Great War Scenarios

Baer's SPAD VII - Image from Reduced Aircraft Factory

Currently there are three World War One scenario books available for Check Your 6! - those being the Colorful Skies series. These books offer the Check Your 6! gamer over 150 scenarios for the Great War, but only one that features the American 103rd Aero Squadron. To that end, I have put together, with the assistance of AI, the outlines for a dozen scenarios that focus on Paul Baer during his time with the 103rd. That is the good news. The bad news? AI cannot make a clear determination of what types of planes Baer was facing.

Baer's opponents during his short tenure with the 103rd were a mix of Jastas (his patrols ranging from early March to May 22, 1918). However the reports are often not clear on the type of planes the Germans used. We do know on certain missions Baer specifically claimed Albatros fighters, but on others his claims are listed as "scout" or "D" type. As the various Jastas in the spring of 1918 were using the Pfalz D.IIIa, the Albatros D.Va, perhaps a Fokker D.VII or two, and even the odd Fokker Dr.I, when the reports are vague we must make some assumptions, and can also assume that just because Baer claimed an Albatros that does not preclude a mix of planes being used by the Germans for that encounter, as was frequently the case within the German Jastas. Therefore, even though I have done much research and utilized many AI queries to access sources unknown to me, in some cases we simply cannot identify what aircraft types the Germans were flying.

Here are Baer's combats, with claimed (letters) and confirmed (numbers) victories:

For the scenarios I will be adding in tables to randomly determine German aircraft mix when it is unclear what was being used. The red numbers on the table that follows indicate this uncertainty.

Most of the scenarios featuring Baer's service in the 103rd are small in scope, which usually means one side would be potentially out of the fight early in the game. However, I have some ideas on using one plane per player for the smaller scenarios that should help make games last a bit longer - more on that to come as I organize my adaptations for Check Your 6! Great War.

Goblin Arrival

A very short post....

Today I received my order from Geektown for a half dozen of their McDonnell XF-85s from their Space: 1963 - Hot Skies/Cold Seas range. These tiny little parasite jets will be a fun addition to any 1950s Jet Age project.

My order was placed on February 5th, and I received it six days later.  The quality of the material used on these 3D prints is on par with Flight Deck Decals which is the gold standard for 3D aircraft.

The Second Taiwan Crisis

For those who know me personally or follow this blog, you may have deduced that I like the off the beaten path topics, whether it is small battles from the American Civil War, or to some of the Check Your 6! projects I have taken on (100 Hours War, 1948 Arab-Israeli, 1950s Jet Age, etc., etc.). As I move slowly into more jet age projects, trying to understand how to use missiles, radar, and what not more effectively, I came across a conflict that saw plenty of air combat in a short period of time, including the first shoot down of an aircraft by a Sidewinder air-to-air missile. The Second Taiwan Crisis is like the Korean War, but with a couple of twists (let's call it the Korean War 2.0). One is the aforementioned use of missiles (although most kills were still through machineguns and cannon), and the other is the use of afterburner. Therefore this period allows the World War II or Korean War Check Your 6! gamer an easier transition into using additional rules as opposed to jumping into Vietnam or later conflicts.

I will not get into much of a history of this conflict, but it is good to note that the Nationalists (Republic of China) had fled to Taiwan and a series of smaller island groups, a few that were within artillery range of mainland China, after their defeat. Taiwan is only 90-100 miles from the Chinese mainland, and as a result the Taiwan Straits, much like today, was a point of potential conflict. There were several encounters prior to the late summer of 1958 as the two sides jockeyed for territorial gains. By mid-1958 the Communists (People's Republic of China) were putting more pressure in taking those island groups that were just off their coast. To support the defense of Taiwan, but not necessarily interested in protecting the smaller Nationalist controlled islands, the United States sent both air force and naval assets to the region. That alone could provide an interesting what-if series of scenarios, but the actual shooting war was just as fascinating.

The two forces involved, the Nationalist and Communist Chinese, used a variety of aircraft, but the principle fighters were the F-86 Sabre and the MiG-17 Fresco. While the MiG-17 was a superior platform over the Sabre, the quality of the Nationalist pilots overcame the technological disadvantages. The Communist pilots were, for the most part, poorly trained and often flew in predictable patterns, making it easier for the ROC pilots to obtain advantageous firing positions. To that end their average aircrew quality is lower than the ROC pilots, and they have an interesting special rule that will be included on the various scenarios I create.

