Into the Maelstorm: September 2016

Treacherous shoals scenario: victory to whoever makes surrender most enemies, with plenty of sandbanks around the table.

The battle began with the frenchies coming from windward

The english just presented broadsides and waited for the french to come, the wind would roll to their front and put them in irons again next turn. They maintanied the "holy line" and remained confident

The enemy was soon bottled up by the shoals

With only three french vs five british the english concentrated several ships on one of the enemy vanguard at a time

Brits at anchor letting fly

The boarding in one end of the line turned awry for the frenchies when another brit joined in

One of the center french ships lost the last damage and striked

The boarding action finished when the outnumbered french surrendered

Their flagship tough charged seeking vengeance

Meanwhile, another ship fell prey to the british deadly crossfire

A point blank broadside mauled badly this white-hulled ship

The british ship resisted heroically against the enemy flagship, which doubled her in crew, and killed off half of the boarders. Bad dice rolling meant she couldn't push away tough.

Another french then joined in to assist her admiral

With obvious results

However a lone english sneaked behind them and with a lucky roll made the flagship surrender.

With only one ship left in the last turn the french were massacred 17-4, and if the battle lasted two more turns they would have had no fleet left!

BRITANNIA TRIUMPHANT!

Again, victory to the better sailor: the french player comitted two fatal mistakes, first to get bottled up in the center, bringing only half his guns to bear in the initial exchange: and second to divide the fire amongst all enemies instead of concentrating on one at a time, a historically attested british tactic which proved its worth once again.