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ASL's base mechanics are buried in a lot of chrome, but there's a playable game in there. It's a good game to get into, there are a ton of grognards dying fir more opponents. For solitaire games, my collection includes: RAF from WEG. It's the campaign day by day, from the RAF perspective. You allocate squadrons throughout the day as German raids come in. Both sides suffer from pilot fatigue and damage taking units out of action. Carrier and Tokyo Express are both from Victory Games. Carrier has you managing a couple of USN carrier task forces in historical or random scenarios. Tokyo Express covers night surface actions in the Solomons. Both are excellent games with some real insight in their rules. I used to own Patton's Best. That did for the tank crew what Ambush did for the infantry squad. It was a little more gritty and less cinematic than Ambush. All fo them are good, but I think my favorites are Tokyo Express and RAF.
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Dec 7, 2013 23:11
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Quad posted:I picked up Afrika Korps at a Half-Price Books and sat down to learn it tonight. I was always intimidated by hex-and-counter wargames, they looked ridiculously complicated, with a bunch of numbers on squares and me thinking "Ok there's gonna be a shitload of tables and countercharts etc"; coming from RTS games on PC. Out of old AH games, I'd say find a used copy of Anzio. It's got a gorgeous map, relatively low counter density, and a wide range of strategies available for both sides. The rules are about a generation more complicated than AK, 1776, or Gettysburg. Anzio also uses step by step reduction of units rather than eliminating units outright, and the advanced CRT has a strong mix of step losses and retreat results. Out of the 1st generation, I'd suggest Battle of the Bulge (my very first AH wargame, bought for a quarter at a church rummage sale in 1980). A good map with lots of terrain to keep things interesting and lots of pressure on the Germans to achieve their breakthrough.
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May 15, 2014 20:00
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Wikipedia Brown posted:Haha, I have that one too, along with its zero-g cousin Attack Vector: Tactical. Never gonna happen! I also have a feeling I'll never convince anyone to play Star Fleet Battles Squadron Strike is a lot more playable than either AV:T or SFB. Movement and combat are both less fiddly than in AV:T, turns should take less than 20 minutes even with lots of shooting. There's also a campaign-oriented ship and weapon design spreadsheet; it's a lot of work but you can recreate just about any ship from any setting. I'm biased, I work for Ad Astra as the lead designer on Squadron Strike: Traveller. There will be a Fleet Book as well as a new boxed set for this. We're starting with the Imperium and the Zhodani, with a few Aslan warships for variety. Plans include two more supplements to round out the fleets of those three powers, plus the Solomani. We'll probably also do a book on RPG-scale ships, the main products include the big ships and we want to be able to let the 5000-ton and under ships shine on their own, not cower away from 200,000 ton dreadnoughts.
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Sep 23, 2014 18:34
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orphean posted:Neat. I haven't got into Squadron Strike yet but I've been playing Sits for a long time. How would you compare the two? Any further development done on the core mechanics from Sits 2nd edition or is Squadron Strike more of a Sits without the honorverse license type of thing? Squadron Strike is not SITS at all, there's a whole new game system there. SS movement is very, very similar to SITS 2e of course, but combat is very different. I'd say SS is Ken Burnside's love letter to SFB fans, it's a playable way to blow up spaceships. And you get to design your own universe if you want to.
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Sep 23, 2014 21:37
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orphean posted:Interesting, I'll have to pick up a copy and check it out. Ad Astra is describing it like this: "Builds on" is the movement, which is basically 2e SITS. At least for Mode 2 vector movement. Mode 1 is more like Star Trek or Full Thrust's Cinematic movement. Mode 0 is more flying saucer-y. Combat changed from SITS mainly to let you roll handfuls of dice for resolution rather than the fiddly procedures in SITS.
