This paper describes work performed during the first half of Phase I of the Offshore Code Comparison Collaboration Continuation, with Correlation project (OC5). OC5 is a project run under the IEA Wind Research Task 30, and is focused on validating the tools used for modeling offshore wind systems. In this first phase, simulated responses from a variety of offshore wind modeling tools were modeling tools were validated against tank test data of a fixed, suspended cylinder (without a wind turbine) that was tested under regular and irregular wave conditions at MARINTEK. The results from this phase include an examination of different approaches one can use for defining and calibrating hydrodynamic coefficients for a model, and the importance of higher-order wave models in accurately modeling the hydrodynamic loads on offshore substructures.