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Thread: BYM Mission 4 - Fly by Night - 27th Oct 1916 by Vagabond

  1. #1

    Default BYM Mission 4 - Fly by Night - 27th Oct 1916 by Vagabond

    The Landing

    Let me do the talking and you just nod and mutter yes Sir and no Sir in the right place and we might not get sent back to the trenches.

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    The cream of C Flight had been sent on a special mission and now I was going to have to explain how we had come back to the Drome by rail and then road tender from the Depot, rather than flying back as the C.O. rather expected we might.

    We were all dressed in our best uniforms and wouldn’t have looked out of place at a Squadron inspection not that we had any of those. The only incongruity was my lack of a hat because it wouldn’t fit over the bandage around my head, and the bandage around Taki’s left hand meant he was only wearing one glove. Bob though, looked perfect, well scrubbed, indeed even pink behind his ears and there was a faint smell of carbolic soap emanating from his direction.

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    “Come” the stern voice of the C.O. answered my tentative knock at his office door, he looked as grim as usual as we filed into the rather austere surroundings, we all saluted and I noticed Uncle looked rather more relaxed than I thought he might under the circumstances.

    “Well Acting Lieutenant, tell me what went wrong. I’ve only a few minutes before going to Wing to request more planes and I’d like some reasonable excuse to give them for this debacle. We only received these Nieuports a week ago they’ve not made one excursion over the lines and now I need to ask for more!”

    I didn’t like the emphasis on “Acting Lieutenant” but cleared my throat prior to speaking but my mouth was rather dry.

    “Come on man spit it out, just tell me about the night landing, you can give the rest of the report to Uncle later.”

    Yes Sir, we’d been flying for about an hour, saw some action Sir and I was leading the flight home. It was rather awkward because there were no landing lights as such around the runway, just the 2 searchlights either side of it, next to their AA guns and so I was trying to put my plane down between the pair of them. Just as I touched down I saw an unturned plane at the end of the runway and took avoiding action.

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    My plane slewed across the runway and I went through their AA and searchlight pit before doing a nose dive into the soft earth by the side of the runway.

    Good grief man, were any of them hurt he asked. Not as many as I would have liked I responded ruefully. He looked startled. I’ll put it in my full report Sir but they fired on us as we were taking off Sir. Indiscriminately Sir, if I may say so Sir.

    Ummm was his only response.

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    Takahashi followed me in but of course there was only 1 searchlight operational and it was more difficult for him to line up on the runway, it was very narrow! The other problem was that my plane had caught fire on landing, fortunately I’d been throw clear but the blaze blinded him as well. He had to side slip at the last moment of his landing, but their damn runway was far too short for this sort of nonsense at night and he rolled off the end of it, hitting the plane I’d seen on my approach. He didn’t see it because of the bright light from my bonfire.

    Anyway on hitting the Be2C his plane also caught fire.

    To save the plane the daft bugger tried to extinguish the flames with his hands.

    How come his gloves didn’t protect him the C.O. asked astutely.

    “Ahhh, well they were new gloves Sir and he didn’t want to damage them”, Uncles eyes grew wide with astonishment as I continued “so he took them off” and the C.O. said, “well he’ll not do that again will he”, looking pityingly at Taki.

    “And what about you Parkhurst” he continued with a slight smile playing round his normally rigid lips.

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    Sir, Parkhurst had the worst situation of all, he was coming in to land, there were 2 planes burning at the end of the runway and as he lost height and dropped down the blasted remaining searchlight was turned full on him.

    He was trying to land by the side of the runway to avoid the mess at the end but when the light lit him up he had to sideslip hard to the left to avoid it but only succeeded in running straight into the AA/searchlight pit before bouncing over and then tipping the plane onto it’s nose well beyond the end of the runway.

    “I suppose they deserved that as well” the C.O. asked rather caustically. “No not really Sir” I said trying to hide a grin, “Their gun jammed on the first burst and they never got chance to shoot in our direction after that, it was the other buggers that tried to kill us.

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    “There’s just a couple of other things I’d like to know and you can go.” “Why were there no light’s around the landing strip?”

    “If I was being kind I’d say they were trying to remain hidden from the enemy, but if not I’d say whoever built the field forgot about including them in the design”. They could also do with a leading light to indicate when to drop down, at night it’s almost impossible to judge it correctly.

    “OK and what training had you been given on arrival” “Well none Sir, we’d chatted to the chaps up there about how they carried on with this night flying, it seems pretty dangerous to me Sir, especially the landing” “So you were asked to undertake a mission in the dark, with no landing lights and no training?” “Yes Sir”

    I was feeling a little easier with the way the interview was going but I couldn’t really understand why I was getting an easy ride, I’d been expecting a roasting for losing 3 planes.

    I’ve checked their records the C.O. interrupted my reverie, and it seems they are losing a lot of planes, mainly on landing, whoever designed the runway will be digging trenches pretty soon if they’re not careful.

    Serve him right I thought but didn’t say anything further.


    Well that was a disaster, my landing skills are pathetic. I placed the planes randomly near to the strip and then did the best I could with the cards. Lining the planes up on the right track was difficult and any last minute corrections mean that you over shoot the end of the bally thing. In all cases I should have opened up the throttle and done another circuit but it had been a long game and pilot fatigue took over so I did the best I could. Which obviously wasn’t good enough, but it looks as if the C.O. is going to give me a pass on this.

  2. #2

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    OK skip the next bit or go and make a cup of tea during this intermission as I give my excuses.

    Just a few notes on how I played out some of the action, I read the game scenario and the link to night flying but not the searchlights, all good stuff but there were a few things I did differently.
    I assumed the British planes wouldn’t know where anyone was in the dark and so used a random direction dice to determine their individual flight pattern. Because of this I allowed them to have a chance of spotting at 1 ruler rather than the 1/2 ruler specified. I also allowed them to fire normally, because if they can see them, they can hit them. Maybe.

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    I don’t think Paul stipulated how planes were to find the landing area to pick up the spy. I’d decided a land based landing site was going to be a disaster, so built my own Friedrichshafen FF33a to land in the sea. The big problem with sea on a moonless night is that you can’t see it in the dark.

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    Then there was the question of how would the plane know where to land and how would it navigate there in the dark. So I incorporated a river running into the sea, so that gave me a land mark to follow, they just had to get to it. On the small island in the sea I placed an accomplice with a hooded torch, so they could act as a direction finder once the plane left the river.
    The spy was in a small boat out at sea with an open light which they would illuminate once the float plane was clear of land. That gave them the specific spot to arrive at.

    I gave the British pilots a chance to see the lights, harder for the hooded one and easier if they were facing in the right direction, etc etc.
    A white light at sea stands out like a beacon and so I didn’t test for the Germans because they were expecting it to be there. The other point was that whilst I knew what the scenario was, the British pilots didn’t and so I used D6’s to determine their actions when they had a choice to make, they had no idea about the spy or the pick up etc their expectation would have been a raid on the airfield.
    I’m still a complete novice as far as altitude goes and the last 2 games have confused me even more. I like Dave and Zoe’s concept of flying in a bubble, altitude being a small amount of height difference but landing means coming down from a high altitude to the ground so not in a bubble. I can’t really reconcile these two concepts in one game but did my best, so you will see things that might look a little odd but I tried to be even handed about it.

    Sorry for the long winded intro and now on with:-

    The Night Flight

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    We’d been sent north, just some of the members of C Flight not the whole Squadron, ostensibly on leave but there were some rumours that a bod up at HQ was planning a night caper and you know how his last bright idea turned out. Teaticket was his name and out of 6 of our crew that were sent up on that mission, 5 came back full of bullet holes, fortunately no one died but it was our worse days casualties since being at the front.
    If he was involved it would be another Brahma and there’d be no volunteers that’s for sure.

    The location we had been sent to was flat and featureless, except for a couple of islands off the coast and one of the new night bombing squadrons was based here, they didn’t look a happy bunch and I’m not surprised, there seemed to be a lot of plane wreckage at the back of the hangers.

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    We’d parked our Nieuport’s at the end of their runway, all their planes were off on some mission or other but it was nice and warm in the mess. It soon gets dark at this time of year and tonight was no exception.

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    With no moonlight it became as dark as the inside of a Yorkshire man’s wallet. I’m a Yorkshire man and Mrs V will vouch for the statement.

    That’s when we heard the engines, aero engines and coming from the south east, they seemed a long way off but getting closer. “Look here chaps, I need you to go up and see these fellows off, I’ve no fighter cover, indeed no planes here until our chaps get back and they’re not due for some time”. I looked in disbelief at the Squadron C.O. “They’ll be trying to put our runway out of action, they came and tried the same thing last week and I need you up there now”.