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Sep 24, 2014 04:25
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bunnielab posted:What are those trays called and where do I get some? Chit Racks  That name comes from an hour's worth of confusion back at Games of Berkeley. One of the non-gamer employees had sold some counter trays and didn't know what they were actually called. So she wrote down "chit racks" on the restock list. We didn't figure it out, we had to wait until she got back from lunch. I'm an old nerd and still think it's funny. As for starter war-games, I'm partial to GDW's First Battle series. They're simple, cover a lot of chrome, and play pretty quickly. I'm disappointed they didn't use this system as the basis for Striker 2, but I'm very happy it exists. For scale, they're basically platoon-sized. I'd recommend either Sand of War for WW2 and later in the Middle East and North Africa, or Blood and Thunder for WW2 Eastern Front. There are tons of scenarios in each, and enough counters to go nuts making your own. The maps are generic geomorphic (and perfect for playing Ogre/GEV on). They fit squarely in the Panzerblitz niche. Oh, and I'll sell you a partially punched Sands of War + expansion or an unpunched Stand or Die for a reasonable price
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Mar 7, 2015 18:04
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Chill la Chill posted:Thanks! Searching for this actually led me to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhKuO8LJEX0 Oh fun ! I'm just setting up RAF on my big table. I had not heard there was a new edition in 2009, they added 2-player and a solo German campaign. I'll have to add that to my wishlist. https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/40209/raf-battle-britain-1940
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Oct 21, 2017 18:03
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Vivian Darkbloom posted:Unrelated longshot: Anyone ever seen Guerra a Muerte, a magazine game from 2008 that takes a grand strategy view of the Latin American wars of independence? I'm ordering a copy out of curiosity. Against The Odds is known for good production values and at least decent rules. I sorely miss the subscription I can't afford anymore.
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Nov 1, 2017 17:27
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homullus posted:Is Divine Right any good? I've been aware of it for decades but now would appreciate it more, I think. I had my girlfriend take a picture of the game shelves at a local Half Price Books and they have it there for either $25 or $75 (pic is blurry). Oh yes. We played that a fair amount back in grade school. It's a much about heroes running around doing cool stuff as it is about armies. There's a tremendous amount of flavor in the setting and the characters. Just keep in mind it's an early 80s game and design has marched on. Go for it immediately at $25, at $75 it depends on how much of a hit to your disposable income that is. Whoever has the rights is leaving money on the table not Kickstarting a new edition.
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Nov 17, 2017 23:39
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Dadbod Apocalypse posted:I hope I didn't come off as denigrating the rule-set because it was for minis. Minis are cool. My comments were in light of our discussion of modeling the entire Vietnam conflict, politics, coups, factions and all. I haven't run across a minis rule set that tries to tackle all that with the possible exception of the kickstarter I posted earlier: Still no rules. I din't know why you go to KS without at least a draft you can wave in peoples faces while you yell about how cool this is. On the other side of the line from miniatures games lie RPGS, this one looks like a really solid take on the subject, and could use minis: Patrol
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Mar 13, 2018 03:50
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https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/5752/black-sea-black-death https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/14387/duel-kharkov https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/8283/blood-thunder Not sorry for the Long OP links, I'm old & cranky.
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Apr 4, 2018 04:46
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Dadbod Apocalypse posted:I'd start off with Axis & Allies. Ogre/GEV are fantastic introductions to the fundamentals of anything with a hex grid and an odds-ratio CRT. Used copies should be cheap, and there's a $50 Deluxe Ogre in-print.
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Apr 5, 2018 06:13
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Ilor posted:Holy blast from the past, Batman! I never played Prefect or Leviathan (the capital ship combat system), but we played the hell out of Renegade Legion: Interceptor and Renegade Legion: Centurion (grav tanks!), both of which were a ton of fun. The games were sort of designed as a spectrum where you could move from one game to another to play out various parts of a conflict. It shows its age in a number of ways, but it definitely had potential. The sad thing about Centurion was the absurdly low lethality. If you fire the biggest gun in the game at the smallest, weakest vehicle in the game, you have zero chance of one-shooting the poor thing. Combat with actual AFVs in it was a slog. Interceptor was cool as hell; although my buddy got dice hosed every single game: after we started keeping track, I won initiative 28 of 30 turns. Phi230 posted:It seems birds of prey and air war c21 are still the best options My publisher puts out Birds of Prey, so I am obliged to say it's cool and good. Which it is. It's also a gateway drug to Squadron Strike.
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Jun 25, 2018 22:13
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EdsTeioh posted:Are there any good computer or iOS implementations of solo games? Stuff like B-17 Queen of the Skies or Ambush or anything like that? Those all seem like good things to do at work but would also cut out all of the setup/breakdown time of that type of thing. There's Bomber Command. It's real time, but you get to manage a bomber and crew through a long series of missions. It can get incredibly frantic. You can go from tagging incoming fighters to 'oh god, there's fire everywhere, the person with the fire extinguisher is hit, someone get a med kit, oh crap, they're down too" to "that but more fire" veeeeeery quickly. And heavy flak can one shot you. I've played three campaigns, including one Ironman no-save scumming. I think that last one is a loss.
