Anyone want to help thrash out campaign rules??

Hi all,

I continue to think about campaigns. I liked the Med campaign that won the contest, as well as To Glory We Steer. But I also have some issues with them.

As a result, I've been working on a new approach, which is card-driven. In addition to the standard things one normally wants from campaigns (variability of scenarios, victory conditions and force preservation driven by strategic needs, etc.) there are a few other goals in this project. One goal is to include some of the Aubrey/Hornblower sizzle that doesn't make it into normal SGN battles (chases, raids, and such). Another thing is to have a design that is quick to set up, physically appealing, light on written recordkeeping, and can be maintained over an extended period of time without the cat demolishing it. A third thing is to encourage battles of manageable size for SGN.

Unlike the other campaigns designs referenced, in this proposal complex strategic movements are deemphasized, and the map is therefore very simple and abstract.

I've still had only minimal time to do any playtesting, so it's not really fair to ask for others to look at it. But on the other hand, it's also hard to work in a vacuum.

So, I am posting it here as a PDF file, to see if anyone is interested and willing to spend some time picking it apart:
Attachment 12473 (and here's the optional map: Attachment 12474)

I'm open to good ideas of all kinds, but the need right now isn't so much "coming up with neat cards," etc. At this stage I'm mostly interested in the core mechanics.

Some questions I have are:
- does the encounter mechanism work well, and get the kind of flavor desired while leading to appropriate battles, etc.?
- is the action deck makeup good? In particular, the little I've played the "fair wind" cards always seem in short supply. Maybe this is ok though...
- is the general layout of the map good? Is there enough scope for some (very) simple strategy or strategic decision making?
- do raids work? Can they be made better?

Anyway, I'll be interested in any feedback people might have...

Fred, did I ever send you my draft on special rules for the Indian Ocean campaign I'm putting together?

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Originally Posted by Diamondback

Fred, did I ever send you my draft on special rules for the Indian Ocean campaign I'm putting together?

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no I haven't seen that one, sounds cool! (just need Ares to sell us some of the ~50/60 gun ships, right?)

Good stuff, Fred! Downloading now.

I was thinking about campaigns and cards too, as a means of getting the right level of abstraction and thematic feel. Maybe I was just picking up some of your brain waves from across the ocean!

I'm really a dunce when it comes to naval strategy and history though, so expect most of my feedback to be from the game mechanics side than from the themes.

Very impressive amount of work, Fred. I've gone through the rules quickly, but will now go back and read them more slowly.

I see no reason why your card driven campaign approach wouldn't work and if it brings some O'Brian flavor into SoG all the better. Printing up the cards, etc., may take me a bit, but I do want to try this out.

:thumbsup:

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Originally Posted by Nightmoss

Printing up the cards, etc., may take me a bit, but I do want to try this out.

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Yeah, it's a one-time cost, but it is a pain.

I think there might be custom card deck printing options on the web, so I guess if this gained significant interest that might be an option.

For the present, I bought some inkjet-friendly cardstock from Amazon. My wife has a paper cutter. After a couple of pages I had it down to a science, and could do three sheets at a time. I think it took about 45 minutes all told. I was really happy with the results--they have a good sturdy feel, and even though there are a lot of cards they shuffled without much trouble.

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Originally Posted by Ozariig

Good stuff, Fred! Downloading now.

I was thinking about campaigns and cards too, as a means of getting the right level of abstraction and thematic feel. Maybe I was just picking up some of your brain waves from across the ocean!

I'm really a dunce when it comes to naval strategy and history though, so expect most of my feedback to be from the game mechanics side than from the themes.

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Great minds think alike! Game mechanics is exactly what I need input on right now...

This is a great idea for a forum topic.
I'm wrestling with mechanics, too, as I design my Lake Ontario summer of 1813 campaign.
I already have the high-level strategy layer in a set of existing rules, called Lord of the Lake. At that level, players assign every ship to a lake zone (1 of 6 zones) and a mission (intercept, patrol, land attack, convoy, in-port repair, or in-port refit).
And of course we have the tactical layer in SGN, or whatever miniatures system one wants to use, once opposing ships are in close maneuvering and combat range.
What I'm trying to add is that middle layer, a grand-tactical one that sets up the prebattle maneuvering at between 20 km and 2 km. In many ways, I find this the most interesting part of AoS warfare -- because so much of the way a battle plays out (or whether it happens at all) depends on what the ships do once they first spot the enemy and maneuver, before they're in combat.

