.

The Brits start off on a broad reach on the port tack; the French are close hauled, also on the port tack, and should get to the intercept point first. In this case the French immediately turned and withdrew downwind; the British line headed toward the middle of the French formation, threatening to break the line. The French turned back to close hauled. Our lead British ship, not finding a good opening to penetrate the French line, swooped down under full sails to lay alongside the third French ship. That turned out to be more aggressive than was good for him, and he lost a couple of masts. At this point the French were in a creditable line, albeit a bit more strung out than ideal; our side could be described three two-ship columns plus our "forlorn hope" out in front. My division, the British rear, had stayed to windward, so we swept past the rest of our fleet and forced the French van to turn away; meanwhile the rest of the Brits had mixed it up with the French center. After some scrambling, this resolved to a line of three French getting rough handling from five Brits, while a little distance away was me and the other four French were circling around. I was off on my own, having creatively interpreted my admirals orders (i.e. did what he wanted, rather than what he said), and trying the herd the French. I eventually decided that disrupting their maneuvering would be worth the damage I'd take from being the only target handy, so I plowed through the middle of them. As a result, my ship got shot up, but my comrades were able to come engage the French successfully; I believe the final conclusion was that we captured six of the seven.

Josh captained the third ship in our line (no, he wasn't the reckless British lead ship, that was someone else) and did a good job dishing out damage, mostly playing conservatively and supporting the line. The three new players on the French side played well, and all present enjoyed the game.

Close Action battle report

We fought the DeTernay vs Graves scenario at the Old Dominion Miniature Society's first con, the Williamsburg Muster. The Brits started upwind and on a broad reach with the wind coming over their starboard quarter; the French are closehauled with the wind on their port bow. I was admiral of the French. I intended to try to maintain a neat, linear battle rather than get into a melee. So much for good intentions.
The British position was perfect for attacking our van while the rest of our fleet crawled upwind to get into the action. Why they didn't try that, I don't know. They maintained course until they were parallel with us, at which point I decided to order the French fleet to wear and come around to the same course the Brits were on; if they didn't have the nerve to come to us, why, we would go to them. At the same time that I ordered the French to reverse course, the Brits turned in succession to attack our rear. That sounds a lot neater and more precise than their maneuver actually was, but it was adequate. Their lead ship passed just ahead of our first ship; our new line leader decided to pass through the British line, leading to two collisions. One Brit turned into the middle of the French fleet instead of following his squadron. Both fleets collapsed into two furballs, one around the lone Brit (who was quickly battered into submission) and the other a few hundred yards away where the two lines met. Both sides fought well, but the only ship to strike by game's end was that imprudent Brit, and that gave the French a convincing lead in victory points.
A fun game and one which vividly illustrated why you should stick with the rest of your squadron. As for the melee...I suspect that players read so much about Nelson that they think breaking the line is normal; and a melee seems to be inevitable once the line is broken. Next time I may try telling my captains "do not break the line unless ordered" and see how that works.

After action report: Fleet Battle off Hango, 1743

Mark Campbell hosted a 24-player Close Action game this weekend, and chose a battle which could have happened in 1743 if the Swedish admiral had been more aggressive. Both fleets start with fourteen ships in line ahead, close hauled, with the wind coming over the starboard bow. The winds are light, the sea is calm. Both fleets are almost exactly the same strength; the Russians have slightly better morale, while the Swedes have the wind gage. It was a very well balanced battle.
I was selected to play the Swedish admiral commanding both the fleet as a whole and the center of our line, with subordinate admirals in charge of our van and rear squadrons. The admiral isn't usually in the lead ship, and the rest of the squadron is usually supposed to follow the lead ship, so that captain also has a lot of influence in determining where the squadron goes. In this game, the leader of our center squadron was Joshua.
As soon as the game started, we turned to get closer to the Russians and I signaled which ship I wanted Josh to attack. The enemy van faded away from us but kept going in the same general direction; my van got a little too far ahead of them but swung around and cut them off. At the same time Josh broke through the enemy line exactly where I had signaled him to, and the rest of the center squadron followed to attack. The Russian rear and part of the center, eight ships in total, were straggling behind, so I ordered the Swedish squadron, with five ships, to break off their attack. This meant that the ships actually in combat were 9 Swedes against 6 Russians, which is about the best that a commander could hope for. The enemy van fell back towards their center, which meant they passed by Josh's ship and pounded on it pretty hard; but our van came along in hot pursuit. Josh's ship was dismasted and immobile but as he put it, "I don't need to move, I have targets right here."
Around turn 9, both van squadrons passed through or just downwind of the action in the center, and the Swedish rear cut across and engaged the Russian rear. I sent a signal to the fleet "Blood for Odin!" and things rapidly devolved into a general melee--which means that ships were headed in every direction, almost everyone had a target at point blank range, and it was a tangled mess. A Swedish ship caught fire and tried to get in among the Russians, but before the fire spread to the enemy, the crew put it out and gave up the fight. Shortly thereafter a Russian--the one Josh originally attacked--hauled down his flag. One of our leeward ships got overeager and fell in among six Russians, but rescuers came in the nick of time and he was able to crawl off with the Swedish flag still flying. To windward, two Russians did the same thing but separated from their squadron, they got trapped among Swedes and couldn't escape. Some of the leeward Russians were starting to edge away from the battle when Mark called the game after twenty turns. I had to leave before the post-game conference but I believe the final tally was that both sides had several ships severely damaged, but the Swedes won the day and captured four Russians. It was a close battle, and very enjoyable.

