Colorful Skies

My Table Top Flights Bavarian blue Fokker Dr.I and the Ares Kempf

Recently I had the chance to play in a Colorful Skies game at the monthly Wright Flight session. Colorful Skies is a set of rules modifications for Check Your 6! for the Great War and are included in the similarly named series of scenario books, all available from I-94. While I will not give much of an after action report, I do want to mention some basing solutions created by a friend that easily allows the use of Ares Wings of Glory planes for the Check Your 6! setting.

The alternating colored pegs in place - here the Dr.Is are at TAL 6, speed 3

I had a pair of Fokker Dr.Is, fairly maneuverable in Colorful Skies but tempered with a low robustness. Across from me were a pair of Camels, similar in maneuverability, but more robust. There were also a pair of Snipes matched against two Fokker D.VIIs.

The Camels Are Coming - here they are at TAL 4, Speed 4

I was able to avoid being shot at as I closed on the Camels by climbing out of gunnery range, but then came in behind the Camels by executing a Split S. Alas, my to hit rolls were too low and the Camels escaped to engage the D.VIIs. I was able to close in, after a D.VII and a Snipe had been shot down, and the remaining D.VII had run out of ammo. I was able to close in on a Snipe for a kill while my other Dr.I, having received both an engine hit and a lucky hit that reduced its speed to 1, dove out of the fray. At that point we called the game.

Come back and fight!

The bases are 3D printed. In this case they are two inches across to adjust for the 1/144 scale planes. The first bottom TAL is represented by the post that is part of the base, then printed pegs, in alternating blue and white, denote the rest of the TALs. A dice is used to indicate both speed and CAB. The pegs worked well, fairly tight and printed to accept the post on the bottom of the Wings of Glory planes. The alternating peg colors were ideal for easy TAL identification. My friend has also made bases with slots to hold colored pieces to denote different aircraft, much like the Check Your 6! official bases use a red, blue, white, black, yellow, or green indicator.

Moving in for the kill, while the Camel missed my Fokker.

Truly the only issue I had is when I climbed to a higher CAB to TAL 1. Changing the red dice to a white one to represent the higher CAB, as I was at TAL 1 I only had one peg on my stand, and my miniature was actually much lower on the playing surface then the Camel that was in the lower CAB. Other than that minor quibble, the bases worked very well! 

I am working with Mike at Table Top Flights to order some 1/200 scale World War One aircraft that has a post that still fits the Wings of Glory pegs. He is hopeful this will work. If so, I look to start a 1/200 project, possibly using a 1.75" hex base and having a custom mat in the same hex size. That is a good compromise between the official Check Your 6! gaming surface and adjusting for the size of the planes.

Snipes on the Hunt After Action Report

At the Wright Flight monthly Wings of Glory gaming day I hosted the Snipes on the Hunt Polish-Soviet War scenario. Five players took part, and we used some modified rules (covered within the scenario found on the Downloads page above).

Using the random starting location generator from the Wings of Glory Aerodrome, the Poles, being on the defense, started in the center of the table, while the attacking Bolsheviks were two range sticks to the Poles' starboard. Within a few turns the planes engaged, with one Ansaldo taking some early damage. I had the Camel, and climbed to maximum altitude while the two Ansaldos became also separated in height. The players took a few turns to grasp the changes to the diving and firing rules, but worked both changes pretty well for the remainder of the game. The Soviet ace continued to lay down some heavy damage on the G Dog's Ansaldo, flown by an ace and representing Meriam C. Cooper's plane, he of later King Kong fame, continued to take a beating as his damage cards were of higher values in the A deck. Down went G Dog.

Down goes G Dog - note the heavy amount of damage inflicted

The other Ansaldo started taking damage, including the boom card (which we play at half damage rounded up) and limped off the board with just a point or two of damage remaining on the stricken aircraft. While  had a nice run at one at the Snipes, my altitude was too high for firing, so I decided that as the Soviets had two planes in excellent shape still on the board that it was time for some discretionary valor and headed for the safety of friendly lines.