Fred, check your inbox. Gina, since there was a limited pool of ships in the Great Lakes battles (similar to the IOC, but smaller ships LOL), if you'd like I'd be glad to send you a draft of what I have so far For Personal Eyes Only too. :)

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Originally Posted by Diamondback

Fred, check your inbox. Gina, since there was a limited pool of ships in the Great Lakes battles (similar to the IOC, but smaller ships LOL), if you'd like I'd be glad to send you a draft of what I have so far For Personal Eyes Only too. :)

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Yes, please, Diamondback.
I'll keep it under wraps and use it strictly for evaluation and inspiration.

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Originally Posted by Broadsword56

What I'm trying to add is that middle layer, a grand-tactical one that sets up the prebattle maneuvering at between 20 km and 2 km. In many ways, I find this the most interesting part of AoS warfare

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Yeah I've gone around on it a few times. For my purposes I think it needs to remain quick and simple, but with enough to meat to support some strategy and historical flavor

What I have right now is very much game and not simulation, but I think it poses players with some interesting choices and hopefully will facilitate, and not hinder, getting to "the point," which is to fight some SGN battles

Really great, I'm going to read these with a better eye this weekend. My gaming group has been trying to hash out some sort of land/ sea campaign, as we all have damn near 2000 napoleonic figures and would like some type of campiagn to run (We usually do alternate history type stuff, with proper tactics and abilities but between ficticous countries and on imginary maps)

Hi Fred, I've read the rules over a few times and collected some thoughts for you. I haven't tried playing it out yet, so keep that in mind. That will be my next step :happy:

Encounters
I like the feel. It makes me think of Stratego and Poker, with a bunch of card play-and-counter-play mixed in. I can see three main situations arising:

1. Scout vs. Unknown force. A larger fleet, even a merchant convoy with one or two strong ships escorting it, may try to use tricks to force the scout into a fight, to try and get a cheap win.
2. Warships vs. Merchant Convoy: The convoy will either do their damnedest to evade right from the get-go, or act aggressive in order to convince the attacker that they are dealing with something more dangerous. Bluffing here is a bit of a fool's game though, considering the opposing player expended a card to initiate the encounter and thus has already signalled an aggressive disposition...
3. Warships vs. Warships: The larger defending force may wish to lure the enemy's fleet into thinking that they are dealing with a Convoy by using frail Evade attempts. Otherwise its just getting into close range

The one piece of information that isn't revealed at any distance is the damage level on respective ships. But considering that ships can only be damaged by the one opposing player, I'll assume that players won't have too much trouble remembering fleet composition and ship damage levels.

Suggestions:

• After the first round, there is no uncertainty as to the speed of the enemy fleet - which, in the case of a Merchant Convoy, might be all that you want to know. To make things a bit more tense/uncertain and to incentivize getting to Identification range, maybe each player should do a secret die roll or draw a chit from the A bag each round and add their fleet's speed?
• If you find people playing encounters too cautiously or aggressively, consider a sort of ante system (i.e. betting victory points or cards from your hand) in order to give people more incentive to bluff.

Card Deck
The card deck can be broken down into three main card types:

1. Merchant cards
2. Encounter cards
3. Map cards

As you noted, Fair Winds cards are very useful both in encounters and on the map, potentially leaving it in short supply. Some other cards have dual-purposes, but its possible that someone will end up with a hand that is heavy in one sort of cards or another, forcing them to end their turn early. Or, while playing through an encounter, each player needs to consider the value of cards that they play with respect to the rest of their turn as well. It seems like a legitimate strategy would be to attack with lots of fast ships just to have the other player burn through a bunch of their cards trying to evade.

Based on the draw/discard/pass mechanic, that seems intentional -- perhaps simulating commander initiative/logistics? Hand management seems key to accomplishing everything that you want in your turn. It makes me think of A Few Acres of Snow, except without the deck-building mechanic.

Suggestions:

• If it becomes too difficult for players to accomplish anything on their turns, you could experiment with different hand sizes and deck make-ups. Or you could consider splitting out the cards into two separate decks, and having players draw a bunch of Encounter cards for each encounter.

