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Bow Chasers
May be used by a ship with a full broadside of 3+ whilst that ship has less than 2 hull boxes uncovered
Fires directly ahead only
Draws one damage chit only
Takes one action to reload OR counts as one broadside fired (not sure what is the easiest way to cover this without having to make more chits - any thoughts?)
Checked a few pictures and I'm not shure if our available ship types had such an armament (that isn't covered by the first firing angle). :question:
Maybe a big first rate had enough space and cannons on the foredeck to legitimate the draw of an damage token.
HMS Victory
http://sailsofglory.org/attachment.p...0&d=1352903091
The front port has a 2 part door not a port-lid for gun ports. As a lid would get in the way of the bow Beakhead. Also can have 2 guns on the forecastle. Do not forget stern chasers!
Be safe
Rory
Chase gun
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A chase gun, usually distinguished as bow chaser and stern chaser (or just chaser for short) was a cannon mounted in the bow (aiming forward) or stern (aiming backward) of a sailing ship. They were used to attempt to slow down a ship either pursuing or being pursued, typically by damaging the rigging and thereby causing the target to lose performance.
Bow chasers could be regular guns brought up from the gundeck and aimed through specially cut-out ports on either side of the bowsprit, or dedicated weapons made with an unusually long bore and a relatively light ball, and mounted in the bow. Stern chasers could also be improvised, or left permanently in the cabins at the stern, covered up and used as part of the furniture.
In the Age of Sail, shiphandling had been brought to a high art, and chases frequently lasted for hours or sometimes days, as each crew fine-tuned their sails to take advantage of small variations in the wind. A single lucky shot could cut through a critical line, or cause a sail to split if the wind was strong, so if the ships were within range, the best gunners on each would use their chasers to make carefully aimed and timed shots at the other.
During World War II, the Royal Navy fitted bow chasers, usually QF 2-pdr pom-poms, to many Hunt-class destroyers employed escorting east coast convoys, to provide a weapon capable of dealing with E-boat attacks.
Attachment 7525
Bow of Soleil-Royal. The two upper openings on the wall of the forecastle allow firing guns on either sides of the bow
What are the chances anyone would ever run a SoG game that would have this situation?Quote:
Originally Posted by Naharaht
It would not seem like a long range chase would be a common (or interesting) scenario.Quote:
Originally Posted by Andy Blozinski
Personally a long range chase would be very boring and can be avoided with the use of good victory conditions.Quote:
Originally Posted by RichardPF
Not common, sometimes interesting in the games we've played with other rules, especially small squadron actions. If you want to shortcut their use it is, IMHO, more a case of good initial conditions rather than victory conditions; the vessel that is the subject of the chase has been brought to heel, but why? Has the captain decided to turn and face his pursuer voluntarily, or as a result of a chaser hit causing damage that has slowed him down? Perhaps they are turning to face the enemy to buy time for other ships to escape? All very useful "hooks" in scenario design (which of course does lead in to the development of VCs as well)Quote:
Originally Posted by tmon
In a one-off game, probably fairly low. As part of a campaign? Well, in my experience (with other rules) often enough to make players want to have it addressed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Andy Blozinski
Such chases usually occurred because the pursued was severely outgunned. If caught the battle would not be much and in reality the captain would probably strike after running became futile.Quote:
Originally Posted by RichardPF
In many cases yes, but not all In our campaign games often the reverse was true; the "fleeing" ship was often a larger vessel that needed to get somewhere to undertake whatever mission it had been assigned, the pursuer often a smaller ship tasked with slowing it down sufficiently to allow other ships to engage. They did make for some interesting games. Where the situation was as you suggest we played out some where there was a criticality to the situation, or if the pursued ship had some reason to make a fight of it, otherwise the umpire usually called the result in the interest of maximising game time.
It does seem like it belongs more in the realm of the campaign mechanics than the tactical game.
I could imagine, for example, that based on how far apart the ships were when they sighted each other (probably determined by spotting dice and weather), their sizes, and their relative speeds, each ship might draw one or more damage counters to represent damage from bow/stern chasers. If the chasing ship takes equal or more sail damage than the chasee ship, then the latter gets away. If the chasee ship takes more sail damage, then a battle happens, and both ships start with the sail damage indicated...
I like this suggestion.Quote:
Originally Posted by fredmiracle
And it can represent longer chases by drawing more rounds, or shorter chases by drawing fewer. In other words, have a time limit to represent escape via time of day (escape under cover of night), weather, boredom, or mistake by the pursuing ship's crew.
A long chase will be hard to model in SoG - the success/failure depends on small variations that are not modelled well.
Differences between ships even of the same class (SoG has only 4 manoeuvre decks)
Local wind direction and speed
Small differences in officer and crew quality - how much speed they can "squeeze" out of the wind, and how close into the wind they can sail.
You can see this in small boat racing when all are the same class, but still there is wide spread of boats crossing the finish line.
I have done a lot of dingy racing and I can tell you how frustrating it is watching another boat get to the good wind first and sail away even with less than 500m separation. Still with a steady sea breeze you'll see more variation due to ship handling and individual boat or ship qualities. I would add that a clean coppered bottom can make quite a difference as well.Quote:
Originally Posted by Avi
Eric
Do you mean 2 hull boxes covered?Quote:
Originally Posted by David Manley
I can imagine a scenario in which a ship has x-amount of turns to cross the playing surface, and another ship or two try to intercept it, with victory points being assigned based on the number of turns it takes. In such a situation, if a bow chaser can slow the pursued ship down, it could affect the results of the game, even if a one-off.
Could you make it something simple like a chaser fires 1/3 (or 1/4) of the main broadside rounded down, with a maximum value of 2 (and a minimum of 0 obviously), and always draws "A" chits... Firing & Loading counts as a single combined crew action (which takes away any hassle trying to figure out how much of the crew relative to a single action just firing or reloading takes up compared o the existing actions).
Then there's no need to worry about hull boxes or such like...
Just my 2c.
Since these guns would only be used in a chase situation, perhaps there should be a time element? How about something like players involved in a chase draw their ship's broadside strength of damage on their opponent. That represents one hour of potshots. Repeat until chase ends and becomes combat or night falls and pursued can try repeatedly to jig away in the darkness. The ships don't have to be on a playing surface for this either. The players just have to decide what the situation looks like when it ceases to be a chase (how far apart the ships are, and who's got the weather gauge).
I suggest broadside strength, since one would assume that the pursuer would only chase if he felt he had a tactical advantage. What captain in his right mind would give up a duel where he had the superior weight of broadside shot for the flip of a coin (my two long nines versus yours), and a chase which only ends when one of the two ships receives a hit that significantly impairs its mobility?
Really Good Points Dobbs! :happy: