It's officially a project. I'm getting into fast play dogfights.
Objective
My goal with this project is to create a set of rules that allow quick dogfights in a small space for solo play.
Method
As I mentioned last time, I think I need to eschew traditional movement mechanisms used in air combat games. Instead, I'll need to make movement relative. positioning planes in relation to each other depending on how well they maneuver in each turn.
Inspirations
I've been gleaning ideas from a few games that take a similar approach. Rather than move models on a board, they determine position with dice rolls or cards.
- Aces Up - I briefly mentioned this game from Two Hour Wargames last time. I'll do a more thorough overview in a separate post.
- Warbirds - An RPG featuring pulp-style air combat, it features a simple dogfighting system. More info on this one at a later date.
- Eindekker - A solo WW1 air combat game from Minden Games. I reviewed it way back in the early days of my blog. I played it a bit then shelved it.
- Down in Flames - Another game I reviewed in the olden days. I played some test games a few years later.
Expect to see more experiments using the basic MicroBattle mechanics and tests of some of the above rules.
There is something just so interesting about dogfights! When 5150FP came out I ran two campaigns but there is a lot of dice to roll. About 18 months a go I started on a streamlined version and your posts have got me inspired to finish them.
ReplyDeleteBest wishes to you on getting somethng working for you!
I'll be posting a play through of Aces Up, also by THW. Spoiler alert - I agree with you about the dice.
Delete5150FP is very simlar to Aces Up. I went to 1d6 for all rolls; combined the Taking Control, Burst and the Firing Table (note 5150FP doesn't have a Burst table) and combined the Heading Home table and Recovery table. But haven't tried it out yet - only finished writing the draft yesterday. I may have sucked all the fun out by removing these additional steps (but hope not). I also have a feeling I am going to just roll for PEFs and do them one at a time rather than use the 3x3 grid. The 3x3 play is interesting but I think just doesn't quite add enough value compared to simply resolving the PEFs one at a time.
DeleteI think it will be fine to reduce steps. Too many steps makes the game drag.
DeleteI also agree about the PEFs.