Map Layout, Raids, and Combats
My main concern here is to do with campaign length. I think you left it pretty open (probably the first person to X victory points, or the most victory points after Y campaign turns). Probably not whoever can sink or steal all of the other player's warships :wink:

Speaking of which, since there is no replacement of ships, sinking or capturing an opponent's ship is a huge tempo swing. I'd be tempted to ignore Merchant ship cards at the start and just go on the hunt. After I secured a ship advantage against the other player, I would be far more likely to be successful with merchants.

It seems to me that the four-section map could become crowded if you have too many ships and fleets. Any idea what the upward limit would be?

I'm not sure that there is much motivation to raid ports. Barring overwhelming force for the attacker, the defender seems to have a big advantage. Unless a port is poorly defended, it seems like it could take a long time to play out, and the motivation appears to only be causing damage to coastal batteries, plus whatever easy points are to be gained from sinking/capturing the inactive ships.

Suggestions

• Consider automatically replacing sunk/captured ships and commanders, and just leave the victory points as the incentive.
• If you find that merchant ships are being ignored, consider having merchants automatically appear instead of needing to be played from someone's hand. You could achieve this by putting the Merchant cards in their own deck, colour coded for each player. After each campaign turn, a Merchant card is drawn, causing merchants to appear at a designated sea zone on the edge of the campaign map, with a named port as destination. If you went for this approach, you might need a few more sea zones along the edge to prevent players from camping on the map edges with their Vice-Admiral.
• For people who are collection-challenged like myself, maybe raids and battles could be scaled based on proportional fleet size?

That's all I've got for now. I hope this helps!

P.S. If you feel like you're going to need a lot of playthroughs to determine optimal composition for the card deck, I might be able to help. I can set up a test harness using Python code; if we can figure out what stats to look for, I can simulate several million play-throughs and report on them, e.g. how often players can't do anything because their hands are full of stuff they can't use.

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Originally Posted by Ozariig

Hi Fred, I've read the rules over a few times and collected some thoughts for you. I haven't tried playing it out yet, so keep that in mind. That will be my next step :happy:

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This is tremendously helpful--thank you!!!

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Originally Posted by Ozariig

Encounters
...
Suggestions:

• After the first round, there is no uncertainty as to the speed of the enemy fleet - which, in the case of a Merchant Convoy, might be all that you want to know. To make things a bit more tense/uncertain and to incentivize getting to Identification range, maybe each player should do a secret die roll or draw a chit from the A bag each round and add their fleet's speed?
• If you find people playing encounters too cautiously or aggressively, consider a sort of ante system (i.e. betting victory points or cards from your hand) in order to give people more incentive to bluff.

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Your analysis of the cases is good. Part of the reason this is tricky to get right is because there are several different situations in which encounters might occur, and it needs to work and be fun for all of them.

Since so much of the historical flavor I'd like to include comes from the chases and fleet approaches, I want the encounter sequences to be robust, almost like little mini-games. This means they shouldn't be tedious, perfunctory, overly predictable, etc. So you're right, my intent is to have some element of poker-type bluffing and bidding. Your SOL might catch my sloop, but it will cost you a lot of precious cards (this also means that the conditions for concluding battles need to be right--if the SOL does pay the price to catch the sloop, we can't have the latter just slip off the board immediately; on the other hand it wouldn't be right to force fleets to always fight to the death--this is another thing that needs to be eyed carefully...)

I have had a random speed element in and out of the design a few times. I don't want it to overwhelm the other factors, but a bit of randomness would probably be good. Maybe there should be a random speed component that is fairly small, say 0-2.

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Originally Posted by Ozariig

Card Deck
The card deck can be broken down into three main card types:
...
Based on the draw/discard/pass mechanic, that seems intentional -- perhaps simulating commander initiative/logistics? Hand management seems key to accomplishing everything that you want in your turn. It makes me think of A Few Acres of Snow, except without the deck-building mechanic.

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yes, the intent is that the cards constrain what players can do, pose interesting dilemmas in terms of how and when to allocate cards, and interject some variability. It aspires to capture, in an abstract way, the vagaries of luck and personality that often dictated how naval campaigns developed.

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Originally Posted by Ozariig

• If it becomes too difficult for players to accomplish anything on their turns, you could experiment with different hand sizes and deck make-ups. Or you could consider splitting out the cards into two separate decks, and having players draw a bunch of Encounter cards for each encounter.

