They discuss the future of the game and mentioned us as a loyal active community!
https://techraptor.net/tabletop/inte...oper-interview
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They discuss the future of the game and mentioned us as a loyal active community!
https://techraptor.net/tabletop/inte...oper-interview
Great... I expect a lot of freelancing on the Pirates line since historical blueprints will be hard to come by and very few make the 28m minimum length for SGN 1/1000-scale sculpts.
I guess I might as well suspend my Jumpshot efforts again... but good that there is at least some work toward the future.
A good article, generally speaking. Regarding this quotation," nothing has purposely been made obsolete with time to force people to buy more stuff, so these games are not a money trap." , it is true that nothing has been made obsolete, which is good, but the money trap comes from the scarcity of items due to Ares neglect in reprinting them.
Unless they're the same scale, I think I'm gonna be sitting "SoG: Pirates" out aside from the historical ships. And since they have the tooling fired up to re-run the Starter, I'm trying to con Ares into another Wave 1 print with some new ships... :)
We can but try DB and I ap plaud your efforts on our behalf. At least we are acknowledged to exist by Ares and who knows but that it may bring in a few new seekers. There is no such thing as bad publicity, and this is better than that!
Rob.
Think I also will be sitting out on the Pirates except any special ships that come along.
Was an interesting article but for sails Napoleonic, seems a death knell to me, nothing at all mentioned about new additions ship wise.
Well, there was the Captain's and crew's ability card coming soon...
I don't have a lot of interest in a Pirates line either -- unless we are talking about Barbary pirates. No mention of addressing the American market with ships of the War of 1812, Quasi War, or Barbary Pirate Wars. I recently noted that Warlord Games has a complete US Fleet line for this period in its Black Seas game...regrettably I may be spending my money there rather than with Ares in the future. :sad:
It's nothing official, but I've been privately working up an 1812 slate to propose, as you might have seen. :)
It's a shame Bill, but I can quite see your point. After all you Americans are the largest contingent on the Anchorage and are the least catered for by Ares. i can see a lot of you chaps over the pond following suit if they have not already done so. On the brighter side I quite look forward to seeing your larger ships sailing the seas here at the Anchorage Bill. The assembly details posts and such will also add an extra dimension to our other posts.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wentworth
Rob.
I think I am going to stay an Ares man. I like the scale and the ingenuity of the movement system. I worry that the larger scales would look sparce without rigging, and don't have the patience to rig a fleet. I honestly like SoG models more too.
As to the lack of American ships, I just create fictional ones as needed. If naval fiction authors can do it, why can't I?
I'm inclined to propose on the Longterm Roadmap that the next waves be set to firmly include at least one each Trafalgar and 1812 sculpts. If we get an American 38 that gives us Chesapeake-Leopard and Chesapeake-Shannon, USS Philadelphia incident, Constellation in the Quasi-War and Barbary Wars, and Congress for Barbary 1 and 2, Quasi-War and 1812. I've long proposed a Cruizer which is the natural opponent for a Peacock Group, but I'm not sure they should go in the same set, which if we stick to "one Trafalgar, one AWI or 1812, two other" gives half each of four future waves plus odds-and-ends remaining for a few more.
Frankly, I'd like to see 1812 and Barbary broken out similarly to Pirates as a parallel line, but retaining same scale and fully interchangeable--in a game called NAPOLEONIC Wars it seems that NAPOLEONIC ships and battles should be driving the bus and we've been taking a lot of sidelines into ships and battles that were gone before Napoleon even began his rise to power, which should have been sub-branded accordingly. (And more sub-brands potentially means more new Starter boxes!)
Well, first and foremost I am an Anchorage man -- and the possibility of some of the ships DB mentions are heartening -- if they happen. If Ares gives priority to their new pirate line, I am not sure when we might see ships of the periods I have indicated above -- hopefully sometime before I slip beneath the waves-- however I would enthusiastically purchase multiple copies of 1812, Barbary Wars, Quasi-War models (to allow for sister ships) when and if they become available.
The pirate range is likely to be to a different scale for just that reasonQuote:
Originally Posted by Diamondback
Rob already confirmed to me that there will be a scale change, but not a very big one--his vision is to have the pirate line be at least somewhat visually compatible as stand-ins in SGN.Quote:
Originally Posted by David Manley
Quote:
Re Pirates, yes, the intention is to do a scale change, so the ships are more interesting visually, but still "visually compatible" with SOG Napoleonic for players who do not mind a little anachronism in their games
I guess if thinking on the Pirates has got that far we may just have to suck it and see. I can't see myself buying more than a token number of them though just to ring the changes a bit. Wheras if the US ships came along I will be stocking them up bigtime to put all DB's hard work into the research to good use.
