Naval Thunder: Battleship Row

I prefer Topside Minis for NT.

This is my go-to set of rules when I want to introduce someone to naval wargames. Its mechanics are very simple using modifiers and pre-calculated values for speed and range, this help new players to practice maneuvers and range their engagements. Yet it lacks of weather, sea conditions and how it handle aircrafts and submarines is a bit too brief.

Relatively simple and enjoyable set of rules. Although armor is based on point system for entire armor and hits roll for penetration, it actually works. Also useful are the excel spreadsheets on ship data. these you can place up to three on one sheet and do not have to go through the work of filling these out. The rules are downloaded from wargamevault and are very well laid out.

DIGIT

Just the right level of realism and complexity for gamers whose primary interest is not naval warfare, but who may occasionally get the urge to command the Bismarck or the Graf Spee.

Naval Thunder is my go to Naval minis rule set.

I've only played this once, but it already feels like a solid addition to the game club. It doesn't take too much longer than War at Sea, so it's still playable in an evening, but has a much more realistic feel. Our Battle of Savo Island results were pretty close to historical.

I'm hoping to get a little more experience with it, now that I've invested in some Topside Minis to augment my small set of War at Sea minis.

One thing I'd like to see is some kind of operational-scale maneuvering pregame to render the carrier actions a little less abstract. I agree that carriers should function on a completely different scale than surface, but I still wish the abstracted system would involve physically putting them on-table at some point.

Some quibbles, some absurdities (base hit probability is by ship class, so a battle cruiser is harder to hit than a battleship even if the battlecruiser is moving more slowly), can be random. But pretty good in terms of the big picture. Very bloody, smaller ships die like flies but that may be due to the tendency of players to just wade in rather than work out the best moves.

On repeated plays, the weaknesses in movement, strange gunnery modifiers and glosing over size differences are more noticeable, but it is still quickly moving and good tactics will win out. Playable for the time spent with friends.