All in all it was a short game, even with the modified altitudes for firing. The Ansaldos were given diving turn cards to enhance their historical performance, but the nimble Snipes were too much to overcome.

We laid out a second game in which I hosted and another player swapped in. The second game saw a much longer combat, with no planes shot down, but a couple forced off the table.

Starting locations for the second game

Planes: Table Top Flights Ansaldos, Ares Camel and Snipes

Mat - GripMats

Magnets - K and J Magnetics

Kościuszko!

After a couple of months of not touching any of my Wings of Glory projects, I have been slowly working on a pair of Ansaldo A.1s for the Kościuszko Squadron. I believe I have them completed from a painting perspective - now I just need to order decals to mark the planes. They are not perfect, but looking pretty decent I think, and once the decals have been added and a final coat of sealer has been applied, they should look good on the tabletop. 

These are resin prints, from Table Top Flights. Good prices and service from Mike over at Table Top. Painted with Vallejo cork brown for the fuselages, and AK Interactive clear doped linen version2 for the wings and tail.

Oops, just noticed I forgot the radiator on the top wing, so I have now taken care of that task, and with a little more touchup around the radiator, the painting will be completed.

I've put together the framework of a scenario, pitting the two Ansaldos, along with a Camel, against two Soviet Sopwith Snipes. Balance should be decent - the Ansaldos are similar to the SPAD XIII, so think boom and zoom. The Snipes are speedy and maneuverable, but slightly balanced by the Camel. The scenario, called Snipes on the Hunt, is available on the Downloads page above.

The Polish-Soviet War

The blogging function on the Wings of War Aerodrome has been changed, not allowing for pictures to appear within the blog, and posting pictures upside down, so I will be blogging about my various Wings of Glory projects and gaming here!

Yeah, I need an intervention as I have plenty of projects to work on, but this one intrigues me. At one time I was going to do a 1792 Russian-Polish War project in 15mm, but alas the company that started making the figures never released more than a few packs, and the project withered on the vine. But as part of that project I read a bio on Andrzej Tadeusz Bonawentura Kościuszko and find the chap fascinating. Since I cannot game the 1792 affair, I CAN game the 1920 war, in which American and British pilots formed a squadron in honor of Kościuszko.

I have two books now on the Kościuszko Squadron. I have a pair of Table Top Flights Ansaldo A.1s to paint. I picked up a Sapozhnikov Sopwith Snipe. I made a trade with camelbeagle for a Polish Sopwith Camel repaint. I plan on getting one more Sapozhnikov Snipe to do a minor "repaint." Based on this I would say that this is enough!

The Ansaldo's are fast and good diving aircraft, and balanced with a Camel, these three Polish crates might be a nice mix against two Snipes. The Snipes utilize a fast and maneuverable deck, and Sapozhnikov should have an ace ability or two as he had four kills during World War One and two in the Russian Civil War. The Kościuszko Squadron pilots should have at least single ace ability as well - they are referenced to being well trained several times in the book Kościuszko, We Are Here!: American Pilots of the Kosciuszko Squadron in Defense of Poland, 1919-1921. This just might turn out to be a balanced three on two game, and a five or six player game is about all I like to manage on the table top!

UPDATE:

While not a lot has happened on this front in terms of getting aircraft painted, I was able to grab a Sopwith Camel repaint that camelbeagle picked up I believe from an eBay purchase (if the Camel in the picture was painted by one of the members of this forum, please let me know!). I know of at least one Camel in the Kościuszko Squadron that was brought in by one of the British members of the unit, however the artwork I have seen has the squadron insignia closer towards the tail, and does not show a red cowling...but as this plane has a spiffy paintjob already on it, I am leaving it alone!

For the pair of Soviet Snipes, I will most likely leave one as is and paint some sort of distinguishing feature on the other...perhaps adding red to the cowling and/or adding a red section to the upper wing.

I have slapped a little paint (Vallejo cork brown on the fuselages) on the Table Top Flights Ansaldos (like weeks and weeks ago). The focus now will be to complete these two aircraft and then create a scenario using all five aircraft.