Rob.
That's more than I'll be buying, Rob. SoG: Fantasy Pirates is as "sit it out" to me as WoG: T&T. If they do historical ships, I might snipe only those, but no fantasy stuff.
Hrrm... "least catered for" Two ships is least catered for? There are several on this forum that I think would agree that the Americans are by two ships not the least catered for.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bligh
I was not suggesting that the other Navies are supplied with ships Jonas, but with all respect the Scandinavians, and much as I hate to say this, wishing I had Russians and Dutch fleets as well as your own and Danish, there are not a vast number of members in those countries to bring pressure onto Ares. The Americans are by far the largest and, thanks to DB, influential market as indicated by the membership here on the Anchorage. I am not saying I like the status quo but realistically I don't see Ares venturing into those areas of a niche market within a niche market. Maybe I should have said, “least catered for within the market we can reasonably hope to see Ares extend".
Rob.
I do agree with you Dobbs. I also fight shy of rigging my ships, mainly because of the rough usage they are exposed to at shows, but I need to explore what we are up against, otherwise I can't be informed enough to pontificate on the members questions. I need to be able to defend our corner if needed. Also I want to see how well ships of that size can be absorbed and integrated into the sails system if some members decide to take that road. I am already embarking on your fictional American ship route with as close a relationship to history as we can get with the help of DB, Wentworth and the rest of the crew. After all the scenarios are mainly fictional, so why not the captains and ships. However, I will not be deploying any 100 gun American liners in my games! That is a step too far for the period in which I am playing.:question: Or is it? :wink:
Rob.
The conversations I had with Ares suggested that they were looking at subjects from the "Golden age of Piracy" (think 2Black Sails" for a visual reference) rather than anything fantasy based. Which I think would be good news. First because "its pirates" and there is a natural attraction to the subject matter, and (b) because if the stat system is scaled correctly then the SOG system works very well for small ship actions, which is what you'd be looking at here. So a scale change needed not only in the models but also in the stat range. Personally I could see it doing very well (Oak and Iron is selling well, it would be a natural competitor with the added advantage of pre-painted models) and probably a well needed shot in the arm for SOG and hopefully a gateway to new releases for the Napoleonic / 1812 range. If its going to work though they need to think of it in a similar manner to WOG WW1 and WW2 - same basis system, but distinct to reflect the individual circumstancesQuote:
Originally Posted by Diamondback
Thanks for that extra insight Dave.
Rob.
I am surprised a bit by your assumption of American's ability to play any conflict they as a country wasn't involved in.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bligh
Does anyone know how much they have actually portrayed US ships and how much is just painting the general ships of that size in US colours? (Except for Constitution and sister)Quote:
Originally Posted by Wentworth
I will not make that trasision partly due to I'm thinking that the scale is too big. Either the game is misrepresenting distances very much or you need enormous tabels. That may fit a small action of a few ships not travelling any distances, but not many actions of the Napoleonic wars. ...And partly due to the sails. To me the sails look awful. I hate sails that's not double curved. They need to be bulging to look realistic to me. This means cast sails. I don't like etched sails and paper can never be bent to be spherical, only cylindrical in different directions in different parts.
I'm not very familiar with the combat system, but I'm under the impression that it is much more suited to handle small vessels fighting, which would make for a much better system for the war of 1812 and even for the Russo-Swedish war of 1788-1790. Sails of Glory is sadly already in trouble handling corvettes and even the smallest of corvettes is really out of it's range.
I think wer are misunderstanding each other here Jonas. I did not intend to suggest that The Americans were either able or unable to play anything they wanted to. Just that they were a lot of them and a lot of buying power. As far as I know they quite happily play French, Spanish Algerienes, British etc, but they should be able to field a reasonable navy of their own to prevent interest from flagging.Quote:
Originally Posted by TexaS
Rob.
Really, there is no place for an American "line of battle" in Sails, because even if you count the Superfrigates the closest to SOL's we could muster were:
BHR, more cruiser than SOL, sunk in action
1788 America, gifted to France upon completion to replace sunken Magnanime and armed with the French ship's salvaged guns
Constitution
United States
President
Guerriere, completed just in time to miss the War of 1812
Java, same
Independence, Washington and Franklin, nominal 74's but closer to spar-deck 90's and just missed the War
American frigate and sloop actions were a big deal and are important to stroke the American market, but still distinctly second-tier importance compared to the serious Napoleonic battles like Trafalgar and Nile, or even AWI Suffren v Hughes in the Indian Ocean.
