Introduction
Extract from 3rd edition (1943 Version)
SEVERAL YEARS AGO, a group of New Yorkers who shared a considerable amount of pleasure in each other's company, and most of whom shared an interest in naval matters, became a trifle bored with the poker games that were the staple amusement of their gatherings. Chess as a substitute involved too much close thinking, and it is, moreover, a game for pairs, not coveys. Various other experiments were tried and found wanting until the possession of a few waterline models of warships, made up from the kits purchasable in every department store, suggested a miniature naval battle, or "Kriegspiel."
Each ship was allowed to progress a certain distance per move and was assumed to fire its guns every time it moved. The skill of all gunners was assumed to be equal, and as a consequence the number of hits secured every time a ship got out from behind its companions and in position to fire. When a ship (again by assumption) had been hit by a certain number of projectiles it sank.
The result was not exhilarating. The game boiled down to a kind of superchess without squares, in which the sole problem was that of arranging one's ships so they did not get in each other's way. This was altogether too easy in a room where the walls imposed an artificial limit on the space for manoeuvres. Battles normally ended in mutual annihilation; the torpedo played no part; and there was produced the unreasonable spectacle of three or four destroyers sinking a battleship by gunfire.
The introduction of dice to determine the number of hits and to produce a variation in gunfire between the two sides only made matters worse. The still more outrageous impossibility of a single destroyer sinking a battleship by gunfire was the result. It was evident that some allowance had to be made for differences in the effect of various guns, and for armor, as well as for the differences among individual gunners. At the same time a yardstick was evidently needed for balancing against each other the fighting powers of quite different types of ships. Was it fair, for instance, to pit two light cruisers against a heavy cruiser with particularly thin armor?
The formula for ship values (in Rule 1) and the method of determining damage was the result of these demands. Neither is ideally perfect in the sense of reflecting the exact conditions of naval warfare. But both are the result of considerable periods of evolution. They represent working approximations which make things easy for the player.
Working out a practical method of gunfire caused even more tooth-gnashing. At various times there were tried flashlights with extra-powerful bulbs, masked to throw a pencil-beam; toy spring cannon shooting wooden plugs; every possible variation on the dice theme; and air pistols, with which the contestants retired to another room to shoot at pictured ships on a wall. All had the fatal objection of turning the game into one of chance, or the dangerous one of introducing a violent sense of unreality.
The present method is the only one that has stood the test of time (Rules 2 and 3.) It was just after the invention of this method of firing that the sweethearts-and-wives influence became manifest. One of the latter appeared as a spectator of what was originally intended to be a purely stag game. In the midst of the ensuing red-hot engagement she was discovered flat on her stomach, aiming the guns of a cruiser and muttering something like "I'll get the so-and-so *this* time." From that date on there was no checking the rising tide of feminism. Today there are nearly as many players of one sex as of the other; and one of the feminine delegation has been praised by a naval officer player as the most competent tactician in the group.
For the group now numbers an occasional officer of the regular navy as well as some from the reserve. Otherwise it is thoroughly cosmopolitan, comprising a broker, a real estate man, a photographer, a botanist, two or three advertising men, several artists (much prized as ship captains because of their accurate estimation of distance) several writers, a chemist, and assorted sweethearts, wives and husbands of the same.
That is, it has proved a game that can be played by almost anyone not too heavily upholstered to bend over and manoeuvre a model ship across the floor. It is also, fortunately, a game whose practical details can be learned in fifteen minutes or less, in spite of the apparent complexity of the rules. Having been told how to move his ship by the speed-scale and how to lay the firing arrows, the rest is up to the individual's keenness of eye and his ability to keep cool amid excitements. The complexities are mostly eliminated before the game starts. Anyone desirous of founding a group however, is advised to begin with a minor action - say one ship on a side - till someone has become sufficiently familiar with the rules to be a referee.
The more players there are the greater the burden that falls on this individual. With seven to ten players on a side, we have found it necessary to expand him into a committee - a head referee, two assistants to measure the shots, and a timekeeper who is also scorekeeper. The necessity of referees is not an objectionable feature; there is seldom any lack of volunteers for posts on this board of temporary Poseidons.
In fact, it is quite the normal procedure for newcomers to begin as spectators, appoint themselves to the referees' board before the evening is over and turn up half an hour early for the next game, demanding command of a battleship. The number who can be accommodated is regulated only by the size of the playing space.
This flexibility - two players to two hundred - is perhaps the best feature of the game. Next comes the fact that it really does provide most of the excitements, calculations, combinations and accidents of war without any damage but that inflicted on kneecaps and stockings. We have had full fleet actions, with columns of battleships blazing at each other, destroyers making torpedo attacks and light cruisers beating them off while airplanes rush in to bomb. We have had minor contacts between divisions of destroyers; submarine hunts; even night battles in pitch dark with pencil-flashlights for searchlights. And the result has been surprisingly like the real thing. The battle off Montevideo was not too much of a surprise to some of the players who had participated in a floor game in which Admiral Graf Spee was pulled down by lighter ships - though at the time the result of the floor game was discounted.
It may be considered, in fact, as a release or catharsis of the war spirit; and if Mr. Hitler and Mr. Stalin had had such a game available, they might not have resorted to killing thousands and disorganizing the lives of millions in order to read dispatches from the front that can give them no more thrill than seeing wooden ships manoeuvre before their eyes, responsive to their wishes. But the aim of this book is nothing so exalted; it is merely to provide some other people with something of the fun we have had out of the game. To those others comprised in that "we," thanks are due; a disproportionate amount of the credit for the game has fallen to myself, but the rules as they stand today are the product of many suggestions from enthusiasts.
Note by John Curry. Interestingly there was a land war section of the Fletcher Pratt rules, however no copy is known to exist of these rules.