Crew Strength

[TWR]

After a recent game we found ourselves discussing crew strength. I thought British ships were frequently under crewed. Is this modelled in the game in some way, or was it left out for some reason?

[fredmiracle]

In general the game stats reflect the ideal case. Therefore the base assumption is that all ships have their standard complements and well trained sailors.

In practice this means that the only real difference between nations is that the British tend to have slightly lower musket values than French and Spanish ships. This is because the official complement of a British ship would tend to be smaller and include less soldiers--in other words, it reflects a doctrinal difference, not an artifact of practical personnel shortages.

Why did the game designers do it this way? It seems their philosophy is that it's better not to bake specific scenario conditions into the core stats. Rather they leave it to players to reflect any real-world deviations from the ideal in a given situation by using optional or house rules.

In practice, for example, beginning some time in the 1790s, any French fleet should probably be using the poorly trained gunners rule. You get much more realistic results that way.

If you want to simulate a reduced crew for British ships, you would need a house rule. You might, for instance, simply X off a crew box (or two) before the battle starts.

EDIT: another data point, in one of their scenarios, Ares simulates a "sick crew" as follows: "put two crew damages in the last two boxes of the crew damage track (the ones at the right)"

[TWR]

Thank you for your reply. That helps set the scene.

[Comte de Brueys]

For an example the complete French fleet of the Egypt expedition 1798 had a general crew deficit of 15%.

[Berthier]

Franco/Spanish crews were often well short of numbers and were supplemented with infantry from their respective armies, not an especially effective methodology. One poor French officer was present at both Trafalgar and Waterloo and survived both. GIven the problems that Britain had manning their ships requiring impressment even directly from merchantmen (a contributory cause to the war of 1812), it is probably true that all fleets were undermanned most of the time.

[Jason]

I believe that the gereral rules are pretty balanced and offer a tournament style confrontation where both parties fight on pretty much equal terms. I've noticed this from the first games That I've played, and it used to bother me a wee bit. However, I usually play with people not that much into history of naval warfare, and it doesnt make sense to casual player, why one side should be untrained, have crew deficits, or smaller number of vessels. Going from that, it's not too hard to agree on house rules when setting up a scenario with enthusiasts of fighting sail - pre-empty some damage boxes, give the French the untrained optional rule, or set up unequal forces on the table and let the captains try to handle the odds

[7eat51]

I usually play with people not that much into history of naval warfare, and it doesnt make sense to casual player, why one side should be untrained, have crew deficits, or smaller number of vessels.

I ran a WoG game last night at our FLGS. This was the first time most of the folks played WoG and the first time everyone played WWII. I equalized the stats for just this reason. Now that everyone has played a game or two, next time we meet, we will use stats as listed, but for the purpose of learning, having perfectly balanced sides worked well; both planes used the same maneuver deck as well, which was rather handy.