86 Days to go....

Despite suffering from a bout of Bronchitis I have had last managed to make a start on cutting out the replacement counters for my planned Jutland refight. Thus far I have completed both the Royal Navy and the High Seas Fleet and the optional 'scaled' Light Ship counters. The latter are very important as I have mentioned previously because the counters in the original game represent formations that are too large. Having a single counter representing some 16 destroyers whilst the capital ships are individual does make for some strange tactical decisions. Under the new system the same formation would be represented by four counters - this is much better from a gaming perspective as the player would be able to make decisions about formations, station keeping etc. It will change how the rules work and this will be something I will need to test.

In the interest of easing myself back into using the core Jutland rule system - it was some 30 years ago I last used after all - I am planning to run a small test game over the next few days with the results posted to the blog.

There will be one change though and that concerns the move distance and ranges. The game as designed uses a measuring device - called the rangefinder - scaled at 20mm equalling 1,000 yards for gunfire. This means that 48cm represents 24,000 yards. For me that is a little too short so I am using 1" to a 1,000 yards. Ships move according to a special gauge with a movement factor of one point for every 2 1/2 knots. Each movement point on the gauge equals 15mm so between the movement and firing ranges there is a difference in how they work. I would prefer a uniform scale of measure so that will be my first priority.

The scenario I envisage running will pit two small forces of battle cruisers in that old standby the encounter battle.

At least fighting a game will not be interrupted by my irritating coughing - which makes painting a challenge for sure!

Of Mutual Benefit....

Following on from last post - a very brief overview of Cavalier at Tunbridge - I thought it would be a good idea to detail my half of the exchange I undertook with Bob Cordery of Wargaming Miscellany fame. My part of the transaction was a pile of blue Hexon terrain tiles (the remaining green and desert sets are now heading north of the border) and in exchange I received rather a nice and useful selection of books. Bob is a cunning chap and I suspect that he knew EXACTLY which of his titles that he had deemed surplus to requirements would be of interest to me - and he was not wrong!

The North West Frontier in two quite different wars - one that Wellington would have been comfortable with and the other with lorries and aircraft. They have certainly made me think about revisiting the Roghan Valley!

A smattering of naval titles - all at the lower tactical end of the spectrum and therefore hugely gameable! The two that have proven to be of most interest are the small paperback on inland river transport in Mesopotamia and that wonderful book on the Konigsberg.

The rest of the rest. The three pamphlets you see are from Pallas Armata and cover the campaign in Thrace during the Balkan War whilst the three Hoyt titles speak for themselves. The Zanzibar title is also very interesting and is full of ideas for small scale actions - gunboats, landing parties and similar.

NOT from Bob but worth mentioning all the same.

The final title in this post caught my eye simple because the Lawrence connection. Sea power dominated the Red Sea and the elderly ships of the RN that were on station gave sterling service in support of the Arab Revolt. Whilst the Turks had no naval presence to speak of the potential for some cracking 'what if?' actions is huge.

I would like to thank Bob for the enormous selection of titles he conjured up and for a variety of reasons all of them have an immediate use....

The Laugh in Cavalier

On Sunday I was fortunate enough to be able to visit the Cavalier show in Tonbridge - and in the words of Wallace and Gromit it was 'A Grand Day Out'!

The haul. There are few things in life more pleasurable than acquiring a new book (or 4).

To begin with I spent some time with Dave Lanchester helping to set up his stand. This is always good fun and is a good opportunity to see what's new in the remaindered and secondhand book world.  I must confess that it is seldom I visit Dave's stand without buying something and the three books you see in the picture (not the Turkish title) are now residing happily in the library in the man cave. Needless to say there are a number of ideas that these new acquisitions will be supporting in due course.



Caliver Books were also in attendance and after a brief catch up with Dave Ryan money duly changed hands and the Ottoman uniform title was also added to the collection. For the record I reckon that I have enough uniform material on the Turkish army from 1912 to 1923 in my collection so producing an army should not be a problem (other than painting it of course....).



I also chatted to Tony at Brigade Models and picked up a couple of packs of 1/1200th scale buildings - the Ancient Roman set and the Middle Eastern village with a couple of Mosques. The former will provide some background for the Salamis project whilst the latter ties in with my next purchase....

