Star Wars Fleet Battles with WW2 ships?

[Podlet]

I haven't visited the AH site in months, so please excuse me if this topic has been brought up before.
The War at Sea game looks, from a very cursory glance, like the Wizards of the Coast Star Wars Fleet Battles with WW2 ships. There are no real naval tactics (battle lines, escorting ships, etc.), but rather a sort of "chess at sea" with each piece having special powers and moving on a board made up of squares.
BEFORE ANYONE HAS A HEART ATTACK AT THIS BLASPHEMY, let me stress that I don't find this disappointing in the slightest. This is, after all, Axis & Allies, meant to be a quick and fun game with cool plastic pieces. I don't want another "Harpoon", with each missle and shell being tracked from discharge to explosion. What's been shown so far about this game looks very nice, and I'll buy it without any problems.
I just want to know if any other posters on this board have gotten the same initial impression I had.

[Lynx7725]

WaS and Starfleet battles are very different beasts, I think. Even without seeing all the rules, there are marked differences between the two.

[Autarch]

I'm sure the rules for SW ship battles are posted somewhere. Some motivated perosn could review them and compare them with what we know about WaS post their analysis here.

[Lynx7725]

Well, for one, SSB doesn't have LOS, doesn't have range, doesn't have aircraft capacity (all starfighters start in central pool), doesn't have land/ planet bases (all starfighters launch from existing ship's launch bays).

SSB is also D20 based, whereas WaS is D6 based.

More importantly, WaS doesn't have Turbolasers, Ion Cannons, Concussion Missiles, Proton Torpedoes, OR Jedi/ Sith.

[unc_samurai]

Oddly enough, my local Star Fleet Battles group has been saying for years. The 2D space simulators do a great job of simulating WWII ship combat.

[Lynx7725]

IMO, that's mostly because most Sci-Fiction authors prefer to draw analogies to current wet navies for their space navies. You see a lot of weird physics in sci-fi, simply because a lot of the authors don't really think through some of the more exotic things you can do in Zero-G.

[Yankee_Dynasty]

You can draw ceartin Comparisons in the rules, for example the gunnery types and turn phases and Damage but not much beyond that.

[XAos]

... There are no real naval tactics (battle lines, escorting ships, etc.),

I certainly expect to see "escourting ships";
a) One ship will be in "close escourt" to a carrier or anything else valuable.
This will; occur as a combination of the stacking rules & the AA-range of zero.
b) Most of the fleet will be in a grid near/around (i.e. within 2 cells of) a carrier. So that they can benefit from the CAP special ability (see Wildcat & Zeke cards)
That matches the typical formation for a Carrier battle group. Though the cause & effect reason is a little odd.

I also expect to see battle lines;
Specifically a line of ships all at the same distance from the enemy squadron. Tactically this will be a "Line Ahead" formation with all ships able to fire broadside on the enemy. In game terms it will occur because all the ships are the same speed & will move into firing range on the same turn. The stacking rule of 2 ships per cell may make this "look" a little odd, visually like a line-abreast.

[Joisey]

I know that AAMN and SWM treat fighters differently. SWM fighters move just as the capital ships do, while in AAMN the fighters "teleport" to their target.

The AAMN plane movement takes into account that the speed of planes in WWII was 100 times faster than that of ships.

[swarbs]

I certainly expect to see "escourting ships";
a) One ship will be in "close escourt" to a carrier or anything else valuable.
This will; occur as a combination of the stacking rules & the AA-range of zero.
b) Most of the fleet will be in a grid near/around (i.e. within 2 cells of) a carrier. So that they can benefit from the CAP special ability (see Wildcat & Zeke cards)
That matches the typical formation for a Carrier battle group. Though the cause & effect reason is a little odd.

I also expect to see battle lines;
Specifically a line of ships all at the same distance from the enemy squadron. Tactically this will be a "Line Ahead" formation with all ships able to fire broadside on the enemy. In game terms it will occur because all the ships are the same speed & will move into firing range on the same turn. The stacking rule of 2 ships per cell may make this "look" a little odd, visually like a line-abreast.


I'm not sure that the 'line ahead' will be nearly so important in the game. In the quick start rules it seemed as if a ships facing compared to the enemy didn't matter. This means it can shoot the same facing bow on or broadside on, this seems like it would make any formation just as effective as line ahead, unless that is, the more comprehensive rules give a penalty for not facing broadside on to the enemy.

[Aries]

The AAMN plane movement takes into account that the speed of planes in WWII was 100 times faster than that of ships.

20kts x 100 = 2000 kts hmmmm ;) F-15 max speed 1433 kts (1650 mph; 2655 km/h)

perhaps 10-15 times as fast

[Zhukov]

Well, for one, SSB doesn't have LOS, doesn't have range, doesn't have aircraft capacity (all starfighters start in central pool), doesn't have land/ planet bases (all starfighters launch from existing ship's launch bays).

SSB is also D20 based, whereas WaS is D6 based.

More importantly, WaS doesn't have Turbolasers, Ion Cannons, Concussion Missiles, Proton Torpedoes, OR Jedi/ Sith.

Its based on SW. Sci-fi. Just take away the sci-fi and things will be similar, its just different themes. D20, D6 based, I can see that not meaning much either. The tactics will still turn out to be the same, just different dice rolling. Ive played SWM too and the D20 has much much more ease then AAM. I get such a cluttered feeling from AAM with all those dice. I hope its a bit different.

