We're sailing Again!

TwistedLords Con Midwest City, Oklahoma  

 

July 14th to 16th, 2023.

There will be two sessions scheduled Friday 8pm to midnight & Saturday 8pm. to midnight

Fist Full Of Seamen: 

Lead-Men Tell no Tales

Welcome to the largest 28mm game of piracy in North America! The year is 1702 and the wealth of the Caribbean is up for grabs. Command a ruthless crew in search of wealth and title in the New World. Easy to learn rules. Open Sandbox game that encourages your creativity to win.

 For the blog insiders, there will be more ships and more locations to explore. This is the first time we have had this game out of storage since 2016 and who knows if we will run it in the future. If your interested in playing sign up! In the past we have signed up 40 players in teams of two but due to the expansion in the number of ships the teams of two may end up with a ship per player to expand opportunities of your adventure.   

http://twistedlordscon.com/default.html

 

 Puerto Pa' Te

This is the prototype layout of the Spanish port I hope to develop into a future table in an already massive convention game. Unlike the other governors in the game the Spanish notably don't actively engage in commerce with nations not subject to the Spanish crown, Catholic Diocese of St. Augustine, or exploited natives of the Caribbean. 

The building and wharf was designed by Crescent Root Miniatures.      

The HMS Penetrator   

This is the HMS Penetrator a sloop model produced by Fire Lock Games.

 I finished this model nearly a year ago but never got enough time to photograph or post the results.

Her Sail plan is that of a cutter and she is flying English Colors, I 

also up-gunned the ship from 6 guns to 10 guns. 

 

In the past I have worked in Pin racks and Line spools on the decks, I prefer the extra details despite making the placement of figures more difficult. this one was assembled during the pandemic so the extra pieces were harder to find. 

 

Cutter not Sloop.

 

The Penetrator  spots some tail. 

This is a fantastic model if not a little pricey, what isn't these days?

 If your looking for a solid resin kit with a simple sail and rigging plan I recommend it.

On the bench

 

In the past I have purposely avoided showing the work bench view of the ships. I always felt it disenchants the immersion in the world we have created. The "How the sausage is made" cliche provides an unappetizing venue to an audience yet being trapped in the house since March of 2020 has changed the perspective of the hobby for me a little. It's not Chateau D'if, but we're all one step closer to understanding Edmond Dantès plight.    

  

Here is the next hull I'm working on, a sloop from FireLock Games, I'm extending the sail plan to a full sloop and adding a little more firepower under the aft quarter. Lots of custom work and after market parts from Old Glory 25 and Amanti wooden model ships. The sails are Evergreen plastic sheets cut to fit.

 

 

Piragua Update

  

Piragua Flotilla   

The disenchanted sons of the new world, Spanish exiles, displaced natives of the colonial islands and run away slaves crew these simple but effective trading vessels as they forge a living on the Spanish main. Never seen as much of a prize,  they trade Cocoa beans to the sweet tooth of the European elite and peddle the foreign goods of distant nations to the Caribbean Islands to claim a trickle of the wealth siphoned from the bloated empires of the Old world.

       

 

Lacking a true gunwale these native craft aren't ignorant of the value of cannon fire. They each pack enough swivel guns to keep hostiles at length and a Bombard a piece to sway off the curiosity of other ships larceny. In a flotilla they pose a very real threat. 

       

The Turtle and The Skink are the latest additions to the flotilla. Any player that is willing to take on the fleet's commodore status has three ships to raid and trade with. In addition the most lopsided firepower in the game.

  

 

One game's Bark is another's Brigantine

 Firelock Games' Bark

All of Firelock Games' models are an excellent starting hull for the price. That said I can't help myself when it comes to modifications and after market parts. The original model is shown here:

Most info I read out there classifies the Bark (Barque, Barc)  a type of sailing vessel with three or more masts having the fore- and mainmasts rigged square and only the mizzen (the aft-most mast) rigged fore and aft. Not getting hung up on the product title I just made the ship into  Brigantine and doubled her gun complement.

      

The ship titled "Le Cresson" or Water Crest in English sticks to the traditional off color naming conventions of our past projects but looses it's humor from the original French Euphemism. 

What the hell's a Piraqua anyway?

Ever since the episode of Black Sails where the Character Jack Rackham mentioned the word Piragua, I've been searching for a way to make one of these for FFOS a playable ship. After a little time looking around on the web and the release of a dug-out style boat by Firelock Games I decided to indulge in a little project.

Blood & Plunder by Firelock Games has some handsome and quality products for starters. I purchased around a dozen of their ships and over time I will be posting some of their models with a little of my own modification, alterations, and hybrid hulls. This is the basic kit for a Piragua:

(photo used without permission of Firelock Games)

A neat little kit but something about the style of sail bothered me. Then I got to thinking about my inspiration to FFOS, Sid Miere's Pirates.It had a huge impact on my creation of our convention game and I really liked his war canoe image design shown here:

  (photo used without permission of Fraxis Games)     

Combining the two resulted in this:

(yes I know this is an Image of Kokopelli from the pueblo peoples of  the Precolumbian desert South-West. But I liked it and I had an ink stamp that made the Image easy to apply.) 

There are a bunch of after market parts from Old Glory 25 and hand made additions to the model. Oars, oar-locks, pulleys... 

No convention going scalawag playing Fist Full of Seamen would ever consider this as a prize vessel. It's actually a problem with most of the ships from Firelock Games, most are tragically under gunned for our games. To remedy this for the Piragua I will be allowing the captain of this vessel to play three of these ships in a small flotilla to make them more inviting and raise the survival rate.