‘These Men Were Not Cowards’: A Review of Paul Rohrbaugh’s "Brave and Noble Fights"

 “No, these men were not cowards. There were cowards present, as there have been on every battlefield; but here, as elsewhere, there were brave men to detest them.” – Philo N. McGiffin, advisor on the Chen Yuen, Battle of the Yalu River, September 17, 1894 

Setup for Wei Hai Wei

About six months ago I came upon the BoardGameGeek page for a naval wargame on an obscure subject, produced by a company I hadn’t heard of before---High Flying Dice Games (HFD). This led me to their catalog, where to my delight I found quite a few titles on maritime subjects often overlooked by the board-game community. Among these was a operational-level game (with expansions) set during the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895), a conflict generally not covered outside of scenarios for Pre-Dreadnought naval miniatures rules. I was intrigued, and ordered a copy of Brave and Noble Fights: The Battles of Wei Hai Wei and the Yalu River (HFD, 2014). Judging by their product descriptions, as a company HFD seems to gear itself towards games that are introductory-level in complexity, and are lower-cost in terms of production (although they do offer a “professional” series that are on par with most other companies in terms of cost). I have no objection to purchasing and playing games with comparatively low production-values, as long as the game delivers; budget printing and BYOD (‘Bring Your Own Dice’) is fine by me, but sloppy game-design or historical inaccuracy is not. I am happy to say that BaNF’s design accomplishes what I believe Rohrbaugh set out to do and at the level he set out to do it, and I found it detailed enough to be educational and challenging yet also a game that can be enjoyed in a couple of hours. 

Brave and Noble Fights is a ‘folio’ game, packed in a large zip poly-bag and including everything needed except dice and a pack of standard playing-cards. The production is definitely desktop-publishing level: the cover sheet, maps, and counters are color laser-printed on decent light cardstock, and the rules are b&w photocopies of originals. Counters must be mounted and cut by the player. When ordering, there are a few options offered, and I elected to have the counters pre-mounted (I still had to cut them) and a set of optional cards included (also uncut). Those options added to the cost of the game, but the final price tag was still well below what I usually spend on games from other publishers. I usually prefer to have everything pre-cut, but it’s not a make-or-break issue and doesn’t deter me from ordering games that interest me. The layout and design-work was good, and I really liked Bruce Yearian and Tim Allen’s choice to use contemporary Japanese ukiyo-e prints from the war for the cover and cards; that was a well-done historical enhancement besides being aesthetically pleasing. All in all, I received a good product for the money charged.

BaNF is listed correctly by HFD as two games packaged together. One is a purely naval engagement, the other a combination land/sea battle; together, the two games bring the sad history of the Peiyang Fleet full circle. There are different rule-sets for the two battles, and even different generators involved, but they are similar enough that the transition between the two is not problematic. Naval combat is resolved the same way in both games, with the addition of Shore Bombardment. 

“The Battle of the Yalu, September 17, 1894” recreates the decisive naval battle of the war. It was not the first engagement between the Combined Fleet of Imperial Japan and the Peiyang Fleet (that battle---the Battle of Pung-Do Island---is covered in the first Expansion), nor was it the last, but it proved to be the ‘Jutland’ of the conflict and Japan’s victory gained them command of the Yellow Sea for the war’s duration. 

 “The Battle of Wei Hai Wei, January-February, 1895” combines both naval and land operations and marks both the end of the Peiyang Fleet and the end of China’s aspirations for the Korean peninsula. The destruction or capture of the remains of the Fleet and the rapid steamrolling of the Peiyang Army removed China from Korea and simultaneously demonstrated that Japan had a modern, disciplined army that was equal to any contemporary European force. 

“The Battle of the Yalu” (BY) was the first of the two games that I played, naval wargaming being one of my primary interests. The game map for BY is a blue seascape in two sections, divided into numbered, rectangular Areas on the scale of 0.5 nautical miles each. The game is divided into Turns which represent about 30 minutes of time. The counters represent single ships and are marked with various number values as well as Arc of Fire, Name, Type and Nationality of the vessel. Separate counters are placed atop the respective Flagships to denote their Flag status, which is very important to the game as will be discussed below. The combat level is tactical, with each ship being sailed and fought independently, albeit as part of a fleet action.  

