Yessuh

The shop has four 4X4 tables out on the floor.  Most of the time they're loaded down with board games covering WW2 (Memoir 44 is a big item there, along with some Naval titles) to Zombie!  to Steve Jackson stuff to an assortment of Clickie accessories.  It gets cleared off of two tables when we play.  When he has his MechWarrior sessions, they clear off all four.

We typically have 4 folks playing IS when we get together, with a few shoppers stopping to watch.  The foldup counters get people interested enough to hear about it (it's amazing, but clickies are SOOOOOooo big here I think a lot of locals just don't want to take the time to paint).  But a coupla guys I know have looked at the minis online and have said they like what they see

It isn't happening that often right now.  Gaming here in the boonies seems kinda cyclical.  Hot and cold. :?

Coupla things.

AAR for the Russian vs Turk battle fought today is pending (most likely no one cares but yer getting it anyway  ).  I just have to polish up my notes because I wanna do it right.

Setup.... The Uyumayan and Sadik cruisers, along with the Cellat battleship and a handful of Kovala DDs (remember, those destroyers are just British Alphas with a new name) took on two Tsargrad cruisers and the Spiridoff.  The title we offered at the table was "Be Careful What You Wish...." as the ambitious Ottoman Ether Fleet -- whatever its official name -- was about to tackle one of the toughest ships represented in the IS rules so far.

Just to let Aresian know -- The other table saw your Goalkeepers replacing the Gammas normally used in TMW's Scenario 6# "That Dirty Little War."  I didn't get to watch everything, but some general observations.

The British player didn't field his Goalkeepers as a dedicated flotilla/squadron/whatever.  He ringed them about his capital ships to offer an "umbrella."  The Austrian player experimented a bit himself and substituted a few Harpunes with Seraphs (better suited, he thought, to try and cope with the DE's rockets).

Two Seraphs actually teamed up and got lucky by killing one Goalkeeper without loss to themselves (lucky damage rolls).  But the 2 Harpunes that tried to exploit this small victory were shot down by other nearby escort ships.  Which should show you that rockets, at least in this instance, did their job of preventing FACs from completing their runs. 

Austrian Huszars then shifted their priorities and started tagging the Goalkeepers.  The exchange between the opposing destroyers was somewhat inconclusive.  I know the Austrian player lost a few destroyers by the time the game ended, and the British player did as well.  But other than that one Goalkeeper lost to the Seraphs, I don't know exactly what happened.  I do know that the British player liked the Goalkeeper's anti-FAC capabilities (each DE is pretty much guaranteed to down at at least one -- maybe 2?  see below --- of those fast movers when left free to act). 

When the Goalkeepers got pinned in place by the Huszars, a few Harpunes got through and managed to ding up British warships with their torpedoes.  But from what I heard, the Goalkeeper was seen as filling a niche.  The Brit player wouldn't necessarily replace ALL of his standard Gammas with them, but he would use at least a few.

(LAST MINUTE EDIT -- Forgot to mention the Brit player fired a handful of Hales at each of those two Harpunes mentioned above.  Figured a 5+ to hit, five shots couldn't possibly miss.  May have been a bit of overkill, but it looks like he was right).

Turks are going up for a playtest session this weekend against the IS rulebook Russians (my figuring is a clash between the Russian Imperial Fleet and the Turks).  We'll see how they do.

I also have a couple of friends wanting to play a TMW scenario, and I think I'll bring the Goalkeeper stats along to replace the Gammas used in the default version

Matt

Technology limits -- most likely (I agree the Brits would not part with lightning projectors). 

But not really size.  In real life, those dreadnoughts the British were going to sell Turkey were very respectable combatants for their time.  That's why Churchill quashed the deal.  He needed them, and with all the question surrounding which way the Turks would go, he wasn't going to let them have that kinda firepower (if I remember my Massie correctly). 

Here is my offering of the Turkish Navy.  I gotta double check and make sure the Young Turks were actually in charge when I have them.  If not, background will need some very minor tweaking. 

I based the three heaviest ship classes off existing British and German ships, using the tweak limits listed earlier in this thread.  I chose fire arrows because I think that fits the region better (the Russian have them, the Chinese have them and I think they should be fielded by Asiatic powers). 

Beyond that, there's some good variation in the kit they're fielding, because I want to reflect the idea that they are ships purchased from different industrialized powers. 

The light cruisers are OK, but nothing special.  They're the only truly original design out of the bunch -- but they're not overwhelming.

The destroyers I think fit really well.  A handful of aging British boats that are stolen shamelessly from the IS rulebook and given a new name.

Lemme know your opinions on the ships and the attached fluff

Matt
PS Aresian -- email address is the same as my ID, just add @yahoo.com at the end.

In terms of fleshing out the minor powers, I'd think a solid approach -- since this thread will hopefully serve as  home for more variant ship designs -- would be to model many of their hulls off vessels already represented in the rules.

Real life precedent -- leading up to WWI, minor league players trying to establish wet navy fleets purchased many of their ships from more industrialized/wealthy states.  IE, Germany sloughed off some of its obsolete pre-dreadnought battleships to Greece, which also saw one wealthy patriot actually purchase a modern armored cruiser based off the Italian Pisa design.  At roughly the same time, Turkey was looking to buy British dreadnoughts and light cruisers and French destroyers. When war broke out, England reneged on the deal and kept the two dreadnoughts for itself -- something that really steamed Turkey off and made it all that more likely to join Germany and its allies.

With the KF cluster being exploited by at least two of the major powers mentioned above (Germany and the UK), I don't think it'd be a stretch to see minor league players use the same approach and start buying modified versions of the older ship classes already represented in the rules.

I had the design as a pdf.  I just didn't think it would compress enough to be a valid attachment.  I was wrong.  I doubt folks are going to re-download it just to have an adobe doc, but here it is again, just in case.

Here's an example of what I was thinking (zipped attachment).

Note armor goes down by 1, thrust goes up by 1, guns have been tweaked and the stabilizer chucked in favor of a single atherkatapult (one special item replaced).

Histories are optional, but I think they give a good idea of what you were thinking.

I have no idea of what the process would be, tho.  If we should have a poll, people post their responses or Inspector 12 stamps "approved" ......

Matt

FACs are a pain to defend against when you're just fielding capital ships.  That's why the Brits came out with the Q-ship.

In pickup games that included dogfights, the frigging Astro 101 "Sprite" gave my Austrian pilots a lot of headaches, as their Hale Rockets don't suffer range penalties and hit on a 5+.  On average, a Sprite could take out a couple of Harpunes at little risk to itself before the torpedo bombers even reached their targets.

But if you used the Goalkeeper like its name implies -- maybe hanging back close to the freighters while a forward screen of Brit fighters engages the Austrian torpedo platforms -- I bet you'd see some pretty good results.

Conceptually, FACs aren't supposed to be able to rearm during a scenario.