OTT-FYM Mission 1 First Outing April 5th 1917 by ShadowDragon
OTT-FYM Mission 1 – First Outing – April 5th 1917 by ShadowDragon
FYM Scenario by Hu Rhu:
https://www.wingsofwar.org/forums/sh...1917-by-Hu-Rhu
The roar of the three, sleek, tandem aeroplanes that landed unannounced at X Squadron Station brought most of the staff out to see what was up. Soon they were marvelling the hitherto unknown machines - obviously, the latest British technology. Each of the tandems had only a pilot and no observer. That was all very strange – unknown tandems, no observers, and no announcements of deliveries. What was going on?
The old hands figured that they’d soon find out and it probably meant nothing good.
“Could be doings of Teaticket at HQ”, muttered a visiting chap from one of the neighbouring RFC squadrons.
The three tandem pilots approached the crowd of gapping X Squadron crew. The senior of them approached someone who appeared to know what was what. That would have been a mistake but fortunately, all the chap wanted to know was where he could find the commanding officer and the Wardroom. He headed for the former and directed his two comrades to the latter. The crowd - none wanting to be ‘volunteered’ - followed the two junior pilots.
Sure enough, before long the CO, Sir Henry, had the tandem flight commander, Robert Samson summoned.
The new machines were the latest Bristol tandems, but a flight of six from 48 Squadron had gone out earlier and met with a terrible misfortune – four of them were shot down. HQ was hopping mad about the situation and requested urgent combat testing – top priority. X Squadron had something of a reputation and someone at HQ had selected them for the honour.
“You mean we’re to be Guinea Pigs”, grimaced Petty Officer Jim Haviland – the observer of the American crewed tandem.
“More like expendable lab rats,” replied his pilot, Lt. Teddy Mahan, “with three new members for the flight.”
Teddy was referring to Samon’s observer, AM3 Bobby Stewart, a replacement for his laid up regular observer AM1 Max Little. The French crew, s/Lt Nicolas Davout and Cpl Jean Roussel, were new too – replacing the recently deceased, Michel Lannes, and the injured Louis Perrin.
In less than an hour the Entente Flight – as the British, American, and French crewed tandems were affectionately called – were up in the air and crossing No Man’s Land. Right one cue their foes – three Albatros DIII – were there to greet them.
The tandems kept a tight formation while the DIII came at them in a pincer move – two on the right and one on the left. They ones on the right were closer and approached Samson where neither he nor his observer could fire. The French tandem was in position to fire but only managed to jam their forward machinegun. Fortunately, the Hun’s shooting wasn’t much better.
No sooner had the green Albatros passed Samson’s tandem when an explosion caused Samson to turn his head – the green Hun had found something vital on the American tandem and it was spiralling downward, but it seemed like the Americans had done some damage to the green DIII. It appeared to Samson that the Hun pilot was out of control – wounded or dead, he wondered?
The new Bristol tandems seemed powerful enough – and fast too. Samson wondered if one could do an Immelmann manoeuvre with one. It might be worth trying back at the station.
The blazing guns of the light blue DIII brought Samson out of his daydreaming. The green DIII was leaving the fight, but that still left two very capable Huns. Samson looked to his left; the new French crew were keeping in a tight formation with his tandem
Bullets were flying in every direction, but few were hitting their targets, thought Samson.
No sooner had that thought passed through Samson’s mind when his new observer, Bobby Stewart, managed to put a few rounds into the engine of the light blue DIII.
The white DIII executed a perfect Immelmann for a close-range opportunity at the French tandem – and, he missed! Worse – Siggi found himself in a hail of bullets from both enemy aeroplanes. One of these grazed his head causing his vision to blur. The new British tandems were fast – faster than anticipated.
Samson circled around and assessed the situation. The light blue DIII hadn’t yet turned for home, so it was still two-on-two.
As Samson circled back to intercept the light blue DIII, another crack announced an exploding aeroplane, but this time it was the enemy. Good showing for the new French crew, thought Samson.
The light blue DIII was in a predicament. He had sputtering engine and two enemy tandems barring his way to safety.