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Aug 17, 2018 06:19
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EdsTeioh posted:Huh, that sounds sort of like a weird mashup of Space Alert and FTL Faster Than Light, both of which I love. Not really what I was looking for, but definitely on my radar now. Thanks! Here's a suitably chaotic gameplay video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h50o4dgzdMc&t=1125s
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Aug 18, 2018 21:59
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Phi230 posted:Are there any wargames out there that do division or smaller scale combined ops? Black Sea/Black Death by peoples War-games does that. The Red Army flanks a strong defensive line anchored at Novorrosysk with a landing that turns into Anzio writ small for a while. At one point they landed SMG-armed paratroopers on the docks from torpedo boats. They also did a combat drop. Units are mostly battalion strength, a whole divisions runs about 20 counters. https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/5752/black-sea-black-death
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Aug 29, 2018 23:07
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Phi230 posted:Would an LP of a naval wargame where goons take the helm of ships in a double-blind game pique anyone's interest 
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Feb 9, 2019 02:59
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Erghh posted:FWIW, anyone into air games (potentially) has an expensive couple of months coming up. Wait really ? Ouch, $120 is a bit much. But this will be the definitive game on the topic for all time.
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Sep 9, 2019 04:35
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Ropes4u posted:Has anyone played Hollandspiel’s Supply Lines of the America Revolution series? No, but almost their entire catalogue is on my wish list, and they're having a holiday sale. They have games on some wonderfully odd topics, like Westphalia, a negotiations game for exactly six players. https://hollandspiele.com/ I think I'm in for Table Battles, NATO Air Commander, and An Infamous Trade.
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Nov 25, 2019 20:18
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The thing about ASL is, behind all of the phonebook-sized rulebooks, acres of maps, and thousands of counters, behind all that... Lies a really good game. It's worth the effort. The rules you'll use over and over again are in the 20 pages mentioned previously. Sheer repetition will quickly make you comfortable with working through the sequence of play. The rest of the rules are the edge cases and the special circumstances that only come up when you've decided to play your first scenario with paratroopers. Knowing those 20 pages opens up an amazing array of tactical possibilities. The return on your investment of learning effort is sky high. To quote some English dude, The play's the thing ! And ASL has it.
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Dec 12, 2019 06:38
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I need to get into VASSAL. Would original Squad Leader or AH's Anzio be a good starting point ?
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Apr 3, 2020 22:52
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Jobbo_Fett posted:Why Squad Leader vs Advanced Squad Leader? I don't have a copy of the ASL rules handy.
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Apr 6, 2020 23:20
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ASL Rules situation: Sorted, legally. And I threw MMP an order for starter kit #3. So, VASSAL for noobies this weekend ?
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Apr 7, 2020 00:45
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Phi230 posted:So an Operational Level WW2 pacific game just hit p500 and I am in heaven loving hell, that's an absolute classic. A masterpiece of game design, and more countersheets than you'll know what to do with. I'm in for a new edition.
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Apr 26, 2020 09:11
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Tias posted:Which one? The new edition of Pacific War from GMT.
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Apr 26, 2020 10:09
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Tekopo posted:It's a semi-monster operational level pacific war game, unfortunately. I wouldn't recommend it for a group that's just starting out. It has smaller scenarios though. What experience do your friends have? Do you have more than 2 players? It's a terrifically clever operational sim of the Pacific War. The scenarios start out as Engagements, where you play out the attack on Pearl Harbor, Savo Island, or a simple land campaign. Then you get into Battles, where you're playing Midway. or Eastern Solomons. Then it's Campaigns; Guadalcanal 8/42-1/43 or the Philippines 12/41-2/42. And then there are Strategic scenarios, here's everything in 12/41, go for it ! The larger the scenario gets, the more you need to be able to analyze your options based on the rules and your available resources. Sure, rolling out the attack on Pearl Harbor is fun, but playing a Battle scenario competently enough to be fun takes some work - your first few turns can take a long time, and games can turn on misunderstanding or forgetting a rule. But when the rules click, you've got whole navies at your fingertips. Think the Japanese should have pivoted to Guadalcanal completely instead of trying to keep the New Guinea front as the senior partner in the campaign ? Do it, you're in command. So I say go for it. By the time it prints and ships you'll have a group with the meta skills to learn and analyze wargames. And waiting for you will be a game that can not only simulate Coral Sea or Midway in 2 hours, but also provide the strategic context for why they were fought when and where they were.