    “Sir, there’s no light at all, just star light, we can’t fly in that” I said but he wouldn’t hear of it.

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    Then the searchlights lit up and started a pattern to look for the enemy planes.

    “Come on” said Taki, “it'll be fun flying in the dark and besides we’ve borrowed their secret weapon we’ll have no trouble keeping formation.”

    “You must go now, that’s an order” the pompous C.O. commanded and with some misgivings we did.

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    Enough of this moody dark stuff, I need the light on to see what I’m doing, you’ll just have to imagine it’s dark.

    The engines we heard belong to this elegant looking plane, and strange as it may seem, their flight plan fell into our hands which gave us some insight into their plans and actions after the event.
    You may find this amazing but in the world where I live that sort of coincidence is quite commonplace.

    The Friedrichshafen, is flying incredibly slowly due in no small part to the size of its floats, these are prototypes that will be refined in the weeks to come, it’s accompanied by an Albatros Dll a short way behind. The Dll pilot has to keep blipping his throttle to avoid overrunning the Float Plane.

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    As we had made our way, reluctantly on my part, to the planes I’d given my orders to the other two. On take off, I’ll turn to port, Taki to starboard and Bob you fly straight. We’ll gain some altitude and then start to search for these Hun. Don’t deploy the secret weapon unless you feel it’s necessary, is it ready and primed?

    They both nodded, but carefully.

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    We taxied in line astern to the end of the runway but we were being stalked. As soon as the searchlights had been turned on, a second Albatros was drawn to us, just like a moth to a flame. Of course as soon as we set off, down what seemed like an impossibly short runway, he dived down behind us.

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    And opened fire on the lead plane – ME.

    The searchlights caught him and all hell broke loose. The first I knew was seeing the tracers flying past me from our own AA guns, good grief what the hell do they think they’re doing, and then tracers hit the ground in front of my machine, fortunately in this storm of lead nothing touched my plane, but I think the attacker was shredded buy the AA fire. At least that’s what they bragged about afterwards but we weren’t on good terms by then.

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    With complete darkness in front of me I knew I had no where to go so just hauled back on the stick and prayed.

    I seem to do a lot of that when I’m sat in a plane.

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    Just a gratuitous shot so Mike can see how good his decals look on my Nieuports.
    Cheers mate.

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    The Float Plane and its escort are continuing to follow the river to its mouth and the sea.

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    My luck finally runs out and bullets smack into the Nieuport’s engine, it starts to smoke and I wonder how the hell I’m going to get out of this jam and back down to earth in one piece.

    I hope Taki is off the ground behind me and Bob is roaring down the runway, I’m also thinking that maybe if Bob wasn’t a novice he could fire up into the belly of that Albatros.

    At this point 1 damage would have taken it down, I’d been forgetting about the +1 damage and it was in a seriously bad state once I added them in.

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    Into all this mayhem and unbeknown to me at the time, one of the squadrons night bombers arrives above the runway, he’s earlier than expected so must have turned back from their mission, maybe he had engine problems but we’ll never know now.

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    The Albatros pilot is chewing on my Nieuport and C Flight are all in the air.

    Bob is right behind him and it’s a certain kill but he still can’t fire because he’s a novice and has just taken off. Why on earth am I using Flying Helmets rules for novices.

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    We all split as planned, I go to port, Taki starboard and Bob straight, the Albi turns to starboard heading home.

    The river in the picture is the one the Float plane and his escort have used as their guide and I’m facing in the right direction to follow them, but as I said I’m going to use random movement until contact is made.

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    There they go, the German planes reach the mouth of the river, but I’ve no idea they are there. The hooded torch light is turned on by the accomplice on the island, I don’t see it but the Germans do.

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    This was my random dice, a 180’ turn. So I’m obviously worried by the Albatross that has shot my plane full of holes and I’m going back to find him and then give him a piece of my mind, followed up with bullets from my Lewis Gun, just to reinforce the point.

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    Taki decided to chase after the Albatros as well (a 90’ turn to starboard and then straight), obviously so that he can also teach him some manners.

    The number indicates how long he will fly in that direction before rolling a new dice. By that time the Albatros is long gone, even with a dodgy engine and we don’t see him again.

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    Bob and I nearly collide in the dark as we fly past each other but luckily don’t open fire.

    Meantime the open light is lit in the small boat containing the spy but none of us saw it.

    That’s the white counter just in case you were wondering and the German Float plane turns towards it.

