The dilemma of cruiser scale?

#1

This was a question that came up several years back, so I wonder if a final decision has been made about the slight error in size?

Since the board hexes are 1.25" across, the two hex long destroyers are 2.5" long, and the four hex long battleships are close to 5" long. The problem is with the light cruisers.
From a conversation i had with the First Sky Lord (many years back) it seems that there was an error in the sizing of the original models. The heavy cruiser at 3 hexes long should have been 3.75" long (though none were ever manufactured), and the light cruisers should have been slightly shorter, about 3.25", although the manufacturer made them too long, at a full 3.75".

So the issue now is what to do about the size of the light cruisers, and how that will affect those of us that still have the old game(s)?

Option 1.) Make the new light cruisers the correct size (~3.25") and the heavy cruisers at 3.75". However the original light cruisers would look too big compared to the new ships.

Option 2.) Make the new light cruisers the same size as the old ones (3.75"), and then make the new heavy cruisers slightly longer, perhaps about 3/8" longer than the existing light cruisers. the disadvantage of this option is that the heavy cruiser model would protrude slightly beyond the 3 hex base.

One factor to consider is if the old moulds are still available, or if theres any chance that they could be reaquired in the future

#2

Make the heavy cruisers and light cruisers the same length, but give them different length to beam ratios. So heavy cruisers could be 3.75" long and 0.75" wide (length to beam of 5:1) while the light cruisers could be 3.75" long and 0.5" wide (7.5:1). Easy as pie

#3

Perhaps, but the original light cruisers are far wIder than that…

#4

So i just measured the original ships (County class).
They are 1" wide without the fins, or 1.5" overall.

Making the new heavy cruisers fatter than that would look a bit too wide, no?

#5

Jeez that’s fat! The USS Oregon BB-3 has a length to beam of 5:1. Honestly I see no need to match the new minis precisely to the old scale… Or at all.

New molds, New minis, improved product line, new scale.

#6

The point isnt to match to the old scale, its trying not to screw over your loyal fan base by changing the scale and leaving them with unusable or out of scale ships.

#7

The reason that width doesnt work is that width isnt the same amongst the different nations. The British & French look to be wider, while the italians and Austrians are narrower. An Italian heavy cruiser might be narrower than a British light cruiser.

#8

As long as they use the same bases the actual mini scale shouldn’t matter. That’s just for aesthetic. Look at BattleTech, all the minis over the years have wildly different scaling, now with the new line of plastic they’re getting all the new stuff on one consistent scale. Do the same with Leviathans.

#9

You can always have a range of sizes, 0.625" to 0.75" for heavy cruiser beam and 0.375" to 0.5" for light cruiser beam. Then people playing with the old minis can fluff the fatties as early cumbersome designs, or slow siege ships.

Plus old players are going to be buying up the new minis anyway because they look better. And it sounds like there’s going to be a lot more national variety in the new minis. Claiming that CGL needs to match the new minis to the old to “not screw over old players” is silly. It’s the old players who are, on average, going to buy most of the new minis because they are the ones that want to see the game succeed and grow. That’s on top of the bases being where the important information is displayed and the minis just being for looks.

#10

The overseas manufacturer took everything, including the molds and their copies of 3-D renders (back before every other hobbyist had a printer at home.) Hence why Leviathans stalled over the years.

As far as I know, the hexes never had an official size and that’s still a thing. CGL learned their lesson in giving BT an official hex to real life scale. It turns out if you start doing real world math on scales and ranges for a universe that features fictional machines running faux physics, things “fall apart.” There’s diminishing returns on the ROI of leaning on simulationism.

I even remember someone with either Naval or Engineering breaking down what they thought the scale distance was. The CGL answer was that if they wanted to use those measurements for their own games, great, but the official CGL answer is an abstract scale.

I have a feeling CGL will eyeball the scale and be close the sizes of the old minis. In some ways, they were too realistic in that the radio towers were too small and fragile. #nobadwrongfun, but I’d chose playability with historical inspiration vs historical fidelity.

#11

Trying to be too accurate might end up causing more problems than it helps. If you look at the info cards for the French ships, you’ll find the Type 3 is actually longer than the Paris-Class Levs. Who knows if that doesn’t get changed as things go along.