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yes I thought about two decks, but that started to sound more complicated than I liked. But maybe making the second deck encounter-specific would work. As you say, it may just be a matter of adding a few more cards to the hand.

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Originally Posted by Ozariig

Map Layout, Raids, and Combats
My main concern here is to do with campaign length. I think you left it pretty open (probably the first person to X victory points, or the most victory points after Y campaign turns). Probably not whoever can sink or steal all of the other player's warships :wink:

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yes, there should be some turn or VP limit. Probably the latter so there wouldn't need to be another thing to track... Or until the deck has been consumed X times?

more responses later...

Fred, thank you so much for making this excellent CDG for campaigns.
After looking over your rules and map, I think it's very nearly there. It looks easy and fun to play.
Lots of good suggestions by others, above -- but my only one would be this:

While I appreciate the CDG type of wargame, I feel very strongly that players should be in the role of the human commander, not God or Neptune. So the player should only be able to play cards that represent things somewhat under his or her control. For example, Fair Winds cards can represent putting up more sail or taking a better attitude to the wind. Sharp Lookout represents a skillful crew, and a Blockade is a command decision. Trapped Against a Lee Shore is OK with me because while it can just be bad luck, it can also represent superior maneuvering on the part of the enemy to trap the opponent there. And even Fog Bank is OK because it can represent the tactical choice to evade by darting into the fog. But IMHO there's no place in a historical wargame for "inflicting" a typhoon or becalmed winds on the opponent, or for inflicting things like the enemy's rotting cargo or his low supplies, which are not subject to your control. To me, that's akin to casting spells and D&D type stuff. Those are good and realistic events, but they should be in a separate category of Random Events and have a separate deck of their own, and which could affect either player depending on the circumstances.
To borrow from Daveshoe's Lord of The Lakes rules, how about inserting a Random Events check phase, just after both players have passed and before the turn ends. Roll a D10, and on a 1 or 2 a Random Event occurs. Some events could affect both sides, while others only affect one side (red player if the roll was 1 and blue player if the roll was 2). And there could be lots more types of those random events, too: For example, a fever outbreak that reduces crew strength/ability, storms, ship mishaps. Events outside the scope of the player/commander's purview could be random events too, like the Admiralty requisitioning one of a player's ships and transferring it out of the theatre, or an unexpected reinforcement arriving.

P.S. -- I'm going to make a Cyberboard module for the card campaign game. That will let people play it by e-mail, and eliminate the need to have printed components for those who prefer the PC to administer things. Once I have the gamebox made, I'd like to make two scenarios for it: One would be Fred's fictional campaign scenario, and the other would be a historical Lake Ontario 1813 scenario that would use the same system but have its own subset of rules, special cards, named ships, etc.

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Originally Posted by Broadsword56

Fred, thank you so much for making this excellent CDG for campaigns.
After looking over your rules and map, I think it's very nearly there. It looks easy and fun to play.

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thanks!! I'm eager to work some more on it, although time just hasn't been on my side. I haven't even had time to finish thinking about Ozeriig's thoughtful comments. The bit we played over Christmas seems promising, but also like significant testing and tweaking is needed to perfect it.

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Originally Posted by Broadsword56

I feel very strongly that players should be in the role of the human commander, not God or Neptune. So the player should only be able to play cards that represent things somewhat under his or her control.

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I can understand that perspective. Personally I don't mind it being somewhat 'gamey'--I kind of like the idea of sticking a typhoon on your opponent. I guess because it is the Aubrey/Hornblower genre that inspired it, and because those guys are undeniably pretty lucky as well as skillful (and in a sense their skill often appears as creating good luck for themselves--Hornblower would sense from the froth on the waves that a typhoon was over the horizon) it fits my sensibilities.

But I'm not hung up on it, and can see the possibility of having a separate random events deck. Exactly how that fits into the gameplay (i.e. how do the right cards get chosen to interject themselves into a chase sequence as opposed to disrupting a blockade) would definitely need some thought. Also I have so-far resisted multiple decks (like one for "fair winds" and one for "special events") just because I like the simplicity of one deck and one basic mechanism.