    I’d decided that the escort plane would fly a circular holding pattern at the mouth of the river until the float plane returned with the spy and then they would then fly back to base the same way they had come.

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    You might be wondering what happened to the returning Be2C.

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    He ran out of runway.

    Well what did you expect?

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    The Float plane is making his approach and losing height gradually, one peg per turn, what he doesn’t know is that the land juts out into the sea a little way, and yes it’s immediately in front of him.

    The white light is getting closer.

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    The Float plane is just about to put down onto the water, he has over flown the white light and is very fortunate because he could have landed and driven straight into the shoreline but a lucky dice roll and he saw it in time and was able to bank right just before touch down.
    The Nieuport in the lower right is Taki and he has finally seen the light (no jokes please) and is headed towards it to investigate, a good die decision for him as well.

    The Albatros is flying his holding pattern, always turning to port. The plane furthest away is Bob and he’s still flying a random pattern. The Nieuport in the middle is me, also flying a random pattern, neither of us has seen the light, due to throwing 1’s and 2’s all the time, but you can see what’s going to happen sooner or later.

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    With a splash the Float plane hits the water and with those whopping floats, doesn’t sink but it is going to end up 2 rulers away from the white light. It’s a long taxi back.

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    I spot the Albatros in the night sky and without thinking open fire, he doesn’t see me, and as soon as I fire I’m blinded by the bright light from my gun flashes.

    That’s when I realize I could be firing on one of my own men. Maybe they didn’t recognise it was me, can I claim it was the enemy firing on them, whose going to believe I would open fire on a British plane?

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    I was in the process of climbing and breathe a sigh of relief as I pass over it and can make out the Maltese Crosses on the top wing.

    The white marker indicates where I opened fire and the gun flashes would have been seen by any observant pilot. Bob – I’m looking at you now.

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    Bob had seen the gun flashes but had also seen the white light at sea level and on a decision die roll decided to investigate the white light. He probably concluded it wasn’t wise to get caught up in a gun fight in the dark when one plane might be on his side and one might not be.

    As I personally knew the Albatros was flying a circle pattern I used a weighted die roll to decide what Acting Lieutenant Vagabond would do, and of course I/he turned right into the path of the Albatros.

    As luck would have it, he didn’t get to shoot, we tooled around for most of the rest of the game, he did get one passing shot in but did very little damage.

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    Taki had come in from the right of this picture but was too high to identify anything happening below him, all he could see was a white light on a boat, it could have been a French fisherman or a submarine so he circled round losing altitude to take another look.

    Bob was coming in fast and they might have opened fire on each other but were out of angle to I was saved that angst.

    He was also too high to see what was below him in the dark.

    I kept rolling dice to see if the spy would extinguish the light. He was obviously attracting what would eventually become unwanted attention. I decided 1,2 he would turn the light off but 3,4,5,6 would leave it on to guide the Friedrichshafen back to him. He kept leaving it on.

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    Me and the Albatros trying to find each other as Taki circles back still loosing height.

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    Taki circling back spots the float plane as it reaches the white light, he opens fire but his gun jams and the white light goes out.

    You can see in the background the Albi taking his shot at me.

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    The float plane is turning into the wind having loaded the spy and all his paraphernalia, the pilot is going to take off towards the camera.

    At that point I realized that the wind was blowing from the north of the table at the airfield and from the south of the airfield on the sea. You’ll have to believe me that sometimes this happens.

    The smoke on the Albatros should have faded away ages ago but it must have been a very persistent oil leak. You’ll have to believe me that sometimes this happens.

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    Building up speed the Friedrichshafen pilot pulls back on the stick and like an ugly duckling she starts to lift.

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    Then like a white swan she’s in the air.

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    Bob nearly runs into the back of Taki’s plane. But the secret weapon saves them.

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    We had loads of fun either trying to spot each other or guess which way the other pilot had gone when we flew out of sight of each other. Eventually the Albatros pilot thinks he’s given the spy plenty of time to get on board and so heads back to his rendezvous point at the mouth of the river and I loose contact for the final time.

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    Rather than fly back to the rendezvous point by the route between the large island and the land where he knew there were enemy planes, the Friedrichshafen pilot flies low, right around the large island and remains undiscovered.

    He meets up with his escort and they fly back along the river and make it home with no further excitement.

    After some time I realize we are not going to see the enemy again tonight and fire the red Very flare to signal the end of the show, the rest of the sorry tale you already know.

