"Ships decks without hulls" Topic

While talking to Tanuki TMP link today we drifted into the world of Pirates and naval combat in the age of sail.

While discussing ship to ship combat it struck me that a full ship (as to be found in twos in his garage) are very cumbersome to work with due to the masts and sails and do not add anything to the game other than the look.

Taking this a bit further I wondered that in my mind ship to ship combat (esp at 28mm) does not work without a large table and is better with smaller ships so why not do away with the hull and masts just leaving the deck and gunwales of the ship!

This could be made out of card (though resin would be better) and can represent multiple decks very simply as per a dungeon plan we linking stairs / hatches etc.

Moving the ships around would be simple and boarding actions would not be tied up with mass etc.

Does anyone make just the decks?
What do you think?

Andrew
blog.kings-sleep.me.uk
2mmwars.blogspot.com

Eureka's "pirate ship" is nothing but some plaques, with rails. You can than add impedimenta like masts and cannons. Basically, their ship is just a Hollywood stage on which to commit feats of derring-d0.

Yep, Eureka!

Also look at "The Maiden" from Worldworks Games, it is a cardstock ship that with a little creativity can be built to exactly what you are looking for.

I understand what your thought is but just do not feel the presentation of just a deckplan with miniatures looks very good for the weather decks. I can see this approach for the lower decks. but when topside I freel the hull is necessary to the presentation. Perhaps you dont need more than stubs for masts.

I have played a Space 1889 game (cant rememberwhich one) that used deck plans for the kites and etherfliers. It was not a very satisfying presentation. May as well have played a boardgame. Minatures is all about 3D presentations.

Al

As Allen57 states, miniatures are about 3D presentations, and guns, rigging, mast an other deck items add to the 3D presentation. Otherwise, why use miniatures if you have nothing but a deck plan – use counters.

I understand that the items that you are talking about get in the way, but they also were in the way in real life. The fighters had to fight around them, over them and on top of them.

But, then what do I know, I sell resin ships for a living.

People fighting around obstacles in real life also had the option of ducking under or stepping over various, and did not have additional height added from a pedestal they stood on that would often have been as wide as the combatants were tall LOL!

Perhaps another solution would be to use balsa (or basswood) strips lined up as planks.

You could take a single (relatively) large sheet and cut out the shape of the ship (from a top down view), then glue the thin trips to the outline and don't worry if the planks extend past the outline.

Once the glue is dry flip it over and carefully using the original sheet as a cutting guide slice off the excess bits of planking.

Then flip it back over so you the 'planks' are face up. Make a few cuts at right angles to the direction of the planks to simulate the reality that planks don't run the full length of a ship's deck.

Then cover the thing with standard wood finish. If you use the 'dip' method you've probably already got some around.

If you want to get fancy, you can take some brass tubing (probably 1cm in diameter for 28s) and attach a short length of it (maybe 1 cm) it to the deck where the masts would go. Find some wooden dowels that are that are just a hair less in diameter than the tubing and you can have removable sails. You could create several sets of masts and use short ones for most actions, and add tall masts with crossbeams for fights in the rigging (ala Errol Flynn).

If you're an absolute purist, tiny, tiny brass tacks are made for doll houses and you could use them to 'nail in' the planks to the backing (which should probably still be glued together).

IF you want to do the ships railing the quick and easy way would be to just use ladders (say 15mm scale ladders if you're doing 25mm scale ships) bent around the edges of the deck. If you want to get fancy there's a link below to a place that has individual deck pieces..

This place:

link

has innumerable items for adding details to the deck. Things like carronades, cannons, swivel guns, netting, etc.

Of course this is all theory, but it SHOULD work.

There's also a tool called the "Loom-a-Line" that makes rigging easy, which is probably more detail than you want, but if you're going to real rigging, it looks to be the way to go.

If you're not satisfied with the look of the wood, you can use the "woodgrain"plastic sheeting from Evergreen. Alternatively, I believe Micro-mark makes a tool that heats up the tip and is supposed to make 'wood grain' texture on balsa.

Finally, if you're wanting to attach a lot of items to the deck, such as cannons, etc, you can put a sheet of magnetic sheeting between the balsa planking and the outline, and then use rare earth magnets to hold the guns and other bits down. Then they won't move around, but they won't have to be glued down either.

@miniatureships / impala – the key for me is to cut the clutter for me – I'm not a small handed guy and masts etc would detract from the games as I will find it hard to work around them.

I still want a semi-3d look and some of these ideas will help.

I have no issues with a flat map and 3d figures having played with paper cut outs before today on basic flat maps.

Thanks for all the input
Andrew
blog.kings-sleep.me.uk
2mmwars.blogspot.com

I've seen some people simply leave the masts off of their models, and/or make them removable easily.

I'm planning to use my models with sails, and some rigging, but will probably fight out any boarding actions on a separate deck plan of the appropriate size, and use the others as backdrops to the action. Not sure if I will have all of the cannons, and obstructions present as on a real vessel, since the bases of the figs will still make moving the miniatures around and over that difficult, but there will be some representation of them, and any masts, for effect.

I've seen some decent two-dimensional wooden ones for sale, online, but they were fairly expensive.

These should be easy to make out of basswood, or other materials, from scratch, as long as you don't require the gunwales. Those can be added, if desired, but will get in the way of moving the figs as well, and will make the models more complex to create.

There is a lot of tiles available for ships, especially with 1" grids; I cannot vouch for them all, especially the E-adventures series ships, whose texturing isn't too good. I haven't seen enough of certain other craft to see if I'd buy them.
But there are the vessels made by Savage Mojo available on RPGnow: link
There are some editing issues with the wrecked ship, though nice art; and I don't agree with the kraken shadow being printed on the tiles so the players keep asking why they aren't meeting a kraken. But the texturing is good and the range contains a ship, a wrecked version of that ship, a giant ship, a VSF sub and even an undersea installation. The biggest ship is 90+ pages and is still gigantic even after you account for the overall plans, covers, tiles for mast tops rigging and ships boats and the awfully inefficient use of space on each page of parts.
Then again the Worldworks Maiden is built as a set of decks and each deck can come off so after detailing the top deck, and maybe the quarterdeck and forecastle, you can forget the rest and just print the deck pieces. Leviathan is like that only flat.

I think using a representation of a ship with just the deck and gunwhales is a pretty good idea. I built several scratchbuilt ships for 28mm, purchased a few, and built WWG's The Maiden (beautiful model). I like the visual appeal of the waterline models. The big problem for me with the waterline models is storage. They take up a lot of space, especially with masts. I'm thinking of trying another scratchbuilt with just the deck, gunnels, and some stubs for masts. Maybe with a forecastle and poop deck. Minimal deck clutter. If it works as is, its a win, another ship that's easy to store. If I decide I don't like the esthetic, I can always add masts, hull, etc.

Thanks for posting this idea. Especially with the recent release of the 15mm Blue Moon Pirates.

Luckyjoe