Each Turn is divided into several phases. The first phase determines the occurrence of Random Events, and determines which side has the Initiative. Initiative is very important in this game, as the force which has it gets the first choice of Movement, and therefore has more freedom of maneuver; once the shooting starts, this can make or break a fleet or squadron. Random Events are just that, and can lead to reduced visibility, command-chain breakdown, or even catastrophic ship loss. Naval Movement is the second phase, and the force with Initiative has the choice to engage or disengage with the enemy, forcing the opposition to react rather than act. 

 Once both sides have completed their Movements, they engage in any necessary Combat. Combat in "The Battle of the Yalu" is heavily abstracted, but works very well for all of its simplicity. Combat between ships is resolved simultaneously, an approach to game combat which I always favor unless special historical circumstances argue against it. Ships have attack values for Primary and Secondary Batteries, as well as for Torpedoes if present. Attacks are resolved with a die roll, and there are quite a few possible DRMs for combat rolls that cover Firing Arc, Damage Level of the attacking and/or defending vessel (if any), Range, obscured targets, and whether or not the attacking vessel is In Command (more on that, below). “Hits” are an abstraction of a strike by the ship's batteries, coupled with many smaller strikes by smaller, deck-mounted guns. Critical Hits (which do double damage) are a possibility under certain circumstances, and are rolled for when a Hit is made. The target vessel opposes the Attack with its Protection Factor (PF), an abstraction of the ship’s armor and maneuverability. Ramming is included as an optional rule that can be conducted by specific ships during the Movement phase, but I chose not to use it (historically, only the Chih Yuen attempted to ram during the battle, and the rapid, longer-ranged fire of the Japanese ships cut her to pieces before she could close). Damage is not a matter of points, but of levels. The first Hit on a ship Disrupts it, and subsequent Hits can Damage or Cripple it, each sequential level reducing Movement range and Attack effectiveness. Ships are considered Sunk after four consecutive Hits. Finally, there is the End Phase during which Repairs can be made to damaged vessels (abstracting Damage Control). An effective Repair can save a vessel, and even get it back into Combat. 

There is one major game element that can affect all aspects of Movement and Combat---the Command factor. "Battle of the Yalu" depicts naval warfare in the pre-wireless era; ship-to-ship communications are line-of-sight through semaphore signals by day and signal lamps by night. Thus, the ability of a squadron or fleet commander to maintain command and control is limited by visibility. Rohrbaugh includes this through the Command rule: ships must be within three areas (1.5 nautical miles) of the Flagship in order to function effectively and with coordination, and are therefore In Command. Ships that fall outside of those three areas are Out of Command, and suffer various restrictions and penalties in Movement and Attack. The second game of the set---“The Battle of Wei Hai Wei” (WHW) ---uses the same combat system for naval attacks that BY did, but also incorporates a card system for Turn progression and land combat. Although the card system seems cumbersome at first glance, in practice it adds a “chaos of war” randomness to the way Turns and combat proceed that I found I really liked, once I understood what Rohrbaugh was aiming for. 

WHW depicts a siege by the IJN and Japanese land forces of the principal Peiyang Fleet anchorage and the main jumping-off point of Chinese military operations in Korea. The city and bay were surrounded by coastal fortifications designed and placed by European advisors, and most outside observers considered it unassailable; with well-placed, armed forts, mine barrages for harbor defense, the remains of the Peiyang Fleet, and the cream of China’s land forces dug in, it should have been. The Japanese proved them wrong. 

