Other Naval Games

[Ruckdog]

Obviously, most of the discussion here on the boards is focused on naval miniatures games, like DW. However, there a lot of other types of games out there, like video games or board games, that incorporate naval elements. For example, Leviathans is a board game based on naval combat, as is Battleship Galaxies. For video games, there is Sins of a Solar Empire; while it game isn't entirely about space naval combat, that element is the core of the game.

How about all of you? Do you have any other games out side of mini games that have a strong naval element?

[MadDrB]

I was very excited when I saw a trailer for a new game coming out which featured sailing ships along the line of 18th century brigs firing canon broadsides.  It was Assassin's Creed III, but after a bit more investigation it turned out the game mostly features climbing trees and jumping around on land with maybe one level focused on a bit of naval combat which looked more like a race car game when I watched a clip of the game in play.  And I almost bought Risen 2 because of the prospect of sailing a pirate ship, but it turns out the ship functions only as a home base rather than anything else.

On the subject of Pirates, the Sid Meier's game featured a simple but fun sailing conflict feature--your ship gained speed when sailing with the wind, lost speed sailing against it and even ended up "in chains" if you sailed too long straight into the wind.  Definitely a tactical, ship vs. ship game.

What I've been playing lately has been the Total War series, specifically the Napoleonic title and the Shogun title--the Shogun game features ironclads!  The game is in real time, and the tactics don't involve much more than putting ships "in line" and sending then in a parallel direction toward the enemy fleet and then watching ships take a beating until they surrender or burst into flames.  It's the closest video game I've found which comes closest to the feel of a historical age-of-sail conflict.  Even big naval battles are resolved within half an hour, so it's a good filler game to play in some spare time, and it satisfies a bit of my desire to play a tabletop naval game when I don't have an opponent or time to spend at the game store.

There was a alternate WWII naval game, I can't remember the name, which was something like a submarine simulator, the sort of game where you could spend thirty minutes just sneaking up toward a convoy to line up a torpedo salvo, fire torpedoes, and then spend the next thirty minutes trying to evade the destroyer which was dropping depth charges.  Again, a good single ship sort of game (you could actually "man" the deckside AA gun on a destroyer to shoot down enemy fighter planes), but not much for fleet action.  The setting was interesting because it wasn't exactly WWII.  I think there was actually a Prussian faction, and the Japanese were allied with the UK, something like that.

The most fun I had with a sort of fleet action, real time game was Homeworld.  I haven't tried Sins of a Solar Empire... yet.

[Camthalion]

I have a couple of sub simulators Silent Hunter 4 and 5.  For non simulation style I have Age of Sail laying around some where and East India Company.  While EIC focuses on the trading there is a bit of naval combat as you need to protect your own fleets and some missions involve the capture or destruction of other companies ships.

[Landlubber]

Aaron...there was an old original Nintendo game very similar to that, except it WAS set in WWII.  You could plot your course as a sub captain and travel around the Pacific, looking for Japanese ships to sink.  Scores were tracked by tonnage sunk, so there was incentive to go after bigger ships---but they usually had more protection.  But if I remember correctly, you could surface and man the gun to shoot at other surface ships or at aircraft.  You also had to keep track of the number of torpedoes you had left, because your ammo supply was limited, but I think you could go into port to fix damage and resupply.  I played that game for HOURS.

On a more modern note, I have the Crimson Steam Pirates game for the iPad, it's pretty fun...turn-based, top-down kind of game.

[Ruckdog]

Hee hee, anyone else play the old Battleship game for the SNES? it had an interesting mix of turn-based maneuvering and real-time combat. Even though it is pretty lame by today's standards, I remember thinking it was the greatest thing ever when I first played it. Speaking of the SNES, there is also the PTO series; I never played PTO I, but I must have put hundreds of hours into PTO II.

[Last Rites]

I would definitely suggest checking out Red November from Fantasy Flight Games. It's a semi co-op board game, where your on a literal race against time to save a sinking steampunk submarine. 

Each player takes on the roll of a Russian gnome (who is often drunk but I digress), who chooses a number of "minutes" to complete a task. At first it seems like the longer you take to complete a task the more likely you are to fix the problem. However, more and more problems break loose at the end of your turn depending on time spent. These range from fires or floods breaking out in various compartments. To overheating reactors and accidental nuclear missile launches. Oh or the kraken! 

Meanwhile with each event the heat, pressure, and air levels constantly force the players to decide what in a quickly deteriorating ship is vital to secure first. There are various cards your player can get to assist in repairs, but by far the best is vodka. Chugging straight from the bottle to gain the courage to make it past the raging fire in the next room. Only to then find yourself locked in with a reactor threatening to destroy the entire ship. KHAAAAANNNNN!!!! Again I digress... Eventually, once at least one player makes it to the end of the "minutes" track running along the outer edge of the board the gnomes are saved. Or you can totally forget your teammates, grabbing a rebreather (and some vodka) then making your way to an escape hatch.