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Originally Posted by Broadsword56

P.S. -- I'm going to make a Cyberboard module for the card campaign game. That will let people play it by e-mail, and eliminate the need to have printed components for those who prefer the PC to administer things. Once I have the gamebox made, I'd like to make two scenarios for it: One would be Fred's fictional campaign scenario, and the other would be a historical Lake Ontario 1813 scenario that would use the same system but have its own subset of rules, special cards, named ships, etc.

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that would be amazing. what it really needs right now is playtesting, so if it could be done in our virtual community that would greatly expedite the progress we could make.

Fred,
Check your inbox. I sent you download links for the Cyberboard gamebox + scenario I made for the CDG.
Hope you enjoy it!

I've been making great strides lately in designing my solitaire card-assisted game, A Glorious Chance: Fighting Sail on the Great Lakes.

The game will be a Cyberboard module, so even though it's a boardgame, you play it on the PC

Initially there will be one campaign scenario: "Mr. Madison Swore (Summer 1813)" Human US player vs. AI British, six turns (2 per month).

It's got two levels, Strategic and Maneuver. These set up tactical scenarios that you resolve in SGN, or with the tactical minis or boardgame of your choice.

Strategic Level:
You assign your ships missions and lake zones. AI British assignments are controlled by a system of chit-pulls.
There's a Turn card that sets certain parameters for each turn, with possible events and changes in AI target priorities.
Draws from a 48-card Target deck and an Events deck can trigger enemy encounters. (These mechanics may seem familiar to fans of John Butterfield's game, RAF). Once your ships sight the enemy and establish the number of AI ships, you can order your force to withdraw and break contact -- or order it to approach, and risk an engagement to discover the actual identities of the AI ships. Once encounters between the initial forces are resolved, you and the AI may try to send additional ships to the area in an attempt to Intercept and join the fight.
Convoys and supply are represented, and control whether/when certain ships can be built or events can happen.
Events on land, and the need to support land operations, also shape the decisions and priorities in the naval campaign.

Maneuver Level:
This is where encounters play out, from the moment the enemy is in sight (19 km, under ideal conditions) until they are within 1-2km. An innovative system lets you set up the starting parameters of any encounter with a draw of three cards from a single 64-card Encounter Deck. Once all the essential parameters are established, the ship counters deploy on a 1km grid. The Maneuver Level, inspired by Jon Southard's mechanics for Tokyo Express, uses six interwoven movement pulses per 30-minute turn and a reactive movement/orders template for the AI ships (this will be an amalgam of the Tokyo Express Battle Map concept and the solo AI movement charts that folks have been making for SGN)

Once a Maneuver Level battle gets into a range that fits your tabletop, you can set it up in SGN (or the miniatures game) of your choice, and play it out from there. You can use any scale you prefer. And it can work as a scenario generator for tactical age of sail boardgames, like Serpents of the Seas. The results of completed battles get applied back to the campaign in an administrative phase.
I hope, of course, that having a good campaign game for the War of 1812 on the Great Lakes will stimulate interest in the period and those ships. And, not coincidentally, the principal ships will eventually be available as 1:1000 scale miniature kits on the Swash & Buckle site (there are two already).

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Originally Posted by Broadsword56

I've been making great strides lately in designing my solitaire card-assisted game, A Glorious Chance: Fighting Sail on the Great Lakes.

The game will be a Cyberboard module, so even though it's a boardgame, you play it on the PC

Initially there will be one campaign scenario: "Mr. Madison Swore (Summer 1813)" Human US player vs. AI British, six turns (2 per month).

It's got two levels, Strategic and Maneuver. These set up tactical scenarios that you resolve in SGN, or with the tactical minis or boardgame of your choice.

Strategic Level:
You assign your ships missions and lake zones. AI British assignments are controlled by a system of chit-pulls.
There's a Turn card that sets certain parameters for each turn, with possible events and changes in AI target priorities.
Draws from a 48-card Target deck and an Events deck can trigger enemy encounters. (These mechanics may seem familiar to fans of John Butterfield's game, RAF). Once your ships sight the enemy and establish the number of AI ships, you can order your force to withdraw and break contact -- or order it to approach, and risk an engagement to discover the actual identities of the AI ships. Once encounters between the initial forces are resolved, you and the AI may try to send additional ships to the area in an attempt to Intercept and join the fight.
Convoys and supply are represented, and control whether/when certain ships can be built or events can happen.
Events on land, and the need to support land operations, also shape the decisions and priorities in the naval campaign.

