"Rules that cover both modern naval+air?" Topic

Is there a modern naval rules set that allows ship to ship, ship to air,and air to air combat, with scale of one model=one ship/aircraft?

All suggestions welcome,thanks.

I believe that I saw a supplement to Nimitz on the Sam Mustafa Honor FB page that might do what you want. It is not an area that I find at all interesting and don't keep up with it so that's about the best I can offer.

Harpoon? link

Harpoon 4 is definitely the answer here, but it's not for the meek of heart. You can probably pick up older copies on Ebay and elsewhere (along with the updates and scenario books), but I believe that there is a new version on Wargames Vault.

Harpoon. Have fun.

If you want something simpler there is Shipwreck or Naval Command – both also on Wargame Vault.

Shipwreck if you want something streamlines, Harpoon if you want something intricate. Or, Shipwreck if you want to finish in 2-3 hours, Harpoon if you're not concerned with finishing. Insert smart aleck emoji here.

The old Skytrex/Davco set from the 80s (A4 format, HMS Invincible on the cover) are still a good set for this. IIRC they were reprinted by Navwar (A4, blue cover with T23)

As with everything in life and gaming, there are trade offs. I had completely forgot about the old Davco rules, but seemed to remember playing them once or twice back in the early 80s. Let's say that there is a wave of 4 Russian SSMs coming towards a US task group. Again, if I remember right and using the Davco rules, the target ships would detect, then get off a shot, then you see if the incoming missiles hit and do damage as the turns were a much longer time scale than Harpoon. In Harpoon, there are going to be multiple detection rounds by a variety of sensors, then a wave of anti-missiles, followed by close in systems. With the Davco rules it's just a few die rolls that takes a few minutes. In Harpoon, that 2 1/2 minutes of scale time might go on for at least 30 minutes if not an hour. Just depends upon what you want to simulate.

Naval Command on Wargame Vault is a decent level of playable rules. Probably not great at larger scale battles, though. Harpoon is a great source for material but not a fun game. I played a scenario with Larry Bond himself at Historicon a few years back and even him running it resulted in very little action and a LOT of rules lookups.

It is DEFINITELY an area for someone to step forward to create a playable set of rules.

Shipwreck is great but abstract and a bit dated (wonderful for 1980s battles, though).

There are a bunch of board war-games I could recommend-

Blue Water Navy
Red Strike
The various Fleet series games (best for 1970s-1990).
Breaking The Chains

But yeah, Naval Command or Harpoon 4 are about it for miniatures gaming.

Navwar still have Warship Commander II 1965-1997 (Enola/Navwar) on their website – don't know if that is up to date though, or whether that's the same as the Davco/Skytrex set.

If memory serves me right, Warship Commander was just a level below Harpoon in terms of complexity. I seem to recall a supplement for it that added in a ton of optional and advanced rules which actually pushed it beyond the Harpoon envelope.

I'd also recommend Red Storm and Red Storm: Baltic Approaches, both boardgames from GMT games.

Red Storm is the Air Game over Central Europe ~1989 and Baltic Approaches adds the ships in.

"Go In and Sink", a "miniaturization of "Seastrike". Fast play-- the air component is a bit abstracted.

"It is DEFINITELY an area for someone to step forward to create a playable set of rules"

I keep getting asked to do this and I keep resisting as it is too close to (professional) home. That said I have a fast play board game that I use to teach the students about how modern naval combat works (and interreacts with air, land, space, cyber) which I could possibly convert into a set if miniatures rules. Of course handling long range fifes is easier on a hex map than a tabletop……

I'd buy it …

:-)

As if they read this thread, Naval Command just popped up as Wargame Vault's deal of the day…

Played Harpoon 4 about 20 years ago. Thanks for the suggestions of what is currently available.