Victory at Sea Open Playtest

Version: June

Welcome to the Victory at Sea Open Playtest!

A great deal of work has gone into the development of the new edition of Victory at Sea, and we are hoping to
make it the definitive World War II naval miniatures game. To this end, you will find an immense amount of
material to get your teeth into.

While we still have more things to add, most sections are now complete and ready for you to review. If you spot
anything that is obviously missing (important battles among the historical scenarios or landing craft, for
example) by all means point them out – they are likely already in the works, but highlighting their omission will
never hurt.

By the same token, we like to run very open playtests, so you are welcome to make observations (good or bad!)
at any time. However, we will also update you with specific objectives during each revision of the playtest rules.
Each update will also have a list of all the changes that have been made since the last revision.

The Final Goal

As things stand, Victory at Sea will published as a three volume hardback set in a slipcase (if you have seen our
Traveller campaign, The Pirates of Drinax, you will know what to expect). Book One contains the rules, while
Book Two will contain scenarios and ‘background’ information on the naval campaigns of the war. Book Three
contains the fleet lists and refits.

We are intending to publish Victory at Sea in ebook format and send it off to print before Christmas, as
promised in our last State of the Mongoose, with the printed edition coming out shortly into 2019.

However.

Our mantra at Mongoose Publishing is to only release when ready. If you uncover some major issues with the
game (or come up with some funky ideas of more things to add!), we will reserve the right to delay publication
until we believe the game is ready. That said, you will continue to see regular updates to the playtest pack so
progress can be monitored (and, indeed, checked).

Current Playtest Objectives

These are the current objectives we would like playtesters to look at.

 We would like a focus on the Victory at Sea scenario. Do the deployment and victory conditions
mechanics work?
 We have given points costs to every refit possible for the ships. Is this going too far? Should we use
standard ship profiles only in tournament-style games, with an assumption of Crew Quality 4? Should
refits and variant Crew Quality therefore be the sole province of ‘historical’ battles?
 We would like you to take a look at the Coastal Invasion and Submersible rules. As yet, we have no
official scenarios for these types of battles, but we would like you to have a go anyway with whatever
forces you deem reasonable, and let us know how you get on. We are just looking for an overview at
the moment, so we can get a feel of how the scenarios should be built.

All comments should be made in the Victory at Sea Open Playtest section of our forums. You are welcome to
create new threads or post to new ones, as appropriate. We will be reading every comment.

Updates
The following have been updated since the last playtest pack.

 Various typos have been tracked down and ruthlessly murdered.

 Evading torpedoes, as a mechanic, has now been removed. The Evasive! action alone functions
perfectly well in this regard, and has the added benefit that players now have to predict when torpedoes
will be coming in.
 When calculating long, extreme and point blank ranges, you now always round down. That should
solve any maths issues!
 Destroyed turrets can no longer be repaired.
 Weapon System is now defined under the ship stat block description in the Introduction. The final book
will have graphics to emphasise this.
 Owning player now chooses which side to place a ship if it is going to end up on top of another.
 Confirmed that critical hits can be scored even if no actual damage was dealt.
 If a ship without turrets takes a turret critical hit, things still go boom.
 Crippled ships now have their current Speed halved. Similar rule applying to DP weaponry.
 Repairs now bring back lost Attack Dice.
 Failing a Special Action does not penalise a ship.
 Come About! is now more intuitive.
 Evasive! half Speed now clarified.
 Spotting ships in Bad Weather now clarified.
 Houses are not a bit flimsier.
 Transport Aircraft and Landing Craft have been added to the Coastal Invasions chapter – this is just a
placeholder until we do nation-specific craft, but I cannot see them varying too much from these specs.
 Submersibles in Bad Weather are now harder to Spot, and Spotted submersibles that Submerge are no
longer Spotted!
 Scouts can now be re-deployed on a good roll in the Victory at Sea scenario. Cumulative initiative
bonus now also fixed.
 Losing Attack Dice through critical hits now affects all similar weapon systems.
 Torpedoes are now reduced when a ship is Crippled.
 Devastating weapons hitting already damaged locations is now clarified. Torpedo Belts do not now
help avoid critical hits from these weapons. Getting hit by a torp is bad news no matter what you are!
 Secondary weapons reduction on Weapons Critical 3 removed.
 Long Lance torpedoes now Wakeless (good catch!). Fan Salvo rules slightly modified to be more
intuitive.
 Radar now aids in attacks on smoke-shielded ships.
 Iowa increased to 850 points.
 All Hands on Deck now interferes with accuracy.