    Ohhh apart from the Secret Weapon I mentioned at the beginning, the one that helped C flight not shoot at C Flight, at least not too often but did mean occasionally we revealed ourselves to the enemy.

    The Night Operations Squadron had spent a long time trying to work out how they could fly in some sort of formation and keep together, and also something that would identify friend from foe.

    They hit upon the ingenious system of wearing a Davy lamp on their flying helmet, this was partially enclosed in a glass dome to keep it from blowing out in the aircrafts slipstream and a leather cover that could go over the whole thing to cut out the light altogether. The front was painted red on the port side and green on the starboard side and left clear at the rear. So just like ships in the night they could see which way the other Allied planes were going.

    Of course the down side is that if you have an observant enemy they can see the light as well and know where you are, but you don’t see them until the last minute, if at all.

    We used this device sparingly throughout the encounter and it served us well. Well that is until we crashed on landing and the oil spilt out of the lamps and set the planes alight.

    When Uncle asked if we had been carrying Poteen in the leaky flasks on an aerial mission again that’s the story I told him. Oil from the Davy lamp Uncle, it’s just not safe.


    Well I know that’s not totally true, not even a little bit but we had bought new flasks and they don’t leak, well not until you crash, but don’t mention that to anyone else or we’ll be in trouble.
    Last edited by Vagabond; 10-17-2021 at 08:49.

  3. #3

    Default

    Butchers Bill

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    Acting Lieutenant John Vagabond – Crashed on Landing – 0 Kills
    C&W Rolled 4+6 = 10 -2FLM -1Dark +1RTB = 8 Skip 1D3 rolled 1 Skip 1

    Thrown clear as plane toppled onto its nose and caught fire. Landed on his head (the least sensitive part of his anatomy) and will spend another week loafing around the mess before being pronounced fit-ish for duty.


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    2/Lt Ichiro Takahashi – Crashed on Landing – 0 kills
    C&W Rolled 11 -2FLM -1Dark +1RTB = 9 all's well when you land near help !
    Taki tried to put out the fire with his hands and was slightly burned for his trouble, left his hip flask behind in the flaming plane.

    F/Sgt Robert Parkhurst – Crashed on Landing – 0 Kills
    C&W rolled 11 -1Dark +1RTB = 11 All’s well when you land near help !

    Bob landed as badly as the rest of us but as he is a bit of a puritan he doesn’t drink in the air – yet, and so his plane didn’t catch fire.

    The Be2C Pilot rolled 3 and died (he had no Observer...).


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    Fwbl Karl Fischer - FFe – RTB – 0 Kills Passenger retrieved

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    Ltn Walter Hubrich – Red Albatros –FRTB-W / WIA – 0 Kills
    Landing 6+1 Landed OK
    C&W Rolled 9 -1WIA +1RTB = 9 all's well when you land well

    Obltn Edmund Neuenhofen Blue Albatros – RTB – 0 Kills


    Dave I'm not sure if I should count -1 Landing in the dark because of the searchlights and then the burning planes, but it doesn't make much difference either way, otherwise I hope not to have too much red pencil. Cheers
    Then you may be disappointed !



    After some daring flying by the Float plane pilot, a night landing at sea in an unfamiliar place, the German spy got away. I wonder if Nurse Schultz is still dispensing succour at the hospital or mysteriously disappeared!
    Another resounding defeat for C Flight, but in the great scheme of things we had a bit of fun flying in the dark and if we’d only screwed the caps on the hip flasks a bit tighter there would have been no crashing and burning, but we did bake potato’s in the dying embers of the Nieuport’s so not all bad.


    Paul that was an interesting scenario thank you. I’m sorry I probably didn’t follow your guide as closely as I could have but I enjoyed the game I played. In retrospect I should have played out the landing sequence when I wasn’t so tired and was prepared to fly another circuit. I’m sure I could have made a better fist of it and to be honest that was one of the things I was most looking forward to in the game. It’s a bit like high altitude bombing, it takes more skill to do that, than fly around shooting at things, but of course it’s probably not as exciting.

    Oh and I didn’t get a rocket because the C.O. thinks the C.O. of the night fighting unit is a complete ninny and not fit to look after a pack of boy scouts let alone hardened killers like C Flight.

    He’d been over ruled by Wing and had to send us north to an ill prepared field and a poorly led unit, now he was going to enjoy saying, I told you so.

    Politely of course.
    Last edited by flash; 10-19-2021 at 01:24.

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    Well that was quite the storyline you gave us, John.

