I think it's an awesome idea. I agree that WW2 pacific naval and naval air engagements circa '42 are fascinating in terms of equipment and tactics and its constantly evolving nature. I was toying with the idea of developing my own modern naval/naval air game. I'm an analyst for a defense contractor so I thought it would be fun to translate my knowledge into a playable system. I like your scale choices. I have a soft spot for that 700 scale though....sorry....lol
Thanks! Nothing wrong with 700 scale at all, for my old eyes I like something a little bit bigger. But I when published it won't have an official scale.
I would love to see a game like this. Would you put in fog of war to simulate the great distances involved or would you make it more like Flames of war were your forces are up close?
It would be more set piece battles. I initially imagined a pair of battles, your Air Group attacks the enemy carriers, etc. I plan on some additional videos in the next few weeks that will go into the mechanics in a little more detail.
I want to see your rule set. But I'd really want an opponent. Well of my enough complaining about opponents. Your painting looks great. Can't wait to see more.
Cool, I am thinking of the same thing, I already have a lot of 1/3000 Davco ships and intend to expand them, and then use 1/600th aircraft - this time from Tumbling Dice - I live in the UK
Pewter which is great for hard waring minis ............ except Peco started using horrid resin prints so I stopped using them, most likely end with up like War Lords a flipping mish mash of resins , plastics and metals !
Would love a game like this. Hard to make gripping spotting and making contact rules. One that adds realistic cloud cover ect. Very difficult to do well. I like the idea of custom dice as your fighters and bombers. That would work great.
How would you set up the European Theatre (attle of the Atlantic? /Mediterranean? the Taranto Raid, the Hunt for the Bismarck). I do like the concept you have for the Pacific War.
Really cool. I started designing my own board game system a while back to use 6mm minis for WW2-era combat in a generic game world (was using Kingdom Builder boards for play testing if that gives an idea). Stalled out a bit due to feeling of design bloat/complexity and uncertainty how to address. This kind of inspires me to go back and try again!
Did you ever play Axis and Allies: War at Sea? It was very similar to what you're describing, just at a larger ship scale ( i believe it was 1:1800 instead of 1:2400). That was my favorite board game growing up, and it served as my introduction to miniature model wargaming
I believe Victory at Sea will be 1/1800 scale, the GHQ models in this video are 1/2400. However when this game is released I expect you can play with any models you want. I'm not tied to a specific manufacturer. I just have my own personal preferences.
Anti-aircraft guns and some battleships could be a good addition as well, just for a bit more variety. Armor values for decks would be good I think so it isnt pure chance and first to shoot. Interesting idea, surprising there isnt anything of the topic yet.
I like the idea for your game. I have been wanting an air-to-air game at that kind of scale as well. For rules, maybe you could adopt something from the board wargame Flattop. I do think the dice look a little busy on the bases. I might look into creating some counters that match the bases and can even be color coded for different wings or squadrons. Then you aren't base 6, but start with a squadron with 12 or so and you can make change as units take losses. Would you use something like an area movement system? Or would you play on hexes, and switch to a "battle board" when combat is initiated? This system might be good for European air battles as well.
Thanks for the comments Bob! I've done a lot of thought on game clutter and don't necessarily want to use dice as counters but it's convenient if nothing else. I'm looking at 3d printed custom bases with numbering count included and other ways.
You mean this one? ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-UvIRjcCU0Wk.html Yup I reviewed it. It covers the same ground for sure but Fighters of the Pacific is diceless, While fun it feels more like a boardgame. I will have a full review of Fighters of the Pacific at some point.
Hey Jon :) Great stuff! 😍 May I ask where you got the 1/700 small plane from? I know GHQ and Pico but the other manufactorer seems unfamiliar for me ☺️ Thanks a lot!
I am definitely interested in an air war game for the pacific war. I am really fascinated in the air war over New Guinea, Guadalcanal and Rabaul during in 1942.
I love the idea and I agree with you that there needs to be a better pacific game. I’m with you, I love the pacific theater and so much stuff focuses on Europe. But as for the counters, instead of using die, what about a small clicker wheel on the base that displays the number of remaining aircraft? I can’t imagine that those would be hard to acquire?
Is this in the same scale as Victory at sea? It's a new game from Warlord that was supposed to drop in April but got delayed thanks to Covid. I believe it's supposed to be a revamp of the old War at Sea game
I believe Victory at Sea will be 1/1800 scale, the GHQ models in this video are 1/2400. When this game is released I expect you can play with any models you want.
How come you have more time off?...also I didn't realize there were no Wildcats in movie Midway till you mentioned it...Excellent movie BTW. Too bad Yamaguchi wasn't in charge of the Kido Butai. He seemed much more on the ball than that idiot Nagumo.
Yup, not a single Wildcat, not even in the background. Bummer as I love that tubby little plane. When I made this video I was between jobs due to Covid Lockdown. Wish I had more time now for the channel.
Fan of the Hellcat but always preferred the Corsair. I'm old enough to remember Bah Bah Blacksheep when it aired in the 70s and I was hooked on the Corsair since then.
@@AllMiniaturesGreatandSmall Mmmh, as I see it, add other types of ships could add much more deep to the game. Have to choose between intercept enemy aircraft or escort you on planes or what targets prioritize. Also, although something tells me that you know much more about naval aviation than I, some ships could attempt to avoid the bombs and torpedoes and try to attack the carriers. I don't remember quite well how many escuadrons a carrier of the time could carry but I think that the weren't much, so diversion tactics or others should be possible. You could even add things such as starting ranges of the battle. I other subject. escort carriers will be included too?
I'm like you since I have often though about wanting to play a WWII naval game similar to your idea, which is great by the way, and thought about designing a game myself. I even painted up the USS Enterprise with a deck decal and posted it on my old, long abandoned blog: cornerofaforeignfield.blogspot.com/2014/08/ghq-big-e-miniature-review.html?showComment=1539155876416 I was mostly inspired by this blog with its incredibley painted GHQ WWII painted ships and planes!: wwiicentral.blogspot.com/ I really like the idea of the mixed scale and your basing but I'm not a big fan of too many dice and tokens on the table because I think it distracts too much from the realism, especially after all that effort has gone into making it look so good visually. Tokens aren't so bad. But that's just a preference and it does seem like tabletop games have trended that way. Back in my youth I would have liked to have seen something as detailed as the WWII navy inspired Star Fleet Battles game , which I really enjoyed, but now feel something less detailed is the way to go. Although I would like to see an off the table card (similair to a Star Fleet Battles SSDs) representing each ship, especially the carriers, since I would really like the drama of refueling and rearming the planes represented and catching the planes on deck during bombing runs, along with close range defense against fighters and bombers well represented, and damage control etc.. Kamikaze scenarios would be great. Something on the table representing torpedoes and trying to avoid them would be nice but I'm not sure how that world work? I'm wondering what would be the best time scale for each turn to get that running out of time, sense of urgency feeling without slowing the game down too much. I also like the idea brought up in a previous comment about fog of war, the handling of scout planes would be interesting, and weather, but perhaps these types of thing would be would be best represented abstractly. I'm sure you have thought a lot about all of this, I know I have over the years. Your ideas have got me really excited about this and I really think you are onto something here!
Thanks Robert! That is the a great build of CV-6! I appreciate the enthusiasm. Right now I'm skewing more towards simple. Ships at the current moment are not much more then glorified targets. But if the system works as I hope it will, I can imagine it expanding well beyond the Pacific 1942.
