PTERROR IN THE SKIES

Onside report by Jim Wallman

Having found my box of 1970s period aircraft I wanted to do another run of my Airwars game, designed for 1970s air combat (originally for Vietnam and Aira-Israeli wars).

Inspired by Evan’s Triplanes & pterodactyls game, I thought I’d do a variant of that idea set in the later period. The result of this made scheme meant buying suitable models for the flying dinosaurs, in this case pteranodons – I ended up getting six 1/35 models, which were not far off the size of a 1/72 scale Phantom F4.

The next step was to work out some rules modifications to give the pteranodons some sort of chance against heavily armed jet fighters. I decided to make the pteranodons fairly slow and manoeverable, but with a ranged attack so that they could do harm to the Phantoms. The next issue was that I only has 2 phantom models, and it looked like I’d have 4 players at the CLWG, and maybe 3 or 4 joining us on Discord. Obviously the pterandons would be the online players, and those in the room would run the phantoms. More kit purchasing meant I got two more phantoms, allowing one per player (than goodness more didn’t turn up).

The simple scenario was that the in-person players were an RAF quick reaction force flying out of Lossimouth in response to an ‘unidentified contact’ near the edge of UK airspace to the north of the Shetlands. The year was 1971, so the possibility of an incursion by Soviet spyplanes was a possibility, so the RAF jet were fully armed and prepared to fight.

One the table was a (scratch-built) ‘mysterious portal’ and out of that portal emerged the six giant mutated pteranodons.

Players were :

RAF, Mukul (in command), Dave b (2iC), Nick L, Trevor

Pteranodons: Brian, Terry, Deborah, Sophie and Jaap.

The Pteranodon briefing

The Pteranodons are threatened by the huge noisy creatures that are in their skies and threatening their nests.

They will attack the huge noisy creatures and their aim is to drive them off or kill them before they can rob the nests or eat the younglings.

The route to the nests is through the glimmering light [=portal].

If a huge noisy creature enters the glimmering this is a Bad Thing – then the creature must be punished when it re-emerges.

Additional Rules

Using the same results cards as the original game, the following additional rules were used:

Pteranadon Movement

Move 1 hex and make up to two 60º turns in a turn.

OR

Remain stationary and rotate any amount

Weapons

There are three sub-specied of pteranodon. Each sub-species of Pteranadon has a special ranged attack.

YELLOW WING STRIPES : Mutant Sonic Scream – two hexes directly ahead : Counts as Multi-Cannon

BLUE WING STRIPES : Chemical Acid Breath – two hexes directly ahead : Counts as Heat Seeker missile

RED WING STRIPES : Radioactive Breath – two hexes directly ahead : Counts as Radar Homing missile

All Pteranodons have a Wing Slam – must be in the same hex as target – same effect as single cannon.

Targeting and Effects

Pteranadons can take 4 damage before dying.

Human weapons effects:

Heat seekers always miss. Do not show players card result.

Radar Homing roll 4,5 or 6 for a LOCK ON. Once locked on, keep rolling every turn. 1 means the lock is lost.

Cannon – work as normal

Effect of hits – any hit causes just one damage

Result

After a very confused battle (In which I resolutely forgot key rules), on RAF jet fled the battle when the pilot was wounded, one with a fuel line leak, and two downed by the pteranodon attacks.  History does not record what happened to the ejected aircrew.  The pteranodons reported said “Squaaark Squaaark, screeeee!” (Trans:  ‘Oooo snacks!’).

Thoughts

The hybrid nature of the game introduced some confusion – though that did create its own atmosphere,  There are always things that could be done to improve the experience, a second or third camera angle would have been good (and this is eminently do-able).  The on-line players were very patient with the frictions, and in any case had the satisfaction of being victorious against the horrible noisy creatures!  I’d be very interested in offside feedback and reports from those who took part.  I was very glad of Evan’s help as the liaison with the on-line players who he monitored on his laptop and phone.  This sort of game definitely needs two people in control – and this is probably the case from most hybrid games with more than a couple of player.

Maybe next time I do Airwars I’ll do a more conventional battle and see how it goes.