Tumbling Dice were also present and the painted examples of their 1/2400th scale Russo Japanese War ships (and the new American range for the Spanish War of 1898 or the Great White Fleet) are really very nice indeed. I managed to avoid buying any of these - for the moment anyhow - but I did pick up a 1/600th WW1 starter pack with German artillery. These 3mm figures are very nice indeed and although purchased as an experiment have a lot of potential for a number of ideas I am currently planning.

A gathering of Rejects with Postie keeping his hands firmly on his wallet in case One Lover Ray opts for another bacon sandwich....Big Lee striking a manly Hannibal like pose whilst Clint heartily wishes he was elsewhere....

Aside from the retail therapy (which is pleasant enough in its own right) Cavalier was also a chance to catch up with old friends and acquaintances, to chat about projects old and new and to see what kind of games were being played and displayed. One of the main orders of business for myself was meeting up with Bob Cordery of Wargaming Miscellany fame. We had a transaction to conclude involving two boxes of blue Hexon tiles and a box of extremely useful books - which will feature in a later post. Bob and I also discussed an idea I have been toying around with and as ever his input was very useful - especially some of the names he came up with - again, more of which in a later post!


I was hoping to get some of my pictures of the games on display but for some reason the resolution was not great so I will leave that to the other bloggers that were present.


All in all it was a grand day (or in my case half a day) out with just the right balance of camaraderie, retail therapy and inspiration.

A Naval Counter Attack

I took delivery last week of several sets of counters for use with the old Avalon Hill board game Jutland. These counters are privately produced enhanced reproductions of those from the original game but with a number of added extras. To begin with the counters now have 'waves and wakes' as well as the national ensign of the ship's origin. In addition to the counters of the basic game there are also a number of sets of additional ship counters being those that featured as add one in various editions of the old AH General and Boardgamer magazine. The four additional sets comprise the following counters:

North Sea Expansion - this includes the remaining dreadnoughts of both the RN and the High Seas Fleet that served in the North Sea as well as the Harwich force and the original 6th battle squadron of pre dreadnought battleships. Also included is the later US 6th battle squadron. The Germans gain some additional cruisers including Blucher and the two ships of the Scharnhorst class as well as some other older battleships.

The rest of the rest - the North Sea completed for the entire Great War - and there are also some hypothetical vessels for both sides.

The Russian Expansion - this includes the major units of both the Baltic and the Black Sea Fleets which is very useful in conjunction with the next expansion (and includes the Ottoman Turks).

The Russian Baltic and Black Sea fleets - with the Turks for the latter

The Mediterranean Expansion - this includes the major units of the Austrian, French, Italian, Turkish and  the in theatre ships from the RN and the German navies. There are also a selection of transport/merchant counters which are useful for convoy or raiding actions i.e. Targets!

The Mediterranean. Austrians, Italians, French, Turkish and units of the RN combine to make this a personal favourite

Light Ships Expansion - this covers the original game and features counters for the light ships drawn to scale. This counters in the original game are very stylised black blobs and with the additional problem of having a single counter representing an entire flotilla of vessels. With these counters a flotilla could be represented by up to four or five counters which makes it more tactically useful (and more representative) although at the expense of some changes to the rules. Also in this picture are the original ships from Jutland for the actual battle

The reworked original counters and the far more useful scaled light ship counters. No more single counter 16 ship destroyer flotillas!

Aside from the counters there a whole host of additional scenarios - complete with the appropriate ship damage record sheets and expanded and optional rules. All in all this is a great way to fight naval battles set in the Great War without using models. The counters are very attractive but could readily be swapped for models - I am thinking 1/6000th here - if required.

Needless to say I now have the materials needed for something Jutland based for the centenary in May - all I need to do is to tailor certain aspects of the rules.

For the record I am not foregoing the use of models - I will merely be using them for lower level actions.

More to ponder methinks....

Hexgone, Hexgone - Where's my Hexgone?

I have two sets of flocked Hexon and extras for sale. There is a boxed set of Verdant Green and one of Desert (RRP £74.95) and for each colour there is 20 single flocked hexes. These are £12.95 for 10 so each colour has a retail of just over £100 - one box of 21 x 6 hex tiles and two x 10 single hexes.

I will not bore you with the rational behind this decision but suffice it to say there is one! I am looking for £55 for each set exclusive of postage which represents roughly a fifty percent bargain for anyone. Sadly overseas shipping is not really an option.

Anyone that is interested please comment with an email address and I will be in touch.

The Great War at Sea via Avalon Hill's Jutland

The box and contents of Avalon Hill's Jutland. My own collection at present has everything except the ship counters and the box (don't ask - its a long story!)