    I first happened on your post when all that was there was just the 'cluster' of landings.
    I was going to come back and comment "Is That All There Is?" using my best Peggy Lee intonation, but Lo and Behold! we have the whole excursion now.

    I think you would have been better off handling the landings when you weren't bone tired ...
    My two-seater had to to pull up and do a swing around or he'd have ended up like your lot.
    My Trainee followed your lead and ended up off the runway, even when piloting a painfully slow BE.2c


    You'll earn a 'C' for effort, to go along with your Flight designation, but at least all survived to tell the sure-to-be-embellished tale.


    I do really like your first nighttime shot - really gives one a sense of the experience.
    Have some REP - I enjoyed that.


    Correction - the REP will have to come later. I couldn't tell I was jammed in the dark.

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    Great everything! How did you make those floats? Clothes pegs maybe?

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    Great AAR and story - looked like fun....otherwise it's

    The scenario was intended to be adaptable to what people wanted to do.

    I assumed that a night flying unit to have landing lights (different purpose from search lights) so didn't bother to mention them. Mind you if you end up with a poor C.O. who doesn't use landing lights - could be used by the enemy, old chap, eh wot!

    As for running out of runway - with fatigue you may have missed the scenario instructions that going off the runway isn't an automatic crash. Instead it's 2 'A' cards if doing so at the end of a diving or straight card and 1 'A' damage at the end of a stall. Seems that the Be2C probably should have taken a single 'A' damage card and a C&W roll only taken if the plane has enough damage to be 'destroyed' (or if failing the landing roll if enough damage is taken so that a FRTB condition applies). However, that wingnut of a C.O. probably surrounded the runway with boulders and shrubs (2-layer effect). As for C flight...well, from what I could see it would be 2 'A' cards each...touch down in an AAMG pit will do that for you.

    However, everyone survived with minimal effect on the roster plus they made a great story out of it, so drinks in the mess.

    P.S. Lovely float plane...it's the bee's knees!
    Last edited by ShadowDragon; 10-17-2021 at 16:31.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Baxter View Post
    Great everything! How did you make those floats? Clothes pegs maybe?
    Hi Gary, the floats were just carved and sanded from a bit of balsa and stuck on with white tac, no more than 5 min but I was fairly sure with this scenario if I tried to land on the tiny runway Paul recommended I would have crashed and burned so this was my best option to keep the pilot alive.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Stumptonian View Post
    Well that was quite the storyline you gave us, John.

    I first happened on your post when all that was there was just the 'cluster' of landings.
    I was going to come back and comment "Is That All There Is?" using my best Peggy Lee intonation, but Lo and Behold! we have the whole excursion now.

    I think you would have been better off handling the landings when you weren't bone tired ...
    My two-seater had to to pull up and do a swing around or he'd have ended up like your lot.
    My Trainee followed your lead and ended up off the runway, even when piloting a painfully slow BE.2c


    You'll earn a 'C' for effort, to go along with your Flight designation, but at least all survived to tell the sure-to-be-embellished tale.


    I do really like your first nighttime shot - really gives one a sense of the experience.
    Have some REP - I enjoyed that.


    Correction - the REP will have to come later. I couldn't tell I was jammed in the dark.
    Cheers Pete, you are right about my stamina non existant.

    Recently I've been reading THECCRICH's AAR's and he did a training flight, on a 3 x 6' table and flew 3 times around a carrier before finally landing, I've enjoyed reading about it but there's no way I'm going to do it.

    If you look closely in the darkish picture you can see 2 small torches, I was hoping to use them to provide atmospheric photos like yours but the battery died on one and teh other just wasn't bright enough, a bit like my idea.
    Cheers

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    Held for Uncle - sorry, been a bit tied up with flight Club.

    Well done John that was a quite different take - I like your inventiveness though I think you made the game harder for yourself at times. There was no +1 for Aim, for instance. You definitely need to practice the landings more, you want to be arriving over the threshold on the dive, not half way along the strip !

    The mock FFe was ugly but well hung (let you make your own jokes up here fellas) It got the job done though and the scenic portrayal was excellent as always.

    Uncle says:

    Well, you tried your best chaps but you were up against it from the start - wandering about in the dark is best left to the owls, though it's not that that will kill you... Like falling, it's the sudden stop at the bottom.
    Had to chip in some RTB+1s to the tally

    Fwbl Karl Fischer is awarded the iron Cross 2nd class for his continued valuable service to the Kaiser and picks up his pilot badge too.
    Last edited by flash; 10-19-2021 at 01:48.

