More altitude discussion

[sparty]

Altitude...

The full rules with climb rates, etc. seem handy at first glance, but in my play so far they've not been especially useful. My assumption has been that they scale better than when played with 2 players and multiple planes.

For example a 5 player game with each player controlling 1 or 2 planes would have a greater return on using altitude than say a 2 player game.

The reason why I'm bringing it up is that the climb rates for some of the planes while historically reasonable seem pretty punitive. The two-seaters requiring 4 or 5 turns seems pretty long even though it's accurate to say they took twice as long to climb compared to say a Sopwith Camel or DR.I.

That 5 turns, however, in game time is incredibly long.

How are folks seeing the altitude rules used well as written? Optimum players, etc. would be handy as well.

[check6]

i do a slight variation on the current altitude rules that seems to work well and keeps the variations in climb rate accurate.

the way i play it is as follows.

every time a climb card is played, you gain one altitude
but, when you do, you must wait a number of cards equal to your climb rate minus one before playing another

ie
a sopwith camel (climb rate 3) may play a climb once every three cards.

[The Blue Baron]

i do a slight variation on the current altitude rules that seems to work well and keeps the variations in climb rate accurate.

the way i play it is as follows.

every time a climb card is played, you gain one altitude
but, when you do, you must wait a number of cards equal to your climb rate minus one before playing another

ie
a sopwith camel (climb rate 3) may play a climb once every three cards.

Sry, but this makes no sense since you can only play one climb card each turn because you only have one in your deck. With your rule all planes with clim rates from 1-4 can clim equally well.

We use altitude rules as written and think they work well.

@Sparty: Where do you see the difference between the same amount of planes played by two or more players?

[Pooh]

We use altitude rules as written. In our games scouts (particularly those with climb 2) may climb 1 or 2 levels during the game but 2 seaters and other slower climbing planes usually don't even try to go up whole levels. When trying to escape the attentions of enemy scouts they typically start diving levels trading altitude for separation.
They do go up pips as we use collision rules and its not nice to bump your wingman when trying to turn.

Pooh

[sparty]

@Sparty: Where do you see the difference between the same amount of planes played by two or more players?

Hi Baron -

In a two player game you get into a stalemate...1 player has a single undamaged plane remaining at flight level 5 while the other player has 2 hurt planes at flight level 7. The guy at 5 says, "I'm not coming up to get destroyed." and the guy at level 7 says, "I'm not flying down there to destroy you so you can get the jump on one of my wounded planes."

In a 4 player game with 1 plane per player, you'd be more likely to entice other players to various flight levels. The larger the game, the more advantageous altitude changes would be to separate the "good" players from the "weaker" players or separate the weaker planes from the higher damage ones.

[The Blue Baron]

Hi Baron -

In a two player game you get into a stalemate...1 player has a single undamaged plane remaining at flight level 5 while the other player has 2 hurt planes at flight level 7. The guy at 5 says, "I'm not coming up to get destroyed." and the guy at level 7 says, "I'm not flying down there to destroy you so you can get the jump on one of my wounded planes."

In a 4 player game with 1 plane per player, you'd be more likely to entice other players to various flight levels. The larger the game, the more advantageous altitude changes would be to separate the "good" players from the "weaker" players or separate the weaker planes from the higher damage ones.

I think that's is just a question of the victory conditions. The player who is loosing at a given point of time will have to act while the player who is winnig can be more passive or (if he leads by enough victory points) start retreating to end the game...

[sparty]

If it's 2 vs 2 planes.

Allies knock out 1 central powers plane. They then fly off the board. According to the scoring rules provided in the BD rulebook for those actions, you're going to win regardless of engaging the lone enemy plane.

[IRM]

Then use a larger version of the "Face To Face" scenario. It doesn't use points and if all one side's aircraft leave the table he loses.

[The Blue Baron]

If it's 2 vs 2 planes.

Allies knock out 1 central powers plane. They then fly off the board. According to the scoring rules provided in the BD rulebook for those actions, you're going to win regardless of engaging the lone enemy plane.

I don't think that there are official scoring rules in BD. There are specific rules for the different scenarios.

But nevertheless: if you play 2 vs 2 (straight dogfighting, no additional targets) shooting one plane down and leaving across your side of the gaming area should be a victory for the player who does so. The scoring could be:
shooting enemy plane down: +3 per plane
leaving acroos your side: -1 per plane
leaving across another side: -2 per plane