Napoleonic naval rules-who uses what?

[CA-68]

Hey folks. Ive been painting and rigging Napoleonic ships for a couple years, and would like to try my hand at gaming in the Age of Sail-does GHQ have any rules in the works for these? And what is everyone using in the meantime? I had thought about giving Signal Close Action a try, mostly because its the only rules set that i am aware of (other than a very simple one i downloaded)

HMS Bellerophn is itching for something to broadside.

Thanks!

[Boy_wundyr_x]

Fire As She Bears seems pretty good, and has a campaign game available based on the Victory By Any Means (VBAM) system. For my beer and pretzel needs, Ships of the Line by Fat Jonny Games is my game of choice. I've added to the ship list and am trying out some house rules to improve the feel of the game in certain areas. My ship list additions have been to expand the eras available, moving back into the Anglo-Dutch Wars and Armada eras. I also made some junk stats, up to Gavin Menzie's uber-treasure ships.

I tend to use the FASB scenarios with SotL rules, plus a fictional universe that throws everything together.

SotL is less than $10 for the pdf last time I checked, FASB is also available online for not much more.

Chris

[Thomaso827]

I'll second Fire As She Bears and the campaign module. The FASB Trafalgar scenario pack is also a good addition. The regular 2d edition rules use 8-sided move bases and the Trafalgar pack includes rules to convert to a hex grid. I've run FASB at a couple of regional HMGS conventions and ran the Trafalgar scenario a few years ago for the 200th anniversary of the battle. Nice scenario, but very slow for the Franco-Spanish fleet, since they are moving at one space every other turn until you get a wind change. I ran the game for over 6 hours and the wind never changed for us, but it was an interesting battle. There are 3 or 4 more scenarios in the packet. I've played this, and the old Ship of the Line rules that the game, Wooden Ships and Iron Men was based on. Bit more detail there but it needed hex grid, and a ship occupies 2 hexes, just like the board game. I prefer the freedom of the octogon move bases, which could be bought through their website or you could print out what you need on cardstock.

Tom

[Terrible Tim]

I am waiting for Warhammer Historical's Trafalgar, due Feb 2009.