    "He is wise who watches"

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    Quote Originally Posted by ShadowDragon View Post
    Great AAR and story - looked like fun....otherwise it's

    The scenario was intended to be adaptable to what people wanted to do.

    I assumed that a night flying unit to have landing lights (different purpose from search lights) so didn't bother to mention them. Mind you if you end up with a poor C.O. who doesn't use landing lights - could be used by the enemy, old chap, eh wot!

    As for running out of runway - with fatigue you may have missed the scenario instructions that going off the runway isn't an automatic crash. Instead it's 2 'A' cards if doing so at the end of a diving or straight card and 1 'A' damage at the end of a stall. Seems that the Be2C probably should have taken a single 'A' damage card and a C&W roll only taken if the plane has enough damage to be 'destroyed' (or if failing the landing roll if enough damage is taken so that a FRTB condition applies). However, that wingnut of a C.O. probably surrounded the runway with boulders and shrubs (2-layer effect). As for C flight...well, from what I could see it would be 2 'A' cards each...touch down in an AAMG pit will do that for you.

    However, everyone survived with minimal effect on the roster plus they made a great story out of it, so drinks in the mess.

    P.S. Lovely float plane...it's the bee's knees!
    Hi Paul, I don't have internet in my games room and so make notes of the scenario but they're a bit cursory, I thought it was 3 A cards for running off the runway on a straight not 2. I'll have another look at the ending because if I'm skipping one scenario as Acting Lieutenant then Biff will be back before I can lead C Flight to a famous victory and I'll just be 2nd Lt John Vagabond again. I'm hoping to impress Dave with my leadership skills that he'll promote me, but I think after this debacle that's unlikely. Maybe if I had another chance that might do the trick.
    Cheers

    Oh the runway lights was a dig at me for forgetting to provide them and when it came to landing I couldn't think what I could use to show them. The short and narrow runway digs were all at you.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Vagabond View Post
    Hi Paul, I don't have internet in my games room and so make notes of the scenario but they're a bit cursory, I thought it was 3 A cards for running off the runway on a straight not 2. I'll have another look at the ending because if I'm skipping one scenario as Acting Lieutenant then Biff will be back before I can lead C Flight to a famous victory and I'll just be 2nd Lt John Vagabond again. I'm hoping to impress Dave with my leadership skills that he'll promote me, but I think after this debacle that's unlikely. Maybe if I had another chance that might do the trick.
    Cheers

    Oh the runway lights was a dig at me for forgetting to provide them and when it came to landing I couldn't think what I could use to show them. The short and narrow runway digs were all at you.
    Doh! You're right it's 3 'A' cards for a straight/dive and 2 'A' for a stall. Dotage here. Dig at me.

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    Quote Originally Posted by ShadowDragon View Post
    Doh! You're right it's 3 'A' cards for a straight/dive and 2 'A' for a stall. Dotage here. Dig at me.
    So Uncles not going to give me a pass then

    Back to 2nd Lt then.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Vagabond View Post
    So Uncles not going to give me a pass then

    Back to 2nd Lt then.
    Well, you won't have held Acting rank once wounded.. Uncle has finished !
    REP gun jammed.

    "He is wise who watches"

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    Great story and pictures, John! Quite a complex adventure you took on there -- kudos for that, but this simpleton won't be taking on all those intricate rules A fun read!

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    Love the game board! Wonderful looking terrain! The Nieuports are quite awesome as well! Great story!

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    Once again John an excellent flowing read and game. Interesting that more damage was done on landing then by the guns, but then again this is a reflection of the danger of flying at night at this time, indeed a little surprised that there were not more mid-air collisions in the two scenarios submitted.
    Like the float adoption and can’t see it sinking with those huge airbags/floats. Interesting that they match the photo I found for t( FE2b and later testing. Excellent scenery and especially the landing sequence for the float plane, have to agree, think the landing strips are too tight.

    REP sent your way - REP gun jammed for previous application

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    Thanks guy's

    Dave - You definitely need to practice the landings more, you want to be arriving over the threshold on the dive, not half way along the strip

    The landings were interesting, mine because I set the plane at 90' to the runway and of course with 60' turns there was no way I was going to be able to line up for it. I think this is the only thing I find hard to accept with the card movement, you should be able to turn less than the card, but heh ho them's the rules.

