ACW Naval set to...

I am long overdue for publishing this - mea culpa - too damn busy elsewhere... 😀

So, a couple of weeks ago my partner in crime DG contacted me to let me know that he was coming down to do some much-needed Grandad'ly babysitting duties (school summer holidays have a lot to answer..  but this was a good outcome!) and did I want a game..  silly question..

So it was the usual emails were exchanged "what do you fancy"... "I don't mind" etc etc and so I asked him if he fancied having a go with the ACW rules that Bill Gilchrist sent me.. "yes" quoth he, and so it was that the Monitor and the Virginia set sail once again..

We played twice, the aim of the game was for the Monitor to exit the table at the map end of the following..  the idea was that this was the archipelago at the end of a river hence the number of small mud banks/islands...

We played twice, and two more different games it is difficult to envisage...

First game - following - and DG can be seen wielding his brand new 12" ruler from Portchester Castle  😀  

Apropos of almost everything you can also see his "devil dice"...  DG took the Monitor in both games..

Seven or eight move later -following - and the Virginia is done for..  streaming smoke, engine damaged, rudder damaged, and more holes than a pepper pot

...and for the record - following - the record sheet for must have been one of the most comprehensive defeats she'd ever experienced.. morale shot (yellow dice - break off ordered), heavy damage, just two points left...

So what went wrong? Ultimately it was her lack of manoeuvrability, and being unable to get my main guns to bear, while Monitor with two guns in a rotating turret was hitting every time practically..  most realistic I would say..  I spent the game trying to turn to face while not hitting an island!

So with a fairly early finish we decided to play again and the re-run was about as different as it is humanly possible to be..  no pictures unfortunately, but in this game I changed tactics and shifted to slow engine speeds, having out-waited Monitor as she came from behind one of the islands, I then pounded her with my forward main gun, caught her up, rammed her (inflicting maximum damage with only one or two to me), fired again, and when she managed to break free, fired and rammed her again..  game over!

The rules continue to give a good game - no issues I can remember but measuring the turn from the stern gave us pause, but we got there in the end, and I think what I need to do is draw up some templates on foil plastic to make it easier..

I'm quite excited about picking up some more ships from Peter Pig - not loads - three or four should do it..