Threedecks Forum

How did French ships of this era (1688–97)) compare to the English and Dutch ships? they seem to be much larger, but did they handle just as well, were they as fast as their English and Dutch counterparts? I seem to recall French ships being very desirable in later eras, being better sailers than th...

Cheers Cy - I've uploaded it to Dropbox now (and changed the link in the OP), which should be easier to navigate, and automatically previews the PDF for people interested (so you could read it without downloading it)

Greetings all, I've been working on an age of sail wargame for the past 3 months, thought I'd share what I have so far: If you're interested in playtesting, or having a look through (proof-reading and fact-checking always welcome!), just send me an email: thespidersrepublic@hotmail.com https://i.img...

Thanks for the heads up Navclio, I have already read that one - very interesting stuff! I have settled on a process of making all Dutch and English guns of the ADW period drakes unless they were chasers, with the exception being the British Demi-Cannon, which seemed to be a drake even in chaser posi...

Nice, thanks Cy - I suspected this might be the case. I found a few detailed archaeological write-ups, detailing cannon sizes from Dutch wrecks of the era, so I thought I might try to gauge their overall weight to their caliber/weight of shot against the information I have on Dutch cannons - see if ...

Ok I have the Spanish Armada & Lepanto pretty well covered and the stats completed, so I'm moving on the Anglo-Dutch Wars. I've been able to find good data about the difference between drake guns and their heavier counterparts, but one thing I'm struggling with is the ratio of regular guns to dr...

I've managed to find a very good source on 3 of the Spanish ships from the Armada, thanks to one of my players; https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/83960101.pdf Quite a good little thesis, from page 114 it deals with the history and archaeological wrecks of 3 ships, listing exactly the weapons on board!

Great, thanks guys - I see a few lists of weapons on tolobador.es, so thanks heaps for that! @Cy From what I've read so far, the English tended to have the heaviest chaser gun in the stern, and the bow chasers were usually longer range, but lighter. That's why I guessed canon of 7 in the stern. @Nav...

Very interesting! thanks Cy. I was definitely aware of the Cannon-Perier being a very heavy weapon, although close range. Thanks for the info on the Canon of 7 and the link to the more accurate EB armaments. I'm guessing those 2 cannon of 7 would be stern chasers. Looks like I'll need to add the Can...

Thanks for the reply Navclio, I definitely agree that the exact facing and weapons aren't all that important in the scope of this game. I'm just going to simplify things a little. It seems the armaments were quite fluid depending on the captain and/or mission so I don't mind lowering the number of a...