Saturday, April 15, 2017

Up Where The Air Is Clear

I believe that it is a common malady among wargamers that we are easily influenced with regards to which period we wish to play. A good movie or book can send us off on another project entirely. That has been my recent experience. Instead of focusing on one of my 6 x 6 challenge games (e.g. I have some colonial figures sitting around waiting to be painted!), my thoughts have turned upward into the skies.

The culprit this time is this:


It is the third book of the Otto Prohaska series, which follows the exploits of an Austro-Hungarian naval officer during and before World War I. The first book, which is excellent, sees Prohaska as a submarine commander. In the third, by a strange set of circumstances, he ends up taking to the skies.

World War I aviation has long been an interest of mine so this book easily tugged at me. I find myself wanting to play out some small scale ( a few planes per side) air battles. But what rules to use? This has long been my quandary, especially because I like to play solo and many air combat rules don't lend themselves to well to solo gaming. I have some rambling thoughts I'd like to share on the topic. They may be fairly long-winded so I'll split them across multiple posts over the next several days.

2 comments:

  1. 'Spandau and Lewis' in the Free Rules section of my blog has no pre-plotted moves or secret information, so can be played solo. It will suit small numbers of planes on each side as well. It'll be right up your alley.

    The linked rules aren't the current version, though; there are a few additions and suggested changes dotted through blog posts, mostly from around this time in 2014.

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  2. I planning to playtest some rules, including "S & L"

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