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Apr 27, 2020 05:22
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Ilor posted:Oh, god, that sounds like it is totally my jam. Two maps Nine counter sheets Named capital ships down to CA/CVL A stack of charts and tables half an inch thick. 40 pages of scenarios from single-hex engagements to the whole war. It might not be everybody's jam, but there is a lot of jam.
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Apr 27, 2020 05:36
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Quarterdeck Games is having a SIP Sale, https://www.facebook.com/jack.w.greene.9/posts/10157447287318299 Jack's a pro-follow on Facebook if you're old, boring, and still on that lovely platform. TOGO: Dawn of the Dreadnought (Zip) SPECIAL - $36. or DURCHBRUCH: Caporetto 1917 (boxed) - SPECIAL $50. or CUSTOZA: Fields of Doom (boxed) SPECIAL - $50. MORAVIAN SUN: Austerlitz (boxed) $45. WISE BAYONETS – 1799 & Suvorov (boxed) $45. These two are designed by Enrico Acerbi using the same system and if bought as a pair, the SPECIAL is $75. GORIZIA 1916 (boxed) - $55. RACE TO TOKYO: The 1946 Planned Invasion (zip-lock) $39. LA GUERRA DI GRADISCA: 1615-1617 (boxed) - $60. OPERATION POINTBLANK: Strategic Bombing Campaign February-December 1944 (small box) designed by Yasushi Nakaguro $39. BRACCIO DA MONTONE – Condottiero battles Sant’Egidio (1416) & L’Aquila (1424) (boxed) $45. CARICAT!: Into Glory Ride two games (zip-lock) $24 OBBEDISCO! 1866 The Bezzecca Campaign – (zip-lock) $24 HITLER STRIKES NORTH Chinese/American version (boxed) – SPECIAL $25 – soon to be on VASSAL. HITLER STRIKES NORTH Chinese version Countersheets (2 with rounded edges) - $6 (for those who have the original game) – consider these as zip-locked. GLORY RECALLED: Hong Kong 1941 (boxed) - $70 (only 2 left). THE INVASION OF RUSSIA: 1812 (Zip) – $39. NAPOLEON’S NEMESIS: 1813 (Zip) – $39. RADETZKY’S MARCH: 1849 Campaign of Novara (boxed) - $70 (AWARD WINNING AND the LAST copy). RACE TO MANILA (Zip) – $11. A STEP TO VICTORY: The Bougainville Campaign 1943-45 (Zip) $11. BATTLE FOR RUSSIA (boxed and mounted board) $55 BATTLE FOR RUSSIA Ty Bomba’s 1941 6 turn game on Operation Barbarossa. (zip-locked) SPECIAL $30. mllaneza fucked around with this message at 15:49 on Apr 30, 2020 |
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Apr 30, 2020 15:42
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Got my order in from Quarterdeck. Here's what I primarily went in for: Red Sun/Blue Cross is a strategic Russo-Japanese War sim. Imported from China, it comes with a translation of the rules to English.    Good looking map ! It's mounted too.  Nice rulebook, pity the translation isn't as well laid out.
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May 7, 2020 01:50
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Tekopo posted:That looks awesome! The japanese wargaming community is quite active so it's cool to see more stuff coming out of there. Chinese :-) I also got Ty Bomba's Battle For Russia, a Command - China. It's a low-complexity, single map, one countersheet game on Barbarossa (Jun-December). It also has a set of translated rules. Looks like the Bougainville and Manilla games are likewise imported/translated. These last two are part of the Chinese publisher's "Pocket War" series, coming as folio games at about 5x8" size. I'll get photos, these pocket wargames are a great addition to the market. 36 counters, including the turn marker and VP chit for the Bougainville game.
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May 7, 2020 09:32
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Ok, maybe that wasn't a Chinese import. A Step to Victory is a Japanese design, definitely published in China. This entry covers the fighting on Bougainville, with Japanese ground forces trying to hold out against the Allied invasion. It's a very basic wargame - 6 pages of rules, one small map, 36 counters. Hard ZOCs, combat strength differential instead of ratio on the CRT, 60-90 minutes estimated playing time. Quarterdeck is selling this with English language rules for $11. I cut my gaming teeth on $2.95 SJG Microgames, and $4.95 ziplock games from Task Force, so I am fully in favor of this format making a comeback.  I don't know how to feel about counters that come pre-rounded.
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May 8, 2020 01:25
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Tekopo posted:Loving the 0-0 japanese tanks. They're dummies actually ! Removed after the Allied player makes their turn 1 invasion.
