Black sails

[Leslie BT]

The old game of PoE had all the elements outlined by Martin below. The game includes a bit of Pirates at sea against a regloratory ship and trying to carry out raids before the locl malitia is raised to see them off.

So I think the new version will be more about changing the rules to an updated fromat in line with how we play the other updated games.

I think this may have been the first PP square based game.

[martin goddard]

Yes Les, you're correct (i think). The land raid was the first squares game.

When the rules are re-done the ships will be on squares too.  i suspect.

[Colonel Kilgore]

Excellent - so that's 2018 sorted, then?

[Leslie BT]

Yes, it was strange that the squares were used for the land game in 15mm and not for the sailing ships game that is 4mm scale. It must have been at about this time that the first version of HI was published using a hex based system.

[Colonel Kilgore]

Just watched the first episode of Black Sails - a rollicking good yarn.

Very interested to see the different "factions" - both between the pirate groups based out of Nassau and even within a given ship's crew, with even block votes - under a more junior faction leader - being used in the election of the Captain [unionised pirates...?!].

Of course, this may not all be strictly historical, but it potentially leads to some interesting pre-game / in-game / post-game dynamics where a captain's hand may be forced by the need to keep his crew from un-electing him (and the somewhat unfortunate personal consequences that this might entail...).

[Duncan]

Can we have some actual pirate/government/trader ship to ship fighting using 15mm figures and ships (even if only deck templates.) As this would be exciting and could take place in the same game as the land based, or not depending on what you want. Could still be grid based but may e not six inch ones for onboard. Then again u it's would be small as the ships were not massive were they?

[martin goddard]

Duncan
that sounds good. Someone here will probably furnish some ideas. It will probably not appear in the next POE rules because the templates are an extra tasks which players might not be wiling to make. Also POE will follow an historical direction rather than a Hollywood one.  Mike in the workshop is playing the sort of game you are thinking off. It is blood and plunder(?) very popular at the moment. I saw it at Historicon. a 3 x 3foot abble with 28mm scale ships on it. It looked superb and is pictured on many Historicon review sites. Certainly not historical though!(opinions may vary I am sure)

[Stewart 46A]

Black sails sounds good, I have put it on my Christmas list

[Duncan]

I have never played Martin's game, at least so far. Would be interested in doing so.
I also had the Ladybird book in mind, yes it conjured many exciting images.
For a ship game I had not considered much manoeuvring, more that it would start just as they were coming together. Did the pirate ships ever get boarded by navy ships crews and have to fight, I don't know much about it historically?
But I was also thinking of pirate ships being off shore or in harbour entrances using their guns to support a landing, or indeed naval ships if a pirate settlement. Did that happen?
At the very least they must have had ships off a harbour/shore to row in from and whilst I appreciate that both bombarding and rowing in could be accommodated by pre-game or simple off table diving in a similar way to assets in other games, I am sure it is visually more appealing and satisfying to actually have ship models to represent this? Just like using actual longships in Dark Ages games.

[Colonel Kilgore]

Combined operations sound interesting. But for this could we use smaller-scale ships on-table for aesthetics (i.e. in a similar way to which many use smaller-scale aircraft above more modern actions)?

I wonder too (as I chug through the Black Sails episodes) whether some kind of campaign-focused tabletop game might be feasible?

[Stewart 46A]

Finished season 3; I have come to realise that the pirates were misunderstood traders being victimised by the nasty imperialist British.

[Colonel Kilgore]

I think it was the dastardly upper-class British and their scheming navy that drove those poor innocents to piratical activities in the first place?

[martin goddard]

The next POE will be gridded I am sure!   however a square does have 8 directions though.

[Stewart 46A]

Martin, hex would be better for the ships to turn through the wind and have the wind on the 1/4 for best speed

[martin goddard]

Just some background  for those who have not played much POE.

Circa 1720
Pirate ships are small and often converted from merchant ships. Crews are large and ready to board. Merchant ships are also small but with small crews too. No real Q ships.
The government would often charge a lot to escort merchants, but accidentally give your route away if you did not want to pay for their "protection"  Oh dear?

Each player has some merchant ships and some other warships. Thus both players are taking the two roles of trader and pirate.  So player A tries to get his own merchant ships through but capture the merchant ships of player B. This is schizophrenic, but it has worked in the past.\\\

Atypical "action" would be a single merchant shop assailed by two small (sloop) warships. It either gets chased down and boarded or gets away. If a player's merchant ship groups get through with no engagements then he can gain a lot of victory points. Also a player might be able to avoid pirate ship groups by clever routes.
The skill in the game is about getting your warships onto the same table as the opponent merchant ships whilst keeping your own merchant ships out of the enemy routes.


There can be non"fundamental" randoms such as weather, mutiny, government, doldrums etc.

various templates for movement under different conditions etc. But the template must end you up in a square, facing one  of the 8 directions?
Probably set off the coast of Carolina as per the  previous POE. Thus we have islands, shallows. Pretty scenery option wold then be available. 1/450th is about 4mm height for figures. So buildings would be easy to fabricate.

POE runs (in its current  form) as a a mini campaign in order to create one sided actions (chaser/runner) which are plausible rather than two equal fleets beating about each other. This wold allow about 4 little actions to constitute the larger/whole game.