With the first planes fuelled up and ready to go it was time for our first game of Wings of War WWII.
Macsver took the Japanese Zero and Ki-100, leaving me with the US Wildcat and sluggish Dauntless. As it had been a while since last playing
MacSver's WWI Wings of Glory, we were just using basic rules (no altitude or tailing), no restrictions on manoeuvre speeds (speed is a rule not in the WWI ruleset) but advanced damage tokens (possible different effects on top of damage) were played.
My US pilots decided to stay together as best they could, where as MacSver went for the split approach, hoping to get at least one fighter in behind my planes. Things went a bit downhill early on for him though. My Wildcat managed to squeeze off a shot on the Zero, and the randomly pulled damage chit had the Japanese plane immediately blowing up mid air. MacSver was up against it.
There was one glimmer of hope though as he drew a bead on the Dauntless a couple turn later. The Ki-100 has a mighty set of cannons, making the US armaments seem a bit puny in comparison. But dodging 2 planes was very tricky and the damage slowly started to creep up.
After quite a bit of twisting and turning (sometime the wrong way!) and fire exchanges the final act came as the Wild Cat and Ki-100 passed almost head to head, guns blazing. But the Allied shells hit home in a truer style and soon the only planes in the sky were wearing US stars.
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A fun game to blow some of the air combat cobwebs away, but I feel we were both dying to add in something more advanced, which we will next time.
As a note (mostly to ourselves) the manoeuvre card play is slightly different in the WWII game than the WWI version. In the WWI game 3 manoeuvre cards are played down at a time for play. In the WWII version we set up with one card down and then add on the following turns movement, which is them pushed down as a single future move is planned, like a conveyor belt. We'll see what difference this makes next game...
Interesting to see you swap from WW1 to WW2 as we do the same. LOL even have the same experiences with Explosion cards getting pulled early. Your sea mat looks good and really shows off the planes well.
ReplyDeleteFun game.
The WWII and WWI games feel a bit different to me. Reading the altitude rules (which I'm sure we'll bring in next game) and bombing will make it more so I'm sure.
DeleteThe 'conveyor belt' movement card mechanic is the one used in the Standard rules for Sails of Glory. It sure makes difference in that game, especially when variable wind is in play, as you're always 'stuck' with the last card planned!
ReplyDeleteYeah, I missed the different planning rules, apologies. It'll be interesting to see how it changes the decisions. Also there are a few differences in a few other rules we've not used yet from the WWI version to highlight the power advances, so I'll have to be careful.
DeleteFirst time I've seen this Sam - very interesting; been toying with the idea of jumping into X-Wing or WoW for a while now.
DeleteAfter having played so many games of X-Wing and Wings Of Glory WWI with MacSver (Tim) I decided I wanted a flight game. Nearly went for X-Wing, but costed up the minimum spend for what I'd want and though this would be cheaper. Of course went slightly over budget but have still spent less that starting (lets be honest!) on X-Wing.
DeleteIt'll be interesting to see the rematch when the zero gets to use its climb rate...
ReplyDeleteI think without that early explosion the US forces would have been toast. And if the video from the previous post is anything to go by that Wildcat is in trouble. (Luckily for it their are reinforcements on the hobby table as we speak)
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