Clash of Giants Jutland

[alan]

Having purchased Si Vis Pacem, I am interested in the Jutland supplement.  However, as Jutland was a massive affair, I would need to know how many ships are required to game it.  I certainly could not do it on a 1:1 basis, using 1/3000 models (I already have a small collection from years ago).

Any help would be appreciated on how the rules cope with such a large action.

[cmnash]

Hi Alan,  While I can’t help directly, you could look at the Yarkshire Gamer blog posts on his Project Jutland:

http://yarkshiregamer.blogspot.com/search/label/1%2F2400%20WW1%20Naval

I think I’m right in saying that his project was the entire battle in 1/2400 … very inspiring, if beyond me!

This post has the first time the game was actually played:  http://yarkshiregamer.blogspot.com/2016/12/project-jutland-roll-bones.html

Huge numbers of ships on an 18′ x 7.5′ table … amazing to see

.

[alan]

Thanks for that link.  Inspiring indeed.

[DM]

Just checking the CoG fleet ORBATs, the Grand Fleet and BCF’s eight destroyer flotillas equate to 34 models / bases, the HSF’s seven flotillas equals 21 models / bases. It is quite a handful, and playing out the whole battle does need a good degree of investment in terms of models, space – and players. We fought through the day phase of Jutland in about 6 hours with SVP, and that was with a team of eight players and umpires. I guess you could do it with fewer but it would take longer and you’d lose the fog of war element that inevitably exists with multiple players 🙂

[alan]

Thank you.

[grizzlymc]

DM, of course, has the right of it.

 

As a general rule of thumb, I think that there is a reason for navies not giving the Admiral’s rank to the young.  It is better to learn to handle a ship, then a division, then a flotilla and to leave handling enormous forces until you are familiar with the above.  Whether Jutland, Trafalgar, Kursk, or Borodino, these are projects which will take a large number of commanders a weekend to fight if they are ably assisted by umpires and everyone knows the rules well.

 

Ad interim, may I suggest, Coronel, Falklands, The Goeben intercept and Dogger bank.  As you paint up your fleets you could try some smaller hypotheticals as you work up to Der Tag.

[Author]

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