[EDIT: Re Ares] The SGN116 sculpt is bang-on BHR, to the point of needing surgery if you really want to match her French sisters. Thorn and Atalanta were both captured Swan ship-sloops, no proxying on those sculpts. And I'm sick and tired of saying my Mea Culpa about Constitution's overlength so you're not getting another, the horse is dead there. [EDIT: Black Seas, unsure how correct their models are, I only have a finite hobby budget and WGF, WGS and SGN leave little room for much else.]
I've actually been trying to collect what info I can find about Danish, Swedish and Dutch ships trying to find French and British reflags to possibly get them into the game too. Copenhagen is a big deal if this game is storytelling about Nelson's career, after all...
EDIT to add: I've been trying to get Ares to be a little more strategic and "roadmap oriented" with a fixed wave structure of "one Trafalgar, one 1812 or AWI, two other" but I'm not sure about my success rate.
I think as with the other fleets the majority if the ships are generic with additional bow and stern galleries included to cover a few named shipsQuote:
Does anyone know how much they have actually portrayed US ships and how much is just painting the general ships of that size in US colours? (Except for Constitution and sister)
That's my feeling too. I think it's an OK way to go as several ships of the time were copies of the enemy or even taken so quite a few ships would be very alike. There are many classes though and as the scale gets bigger so does the differences. In that way SoG pretty much almost has the same number of Amarican ships as Black Seas really. You just have to reflag them yourself, and with Black Seas you have to build them, paint them and flag them. To me that sounds like the biggest difference is what it says on the box. We've alredy found that some repaints would be servicable as Americans. Ares could just do this with old ships and concentrate new sculpts on things that I think would be more needed as a true merchantman, British second rates, and Xebecs.Quote:
Originally Posted by David Manley
I agree Jonas.
As DB has admirably demonstrated with his ship stats and comparisons, there are a lot of ships still available in the Ares locker with only the minimal work required to convert them, a paint job here, and a change of ship logs there. The stumbling block as I see it is that if we want new sculpts, we need to be rational about what we really need. When we canvassed the members on the Drom for the next set of aircraft we got as many replys as there were members. that is why Keith appointed a member of some standing to act as the sole conduit to Rob on our behalf.
Could we do better here perchance and find some common ground within DB's and Ares stated perameters for a consensus on what would be the way to go? I have no axe to grind on this, because whilst my interest at the moment is the US and Barbary ships, I can see why other people preffer their own pet areas of interest, and as far as I am concerned any new ships are better than no ships at all.
Rob.
To be honest, I'm not sure about using existing sculpts for the USN, most of what I've done with them on the Stats Committee has been modeling their stats. SGN101 (not 103; the Concorde sculpt) might work for USS Insurgent (ex-FNS Insurgente), and many of the USN 28's were about the size of a 1773 Amazon 32. (Again, size only; not confident on shape.)
Call me overconservative, but I want to be spend-my-own-money-on-it sure before I make a recommendation. :)
Well... there is a gap in the size 24-28 gun frigates. Making a "HMS Surprise" might be good for both promotion and making frigates available for US.
I'd guess Amazon is a bit wide.
Amazon is a little oversize in both length and beam but to my eye looks VERY close to 1775 Enterprise, the last and most numerous of the 28's: six feet in length and two feet in beam, so close you wouldn't see the difference on the table without calipers or counting gunports. (Enterprise is one port shorter; the French system would call them "frigate of 24x9 vs frigate of 26x12.") My personal recommendation was to handle post-ships and "bastard frigates" with two new sculpts, one each flush-decker and quarterdeck (I had suggested Cyane and Levant as specific bases), and then re-paper SGN103 for an Enterprise. (Earlier 28's were small-batch classes and I need to study the drawings more.)Quote:
Originally Posted by TexaS
I shall go in quest of another Amazon then DB.
Rob.
We may need to cook the maneuver decks and sailing angles too. I have no idea how, though.
I have already taken steps in this direction:
https://sailsofglory.org/showthread.php?4767-Burdens
I think my post ships use the C deck with the Concorde sailing angles.
Dobbs, one other point worth noting is that an Amazon is MUCH smaller and shorter (about 5m and a couple hundred tons BM) than a Concorde. I suspect this is why Ares beefed up Concorde's Burthen--Enterprise and Amazon are closer than Amazon and Concorde; American "28s" were de-facto 12pdr 32's and our nominal 12pdr 32's were around Concorde size and in practice more like "pocket 40's."
Right gents. Methinks I will wait a bit for a consensus before making any alterations to my existing ships.
Rob.