Pages

Sunday 28 April 2013

COW2005: Fletcher Pratt Naval War Game

Back in 2005 the FLETCHER PRATT NAVAL WAR GAME was well known within the wargaming community, but the rules (and attendant ship cards) were not widely available. (Thanks to John Curry and his 'History of Wargaming Project', they are now.)

John ran a session at COW2005 where the rules were used, and the following photographs were taken during that session. The scenario featured a clash between the Imperial Japanese Navy and the combined forces of the the United States and Royal Navies.


The Imperial Japanese Navy sets sail.

Three Kongo-class battleships ... or are they?

Two of the Kongo-class battleships and one of their escorts.

The current editor of The Nugget carefully measures the range from one of the British cruisers that is firing at a group of Japanese destroyers.
Once the range is measured, shell splashes (up-turned golf tees) are placed so that players can see how effective (or ineffective) their gunfire has been.

The red golf tee indicates a hit on one of the Japanese destroyers.

More hits ... and even the misses are dangerously close!

A pair of Japanese battleships: a Yamato-class and a Kongo-class. The former had been 'substituted' for one of the original Kongo-class battleships once the battle had begun. Its appearance was a bit of a shock for the Allies!

Another hit on a Japanese destroyer.

HMS Exeter suffers a number of hits ... but HMS Achilles seems to have avoided the attention of the Japanese gunners this time.

4 comments:

  1. Very interesting stuff. Thanks for posting. How long does it take to play a game of this size out of interest?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Would love to play a game of this. Sadly, I don't think it would work very well solo! Thanks for the report and the pictures.

    Best wishes,
    Aaron

    ReplyDelete
  3. Millsy,

    I am very pleased to read that you found this blog entry of interest.

    Battles fought using these rules vary in length depending upon the number of ships used and player/umpires available. If each side has two battleships, four cruisers, and eight destroyers, and has three or four players, then a couple of umpires can run a battle that will last two to three hours.

    All the best,

    Bob

    ReplyDelete
  4. Prufrock (Aaron),

    It is a great game system, but it does need more at least one player per side. I have yet to find a way of making it a solo game … but if I ever do you can be sure that I will write a blog entry about it!

    All the best,

    Bob

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for leaving a comment. Please note that any comments that are spam or contain phishing messages or that come from Google Accounts that are 'Unknown' will be deleted.