Gritty Goblin Games Wings of War/Glory, 5 March 2020

[RJG173]

AAR #1 - Dogfight A 1918 dogfight with three German aircraft verses 4 Allied. John flew his German captured Sopwith Camel, BobP a Fokker D.VII repainted he won on the forums some time ago, and I flew my recently completed Hansa-Brandenburg W-29. Craig, BalticBob and Jim all flew Eddie Rickenbacker's Nieuport 28 while Todd had another Nieuport 28. I think the allies were trying to confuse us with all those '12's.

Here we are closing on those USA pilots.



BobP and I have slipped past the Nieuports while introducing them to my rear gunner. John has managed to surround the Nieuports and plans to take on all comers.



That plan didn't work out so well.



Jim's Nieuport is the first to crash. I like how the custom base causes four pegs to be shorter than on an Ares base so the wing of my W-29 slips under the wing of Jim's Nieuport.



BobP and I are ganging up on Craig while my rear gunner takes a shot at Todd. I really like the large firing arc on the W-29. BalticBob trails behind Craig.



And Craig crashes in No-Man's land.



Now Todd is out of the game. That was the first Boom card of the game.



At this point we called the game in favor of the Germans. BalticBob only had four damage points, but he would have had a difficult time taking on two German planes.

[RJG173]

AAR #2 - Locate the Paris gun On March 21, 1918 Paris was shelled by the Paris Gun, a large long-range, railroad deployed artillery gun. Also, while reading Groupe de Combat 12 'Les Cigognes' there was mention of a French pilot taking a early morning flight in his Spad searching for the Paris gun, but he did not return from his mission. A scenario is born. I found the below image of a railway gun and made a target card from it.



Two other targets were deployed all face down on the table. Four French scouts had to locate the Paris gun by flying within 1/2 ruler length of a card. The pilot then got to see what the target was. If it was the Paris gun, he had to return to HQ with the information. If it was not the gun, he had to continue on to the next target. Three Nieuport 28s were flown by Todd, BalticBob, Jim and I flew a Spad XIII. BobP flew his D.VII while John and Craig flew Siemens-Schuckert D.IIIs to stop us in our mission. We decided that any French plane that was shot down would respawn as a German SS D.III in a corner of the table.

Our plan was that BBob and Jim would fly down the left side of the table heading for the left target and if it was a bust to then head for the middle target. Todd and I would do the same thing on the right side of the table.

However only two rounds of combat knocked Jim out with a near straight (poker reference). So he respawned as a SS D.III in the left corner while BalticBob continued on his mission without a wingman. Meanwhile Todd and I were advancing on the right, but my Spad quickly outpaced Todd's Nieuport.



I flew by the rightmost target but it was not the cannon. Fortunately I had planned my maneuvers, so that if the target was not the gun, I could easily continue to the middle card. Notice John is on my tail. He didn't take getting shot down in the first game well and was out for revenge. Off the photograph to the left BalticBob was streaking for friendly lines. Did he find the Paris Gun or was he trying to fake out the Germans?



The middle target was also a bust, but I felt that I had to continue on to the third target just to be sure. John hit me with a No-Left turn special damage. That was going to make it difficult for me to pass the target card and then head for friendly lines. His next hit at +1 was a No-Right turn special damage card. Now I am really in a pickle. I reached the target and it was indeed the gun. How I had to plan my maneuvers carefully so that I didn't fly off the table. I went with a stall, straight and Immelmann. That saved me from going off the table. Now the no-turns were over and I was able to head home. Meanwhile Todd was going back to attack the Germans in case I needed help heading home. With the Spad XIII, I was able to quickly outdistance my pursuers and even Todd was able to make it back. So the mission was a success for the French.

The Germans felt that the French should have had slower airplanes, but I countered that the Mission was in March 1918 so the French would have used the fastest planes possible. I had envisioned an all Spad XIII recon force, but that may have been overkill. The other players did say it was an enjoyable scenario.

[Baxter]

I liked both of your AAR's. The second one had a really good target model too. Well done and thanks for posting.

[gully_raker]

Love that W29 & the Target train.
Have some rep for those AAR's!

[BobP]

Both game were fun. In the second game I thought the allies had one of their planes do a fake like he saw the target and just took off hoping we would just follow him. Alas he did see the target and we didn't pay much attention to him but went after the other planes. Liked the idea of finding the target and then chasing after them. Good time