Fleet File Vol 6 Review and Formation figting
Fleet File Vol 6 review
Fairly random collection of models, the imperial ones all seem to be simply the ones with a red band in the ensign.
Heorot: Bayerlein's flagship before his promotion and being assigned a unique ship. It's basically a normal imperial battleship but the red strip looks quite nice.
Beowulf (Goldenbaum and Goldenlöwe versions): Mittermayer's flagship has a fairly standard imperial design. The similar red stripe makes it look like it's an upgraded version of the Heorot.
2x Alliance battleship: they're technically both numbered ships but they don't correspond to specific ships with stories attached to them so they're basically just generic alliance battleships.
Nürnberg: Bayerlein's actual flagship. I do love this design since it reminds me of the classical spaceship/rocket profile. It is also nice because there isn't a Goldenbaum duplicate version of the ship.
Perun: Admiral Borodin's flagship. Fairly standard alliance flagship design but with a bit thicker prow.
Sindur - Goldenlöwe version: a bit unusual since in all the other sets the Goldenlowe and Goldenbaum verisons are included together, here it's just one of them. Probably to keep in line with the red crest theme.
Airget lamh: Adimaral's fisher's ship. An experimental flagship where they tried to maximize firepower at the cost of sustained rate of fire. It can fire 6 volleys at the beginning but then needs to slow down. I really like the design, especially the weird indent under the bridge that gives it the unique silhouette. Fun fact, the BG-20 number is the code for the colour of the ship.
Formations
Formation fighting is one of the main aspects of tactical battles in the LOGH story and an aspect which is very important to model in any gaming system trying to emulate the story.
We can divide formations into two types: army level and squadron level.
Squadron formations would be the equivalent of a square to repel cavalry, shield wall or pike phalanx. Individual units arranged in specific fashion either as a reaction to an attacking unit or to maximize the effectiveness of a particular type of weapon or equipment.
Army level would be arranging an army in a crescent shape to envelop the densely packed enemy, or the checkerboard roman legion arrangement or the Napoleonic attack columns.
In this system we are dealing with each base representing hundreds of individual ships and we are assuming that at a more micro level each group of ships will be coordinating their own small scale formation arrangement. Micromanaging individual ships is not the purview of the fleet commanders and will not be modelled in the rules.
At this point we reach another issue in how to make some rules for formations. Since it's impossible (and not fun) to have a huge list of all possible ship arrangement and the relative bonuses and negatives, there needs to be some way to determine if ships are in a formation or not and what modifiers to apply based on how they are positioned.
The idea I'm currently working on involves each commander being able to position a battleline (literally a line, like a ruler or a pencil) on the map during the movement phase. Any unit touching one side of the battleline would be considered in formation and any base in contact with one of those units is also within the same formation.
This allows flexibility in unit arrangement as long as they are all in contact with each other and also allows formation disruption through morale hits during combat. When going down certain morale steps that unit has to move away from the enemy by a specified distance leaving gaps in the formation.
Units in formation benefit from a +1 modifier to their moral characteristic and units in direct contact with the battleline a +1 to hit during firing rolls.
Units directly behind another unit in formation support it and add more focused and concentrated firepower during the shooting phase. This corresponds to a -1 to the morale value of the attacked ship. This simulates a stronger barrage of fire that is harder to withstand.
The overall effect of this last rule is to create deep formations for strong punching power but less attack rolls as opposed to a very wide formation which maximizes the firing capacity of the army.
Hello,
ReplyDeleteI have always thought LOGH to be best simulated by either Napoleonic or Ancients rules. I have thought in the past about Napoleon's Battles and De Bellis Magistrorum Militum (DBMM) as possibilities. The one major difference is that there is no real LOGH equivalent of Napoleonic artillery, aside from cases like the Asgrimm battleship. DBMM also had the concept of impetuous troops, which were basically hot-headed troops that commanders had to spend command resources to restrain from doing things like charging after a feigned retreat. That might well represent Bittenfeld's fleet or that of the Lippstadt nobles.
I like that concept. I've tried to incorporate it in my command and order rules that I've described in a previous post. I'll keep your suggestion in mind, i have a couple of playtest sessions scheduled and if the current system does not work out well I'll look into the DBMM rules.
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