AAR: Pourvoyeuse vs East Indiamen

Ater action report for a Close Action game, scenario from Monsoon Seas. In the original action in 1782, the French frigate apparently plinked for two hours and decided the Indiamen were too tough for her. I always thought that the French captain was...perhaps not cowardly, exactly, but certainly not as bold as he could have been. I found out why.
Josh played the four HEIC ships, which start in a straggly line close hauled on the starboard tack. I played Pourvoyeuse, beating upwind on the port tack and headed to intercept the lead Indiaman. The aggressive merchantmen closed on me, moving to envelope my frigate. His first shot caused "leadership casualties" and of course I failed the morale check, dropping from C to D quality. I realized that if I were in the midst of them, they could all shoot at me and I could only shoot at one of them, and probably not the same one all the time. Therefore I ran downwind, trying to get outside of the mob; but one of them accidentally rammed me and fouled, and by the time I got unfouled, the others had boxed me in. I nearly escaped, but Berampore charged over and cut me off. Her gunnery wasn't much of a threat but I had to heave to to avoid a collision, and again the other Indiamen had shots at me with fresh broadsides.We ended the game at turn 14 with Pourvoyeuse at E quality, her Basic Gunnery starting at an 18 factor at range 1, but reduced by -3 for a crew section, -2 fatigue, -2 crew quality, and -4 guns dismounted, for a whopping net 7 gunnery factor. The frigate had lost 1 rigging, 2 hull, and 1 sailor, for a total of 13 points to the English. The HEIC flag had lost 2 masts and a hull, and the Berampore had lost a hull and was on fire, giving a total 5VP to the French. I'm told this scenario is a lot more realistic, and easier for the frigate, with the Indiamen divided among two players. Nonetheless, we had a good time.

The Happy Return

On Saturday, we played Close Action , specifically "The Happy Return" from the Monsoon Seas scenario book. This situation pits three French ships vs three British ones, with the Brits being slightly higher quality but less powerful. Mark Campbell, the game designer, took command of the French side, with two inexperienced captains; on the British side, my teammate took the best British ship and I took the other two.
The game started off with a bang, the enemy's first broadside taking down my flagship's mast due to a lucky long range hit. A couple of turns later we returned the favor with a waterline hit on a French ship which forced part of her crew to man the pumps rather than the guns. One of my ships failed three moral checks in a row, an unlikely occurrence which cut her firepower in half. Then one of the French ships caught fire. The game ended with one of my ships hors de combat, fouled with the burning French ship and unable to move. My second ship was crippled and trying to crawl away, with the two remaining French hobbling along in hot pursuit. The third Brit was in comparatively good shape but had gotten separated from the action and couldn't rejoin fast enough to effect a rescue.
The small scenarios are more demanding, in my opinion, than the ones with more ships. Close Action is a game of teamwork (despite limited communication). If you have twenty ships and one of them wanders off to do his own thing, the team is not as strong as it could be but it will probably survive. If you have three ships and one gets separated, you're probably doomed unless your opponent makes a mistake or you get lucky. That's what happened to us.
A fun scenario and a good time. Mark is a great opponent and marvelously knowledgeable about the Age of Sail, and Close Action is a clean, well designed game that I'm always eager to play.