"Somewhere Over the Channel, 1940" Topic

All,

I played a monster dogfighting game this past Sunday: eight Spitfires vs eight Me-109s, four hours, 109 pictures, a lot of fun, but I'm worn out!

The report is very long, and I apologize for that, but I put quite a few insights into the rules in there.

And things got a little crazy…

For anyone interested, please check the blog at:
link

On a side note, I received my Pendraken package so I can finish my France 1940 forces.

V/R,
Jack

Wow, four hours for a fight of about 2 flights per side? That's a lot of time for an encounter that would take mere minutes in the real world. You must be a far more patient soul than I, Jack!

MM,

"You must be a far more patient soul than I…"
Possible, but no probable ;)

Yeah, four hours, certainly longer than I was hoping for, but still a real blast, until the very end with the Brits fighting for scraps. It was really akin to sharks circling a wounded manatee ;)

Regarding the game time vs 'real' time, I'd never really looked at it that way, just never even thought of it. You could probably apply that to most games, at least platoon, maybe company, and lower. A skirmish firefight between two squads probably lasted three minutes, but played out in 2 hours on the tabletop.

I dunno; I'm always looking for quick rules that still provide the flavor of what (I think) the period was like. If I sound a bit sour, it's only because I should have halted the game when Blau 1 was damaged; at that point it was no longer a fight. But up til then it was a real barnburner, and I didn't realize how much time had gone by because I was having a great time.

V/R,
Jack

Would it be feasible to add and remove Lego pieces on the flight stands in order to better display altitude?

Sadowa,

It is possible, but for me it's not really feasible. That is, it takes quite a bit of time to swap them in and out. I tried it once a couple years ago, it's the reason I bought those tiny dice ;)

I agree it would look much better, but for me it's not worth the trade-off in time.

Thanks for taking a look.

V/R,
Jack

Excellent Batrep Jack. I was particularly interested in this when I saw it was WW2 (I have quite a lot of aircraft in various scales). Is the core of the game based on the 5Core system?

Sounded like you really enjoyed the game. Granted you mentioned the final hour dragged on little but you have plans in the pipeline that'll hopefully settle things more decisively. I know how that is though; I played the last section of a Bolt Action game and was very enjoyable but for the last 20mins when the US were mopping up the last enemy stragglers and it seemed to go on forever. Some form of morale system seems to be needed alright.

You said the first couple of turns were played without the reaction fire rules. I'd imagine it makes quite a difference. Is it unusual to have a reaction fire in an air combat game?

Whole game looked great and was a very enjoyable read. Makes me want to get out some of those spitfires :)

Thanks for the post

Panda,

Yes, heavily 5Core based (activation and firing, and combat effects mechanisms). The game was great, and I will make sure there's no dragging on in future games. I also want to come up with some 'canned' scenarios for the game that 1) make set up a little more interesting than 'put your planes on that edge and I'll put my planes on this edge,' and 2) get planes into contact a bit quicker.

Yes, I forgot about the reaction rules (I'd played the previous two games without them, as I wanted to get the core stuff down first). I don't know that I've seen another set of air rules with react fire, but it made a huge difference, and felt great in that it 1) didn't let you perform circus maneuvers before the enemy, 2) it forced formations to break up, and 3) if forced changes in altitude (to avoid react fire), which I thought was fantastic.

I'm not sure how I feel about react fire with modern, missile-age fights, but it felt fantastic with the WWII gunfights (and I imagine will be great once I get bombers with waist gunners and ball turrets, as well).

Get your planes out buddy.

V/R,
Jack

Interesting AAR. I especially like the detail.

MH

Thanks MH, I appreciate it.

V/R,
Jack

Interesting battle Jack! Would like to hear more about the rules. Of course, I know you are using Squadron Forward to generate your squadron!

Cheers

Joe

Thanks Joe, and I'll be putting out more info, likely in the form of a full-blown turn, to show how the rules work.

I haven't been using Squadron Forward yet as I'm still just testing them, but I will ;)

V/R,
Jack

I am currently using a heavily modified version of BTH. I have kept maneuvers and tailing and the fact that you roll lots of dice. Planned to publish it in a special someday.

Joe