Blood Red Skies

I've been wanting to try out Blood Red Skies for some time.  My rules of choice for air games have been Bag The Hun but I'd heard lots of good reports about BRS.  Luckily there was a multiplayer game arranged at the local club this week so I managed to blag a space in this and have a go.

The rules are deceptively simple.  They have dispensed with altitude levels and instead planes are either Advantaged, Neutral or Disadvantaged...depicted by using their moveable flight stands although a marker works just as well.  Planes have to be in a better Advantage state to shoot at an opponent but you can also use up this status and do other things (manoeuvre, increase movement etc).

Planes can also attempt to outmanoeuvre opponents, forcing their Advantage status to degrade and making them an eligible target for next turn or for your wing man.  It does encourage some tactical thinking and the use of formations which is always a good thing.   I think there are more complicated rules and tactic cards etc in the boxed set but we didn't use these as it was confusing enough with 8 players.

The game set up had targets on either side of the Channel (ships, radar bases etc) which our bombers were aiming for while both sides had flights of fighters whose mission was to protect the bombers and see off the enemies fighters.  I had a flight of 3 Spitfires who fended off some Me109s and kept a flight of Blenheim's intact.  At the other end of the table there were an assortment of planes including some rather nice Gloster Gladiators slugging it out.  As we all had different victory point criteria it was hard to tell who was winning but in the end it was a narrow victory for the Luftwaffe.

I was impressed enough to go off and order the starter set.  Annoyingly the models produced by Warlord Games are 1/200 while the models I already have are 1/300 but I'm hoping the difference in scale won't stand out too much.

The view from the English coast

Spitfires and Me109s fight it out

A dogfight over the Channel

Hello Rabbit Leader - Battle of Britain boardgame

Although I bought the Battle of Britain boardgame from Plastic Soldier Company back in October I'd only managed one actual game...this was with Eric the Shed towards the end of last year and I was soundly beaten!  So I was pleased to get a chance to give it a second outing this week at Guildford.

Action over the South Coast

My opponent, Anthony, has a preference to play the Brits so I knew there wouldn't be any debate about which side I was going to play!

The game mechanics

The game mechanics are fairy straightforward. Squadrons are organised into Luftflotte or Groups and these comprise 6 German squadrons made up of a mix of fighters and bombers versus RAF squadrons made up of 3 fighters.  The actual composition of each squadron is initially random but can then be adjusted as the game progresses.

The Luftwaffe allocate missions to each squadron; again these are drawn randomly but the German player has some control over where they are allocated.  As German planes reach the British coast and cross a radar marker, the RAF have the option to intercept them.  This can be pretty deadly as the RAF field all 3 fighter squadrons while the Luftwaffe have to put up a random draw of 3 of the 6 cards, which could result in the German bombers being caught in an unwelcome air battle.  The snag for the RAF is that they only have resources to engage in 5 air combats each turn which means inevitably some bombers will get through.

Assuming they survive the initial interception, next turn the Germans can continue to move a further 5 or 10 squares (the RAF only move 3) which does give them the option of reaching far flung targets like Belfast!  The Luftwaffe have 3 target types:  radar stations (which mean they cant be automatically intercepted), airfields (which make them unavailable to the RAF) and cities (which deny the RAF production points).  The RAF can also dogfight with German squadrons but this is fought as a series of one on one fights which means the Germans have the chance to field fighters where available...again there is a 5 combat limit which means the RAF player has to choose carefully where and when to pick his fights.

Assuming that some of the bombers at least have made to their targets they are then able to make a bombing run (and risk ack-ack fire in the process).  Squadrons then return automatically to home but do have to check on losses on the way back depending how much fuel they have used on the way

Go Luftflotte 5!!!!

At the end of the turn the RAF use the available production points to repair damaged radar and airfields and restore damaged aircraft.  The Luftwaffe don't have the luxury of repairing aircraft but do have a much bigger starting stock (apart from the rather weedy Luftflotte 5 who fly out of Norway with a frankly rubbish small mix of bombers and fighters...historically accurate though)

So how did our game go?  I was very lucky in that my initial choice of bombing missions was largely concentrated on the south and east coasts so I was able to knock out a couple of radar stations in turn 1.  Some lucky dice throwing on my part also meant that the RAF took heavy casualties...especially 10 Group covering the South and West.  I had less success around the SE but did manage to knock out a radar station in the North West and avoid too many casualties on Luftflotte 5.  The high amount of damage meant the RAF couldn't repair everything and get planes back in the air and crucially the gap in radar cover meant I was able to pile squadrons through the gaps and bomb Exeter and Swansea. Although these were repaired next turn I was also able to bomb Portsmouth and the Port of London and keep the pressure up on the South coast.  Luftwaffe casualties were mounting this point however and we ran out of time for the final turn but it was looking like a narrow victory for the Luftwaffe.

Each Luftflotte has a management board to organise flights and missions

Back when I first posted about the Battle of Britain game there was a lot of grumbling (including by me) about the quality of the miniatures, the bendiness of the wings etc.  I've straightened out most of the planes which was pretty easy to do and they look good on the table.  They aren't meant to be detailed representations of the the squadrons...the actual plane used has no connection to the composition of the Luftflotte or Group.  Think of them as the counters being pushed around by WRAFs on a map table in a Command Centre somewhere in the South of England while a stoic Wing Commander smokes his pipe and looks on pensively...to that end they work very well.  The only niggle I still have is the size of the stickers used on the bases to denote which Flight and Squadron each one represents...although they are colour coded which helps the writing is tiny which makes it very easy to mix up the flights.  Despite this the game is great fun and well worth looking out for.

