"Ghost Fleet COMPLETE" Topic

HI Guys,

Bet that title got your attention! :) Well nothing that dramatic, but I've printed out some MTB silhouettes on Shrinky Dinks plastic sheet here, the kind you can run through an inkjet printer, and then put into the oven for a few minutes to thicken them up for handling (a way to custom-make durable game counters) -

We're going to use these this week, to track hidden movement in our Cruel Seas scenario(s), where a counter can reflect a flotilla contingent [or not], and which will be revealed in-game when LOS and spotting distance has be achieved – for a little "Fog of War" game play fun -

The sides opposite of the printed side have been spray painted black.

that is way cool!!!!

These are awesome! Any chance you'd be willing the share the files so we can print these ourselves?

No problem, I'd be happy to!

Now let's pay homage to the original artist here first – Peter Scott, as the image was assembled from one of his B&W drawings from in his book Narrow Seas (then doubled and overlaid).

The jpeg file linked below is for printing out on a standard letter-size plastic "shrink" sheet (8.5" X 11"), and as such, each image is enlarged 2X+ the intended final size, because that's a rough shrinkage rate for the Shrinky Dinks sheeting (after oven shrinking and thickening, each cut out image should measure around 4.5" in length).

The sheet here has been reduced in resolution so that it can be uploaded – it's 4 times smaller than the original, but hopefully should print out clear enough) –

Now the images are prepared for Shrinky Dinks inkjet printing sheet, and are over-sized to compensate for the oven-shrinking/thickening process. If someone is wanting to print these out as rectangular "placards", maybe as 2-sided "fold-over" type images, then the artwork will need to be reduced, and realigned for this. I can do that, and upload another image for this, if others want to go this printing route instead (they won't look as nice as being scissor-cut-out silhouettes – but let me know?).

What spotting distances are you using? Would you mind posting your house rules?

Hi Chasseur,

We'll use either 80cm or 120cm for our maximum visibility range in these upcoming "Fog of War" scenarios. The map will be "laced" with fog banks running diagonally across the board surface, with random breaks in them (for the "fog" we'll use lengths of poly-fill stuffing). The LOS tracking will be done from each flotilla counter along it's movement path, and using a laser tracker to "peer" through any gaps to reveal an enemy flotilla's contents when spotted.

I've marked the bottoms on each of the clear stands for these flotilla counters (A thru F), and since I've plastic laminated my ship cards, the players can note which flotilla counter they've deployed their ships into (again using A-F, and dry-erasable mark the deployed letter directly onto each ship's card). The players will do this distribution and marking pre-game, so some flotilla counters may contain no ships at all and act as dummies, or a player might even have his controlled ships distributed across a number of counters (we'll have three flotilla counters per side here initially). The scenarios will be hunter missions initially for 6 players, and we might have time to do an escorted convoy mission. So nothing too involved – we'll just use the poly-fill fog banks to provide the blocking "terrain", and use a laser tracker to do the physical LOS determination.

I'll post some pictures here (or as a pictorial AAR on the board) showing the board's setup, and maybe some shots of the action in progress – it ought to wild and "woolly". :)))

Here's a few photos from our recent game, using the Flotilla counters, and lots of pillow stuffing.

As GMs/naval observers, Fitz and myself enjoyed watching the game probably as much as the guys enjoyed playing it!

Your table looks phenomenal as usual. I almost don't want to post my stuff after looking at your ships.
Great job!

Joe

Well Joe, you know it's all just "fluff". :)))