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May 9, 2020 06:31
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One more pocket game before I get to the big stuff. Race for Manilla covers the Japanese invasion of the Luzon, and the withdrawal to Corregidor. This game is related to A Step To Victory, but has a few more twists on the same 4 pages of rules; there's an infiltration move to get through enemy ZOCs, Manilla can be declared an Open City which adds an MP to allied units, no stacking, and each player secretly chooses an objective before the game which influences VP gain. Again, it's at least $11 worth of wargame. The map is a little larger this time,  And there are only 30 counters this time, should play out very fluidly given the low density. 
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May 12, 2020 01:13
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AARP LARPer posted:Those are pretty neat! I loved all the microgames too. Chitin was my personal fave. Ice War and Black Hole were faves. I'm glad to see someone keeping the format alive.
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May 12, 2020 07:03
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AARP LARPer posted:Those are pretty neat! I loved all the microgames too. Chitin was my personal fave. I played Race For Manilla solo today. I chose the strategy for each side randomly, then played to that. It wound up as a narrow IJA victory, 7-5 by points. Since each side has three (secret) choices for how they will gain VP, there's a lot of replay in a small package. Game time does work out to about an hour. The BoardgameGeek forums have an updated rules PDF, which I recommend. As originally translated, the ZOC rules are confusing in some important cases. There's also a VASSAL module, if someone wants to grab the PDF and game module, hit me up for a quick game.
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May 13, 2020 02:45
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SelenicMartian posted:GMT store is open again! I'd go for that !
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May 30, 2020 07:08
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SelenicMartian posted:Ahh, stackable counter trays. Chit rack.
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Jun 9, 2020 20:01
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Jack Greene of Quarterdeck Games is very vocally a good person on Facebook. He and Jack Radey agree on a lot of stuff, it's fun to watch, especially since his move to Vicksburg TN.
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Jun 14, 2020 06:13
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COOL CORN posted:It's the only way Ty Bomba can reach completion anymore He's back to Europe. His current thing is early-1980s Cold War in Europe; 2.5 miles/hex, WarPac regiments, NATO battalions.
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Jun 16, 2020 02:02
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Red Sun Blue Cross I did a quick summary with photos of this title earlier. It's a quick play strategic level overview of the naval side of the Russo-Japanese war of 1904/5. Since then I’ve had time to put counters on the map and roll some dice. This is a gambler’s game. Both sides, especially the Russians, are going to be praying to the dice gods to make their current gamble work out. There is a really slick interplay between Points of Control, naval operations, the Imperial Japanese Army, and the dice. Let’s look at the map real quick, then the sequence of play  Points of Control are basically victory points, tracked on the map in the top right. You can only be so dominant in this game, the PoC track maxes out. You can move the PoC track in your favor by holding sea zones, and the Russians can get some from disrupting troop convoys to the mainland. You score PoC for a zone if you have the only fleet there at the end of the turn, and ‘end of the turn’ is a very fluid concept in this game. The Phillipine Sea and Pacific Ocean zones are worth 2 PoC to the Russians, and none to the Japanese; freeing up a small cruiser force to go camp these zones is a good Russian strategy. The three zones I’ve outlined in green are the money zones. For either player, they’re worth 1 PoC for the first zone, 2 for the second, and three for the third for a total of 6 points. The two red circles, and the red-outlined track on land are the IJA’s presence in the game. The two circles represent troop convoys; the Russians gain 1 or 3 PoC for controlling those zones at the end of the turn. This also removes the troop markers (wooden cubes in this edition of the game). If they don’t, the Japanese player lands them on the highlighted track of boxes representing the land campaign. There’s a decision point after the third cube placed, advance on Mukden (the Russians automatically win if the IJA hasn’t made it that far by the end of turn 6) or go for Port Arthur. Claiming the Hill 203 box removes Port Arthur’s ability to repair damaged ships and is Very Bad for the Russians. Taking the port itself eliminates any ships left there, which is Even Worse. Sequence of Play This is basically Prep Sortie Naval Ops Return to port Scoring The Prep Phase includes repairing damaged ships in repair boxes, and the Japanese player deploying one or two IJA cubes. In the Sortie Phase the IJN, then the Russian navy can move their ships out of port. Japanese ships can reach the Yellow Sea - 2 full sea zones from Japan. They should also deploy cruisers to watch out for the Vladivostok