All at Sea - the background

Don't ask me why but, ever since I was a lad, I've been fascinated by ancient galley warfare. That said, it's actually something I've not really successfully gamed. My first attempts, way back in the 70's, used a truly dreadful set of rules that shall remain nameless. I think the main drawback of these rules was the requirement to use a cloth with a grid of offset rectangles. A lack of ship models probably didn't help either but I do recall designing and casting my own from lead. They weren't actually too bad if slightly huge.
Moving on a couple of decades, I gave it another go using 1/1200th galleys from Langton and Navwar. This was altogether more successful but the project, for one reason or another, just fizzled out. As one of the themes we are hoping to explore at the club, this year, is naval warfare (albeit largely age of sail), I thought I would give galley warfare another try. This also ties in with a solo ancients campaign that I'm hoping to revive.
So the first step in the project is to look at the available rulesets and see if anything fits the bill. I have several criteria in mind here and it's unlikely that one set will meet them all.

1)  Small scale actions involving a handful of ships - essentially skirmish scale (solo gaming)
2) Small fleets of several squadrons, each of a handful of ships (multi-player club gaming)
3) Large fleet actions of hundreds of ships (solo gaming)

First up for evaluation are Langton Miniatures 'Naumachiae' rules. As luck would have it, I have found an after action report from a solo campaign I ran about 20 years ago. I'll copy the report here and see if my thoughts have changed over the intervening years.

1^st Illyrian War

.............On hearing of the approach of the Illyrian fleet, Quilpius took up station between the mainland and a small island. The Romans were aware of the numerical superiority of the Illyrian fleet and took up this position to deny the Illyrians room to use their smaller and more manoeuvrable ships effectively. Quilpius had previously landed a shore party on the island but as the Illyrian fleet approached he became aware that the landing party had been overcome and the island was in the hands of the Illyrians. Denied any opportunity to land the ship’s sails and excess equipment the Romans faced the prospect of engaging with the fleet dangerously overburdened. [Recognition of the importance of shorelines, and a simple abstract mechanism to account for this, is a nice feature of these rules.]

Quilpius planned to place his least trained ships in the front line, to absorb the Illyrian attack, and counter with his best ships which were placed in a second line.

Roman deployment in double line

The Illyrians advanced in 3 squadrons. The two wings were made up of light ships in a single line abreast, whilst the heavier ships were placed in the centre in line ahead. The Illyrians evidently planned to pierce the Roman centre with their heavy squadron.

The Illyrian fleet

The Roman advance was slow, the rowers evidently suffering from the effects of the overburdened vessels and fatigue soon set in. [Fatigue plays an important part in the rules.] The Illyrians held back the light flanking squadrons but quickly advanced the heavy centre squadron. There was some confusion in the Illyrian fleet when they encountered an unknown current and the squadrons were swept closer together. [Presumably an effect of the patent Langton Ability Chart - which I quite like.]

Illyrian centre squadron takes evasive action as squadrons collide.

The Illyrians soon recovered and the heavy centre squadron attacked the centre of the Roman line. The Romans were in a bad position having been thrown off course, when leaving the lee of the island, with many of their vessels exposing their flanks to the approaching Illyrians. The lead Illyrian quadrireme took advantage of this and attempted an oar rake. However, it misjudged the approach and crashed into the nearest Roman vessel. The intended target happened to be the quinquereme carrying the Roman Vice Admiral, which avoided the rake but nevertheless suffered badly in the collision.

First Blood to the Illyrians

The Roman Vice Admiral quickly gathered together his marines and legionaries and led them onboard the Illyrian quadrireme. Unfortunately, the shock of the collision had thrown the Romans into confusion and they were heavily repulsed. The Illyrians counterattacked and took the squadron flagship. On seeing this the nearby quinqueremes faltered but the line held. Although the lead Illyrian Quadrireme was caught up with the its prize and drifting the rest of the squadron followed closely behind and began to pass through the Roman line. This was the signal for the rest of the Illyrian fleet to advance and the light squadrons on the wings began to close in. At this critical juncture the Roman lead squadron was nearing exhaustion and was forced to halt to allow the rowers to recover from their fatigue. They then came under heavy attack from the triremes of the Illyrian centre squadron but could not manoeuvre because of the threat posed by the Illyrian flank squadrons.

General mayhem ensues

Although, the few Illyrian ships which passed through the Roman line were successfully countered by the Roman second line the battle was going badly for Quilpius.

The Roman second line counter attacks

At this point another front line quinquereme was captured and another completely sunk. This was enough for the poorly trained Roman crews and the nearby vessels, including many from the second line, began to withdraw from the action. [A morale system is probably essential to prevent battles being fought to the last ship.] Quilpius made his escape back to Italy where the senate awarded him the cognomen Aquaticus.

So there we have it - a 20 year old battle report. My first impression was it's huge! I can't imagine running that many ships, for both sides, solo. I'm not sure how easy it was at the time; although the outcome seems fine I think it is rather telling that the next battle in the campaign used different rules. That said, I think there is a lot to like about these rules but perhaps not at this scale.

It remains to be seen whether I can still play a game successfully with Naumachiae - so next up the play-test (certainly not on this scale though).