In contrast to “Battle of the Yalu,” WHW relies on Unit Activations rather than Initiative. The number of Activations---and which side gets to make them---is determined by card draw from a standard deck of playing cards (the process and effects of Card Draws are laid out in the Rules and I won’t go into it here, but I will say that the process is greatly simplified by using the optional card set offered by HFD; that's not a plug, just my experience and opinion). Activations are drawn for until both Jokers have shown up in the draw, at which time the Movement and Combat phases of the Turn are over, any Repairs are made, the Turn is ended and the deck is reshuffled. Lather, rinse, repeat for seven Turns, at which point the game ends. Along the way there is a lot going on, and Turns can be quite long, depending on how the cards turn over. 

Another significant difference between the two games is the importance of Morale and its effects on combat in WHW. Morale adds or reduces the number of Activations available to each side. In BY, the war had just begun and both sides were confident of victory; by the Battle of Wei Hai Wei, the Chinese had suffered one serious defeat after another, and morale in Qing forces had dropped accordingly. Although the game is set up with equivalent levels of Morale in both forces, a more historically-accurate variant rule (8.1) starts Chinese Morale fifty percent lower than the Japanese, as well as reducing the effectiveness of some ground units. Ground Assault is resolved by using the value of a Card Draw, then adding or subtracting a unit’s Combat Factor and various modifications. As with Naval Combat, successful attacks on ground units reduces their effectiveness by Levels rather than points.

How does BaNF hold up as a pair of historical war games depicting a specific conflict? At the Battle of the Yalu River, the IJN won a stunning defeat over a numerically-superior force. Indeed, at the time the Beiyang Fleet was the largest naval fleet in Asia, and many powers expected Japan to lose the encounter…or avoid it in the first place. Size isn’t everything, however; the BF suffered from a number of shortcomings that became all too obvious once the shooting started, and which are reflected in the game. Although well-armored, the Chinese ‘heavies’ were slow, with main batteries which were devastating at shorter range but which were outclassed by the lighter (but farther-reaching) IJN guns. The endemic corruption in the Chinese Imperial Navy also meant that their ships were saddled with rounds which were either badly-out-of-date “condemned” European imports, or locally made munitions of such poor quality that ‘explosive’ shells were often filled with sand or concrete rather than guncotton and other explosives. And the level of training given their crews by the Qing admiralty was inferior to that of the Imperial Japanese Navy, although that did not necessarily lessen fighting spirit. These factors are incorporated in BaNF by having all Chinese ships roll a d6 To Hit, as opposed to the d10 for the IJN vessels---a simple, well-chosen rule that reflects several historical realities of the conflict. 

Rohrbaugh’s Order of Battle is accurate, even down to including the “armed auxiliary cruiser” Suikyo Maru on the Japanese side---a converted passenger liner that was being used to ferry an IJN admiral and his staff on an inspection tour that got badly mauled in the battle. His unit placement for the opening of the battle is historically sound (be sure to use the placement in the Addendum, however, as it corrects a printing-error issue), as is the formation the units are placed in. True to history, the Peiyang Fleet is in Line Abreast formation, whereas the IJN steams Inline---a tactical difference that affected the outcome of the battle. The game is limited to ten Turns or less, which reflects the limits of Pre-Dreadnought naval technology (i.e., the size of the ship’s coal-bunkers) and also the desire of both fleets to avoid a night engagement. The same degree of historical accuracy is present in WHW, although Rorhbach allows the players a wide degree of latitude in unit placement within certain historical constraints. 

So, BaNF works very well as a pair of introductory-level war games, in my opinion. Their respective systems are straightforward with an easy learning curve, and the combat is as balanced and satisfying as possible with two mismatched forces. There are a number of rules, combat modifiers, and adjustments to the units that reflect well the historical circumstances of the respective battles and of the war in general. Their inclusion in the design demonstrates an awareness of their importance in accurately depicting the conflict, of “board war games as a form of narrative history,” as Rohrbaugh observes in his Designer’s Notes. I view education as an essential element in any war game; being fun to play is fine, but I want the game to give me some insight into the historical reality of the conflict it’s depicting. Brave and Noble Fights does both, and that makes it a “Win,” from my perspective.