squadron and cover the troop transports in the Tsushima Strait zone. Full strength ships can sortie a second zone. If the IJN has blockaded Port Arthur )PA is NOT blockaded on Turn 1), a Russian sortie can move a second zone. Other than the Port Arthur blockade nothing can stop an undamaged fleet from moving a second zone during a sortie. And now, Naval Operations This is a simple loop. Each player rolls a die, high roll gets to take an operation or pass. If the high roller passes, a pass by the other player ends naval operations for the turn. If the die rolls are tied, naval operations end immediately. The dice have reared their ugly heads. If the high roller conducts a naval operation, afterwards you return to the top of the loop and roll to see who conducts the next one. A naval operation is: Initiate a naval battle between opposing forces in one zone. Move ships out of a port into an adjacent zone. This makes holding ships back as a reserve a viable tactic. Move a fleet (all the ships in a zone) into an adjacent port (they can come back out on a later operation). Move a fleet to an adjacent zone. The last two require a die roll. Ships have a speed, usually 4 or 5, damaged or old ships might have a 3, and the IJN has one cruiser with a 6. Roll the fleet speed or less on a d6 and you complete the move. Fail, and your operation ends with nothing happening. Dice off for the next op. The Russians are numerically disadvantaged. The IJN can cover the troop transports (and incidentally blockade Port Arthur), the Russians have to try and juke the Japanese Navy out of position, or get the Port Arthur squadron in action against a weaker force in the Tsushima Strait. Having enough naval operations to spam cruisers into the Pacific, the Philippine Sea, and the East China Sea is a nice PoC bonus. The heart of the action is around the troop transports, which can destroy the Far East Squadron more efficiently than the IJN can. And naval ops can end after any action if the players roll a tie. So the Russian player is going to try and put ships in scoring position, ideally with control of zones with troop transports, and hope the Naval Ops phase ends before the IJN player can cover up. This is a gambler’s game. You’re going to be relying on, and pushing, your luck to keep small cruiser forces from being ganged up on. Conversely, the IJN is going to want to keep reserves in port in Japan. The Russian navy will be all over the place looking for PoC, and the IJN doesn’t want to be stuck in unwieldy fleets that have to move together. Naval Combat Naval combat is not designed to be a bloodbath. Each side shoots and assesses damage once, then the combat ends; combat can be resumed on a later Naval Operation. The fleet with the higher fleet speed (calculated as the speed of the slowest ship in the fleet) shoots first. This is likely to be the Japanese force early in the game. In case of ties the defender shoots first. The player with the Initiative token can spend it to shoot first. To resolve fire by one side you add up the combat values (CV) of every ship on that side in the battle. Battleships are 5s and 6s, armored cruisers go 4, and protected cruisers are 1s and 2s. Once the total has been calculated, the firing player decides how many d6 to roll, with a limit of 6 dice. Every die rolled is worth one hit to the target side if the total on the dice is equal to or less than the combat value of the force. If the total is over the combat value, then remove dice from high to low until the total on the dice is equal or under the CV of the firing force; to make matters worse, no critical hits will be scored. In addition to regular hits, critical hits are scored by pairs of dice, or 1 less than the number of matching dice for triples and so on. This is in addition to regular hits based on the number of dice rolled. To resolve damage the firing player applies critical hits, then the target absorbs damage as they see fit. Critical hits flip a healthy ship to its damaged side, or sink a damaged ship. You can’t apply crits to damaged ships if there are any undamaged ships left. Normal hits are absorbed by the defending player flipping healthy ships to damaged (1 hit) or sinking damaged ships (hits equal to their defense value (DV)). Since having healthy ships restricts the application of critical hits, sinking ships has a real value in preserving a fleet’s fighting strength. All hits must be absorbed, even if the target has to sink a ship with more DV than remaining hits to allocate. Return to Port Any ships in Repair boxes are flipped to their healthy side. Return to port. All IJN ships return to Japan. Russian ships return to the port specified by the sea zone they end the Operations phase in. Poor maintenance. Ships ending up in ports without repair boxes flip to their damaged side if healthy. tl;dr So that’s the heart of Red Sun Blue Cross. It’s a naval-themed dice game with a lot of prospects for swinginess based on dice, but it plays fast enough that you could switch sides and get two games in in two hours. You also will roll a lot of dice, so things should even out. It looks to be really fun, the components are high quality, the map is gorgeous and you get to make a lot of decisions and push your luck to win. Quarterdeck also has Togo if you want to fight the battles on a tactical map. I’m going to try and get a VASSAL module made when I get regular access to a good scanner again.
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Jun 19, 2020 23:49
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