Man O' War (1993)

Man O' War is the game of Raging Sea Battles in the Warhammer World. As an admiral of an ocean-going war fleet you must command your ships - squadrons of Ships of the Line and heavily armored Men O' War - in the battle for supremacy of the high seas.

Players choose fleets from the multitude of races in the Warhammer world. Every ship is represented by a template showing individual areas, along with the items (masts, cannons etc.) in those areas as well as the damage that they can take before being destroyed. At the beginning of each turn, players determine Initiative (who will go 1st in each phase) and then conduct the Magic Phase with each player making one spell attempt if desired. Next, players alternate between each phase of Movement and Combat, each choosing a single Man O War or squadron and then conducting its movement and making any attacks possible before passing the turn sequence back to their opponent. This process continues until all squadrons/Men O' War have moved on both sides. Once that has occurred, the turn is over and a series of quick turn ending/record keeping events occurs before moving to the next turn. Game play continues for a predetermined time or until one side is destroyed, surrenders or flees the battlefield.

There were two separate expansions to the main game. The first was Plaguefleet which added rules and templates for the Chaos fleets of Khorne, Slaanesh, Tzeentch and Nurgle (collectively known as a Plaguefleet), the Skaven and finally the Chaos Dwarfs. This expansion effectively doubled the number of available fleets for the game. This expansion also included color templates for the original 6 races as well (Imperial, Bretonnian, Dwarf, High Elf, Dark Elf and Orc).

The 2nd expansion Sea of Blood mainly introduced new rules for Airpower, Sea Monsters & Beasts and Allies as well as new ships for the Dwarfs and Imperial fleets. The inclusion of the Norse fleet wrapped up the content for this expansion.

A wide variety of miniatures were produced to represent the many ships detailed in the game rules. Assembling and painting the miniatures gave the game a feeling of being "collectible" as well as being a hobby in itself.

Detailed Information

More detailed and extensive information on the miniatures and other aspects of this game can be found on the supplemental Man O War wiki page.

Microbadges Available:

Man O' War Microbadge Owners

Man O' War Wiki Page on BGG