Balls of Fire - After Action Report

Initial setup of VF-66

I finally hosted my hypothetical late Second World War scenario, called Balls of Fire. The game features the Ki-100 Goshikisen against the Ryan FR-1 Fireball. Why these two planes? Because I can! 

The Japanese setup

The scenario is set over Sagami Bay, southwest of Yokohama. VF-66, a specially assembled Navy fighter squadron that pulled experienced pilots from other squadrons, had been training on the Fireball for months as the Ryan was the only plane fast enough to intercept the Yokosuka MXY-7 Ohka. However, the war ended before VF-66 could see action. This scenario assumes the war extended long enough for VF-66 to get into action. Their opponents are the pilots of the 244th Sentai, a home defense squadron, with its own selection of experienced pilots. 

Both sides have spotted and are starting to react

The players can only plot forward maneuver codes until either completing a successful spotting roll or after taking fire. 

Five hardy players from the Check Your 6! Southwestern Ohio Group met at the local game store. Initial setup is a bit randomized. While the opposing forces set up in opposite corners of the board, their starting CAB and TAL are determined by a roll of the dice. The Japanese started with three formations, two at Medium CAB and the last at Medium Bottom. The Americans started at  Medium CAB. Numbers favored the 244th Sentai with six aircraft, while aircrew quality leaned towards VF-66 (the Americans had one ace, two veterans, and one skilled pilot, while the Japanese had three veterans, two skilled, and one green aircrew).

The first five to six turns were simply approach moves until the Japanese closed to within spotting range. They were successful in spotting the Americans while the latter failed to spot in return for one turn. However, as distances were great, the Americans spotted the next turn so there was no impact with their initial failure.

Maneuvering towards the Imperialists

VF-66 moves to engage

Scratch one Ki-100! Ys, I used an afterburner marker to indicate the destroyed Nippon

One of the best opportunities for the Japanese fell short and resulted in an airframe hit in return

The Dance of Death starts

Can you say airframe?

The last formation of Ki-100s close in

But for naught with another airframe hit

The setting sun on the Japanese Empire, another good chance to damage a Fireball failed

The Americans did not fair overly well with their damage dice results, but they were just enough to result in several airframe hits. The Japanese lined up a couple of good shots, but the Americans had a wave of successful robustness checks. And once the forces had closed, it was a day of Split S and Immelmann maneuvers, neither side wanting to show tail to the opponent.

More Japanese fell from the sky. With two Ki-100s now out of ammunition and no damage on the invading Imperialist Yankees, we called the game at fifteen turns. It was a tough day for the Emperor's 244th Sentai.  I had the American ace (VF-66 commander John Gray) and did well, inflicting two airframe hits. The Japanese commander, Teruhiko Kobayashi, not so much - I think he was one of the veteran pilots that were shot down.

Some takeaways:

1. Having the players start within five hexes of their respective edge corners was too far apart. Next time they will start within their respective areas (A for the Japanese and F for the Americans). This will allow the forces to get into action sooner.
2. Having a random die roll for TAL worked well, but having one for random CAB kept one Japanese player out of the game for quite some time (both sides had to hold course, CAB, TAL, and speed until spotting the enemy). Instead I will have the players all start in the same CAB, but still randomizing each formation's TAL.
3. Dice of course determined the outcomes. Had the Americans failed a robustness check or two, the game would have went quite differently. 

• The updated scenario is available under the Downloads page above.
• Planes are MSD Games FR-1s and Raiden Ki-100s, painted by Chris at I-94.
• Game mat is from Deep Cut Studio.

Balls of Fire

The Ryan FR-1 Fireball (MSD Games) and the Kawasaki Ki-100 (Raiden)...I've had these planes painted for some time, but finally got around to adding magnets so I can host an upcoming game using these oddball planes. The scenario is set in September 1945, and it assumes that the Japanese have yet to surrender, and that the Ryan Fireball, a hybrid piston/jet plane, and historically assigned to VF-66 (the Firebirds), makes it into action. The Firebirds were commanded by John F. Gray, an ace with 8.25 kills to his credit. Gray selected experienced men to join VF-66, including another ace, Kenneth Hippe who had five kills during the war. Overall the pilot quality of the Firebirds was very good with just a handful of new pilots, who were relegated to training for a new squadron. Hence, had VF-66 made it to war, their aircrew quality, using 40+ kills as an experten (+4), 20-39 as an ace (+3), 5-19 as a veteran (+2), and 0-4 as skilled (+1), VF-66 would have been rife with veteran and skilled pilots. .

On the other side is the Kawasaki Ki-100, which was developed from the Ki-61 (Tony). Both the Fireball and the Ki-100 (known as the Goshikisen) were fairly close in performance from what I could gather, but the Japanese will have a bit of an armament advantage as the Ki-100 has a heavier armament than the Fireball (two modern cannon and two heavy machineguns vs. four heavy machineguns). Also, the Japanese unit that did use the Ki-100, the 244th Sentai led by Teruhiko Kobayashi, was considered to be an exceptional organization, so the Americans do not have a great advantage in pilot skill that one would normally expect at this stage of the war. 

The scenario is a straightforward "shoot 'em up" with four Fireballs facing off against six Ki-100s. An after action report will follow once I host the first game using these rare birds. In the meantime you can grab the updated scenario by clicking the Downloads page above (the file is housed on Google Drive and is in pdf format).