This is a brilliant game that is constantly forcing you to think/move quickly. If this game was a movie I'm sure it would reek of Michael Bay. For $25 it's def well worth it.

[Landlubber]

Funny that you mention this game--I just saw it for the first time a few days ago at my FLGS.  I'd never heard of it before.  The guy behind the counter says it's a lot of fun.  I'm just now getting back into board gaming after years away from the hobby.  Think I'll have to give this one a try.

[Last Rites]

This board game is on my must get list.

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2015/11/3/star-wars-rebellion/

[captainrockman]

There are two sub warfare games that I play a fair bit. Steel Diver and Steel Diver Sub Wars are both made by Nintendo for the 3DS.

Steel Diver is a side scrolling shooter. On the top screen you have your sub, enemies, environments and the like. On the bottom touch screen you have a control console. You have to adjust your depth, thrust, angle, and sonar. You also need to monitor your oxygen levels, torpedo stock, and any leaks your sub may have. When you surface, bombers attack. You also have enemy subs and concussion charges from surface ships to deal with. There are periscope side missions that you have to use the gyroscope to physically turn around and shoot at surface ships.

Steel Diver Subwars is an online FPS. You control a sub and have a similar control console on the bottom screen. However, unlike most FPS games you are controlling a submarine! It moves really slowly, so you don't have the hyper maneuverability of a game like Halo or whatever CoD game is out this year. The other cool thing is that instead of voice chat you can only communicate in morse code. You use the R or L buttons to tap out morse code to your team mates. Most critics ended up calling this a contemplative FPS because it is quiet, slow moving, and your movements have to be more methodical.

Greg, do you still think Nintendo doesn't make any good games anymore?

[Quickdraw]

This board game is on my must get list.

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2015/11/3/star-wars-rebellion/

Well there's one to put on the shelf for sure. It looks like it has everything: suitably grand, seemingly simple rules, awesome looking components, and Star Wars.
This can go right next to Axis & Allies and Twilight Imperium.

[Landlubber]

Greg, do you still think Nintendo doesn't make any good games anymore?

HA! Well, to be fair, I'm also no big fan of the Playstation consoles. But that's just me. I mean...if you can't play Gears of War or Halo on your console, what's the point in having it??

Agreed on this new Fantasy Flight game...could be very cool. Only issue I have is that this is likely going to be an expensive game (given the apparent quality of the components), and that's money I could be using for miniatures or scenery. Although some of the components shown could be used in other games.

The other thing is that my boardgaming time is very limited, due to the miniatures games I play. I have two boardgames, Pandemic and Firefly, and I don't play either of them as often as I should or would like to. That being said...Quickdraw...if you pick this up, I'll give it a go with you. And I was talking to Captain Rockman last night, we need to get together for a Firefly session soon. Been feeling the itch.

[Quickdraw]

Agreed on this new Fantasy Flight game...could be very cool. Only issue I have is that this is likely going to be an expensive game (given the apparent quality of the components), and that's money I could be using for miniatures or scenery. Although some of the components shown could be used in other games.

The stated price is $100. Which is comparable to other Fantasy Flight Games of this caliber. And slightly cheaper then some others.
As far as time goes...games at this size are hard to play often even without other hobbies.
I usually have a couple games of Axis & Allies with old friends every year. And I play one game of Twilight Imperium every year.
Arguably Twilight Imperium is the hardest game to put on the table. It takes roughly 10-12 hours and is really poor with less then 4 players. A game like this will be much better because it is FAR easier to wrangle one friend into a long board game. Scheduling 6 people to sit down for an entire day/weekend is nigh impossible.

[captainrockman]

Yeah. Caitlin and I are down for board games. This new one looks alright, but it probably won't have the same appeal as Firefly does for my wife.

[Last Rites]

True spending this much on a board game does take away from time on other miniature games. Thankfully at the moment i am only involved in DW when it come to tabletops, so when it comes to hoarding board games i'm a bit more free. We also tend to host folks at our house about once a week or two. Normally, I make a big lunch/dinner for us then afterwards we play a board game. Depending on who is coming over these can range from Catan or Smash Up, to longer games like Risk or Waterdeep or the Game of Thrones board game. Since the majority of our friends are not table top gamers this is a nice way to include them. When we first started doing this a few years back i was amazed by how many folks were eager to come over and try out a new game, or went home and bought the game they had just learned.

Agreed only only getting to play certain games a couple of times a year (thankfully DW isn't one of them). Terrra Mystica is one i would like to play more, but has a larger learning curve for the casual board gamer. Twilight is one i would like to get, but feel it too would only get limited play. That said i am pretty fortunate to have a pair of couples who live in NY State and VA Beach who are pretty hardcore boardgamers and like to visit a few times a year. So having those games and memories from them balance out a bit.

Side note: Boss Monster is a fantastic game I recently picked up. Its not naval, but it is ridiculously fun and you can get 3 or more games done in a sitting.

[captainrockman]

I just picked up Boss Monster a few weeks ago. Need to sit down and play it some time.