Maneuver Level:
This is where encounters play out, from the moment the enemy is in sight (19 km, under ideal conditions) until they are within 1-2km. An innovative system lets you set up the starting parameters of any encounter with a draw of three cards from a single 64-card Encounter Deck. Once all the essential parameters are established, the ship counters deploy on a 1km grid. The Maneuver Level, inspired by Jon Southard's mechanics for Tokyo Express, uses six interwoven movement pulses per 30-minute turn and a reactive movement/orders template for the AI ships (this will be an amalgam of the Tokyo Express Battle Map concept and the solo AI movement charts that folks have been making for SGN)

Once a Maneuver Level battle gets into a range that fits your tabletop, you can set it up in SGN (or the miniatures game) of your choice, and play it out from there. You can use any scale you prefer. And it can work as a scenario generator for tactical age of sail boardgames, like Serpents of the Seas. The results of completed battles get applied back to the campaign in an administrative phase.
I hope, of course, that having a good campaign game for the War of 1812 on the Great Lakes will stimulate interest in the period and those ships. And, not coincidentally, the principal ships will eventually be available as 1:1000 scale miniature kits on the Swash & Buckle site (there are two already).

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I really like the idea of a system that can be used to generate Sails of Glory tactical battles. "A Glorious Chance: Fighting Sail on the Great Lakes", certainly sounds like it will fit the bill. I still want to devote some effort to Fred's campaign rules as well, but I've just not had the time to sit down and do it. The fact that it's also freezing in the basement where I have the gaming stuff set up doesn't help. Based on the extended forecast it may not be until March before I can get back to gaming, etc.

Keep us informed of your progress and thanks for this update!

yes I just haven't had any spare brain cycles myself, but very much looking forward to digging into the cyberboard, hopefully sooner than later...

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Originally Posted by Diamondback

Fred, did I ever send you my draft on special rules for the Indian Ocean campaign I'm putting together?

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I would be seriously interested in this DB! I have been mulling over a Mauritius Campaign after reading O'Brien's book. I have downloaded a fair amount of background, maps and documents, and have obtained Vol 5 of the History of the RN. The things I have been pondering over have been the use of troops,landing them in boats, the forts, the routes of the EIC and other merchant ships/fleets en route to Britain, etc.. So far I think a campaign map would be in hex format, maybe based along the lines of 1805 Sea of Glory. The map would need to reach from the Cape up to somewhere near Bangladesh. Maybe even a second map for going further east!

I would be most grateful for any input members might have. Maybe others besides DB are working on this.

Recently came across this site which will help. Down the bottom there is a link for a kmz file that, when loaded, gives you a month by month overlay in Google Earth of prevailing winds around the planet. Damned impressive I must say! Check it out, but you must have Google Earth. http://www.pitufa.at/2010/12/prevailing-ocean-winds/

Cheers

Just been reading through your campaign concept Fred. Yes, I am way behind everyone as usual, better late than never I guess! Congratulations on a great effort mate, most impressive. The cards are excellent. Do you have 1805 Sea of Glory? I was thinking whilst reading through your rules that I like your system regarding the handling of fleets with Ship Cards rather that a pile of counters as in 1805. So much easier to conceal from one's opponent methinks.

Have you thought of using a real map and making the ports real places? Just something that just came to mind.

Do you think that this could be adapted for solo play?

Cheers

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Originally Posted by Iron Outlaw

Just been reading through your campaign concept Fred. Yes, I am way behind everyone as usual, better late than never I guess! Congratulations on a great effort mate, most impressive. The cards are excellent. Do you have 1805 Sea of Glory? I was thinking whilst reading through your rules that I like your system regarding the handling of fleets with Ship Cards rather that a pile of counters as in 1805. So much easier to conceal from one's opponent methinks.

Have you thought of using a real map and making the ports real places? Just something that just came to mind.

Do you think that this could be adapted for solo play?

Cheers

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Thinking ahead to the 2016 solo campaign I'm also wondering if Fred's campaign system could be used to generate some scenarios for next years battles?

Fred, I've been reading through your rules again, but before I run out and print up the cards is the version on file here the latest you've worked on?

Thanks in advance!