Speaking of scenarios, I have fifteen outlined that should convert well into the CY6! format. Most feature Sabres vs. MiG-17s, but there are a few other aircraft types present as well. I used AI to assist, providing source material so that AI could create historical encounters. Turned out decently well.

We need to talk about miniatures, and of course I lean on Flight Deck Decals for this conflict. They make an F-86F Sabre which is ideal, and a variety of MiG-17s, but one would want the Fresco C version. Add in a few F-84s and MiG-15bis models and one is good to go. I will post numbers needed by scenario in a future post, but this project will be very affordable for gamers due to the small number of miniatures needed, and mostly of the same aircraft types.

The McDonnell XF-85 Goblin

A member of the Check Your 6! Facebook group recently shared a post from a company called Geektown, a 3D print company. While Geektown offers merchandise that I am far from interested in, they do have a line called Hot Skies/Cold Seas that have a few oddball "could-have-been" aircraft that made it into the test phase but not into production. One of the offerings is a six pack of McDonnell XF-85 Goblins, a parasite fighter that was to be used to protect bombers during missions that would have been beyond the range of conventional fighters. The Goblin would be carried under the bomber, then launch when enemy aircraft were nearing the bomber formation. It would be retrieved by connecting to a trapeze via a retractable hook that extended in front of the canopy on the Goblin.

The use of parasite aircraft extended back to the Great War, with planes being considered for use under airships. The Unites States Navy did put the parasite idea into use during the 1930s on the airships Akron and Macon. During World War Two both the Soviets and the Germans toyed with parasite designs and testing, with the Soviets actually using parasites in 1941 to attack a bridge. The United States put out request for proposals in late 1942, but McDonnell that submitted a proposal concept.

The XF-85 was originally conceived as a piston engined fighter that would be carried partially exposed under a bomber, but the United States Army Air Force rejected this concept due to the increased drag caused by carrying the parasite. Future developments led to the Goblin being placed within the bomber's hold, and it was conceptualized that a B-36 could carry up to three Goblins, providing a sort of flying carrier to support the other bombers on any given mission.

However, the Goblin seemed destined for failure - the first prototype was accidently dropped from a height of forty feet during wind tunnel testing. Additional testing proved that the Goblin, while showing promise, would not be fast enough to deal with the generation of enemy jets it would face, and recovery of the parasite was problematic due to the buffeting of air around the bomber. Only a few successful hookups were completed during testing, and the program was canceled.

In Check Your 6! Jet Age terms I have cobbled together these stats:

There is an existing XF-85 at the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton.

Operation Torch - The Western Task Force

I have a few Operation Torch posts already on the blog, but I wanted to provide a bit of an update as to where the project stands, including a small scenario book that I will be working on soon, providing a mix of historical and hypothetical encounters that feature the United States Navy's air operations which, as part of the Western Task Force, mostly dominated the skies over Morocco. 

Thus far I have ideas for seven scenarios which include an interesting mix of American and Vichy French aircraft (the following chart includes an eighth scenario from the Check Your 6! rulebook):

I have aircraft painted for two scenarios (French Surprise and Torched), however I might replace some or all of what I have with the exceptional Flight Deck Decals range. I do have the Model 75As already from Flight Deck - I just need to ship them to Miscellaneous Miniatures for painting as doing three tone camo scheme and Vichy stripes might be beyond my skill, or at least patience, level. 

Also, something I want to try to do is offer a mini-campaign aspect for the scenario book. Years ago when I used to game the Command Decision series from GDW, one of the concepts they offered in their Over the Top World War One rules was a "bathtub" campaign - taking units and scaling them down into playable units on the tabletop while also allowing campaign movement using a hex map. I plan on doing something like this for Operation Torch - taking the numbers of available aircraft and scaling that down to 10%. This would yield the following available aircraft for the mini-campaign:

I would have to determine how to use a force pool to generate scenarios, or really I would need a scenario generator and then a way to track the force pool due to shoot downs, damage, etc. Since the campaign was so short (just a few days), any plane that is shot down would not be replaced, and an aircrew survival roll could be made to determine if the pilot is able to return to the force pool. Damaged planes might return after a full day of inaction. There are several factors that need to be accounted for.