Here are the altitude rules I am developing for KotA. The reason I want to design my own altitude rules is that I feel with 6+ players on a single table, the altitude rules as written get a little cumbersome and slow down game play. My goals are to remove as much record keeping as possible and keep it as simple as possible. This means getting rid of the climb counters and different climb rates for all the planes.
Ignoring climb rates is not that hard as most planes of the time had similar rates of climbs. While the differences between planes was a major factor when getting up to altitude, in dogfights it was less important as energy management took over. Dogfights almost always end up losing altitude, not gaining it.
Removing the climb counters turns out not to be such an easy task. While they are tied into climb rates, they also give players insight into if a pilot/plane is trying to climb or dive. In real life, a pilot would be able to see the attitude of the plane he is engaged with and react to the increase or decrease in altitude. This does not translate into game play very well. To off set this, I've designed the following maneuver sequences dealing with altitude changes.
Normal Climb
2 card maneuver
Normal Dive
2 card maneuver
For these to work, the Steep symbol on the climb card would have to be ignored. Since the next card would have to be a stall anyway, that should not matter at all.
The purpose of having a set maneuver after the gain or loss of altitude is to give a vague sense of being able to react to a plane's pitch in attitude. While not perfect, this gives other players a good idea of about where a plane will be after completing a dive or climb (remember, if you know that the next card to be played is, you can deduce the general area the plane will be in after the third card is played). This is similar to how the Immelmann works out.
I am using a narrow range of altitude levels, ranged 1 through 6. Whenever a player plays the red climb or dive maneuver card, their plane is immediately placed in the next higher or lower altitude level. Some missions will state what altitude one or both sides must start at. In order to observe a ground target or do a bombing run, the plane must be at an altitude of 2 or lower. If a plane goes below altitude 1, it is considered grounded and removed from play (unless it lands on a landing strip). A plane that climbs above altitude 6 is considered to have fled the fight and escaped (follow the normal Chased Off rules in KotA). The use of the Litko 6 counter dials make keeping track of altitude very simple.
Shooting can only happen between planes of the same altitude or one level higher or lower. Shooting is reduced to only one shot at half distance of the range ruler.
When a plane is on the ground (or ground targets for that matter) they are considered at level 0. This means in order to strafe them, the plane needs to be at level 1. There are not restrictions to shooting between levels 1 and 0.
While not completely historically correct for the time, I have added the following maneuvers to the rules...
Immelmann
4 card maneuver
Gains 1 band of altitude
Split S
4 card maneuver
Loses 1 band of altitude
For these two maneuvers, I am not sure if the Steep symbol on the climb and dive cards should be ignored or not.
The other part of this system I have not totally figured out yet has to do with the Fokker D.VII. Should the non steep stall and the left and right turn stalls be able to be used as part of the normal climb sequence?
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