"Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Fleet Battles - Fire and Fury" Topic

Hello all,

I have put together a set of rules for playing fleet battles set in the Legend of the Galactic Heroes universe. They are based on Rich's Brigade Fire and Fury.

Why has a set of Civil War rules been adapted for space battles? Simply put, the battles in LotGH are EPIC. Fleets consist of thousands of vessels, from battleships to destroyers, and millions of soldiers. Because of technology it is no longer possible to use guided weaponry so commanders are made to adapt formations and fight the battles using Napoleonic tactics. Ships line up and fire volleys, hoping to score a hit, they charge, outflank, and form various breakthrough and fire formations. The battles are fought over long distances, with weapons firing out as far as 40 light seconds. The commander of the fleet, like Napoleon, watches the battle and makes decisions, hoping that his strategy takes the day.

It was apparent that the battles of LotGH would need to be land based. Fire and Fury presented a groundwork that was easily adapted for fleets that have adopted horse and musket tactics. As such, there was no great need for modification of the rules; the only big difference being that the infantry, cavalry and artillery stands were now replaced with ships. The way the game plays has some minor changes, but all-in-all the game plays like a typical Fire and Fury battle.

The system has been playtested twice so far and I am hoping to find others that would have to time to playtest it further. I realize that many will not have ships to play, but they can be substituted with other ships, even counters.

This is not a commercial project; its just a way for fans of the anime series to simulate the conflict shown in the show.

If anyone is interested in playtesting please contact me and I will send a copy of the rules. You will need a copy of the current Brigade Fire and Fury book to play. I ask that you at least try the game once and inform me how you think it went, along with any problems and your thoughts.

By the way, the conversion of the ships was based on material found in the "Fanky" fan made ship guides for the show and other sources. The weapons were then converted, using an algorithm that I designed, into fire points. Not all ships translated easily, especially Alliance vessels with their huge amount of forward weapons. In any case, they present a close approximation of their abilities.

Thank you and God bless.

I don't see why it wouldn't work. I adapted the F&F system for use in recreating ancient and Renaissance galley naval battles and they work fine :)

I'm in!

Hi David,

Your "Christian Fire and Turkish Fury" rules was of great encouragement to me.

Hello, want to try it

I need an address to send the information to. Either post it here or send me a message with it through TMP.

This is also being discussed over at Fire and Fury games forum under Brigade Fire and Fury.

mictator@gmail.com

Not in a position to playtest at the mo, I am INTENSELY interested in hearing the progress of the project.

I've been years watching the series from small bits of fan-dubbed VHS through 'all-your-base-is-belong-to-us' DVD's, and still love it.

PLEASE keep us in the loop!

Doug

Rules are now ready.

If you want a copy send me an email. You can contact me through BGG as killerkatanas.

Brian

Printed off counters. There is no way anyone could have enough ship models to represent a fleet from LoGH.

I'm guessing the fast battleships are used like cavalry then? The FPA has none, and Reinhard has a fleet the Schwartz Lancers made of nothing but fast battleships. Only question is how are fighters used in the game?
In the anime it seems a fleet has to be within a close range to make use of fighters, otherwise they could be picked off from a long distance barrage.

I have enough ships to do the fleets, some 300+ stands for each side. But you don't need this many to play. Our playtest sessions had four fleets, made up of 8 bases each, per side, and we had a fun game.

Yes, the fighters and missiles cannot be used until close range.

Fahrenheit also has a black fleet. He and Bittenfeld don't just have fast battleships, their fleets also have carriers, regular battleships, cruisers, destroyers and missile ships, just like the others, but they are all painted black.

There are some 1/12000 scale ships available over at Ebay.

"There is no way anyone could have enough ship models to represent a fleet from LoGH."

Going by the original anime, as I've not seen the translated novels, even the Battle of Astarte had the Imperial fleet at 20k ships, with the FPA at three fleets of 13K.

Not sure how many you have per stand, but still hard to imagine you having 'enough ships.'

Seriously, do you use a Nappy-style ratio of figure to ship?

Not that I've not imagined dozens of boxes of plastic forks, cut tips of tines glued to upright clear sheets… *hmmm*

Doug

I use the 1/12000 scale ships from Hobby Base.

I use the clear plastic bases that come with the models, mounting one flagship or battleship, two cruisers, or four destroyers per base. I do not use the stands that come with the models. Instead, I drill a small hole in the ships and add a piece of wire. I then drill a hole in the base and insert the ship's wire into it. This works very well.

The rules have a scale of 500-1000 ships per base, and 1" is one light year. Maximum range is 50" for the most powerful neutron beam weapons.

I have over 300+ bases for each side, so in scale I can field a fleet that represents 150,000 ships per side.

Gotcha!

Thanks so much for clearing that up; even in my poor imagination, looks awesome!

Doug

"The rules have a scale of 500-1000 ships per base, and 1" is one light year. Maximum range is 50" for the most powerful neutron beam weapons."

1" is 1 light-year….you mean 1 light-second ? A 50 light year neutron beam would be something.

Kirk

Sorry, yes, 1" is one light second.

Ship counters have now been added to the supplement. These will allow you to try the game out with little cost.

^KillerKatanas,

I'm loving this idea. I always loved the anime and I've looked for affordable models several times, as these are probably my favorite space fleet designs. I'm looking forward to hearing how this comes out!

^TheBeast,

Maybe I'm the only one, but I've always chosen to assume there was a translation error, and that it was 200 ships, not 20,000. Knocking a couple zeroes off everything makes it make more sense. (But that's just personal preference.) Still plenty big enough. And I wouldn't want to have to put 200 ships on the table for a game. I've got some WWII fleets of that size, but lord, putting them all on the table at once takes the whole table. I only ever did it for fleet reviews! :D

Yeah, the numbers are huge, but remember that in this world a few thousand years has past since mankind left Earth. This expansion has led them into another Galaxy, where there are hundreds of planets. These planets range from the rural type, such as Westerland, to the densely populated, such as Odin. Earth is quite small at this time, with only a few million left on it.

There are now trillions of humans throughout the two galaxies, so it should not be a great stretch to imagine fleets that are in the hundreds of thousands. With that said, the largest fleet assembled in the series is around 300,000 with a crew of around 6 million.

I have decided to make copies of the rules available on Ebay.

Found 'em.

Now to see if any of the 'gang' have Brigade Fire and Fury…

Doug

Hi, I'm just curious if the rules are still available?

They are on Ebay now.

The rules now have a page over at BGG: link

I will use this page for discussion and to update the game.