I hope this game is realisitc and makes use of all sorts of sea tactics I dont know about and will learn about. Yet if the cluttered dice rolling brings better accuracy, it is a sacrifice Im willing to take!

EDIT: Looking at this later. I sounded mean with the duh. Something I didnt want.

[Joisey]

20kts x 100 = 2000 kts hmmmm ;) F-15 max speed 1433 kts (1650 mph; 2655 km/h)

perhaps 10-15 times as fast

Ahh, a turn of phrase, as it were, not literal.

[Joisey]

Its based on SW. Sci-fi. Just take away the sci-fi and things will be similar, its just different themes. D20, D6 based, I can see that not meaning much either. The tactics will still turn out to be the same, just different dice rolling. Ive played SWM too and the D20 has much much more ease then AAM. I get such a cluttered feeling from AAM with all those dice. I hope its a bit different.

I hope this game is realisitc and makes use of all sorts of sea tactics I dont know about and will learn about. Yet if the cluttered dice rolling brings better accuracy, it is a sacrifice Im willing to take!

EDIT: Looking at this later. I sounded mean with the duh. Something I didnt want.

Doubtful. From what we know, there is NO tactical movement to speak of. But you could easily make house rules to allow tactical movement if you want.

[Lynx7725]

Its based on SW. Sci-fi. Just take away the sci-fi and things will be similar, its just different themes.
Not really. Even without the WAS rules at the moment, there's quite a bit of known difference.

SSB has no range, so you can literally just sit at the edge of your side and pound away (and in fact, ImpStars are pretty much built to do just that). WaS requires you to close to an optimal range, so there is some movement.

SSB rewards movements with shots against weaker defenses, which WaS doesn't represent, but if you got a strong frontal defense ship with good armaments, you can literally just ignore tactics and just sit and pound and wait for probability to work.

SSB's damage track is so short that you can lose entire ships in a single turn's salvo -- consistently (which is an issue with D20-based games), and starting from turn 1. The probability of that happening in WaS is lower, and is highly unlikely to happen from turn 1 (as you need to close).

SSB has no terrain at all, by default, while WaS has terrrain effects. Even without tactical movement, you need to account for the terrain in operational movement.

SSB has a common fighter pool, whereas WaS has aircraft tied to specific platforms. Kill one carrier in SSB and nobody cares if there are more; kill the Shokaku and its aircrew is in some trouble. Preservation of individual carriers become more important.

SSB starfighters also move slowly; they are on-board movement. WaS fighters are effectively teleporters (as far as we can see at the moment). This changes aircraft tactics, as SSB can afford to throw starfighters ahead, secured in the knowledge that interception can be done far ahead of the carriers. WaS can't, and as such has to hold reserves back to act as CAP.

SSB also has no equivalency to the PT boats and submarines. There is no place to hide, nor is there any real equivalency to small expendable crafts that can seriously hurt a ship-of-line. WaS has that and operationally, that changes tactics.

The tactics will be very different. SSB, you get ships lined up in the back row and blowing each other up. Whether your unit is a massed carrier or not is irrelevant because there's no place to hide. You can throw your entire starfighter strength forward to engage the enemy fleet at close range.

WaS, you can't have that; you have to close with your battle lines, avoiding terrain, and keep your carriers out of sight. You have to keep fighters in CAP to avoid getting sunk, which reduces the protection that your strike aircraft would have.

Tactics would be markedly different. However, objectives would be similar -- the destruction of the enemy fleet.

[Lynx7725]

Doubtful. From what we know, there is NO tactical movement to speak of. But you could easily make house rules to allow tactical movement if you want.

Oh, such as in this thread (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showthread.php?t=16255&highlight=Long+Lance+Mark)? Specifically starting here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209122&postcount=57), continuing here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209132&postcount=58), here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209148&postcount=60), and here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209436&postcount=72) and finally ending unfinished here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209449&postcount=73).

Ha, Joisey, thought I'd forget, did you? :D

[Jaels]

SSB has a common fighter pool, whereas WaS has aircraft tied to specific platforms. Kill one carrier in SSB and nobody cares if there are more; kill the Shokaku and its aircrew is in some trouble. Preservation of individual carriers become more important.


A very good review of the difference between the systems, which I agree fully with.

As far as aircrafts and carriers interaction, there are still some dark areas in WaS that should only be clear when the rules are published. From what we've seen in the latest Salvo, it doesn't look like a plane is bound to a carrier per se; only that a carrier is able to reload an amount of planes equal to its capacity instantly (compared to the one-turn delay if landing on a land-based strip). Sinking carriers is still important, but apparently it won't strand a specific group of planes in the water.

JL

[Joisey]

Oh, such as in this thread (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showthread.php?t=16255&highlight=Long+Lance+Mark)? Specifically starting here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209122&postcount=57), continuing here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209132&postcount=58), here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209148&postcount=60), and here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209436&postcount=72) and finally ending unfinished here (http://boards.avalonhill.com/showpost.php?p=209449&postcount=73).

Ha, Joisey, thought I'd forget, did you? :D

I'm not forgetting either. That was a great ruleset you came up with.

I've been pondering lately a translation of the movement rules in SFB for WaS.

[Lynx7725]

It's only going to be two Mondays before the rules are released. I think I'll pick up after I see the WaS rules..