Games Workshop’s ‘Man O’ War’ Needs to Come Back
While everyone is so excited about 10th 40k, there are still plenty of us looking back fondly at games like Man O’ War that deserve to be revisited.
I’ve been staring at the edge of the water, as long as I can remember. Always knowing I just wanted to be an orkish pirate. Fortunately for me, there’s Man O’ War! Unfortunately for me, it’d been mostly lost to the briny deep.
History O’ Man O’ War
Man O’ War was released in 1993 by Games Workshop and was a project of Nigel Stillman with help from Andy Jones and William King, all Games Workshop veterans. The game takes place in the Warhammer World and focuses on The Old World. As the name suggests, it’s a purely naval battle with lots of magic thrown in. It sold well upon release and is still very well regarded today.
Unfortunately, the game was discontinued in 1995 after 2 expansions. Plaguefleet added Chaos forces to the game and Sea of Blood added sea monsters and flying units. However, Citadel Journal Issue 6 also included rules for Undead ships, although no miniatures were ever made.
The idea wasn’t scrapped forever. In 2011, Games Workshop released Dreadfleet, another naval combat system, which probably didn’t get the attention it deserved. But Dreadfleet isn’t the focus of today, so let’s save that for another day.
Gameplay Overview
Man O’ War is a competitive dice-rolling miniatures combat game. Like with most Games Workshop games, players will have an allotment of points to spend towards their fleet, and plenty of options within that. The base game came with Imperials, Bretonnians, Dwarfs, Elves, Dark Elves, and Orcs. Each race has a number of different ships to purchase as well as specialized crew and equipment. Ultimately, plenty of options for any discerning admiral.
During each player’s magic phase, the active player can attempt to cast any magic card they have in hand, whereupon their opponent can attempt to dispel it. Each spell is discarded upon use as a cast or as a dispel effect. However, dispelling requires a specific color of magic to perform. Each spell card notes at the bottom which spells it can dispel.
After the magic phase is the movement phase where players will have to account for wind direction and utilize the turning token in order to best position themselves where they want to be. Some ships can move by sail or by oar, each with its own advantages. Perhaps most notably, ships with oars and a ram can perform a ramming attack, which can lead to a boarding action.
Fire Cannons!
Each ship is outfitted with a variety of weapons, but mostly cannons. The attacking ship chooses its target and rolls a die for each cannon fired in the proper direction. The result shows on the defending ship’s card where that ship was hit. Some ships are large enough to require the attacker to declare if they are aiming high or aiming low. This will change which sections of the ship could be hit. Of course, each hit can be shrugged off by the defender with a successful saving throw. Each ship’s stats are listed on that section of the defending ship’s card.
As sections of a ship are damaged and destroyed, the ship can be sunk or perhaps taken as a prize if properly boarded. Ships can also be set on fire, turned into wreckage, or turn to mutiny.
Personally, even though I’m very bad at forced movement tabletop games (if I had a nickel for every X-Wing ship I flew off the map), I would love to see Man O’ War make a comeback and let me live out my Orkish pirate dreams. It’s a simple, low-complexity combat game with tons of potential. The sheer amount of options through the ships and crew make it viable even today, where it still has a huge following.
With all the new games Games Workshop is releasing recently, I say it’s time we bring back Man O’ War.
