"Air War - 1915" Topic

Before there were machine-guns on planes, people had … rifles.

And jolly good fun it was, until someone got hurt.

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Great fun! It was quite a feat for the Germans in the last scenario, well done to the Kaiserīs boys.

Back in the day I added some rules to Richthofenīs War for rifles, pistols, aerial darts, and the odd brick. I donīt think anyone hit anything though.

it's all fun & games until someone gets hurt…..then it's a sport….

It can't be a sport – I stayed awake until the end :)

That was splendid!
I would go with only criticals, make there be a large variety of results, and just say each hit cause either a critical or no damage at all. The hits can be the usual major things but also some minor effects like, "oil line severed. Pilot must wipe oil from his face every other turn (no other action that turn)" "control stick nicked, plane maneuvers with penalty", "cylander shot away, plane has less power available due to wonky engine". That sort of thing.

Bob

Strangely the criticals in Spandau and Lewis only exist to solve an problem I had with the Instant Kill rule I wrote. Firing is resolved by rolling a number of D6 – usually between one and five. Each 5 or 6 is a hit, with a plane being able to take 5-10 hits depending on size. But I wanted the ability to take out a plane with one shot, so I added an extra check – you total how many sixes you get, and roll a D6. If the score is equal to or less than the number of sixes, the target is automatically shot down. Simple.

However this represents things like the pilot being killed or the engine catching fire or a catastrophic structural failure. Fine for single-seater scouts, but they don't take into account larger aircraft or ones with more than one crew. Hence the critical hit table; you roll to see what the 'fatal' hit is – it can be crew, structure or engine. But if you have, say, more than one crew member it may not be the pilot. A plane that's big can survive the extra hits from a structural failure. And a multi-engined plane can lose one engine and still keep going.

The game isn't really designed for one plane vs one, hence the lack of detail. It's designed so one player can easily run four to eight aircraft at a time, giving larger games with whole flights in play. Detailed criticals are too much bookkeeping; tracking ammo, power and hits is enough of a challenge :)

I actually tried an updated version of the scenario tonight. The Germans had an observer machine-gun, whilst the British plane had Hawker's angled Lewis gun lashed to the left wing. It was interesting to see the difference in game-play that effective weaponry gave. Both planes scored a few hits on each other, but the Germans made it home after the British swung too wide around the German plane trying to get a clear shot, and got left behind when it made its run for home.

Trying to line up shots when you can only fire to your left was an interesting challenge for the British plane.

I am looking pretty much for the same thing in a WWI game as you, and these rules look like fun. Will you be updating them anytime soon to include the spotting rules? Also, you mentioned diving in the first fight but I donīt see anything about altitude in the rules, will you be including that as well?

I think the version of 'Spandau and Lewis' you can download from my Free Stuff page includes some draft spotting rules at the back, although the version I am using at the moment is slightly different (mostly number tweaks though, so nothing radical).

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I have no plans to include altitude at the moment. An odd thing to say for an air game, but it was something I didn't want to track. I have tried to factor or abstract its effects into the other mechanisms.

Aha! You are absolutely right! I had the previous version, and so didnīt bother to scroll past design notes. That will teach me to assume. Thanks!

Altitude is absolutely critical in any air war game. Even back in the day when playing Milton Bradley's Dogfight, I created 1/16" diameter piano wire altitude stands. Any aircraft with a height advantage got to add plus one square of movement per altitude level that he dropped that turn, and only aircraft on the same altitude could engage. There was no climbing during a given "mission", so once an airplane dropped a level that was unrecoverable until he landed. We had a decreasing number of higher altitude stands available per side, with only one "lone wolf" maximum altitude stand available, usually for your eminent "ace" plane, so he could pounce at will.

From this humble inclusion of altitude, you could proceed to aircraft differences (something totally lacking from the original Dogfight game, of course). A generalization into ordinary to extraordinary climbers would allow a gradation over several turns of gaining altitude. Reversely, famous divers would be capable of dropping "like a stone", either to attack or escape. In the scale of your game, like we did, only those aircraft at the same altitude can engage each other in combat.

I would place a huge hindrance to getting a hit at all with rifles. If you managed to get within say fifty yards your chances would increase to MAYBE one in thirty-six, i.e. needing boxcars (2d6). If you got so close that you could shout (sic) at each other, then the chances would increase to needing c. 9-12. Once a hit has occurred, then the "critical hit" table of 1d100 comes into play: 80% of the aircraft is going to have a single bullet pass through it without effect, i.e. punch the fabric and perhaps nick a spar or rib but no more. Those other twenty results are equally likely, ranging from one chance in twenty for a control line damaged or shot away, engine hit for reduced performance or dead engine, fuel line severed or fuel tank punctured (no chance of fire however, there was not a single case of shot down in flames during the "carbine period", but a severed fuel line would kill the engine, while a single bullet through a fuel tank would only "dribble" petrol out above the hole, reducing flight time depending on where the hole is, and would the crew even know? that would depend on the aircraft, i.e. where the fuel tank is located), radiator hit (NE if using a radial/rotary or other air-cooled engine) machinegun damaged, crewman wounded or KIA (nearest is simplest, or randomize who gets hit), structural damage (flying wire severed or a strut splintered – or a cracked spar, which manifests the first time the aircraft is put into a "combat turn"), landing gear hit (tire shot out, which becomes a problem only when the airplane is landed), control surface hinge shot out or jammed (either maneuvering suffers or unluckily the whole surface peels off in the wind and the aircraft falls out of control), etc….

Yes, my game does assume that all aircraft are at the same altitude band, and I have considered allowing some planes to start with altitude advantages. As I said in a previous post, I haven't ignored altitude; I am just factoring it in in a more abstract way because I wanted to minimise bookkeeping. I'm trying to avoid tracking anything which fluctuates or which requires markers or special equipment (such as special flight stands). That is part of the design criteria of the game, so I'm pretty strict about what I allow myself to include in the rules.