    On both the other two landings I placed the planes at 60' but then miscalculated the approach, overshooting on both occasions before turning, which ment I had to play a sideslip before the dive. If I'd not miscalculated the distance to the turn both landings would have worked. Such is hindsight.

    I'm getting worse with the tally - sorry I thought I had it buttoned up this time. Are you sure about the dark! that would make all the difference now.

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    Baz it was your picture that convinced me I could add the floats and I had originally been going to play this the other way round and add floats to my Fe2b but I didn't want to stick them on my painted plane because it's not varnished so went with the Albatros instead.

    The strip is actually OK but don't tell Paul I said that, although there's no room for error, be prepared to make a second or third pass to get down in one piece.

    Chris/Dan I hope you get as much out of this scenario as I did, although 2nd Lt John Vagabond WIC won't agree he got anything except a sore head.

    Cheers

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    Quote Originally Posted by Vagabond View Post
    Baz it was your picture that convinced me I could add the floats and I had originally been going to play this the other way round and add floats to my Fe2b but I didn't want to stick them on my painted plane because it's not varnished so went with the Albatros instead.

    The strip is actually OK but don't tell Paul I said that, although there's no room for error, be prepared to make a second or third pass to get down in one piece.

    Chris/Dan I hope you get as much out of this scenario as I did, although 2nd Lt John Vagabond WIC won't agree he got anything except a sore head.

    Cheers
    With one phase = 3 seconds the scenario runway length is 1250' X 300'. I based the 3 seconds on the turning radios for a Nieuport 17. I think I read somewhere that Ares says 6 seconds - in that case you can double the dimensions. I did find this on the US Postal Office request for a runway of 1200' X 600' but that was 1919 with faster and larger airplanes so it was doubled to 2300' X 2300'.

    https://www.gbcnv.edu/howh/dirt.html

    The trick is to do what real pilots do which is to line up with the runway when far away and then descend. Turning just before landing???? Challenging even for a stunt pilot. I do think that the cards unreasonably limit the amount of turn to 60 degrees (plus, for those with the tight turns 90 degrees). One suggestion is that with the final turn to line up with the runway a plane should be able to turn less than 60 degrees (with the normal turn) or between 60 degrees and 90 degrees (with the tight turn). I think that would be reasonable.

    Oh, I also checked John's landing(s) for his AAR in the DYM campaign scenario with a runway of exactly the same dimensions. He did a reasonable job there. What has happened since then, John?

    P.S. A Nimitz class aircraft carrier is 1100' X 150'. Of course, the carriers have arresting gear.

    Then there's this:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJIZTL2ZyEw
    Last edited by ShadowDragon; 10-19-2021 at 13:04.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Baz View Post
    Interesting that more damage was done on landing then by the guns, but then again this is a reflection of the danger of flying at night at this time, indeed a little surprised that there were not more mid-air collisions in the two scenarios submitted
    Baz, I haven't posted my AAR. Lots of mid-air collisions. More planes downed from collisions than shooting.

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    Quote Originally Posted by ShadowDragon View Post
    ...Oh, I also checked John's landing(s) for his AAR in the DYM campaign scenario with a runway of exactly the same dimensions. He did a reasonable job there. What has happened since then, John?
    More, or, less vino collapso ?

    "He is wise who watches"

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    Quote Originally Posted by flash View Post
    More, or, less vino collapso ?

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    Quote Originally Posted by ShadowDragon View Post
    Baz, I haven't posted my AAR. Lots of mid-air collisions. More planes downed from collisions than shooting.
    Look forward to reading it, have also played mine and need to write it up, but tame compared to these and yours by the sound of it.

    Baz

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    Wow, what an adventure. Your boys were very unlucky with their landings but what can you expect if you have had no training and an unlit airfield. Nice write up; you paintred a very vivid picture of a difficult mission.

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    Quote Originally Posted by flash View Post
    More, or, less vino collapso ?
    How did you know? has Mrs V been talking!!

    Paul that Youtube video is just plain scary, I bet the helicopter pilot was OD'ing on adrenaline.

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    Great take on this one John and a splendid story to boot. Love your prototype float plane. I think I've sen it on a Saturday morning catroon.

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    I can do dark for you John.

    If you have Photo shop I can tell you how to do it.
    I actually have to small lorries with searchlights on them. They don't work any better than your flares, unless you blow smoke across the beam. What we really need is a smoke machine.
    Rob.
    "Courage is the art of being the only one who knows you're scared to death."



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