He nearly slipped past the Bristols but nearly wasn’t good enough. Fire erupted from the engine of the DIII.
The fire was manageable, but the Albatros was heavily damaged and wouldn’t sustain much more.
With Samson’s gun jammed and the French tandem far off, it looked like the Hun would escape.
Unfortunately for the Hun, the new Bristol F2A were faster than a sputtering DIII. The French tandem caught up and Nicolas was able to match Jean’s score for the day – the light blue turned its nose to the earth.
(Note: I did not notice that Samson shouldn’t have shot at Schmidt as his gun was still jammed. The ‘x’ marks the two damage cards that should be ignored. The one shot by Davout was sill enough as the DIII had 13 or 14 damage points.)
Feelings back at the Naval Station were mixed. The new tandems seemed that better than their first outing with 48 Squadron had shown but X Squadron had lost yet another experienced tandem crew.
Note: For the expanded firing arc of the F2A, I rolled 50-50 that there would be a shot taken in the arc between the forward firing arc and the rear arc, as printed on the card. In only one case was the tandem observer’s roll successful – out of 4 or 5 opportunities.
Points:
Seadogs = 2 shot down X 10 + 1 FRTB X 5 = 25 points
Adlers = 1 shot down X 10 = 10 points
A win for the Seadogs and their new tandems.
A great scenario, Gary. It think it was well balanced.
Comments: The game was a good fight that really could have been a win for either side. The bad part – as usual – were the unkind C&W / E&E rolls. I was okay with Haviland being a PoW, but it really hurt to lose Siggi. Oh well.
Evaluating the fight – for those interested in this type of trivia!
Speed: According to the Wings of Linen website the F2A had a maximum speed of 110 mph vs the F2B 120 mph. The DIII is listed between 103 and 109 mph. Perhaps the J* deck, with average speed, would be more suitable for the F2A instead of the S deck. I don’t think it would have made a difference. Schmidt’s DIII had engine damage (i.e., using 1 stall card per turn) and still had 2 more fire damage cards to draw with just 1 point left on his DIII.
Damage Card Draws: The Adlers drew 20 cards – 15 in a fair fight, 1 fire damage and 4 while Schmidt was fleeing the fight. The Seadogs drew 12 cards. Ignoring the fire damage and the pursuit cards, it’s 15 vs 12 cards while dogfighting. An edge for tandems with both forward and rear guns is to be expected. As mentioned, I used a 50% roll that the F2A rear gunner would fire into the expanded firing arc (between the marked rear arc and the forward arc). My rationale is that in combat the firer cannot be that precise about whether a target is in or out of a firing arc, so some shots would take place beyond the marked arc. I think there were 4 opportunities (I thought there were more but I can only spot 4 in the photos) and only on one occasion did the rear gunner fire.
Damage Points: It’s tricky with boom cards. The Adlers got full value for their boom as that F2A suffered no other damage. The boom inflicted on the Adlers (Siggi) was irrelevant since Siggi suffered his 2nd wound and would have been shot down anyway, but his DIII still had 6 points left – so one could count that boom’s value at 0 or 6 points. Taking into account expected damage from damage cards, fire damage and booms (at half an enemy plane’s value - i.e., 8 vs the F2A and 7 vs the DIII), the expected damage for the drawn cards was about 28 vs the Alders and 24 vs the Seadogs. The actual damage, treating the booms as mentioned above was 26 to 32 vs the Adlers, depending on the valuation of the boom card, and 23 vs the Seadogs. Final note on damage – it’s clear that the Adlers got more than their fair share of 0 damage cards vs the F2A, but the Boom card on a fresh F2A compensated for that.
Critical Damage: Both sides drew boom cards, so it was even for that damage. However, the Adlers drew 2 cards that led to FRTB while the Seadogs didn’t draw any. Expected results would be one for each side, so the Seadogs got the benefit there as the FRTB gave the F2A a definite tactical advantage.
If one allows the F2A to both use Immelmann turns and have an expanded rear arc, they are a definite match for the DIII.
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Originally Posted by Hu Rhu
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