Bag the Trucks

This week we played a game of Bag the Hun for the first time in ages.  I haven't really found a better set of air rules which are as quick to grasp and very playable as these.

 

For tonight's game I pitched a flight of Spitfires against some Me109s and a couple of Stukas.  In order to give the Stukas something to do there were several trucks heading across the table which the RAF had been tasked with protecting.  As it was the Stukas strafed the convoys once to little effect but the Luftwaffe were definitely gaining the upper hand over the enemy fighters.

Good fun, especially as I haven't played them for some time.  I've also heard good things about 'Check Your 6" which I think are more detailed involve smaller actions that BtH but any suggestions for good air rules would be gratefully received... not that I'm unhappy with BtH but you can never have too many rules!

Forza Italia 2... biplane v biplane

Last week at Guildford we had the first 'official' game in a small Bag the Hun campaign that Keith and I have been playing.  There is a wider plan to have a Med based naval campaign so we wanted to see how the games worked when linked together.

For the first game my Italian's  led a flight of 4 Fiat CR42s and a couple of Stukas against a British convoy of barges, hoping to cause as much damage as possible before the inevitable British fighters turned up to spoil the fun.

The Stukas attack the barges, cunningly disguised as wooden bases

Initially all went well with the Stukas diving down on the barges, occasionally being driven off by anti-aircraft fire but not taking damage while a pair of CR42s strafed the barges at low level.  The 2nd pair of Fiats circled high above watching for the arrival of the Fleet Air Arm.

After 3 turns of merrily bombing and strafing a flight of 3 Gladiators  arrived and the CR42s peeled off to engage them, leaving the Stukas to continue the attack on the barges.  The 2nd group that been strafing took a very long time to climb to the correct altitude so it was left to group #1 to engage.

Some lucky firing from the Fiats shot up the lead Gladiator, damaging his controls and forcing him to turn tail and head off as he could no longer engage the enemy.  There then followed a couple of rounds of circling and twisting as both sides attempted to get onto each others tails, or even get anywhere near a decent enough position to get a shot off.

Finally the Fiats managed to get a burst of fire against the Gladiator flight leader and scored a critical hit!  Disappointingly all this did was cause the plane to swerve sideways.... but luckily this took it straight into the path of the remaining Gladiator, piloted by a very unlucky Rookie.  Again this wasn't disastrous as all Keith had to do to avoid the mid-air collision was not roll double 6.... and of course that's exactly what he did!  The Rookie was killed and the swerving Gladiator went into a spin, needing to test every turn to regain control and pull out of the dive.

The CR42's gunfire hits the Gladiator, forcing it into the path of it's colleague

Sportingly the Fiats followed him down, machine gunning the spinning biplane and causing major damage to his control which we decided would mean he couldn't regain control and plummeted to the ground.  As the bombers had now exhausted their supply of bombs, sinking 3 barges and damaging a 4th, we decided it was time to head for home just in case any more fighters appeared.

So a very successful first out for the Regia Aeronautica and a rather dismal start for the FAA but I'm sure there's plenty of time for them to even the score.

Forza Italia!!!

This week saw us dipping our toe in the water of a WW2 air and sea campaign at Guildford.

We've just concluded an excellent naval campaign based around a Japanese invasion of Port Moresby in which the allies somehow managed to snatch victory from the sinking carrier of defeat [although I'm still not entirely sure how we managed...my Australian Admiral had been brushing up his handy Japanese phrases for weeks...].  This inspired us to have a look at a Mediterranean based campaign...we've still some way to go before this gets off the ground but Keith and I thought we'd brush up our skills at Bag the Hun, the excellent air rules from Too Fat Lardies.

Keith obliged by providing the planes and his rather neat double sided mat from Hotz Mats.  I have one of these with 3" hexes which I've used for 1:300 planes but Keith's mat has [I think] 1" hexes and he has some really neat 1:600 planes.



The scenario pitted 2 pairs of the Regia Aeronautica's elite Fiat CR42's against 2 Blenheims that were trying to get safely across the Med.  Bag the Hun is a deceptively simple system which encourages formation flying and, like many TfL rules uses a card activation system.  Neither of us had played it for some time and it took us a couple of turns to get back into the swing of the manoeuvre system.

The Falco's [or should that be Falchi] buzzed around the Blenheims blazing away to little effect.  The leader of Flight #2 was so keen that he'd expended all his ammo in 2 passes and had to settle for becoming the wingman to his less experienced colleague.

The Blenheim's were able to return fire but this also proved pretty ineffective and both sides continued to display some neat formation flying if nothing else.  A damaged fuel line on one of the Falco's all the tailgunners were able to achieve while the Italians managed to kill a gunner and reduce their effectiveness but little else.

After several turns the RAF reinforcements which had steadfastly refused to appear finally turned up... a flight of 3 Tomahawks.  The Italians fired a last blast at the Blenheim's, forcing one to take evasive action by diving... Keith then had a couple of nervous turns as the pilot struggled [and failed] to regain control and continued heading for the Med before he finally managed to pull the plane out of it's dive. 

The Tomahawks which eventually turned up.

The Falco's buzzed past the fighters and rapidly headed for home, having decided that the fight had suddenly become a bit unfair.  Here the Italian Junior Ace who was leading Flight #1 showed why he was the superior pilot by rapidly overtaking his colleagues and heading for the table edge at record speed!

Zoooom... the Falco's break the sound barrier while heading for home!

So, a really enjoyable game where no one died!!  I'd guess the reports back at the respective bases would tell how the Blenheims had been badly shot up and almost certainly destroyed while the Falcos also had to battle against dozens of RAF fighters, or that the bombers had come under wave after wave of Italian fighters and had driven them off with British pluck!  Medals all round I'd say!!!