Tuesday 4 December 2018

Conflict in the Air

A while ago I'd purchased a copy of Check Your 6 after trying to find a WW2 tactical air battle game that I could enjoy. I had a lot of fun playing Canvas Eagles, and wanted to run some games set in WW2. The area I wanted to start was covering the conflict over Malaya in 1942 between the IJA and the RAF/RAAF. Mind you, planning for this started back in about 2015, so things have moved quite slowly here.

Running a game set over Malaya was going to be a bit of a challenge because of the aircraft involved in the fight. Hawker Hurricanes were no problem, but some of the others were a little harder to get. 1:72 was easy - they make every conceivable aircraft in that scale, but that'd make it difficult to play on a regular 6'x4' table, or even a larger one, and would preclude the use of most bombers. Playing on the floor as an option? Given that movement is done using hexes, that presented a challenge. Playing without hexes? Possible but a little more difficult to do. I thought of using a move template with which to plot the movement of the aircraft: some sort of die that had hexes printed on it that enabled the model to be moved to the correct position, but still a little tricky. The other other thing about that game is that, while it'd be monumental, it would also be a little impractical.

I then looked at going lower down the scale. I purchased a few 1:144 scale models, both injection molded and resin. I had a Ki-27 Nate, a  B-339E Buffalo, and a Hawker Hurricane. I hadn't purchased a Ki-43 Hayabusa/Oscar, but after doing the other three wasn't sure if that was the right scale for me. I had some 1:300 micro-armour aircraft, but they seemed a little too small. Then Ares bought out their WW2 Wings of Glory set and I thought that could be it! After a few games though, I wasn't convinced that WoG was what I was after. The models were a little pricey, though not excessive, and they didn't have all the kits I was after.

I looked at Bag the Hun, but haven't purchased a copy yet. I had heard of Check Your 6, but didn't know much about it, but after reading some online reviews thought I'd give it a go as it looked closer to Canvas Eagles than the other sets. In the back of the CY6 rulebook was an add for Armaments in Miniature, and after looking at their website that pretty much sealed the deal for me. By that time Blood Red Skies had been released, and their boxes of aircraft, also at 1:200, looked like great options as well, so for me that sealed the scale question. I purchased a couple of Ki-27s, Ki43s, Hurricanes and Buffalos, and got to work on them (interrupting some War of the Roses LH lancers).

Last weekend managed to get a game happening at NWA with a few willing volunteers. Playing along with me were a veteran air-war gamer (we're talking a guy who I played Air War with when we were teenagers, as well as having made a few score kits for CE), another player with a decent collection of WoG WW2 aircraft and clearly an experienced air-warfare player, and a fourth guy who had more enthusiasm than experience. It was like we had the full range of possible experience:enthusiasm ratios right there. I won't do a dissection of the game here, but we used most of the rules and just practiced flying about and taking pot-shots at each other. Even the aircraft weren't finished: they had no decals at that point. However, it a great game, lots of fun, and a few more where we can explore the nuances of the rules look like they could offer plenty of action for the finally prepared aircraft.


 

 
 

 
 

 





 



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