"Raid into Germany - Late 44'" Topic

Yeah you know it …. Late 44' … Means ME 262's, ME 163's, FW 190 A-7's, A-8's, ME 109 K's, G-10's, ME 110's against B-17Gs, P-51Ds, P-47D's, & P-38Js.

Battle started out as a group of 40 B-17Gs (Actually 10 but each counted as 4), lead by 4 screening P-51D's made their way into German territory. The Bombers also had the company of 2 P-47Ds and a pair of P-38J's as top cover. All was well for the first 3 turns, then 3 ME 262s came screaming out of the clouds, 2 on one side and a single on the other. THe first 2 hammered 2 Bombers pretty well, but got caught crossing into the box and blown out of the sky. The 3rd, never really made it into the bombers as he was cut off by a set P-51Ds and managed to flame one of his engines, thus he had other issues, which lasted for more than 8 more turns. BUt it wasnt over for the bombers. Coming down from ahead were several FW190s and a ME 109, each blasting holes thru the bombers as they went. "Virginia" caught an unlucky burst in her ordanance, and blew up in mid-air, while "boxer shorts" and "Hot Pants" both caught fires on engines. "Two bits" Took a hard elevator hit and some rudder damage & fell back due to a spin. MEanwhile another bomber loses control for a turn and ends up heading away from the group… With 2 Bombers gone, and 2 stragglers and another 2 on fre, the going was getting tough.. but the bombers pressed on. A lone wolf (FW190) slipped one too many times, and found himself the recipient of the business end of 8 50 cals, courtousy of a P-47 … needless to say, there wasnt much left of him to identify! While the escorts were busy with the original interceptors, a ME 163 came streaking in from behind, blasting away at one of the bombers, before being targetted himself and put out of action. Another rear attacker (FW190) came in unnoticed, to decimate several of the B-17s and picked off one of the stragglers.
Out of the intial formation of 40 B-17s …. 16 were able to bomb the target… an attrition rate that is undoubtably too high to warrant a second attempt, thus victory was given to the German defenders for their tenacious attacks and nearly totally decimation of the allied Bombers, even though comments were made reagrding that their were too many Allied fighters on the board! THis was a great game … It got pretty BUSY at times, but was defintely eventful, as I have never seen 5 planes on fire in a game before! And the 262 who originally developed one fire, also managed to develope 2 simultaneously … great looking game!

This game was held at the World War 2 museum, in New PRlean this last Weekend. Game rules were KNights Cross, and 1/144 scale planes were used. Pictures can be seen at 2 yahoo groups (Joining is free). OR one pic (my favorite) can be seen at the front page of the West Tennessee gaming groups yahoo page.

W-TN Gaming Group: link

KNights Cross gaming group: link

Cheers!
-Troy

Sounds like fun Troy.

Thanks for sharing.

Which B-17 models did you use?

Best regards,

Rob

Thanks! the scenario was fun and at times BUSY due to the number of players and the space constrictions!

Word of advice for those playing in similar games… TAKE YOUR TIME, especially when moving aircraft…. when folks bum-rush to move their planes is usually when one or more get hit, knocked over, and BROKE! I typically step back from the table to allow others to move their planes, then I go move mine. If I were asked to move mine first, I glady will oblige, but I prefer to keep my models in one piece.

Models: I want to say Minicraft (Yankee Doodle, Bit o Lace…etc..) I dont think there are any Revell kits in there. or maybe I got em all wrong and they are all revell and not minicraft! but they were 1/144 scale planes. I also scavenged 1/72 decals from (a P-38 fighter group, B-24 (1/144) and B-29s), as they matched up well for the nose arts, just to give more than one llok for nose arts.

I played in thr first 8 turns of this scenario and it was a blast! I had the FW190,which I assumed is the one that slipped in front of the P-47.LOT of participants but it was fun and Troy did a great job running the game.Hope to get into one of his Russian front aerial battles in the future.

Thanks,Troy!

MD