Regular readers of this blog will doubtless recall my mentioning the various plans I had for commemorating the centenary of the Battle of Jutland in May. From the grandiose 1/2400th scale refight aboard HMS Belfast, sadly abandoned, to my current scheme - one which is far more achievable and is now my preferred choice.

I have also previously mentioned my fondness for the old Avalon Hill game of Jutland - the board game that is a tabletop system rather than being hex based. I have had some superb games with this over the years but it is not perfect. The various optional rules that appeared in the old Avalon Hill General magazine and also the Boardgamer add a suitable level of sophistication and complexity and are, in my opinion, essential. Having said that, the rules could use some additional work to make them more 'naval miniatures rules friendly' and this is something I have a number of ideas to experiment with.

The big news with this idea though is that I have ordered and am taking delivery of a number of reproduced counter sheets produced by a chap in Canada. These cover the the counters from the original game, the counters from the North Sea expansion set (which includes pretty much everything else for the North Sea), those from the Mediterranean set - featuring the Turks, Austrians, French, Italians and additional RN types - and also the 'Russian' set. The latter features both the Baltic and the Black Sea fleets. Finally, he has also produced a set of light ship counters with scaled views on them rather than the usual black blob. I was quite pleased with this as representing a destroyer flotilla of some 19 ships with a single counter (as in the original game) is a little odd in my opinion. 

All the counters now have 'waves and wakes' on them, together with the national ensign and as a result look far more attractive than the original versions. Scale wise they come out at around 1/4800th.

The significance of this purchase is quite simple - it means that I will be able to fight fleet actions in a sensible fashion on a 6ft by 4ft table. The game mechanics are simple and are designed for this scale of action and, if I am honest, using models smaller than 1/3000th is not really going to cut it for me for games of this scale.

However, I have not abandoned the use of models entirely as my cruiser/colonial ideas would suit using them very nicely - simply as there will be a lot fewer models to contend with. For this I envisage using Panzerschiffe as 1/2400th looks good although for convenience 1/3000th would suit just as well and has the huge advantage of Navwar being some thirty minutes away.

The Far Seas

A very good primer for the period and with plenty of gaming ideas

I suppose it is inevitable in some ways that despite my fascination with dreadnought battleships and fleet actions I find myself increasingly looking at naval actions at a much lower level. In the context of WW1 - and ignoring the gunboat type of action for the time being - this leads to actions involving cruisers and destroyers. I must confess that some of the best naval games I have ever taken part in have not been the great slugfests between lines of battleships (although they do have a fascination all of their own) but actions involving single cruisers or small surface action groups.

In recent times - no more than a few years ago - I fought a number of actions in 1/3000th representing the Balkan Wars. The forces were not large but nevertheless gave some very good games - more so on the tabletop than in history if truth be told. 

Moving on to the Great War then we have the potential for some cracking actions - both historically and the all important 'what if'. The exploits of the German cruisers in the early years of the war - Von Spee's Far East squadron, the cruise to the Emden, the escape of the Goeben and the Breslau and the hunting down of the Konigsberg for the basis for some cracking refights - and again, the all important 'what if?'.

Going back in time to the days of the legendary Madasahatta campaign I seem to recall (and no doubt stand to be corrected) that the naval side was quite small in scale although a few dreadnoughts were involved - not so much on a squadron basis, more like a couple or so at any given point. This is the size of action that works best for me so the cruiser scaled engagements of WW1 tick a number of boxes.

With this in mind - and if I am completely honest very much on the spur of the moment - I acquired via EBay the title you see above for a give away price. It is the usual Pen and Sword style title and is an account of the exploits of the German cruisers at the start of the Great War and of the Royal Navy efforts to bring them to account. This they did but not without cost. From a naval wargame perspective the old standby of 'Hunt the Raider' is an ideal scenario generator - and given that 'hunters' were often older or less effective vessels the player has a number of challenging decisions to make in respect of how he conducts his operations.

Bryan Perrett is a well known historian and his account is a superb introduction to the subject. I have more detailed works on the period but as a one stop primer this is hard to beat. I suspect it has been remaindered which is why i was able to get it so cheap but even at the full price i would have been tempted.

Mention of this type of operation and Madasahatta in the same post was no coincidence - and if you read my post about Lawrence of Arabia recently (which I enjoyed watching again enormously) you may have an inkling of where this may be heading....

Of course I couldn't possibly comment....