Sailpower
Are you the master of all commanders? Are you the scurviest sea dog? Are your tactics able to rule the waves?
Sailpower is a large scale miniatures game that allows you to take the role of a captain in the Age of Sail. Command small ships, large ships or even a whole sqaudron. It’s your call! The game is in a very visual 15MM – 1/8th inch = 1 foot – 1/96th to 1/100th scale.
You can play Sailpower on a small table with a couple of ships or a big table with many ships!
Sailpower at Origins07 (photo by event player Don Goddard) !!!
SAILPOWER BOOKS AND KITS AVAILABLE ONLINE!
Sailpower ship kits and rule books are now available for sale thru http://www.drowsydragononline.com/shop/ courtesy of our friends at The Soldiery in Columbus Ohio!
Sailpower wins best theme game for Saturday AM timeslot at Coldwars 2008!
What is Sailpower?
Sailpower is “Fun Scale Combat in the age of sail! Big ships are fun, Sailing them is more fun! Sailpower is a large scale sailing ship game that attempts to keep play accessible to the general gamer, while being rich in historical detail. It stresses managing your crew, and commanding a warship as opposed to just fighting from deck to deck, or fleet actions. We also generally allow the players to treasure hunt the game board, and run fast and loose role-play. If you are a fan of naval sail games, Sailpower is a good beer and pretzels level game that has a lot of historical details.
What Period does Sailpower cover?
Sailpower covers the Age of Sail, pre steam, and post cog era -or approximately the late Elizabethan thru Napoleonic era. The cannons are abstracted in a general way so that ships from differing era can be played together, or you can choose what era you want to focus on. Sailpower is perfect for Golden age pirate scenarios, War of 1812, Napoleonics, American Revolution, or even Barbary Coast pirate actions. You can even incorporate Sail power into a semi fantasy setting although there are no fantasy rules in the core rulebook.
What scale is Sailpower?
15MM – 1/100th – 1/8th inch =1 foot Conversions are available to other scales. The easiest conversion is to 28mm, just use 2X
I don’t have much space. Can I still reasonably play Sailpower?
Yes, we tested the game heavily with small sloops and schooners on 3X3 and 4X4 coffee tables. If you want to use very large ships you obviously will need more space, but a battle of sloops on a coffee table is just as exciting as a pair of frigates, perhaps even more so!
Why 15MM?
15MM is a very cool scale; it’s large enough to allow a lot of personalization of your miniatures. It’s also large enough to feel like a real command, yet not as large as the 28MM scale where ships can be upwards of 4 feet if properly scaled. We believe the 15MM scale is a perfect balance between small enough to sail around, and large enough to immerse you into your command role.
Do you make these ships?
Yes we do. We model and cast most of the ships you see, and in fact offer kits for players to make their own. A couple of the very largest ships are either scratch built or based off plastic models (USS Constitution, HMS Victory, HMS Leopard). Also in some of the older pictures we used miniatures from other companies, or model ships cut off at the waterline. Outside of that, most of the ships you see are based of kits which we have developed and cast. Some are modified or customized.
Where do you get the crew figures from?
We don’t currently sculpt crew figures, as there are many good sources out there. We often use figures from Thoroughbred figures, Minifigs, Old Glory, and Peter Pig.
Why don’t all your ships have crew, do you need crew figures to play?
Crew figures are not required to play. The actual crew is managed from the ships sheet. That said, it adds to the look to add crew figures. If you add about a dozen crew, the ship looks busy. Because the real crew numbers and locations are on your ship sheet, you can place your crew in action diorama poses, and glue them down, as they do not directly influence combat. We hope to eventually put some crew on all the ships, but have not had the time to get to them all (we have well over 40 ships to crew!)
Why don’t you put rigging and sails on the ships?
A few reasons: 1. Time: we have too many ships to make realistic sails for all of them. 2. Battle damage: we like to make the mast removable so the ship can have them shot off! 3. Storage space: Fully rigged ships would be hard to store 4. Silliness factor: Ships in combat usually carried less then full sail, but the sails often changed drastically as the ship sailed. Any set of sails we put on would be wrong most of the time. We have put sail sets on a few of the ships to show players what they look like. You can of course put sails on your ships when you play Sailpower!
Who made the Terrain?
We made most of the terrain, although we use a lot of buildings from various hobby and miniature companies in a modified way. The O-shaped fort is available as a kit from us. Last, but not least, we have some islands out there created by Game Fusion Studio, and by master terrain sculptor Josh Potter.
Do you have stats for (INSERT YOUR FAVORITE SHIP) ?
The Core Rulebook comes with a section on how to convert your favorite historical ship stats for use in Sailpower. It’s very easy and uses commonly available historical stats. We also have collected stats on literally hundreds of ships, and hope to release a ship book soon!
Great Places to Play Sailpower!
We are running semi-regular games in Columbus Ohio at The Soldiery, a gamestore located at 4256 North High Street, Columbus Ohio [phone (614)267-1957] Check the events page for future games held at this location or feel free to propose a time for an event via our forum! This store also stocks the game rules, as well as all kits The Soldiery web site
If you carry Sailpower, or host Sailpower events and wish to be listed here, feel free to contact us.
Contact, Convention, Retail Demos, and Distribution info!
If you would possibly like to host/run an event at your local game store/convention feel free to contact us at info@sailpowergame.com.
If you would like to carry Sailpower, or Sailpower ship kits at your retail game store, feel free to contact us at info@sailpowergame.com with questions. Currently, distribution is being handled by Kent Boelling of The Soldiery, Inc. His contact info is 614-267-1957 Fax: 614-267-0558 and email mail@thesoldiery.com The best hours to contact Kent are Tues – Thur 3 pm to 9 pm, Friday 3 pm to 1 am, Saturday 1 pm to 11 pm,Sunday 1 pm to 7 pm, CLOSED MONDAYS. All times are EST US
If you would like to suggest a convention or be considered as a event volunteer, feel free to email us at info@sailpowergame.com. Please include in subject line regards to Convention or volunteer details or post in the forum.
Again, questions or information requests can be directed at info@sailpowergame.com
More pics can be seen in our gallery and on other site pages.
This page and all contents copyright 2007, 2008, 2009 Brian Carnes / Seadog Trading and Games. Unauthorized duplication prohibited.