Tides of War

I know many of you are in merry olde England or otherwise overseas, but in the US there are clubs that battle 1/144 scale radio controlled warships, covered with balsa wood and shoot BBs at each other. They have pumps, but if they take too much damage, they sink. They are then easily retrieved, emptied of water, patched up and sent to battle again. I've seen a couple of battles, and it is really incredibly fun to watch, and better to play. These are all World War I/II era ships from destroyers up to the mightiest battleships (the Yamato and Iowa are over six feet long, and weighh sixty pounds) , and they play games from straight fleet battles to campaign games with shore bombardment and convoys. I am planning on buying my own warship soon, and figured that Enigma players might either want to get involved or just see what it's all about. Here are a few sites if anyone is interested:

Swampworks- they sell models and all the equipment you'll need Simply amazing site

Model Warship Combat Inc, the site for the main US club. Photos, articles, list of local chapters, etc. Pretty impressive as well. These guys get really into it.

If you're like me, and love Enigma, Fighting Steel, and all sorts of WWII battleship combat, this hobby might be fun for you.

Enjoy,

Matt

aka "Lucky Jack"

Does look fun. I watched some of the videos on that club site and the damage dished out to the battlecruisers was impressive. Looks like it could be quite an expensive hobby though if you have to keep replacing damaged parts and if I take up another hobby my wife will probably have me strung up from the main mast.

They need a huge area so they can have a big war with some tanks and aircraft mixed in =) Looks like fun

Dont do R/C but do a lot of Table top Naval wargaming, played a WW2 Scenario yesterday Jap's v Brits in the South China Sea

No the ships are expensive, my fantasy USS Chicago heavy cruiser, if ever built, will have a total cost of about $700. Once in action, though, nothing is damaged, you just keep draining the ship, charging the batteries, and patching the balsa wood with silkspan modeling tissue. Or, if your ship got shredded (there is a story on the mwci.org site of the HMS Valiant taking some 500 bbs and not sinking) you might have to resheet the hull with balsa, but its not expensive after the ship is built. No one would play if you had to keep replacing damaged expensive parts.

Although, someone I met at one of these battles is building an Iowa class which will run him $1300 before construction costs (including balsa wood and silkspan and all the construction supplies), so that would be about $1450, so a big difference between a 3 foot heavy cruiser with three battle units and a 6.5 foot 70 lb battleship with 8 units.

Thats about Au$2000 =)

and around 700 uk pounds

It sounds interesting, but where would I get the Parts? After all, I am only a student.

Sounds like I could probably afford a radio controlled trawler at those prices - definately a hobby for the retired and wealthy!