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2022/01/10 15:48:26
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Greetings All,
I have been tinkering and working on an air combat game for the Korean War tentatively called White Star/Red Star. For these rules, I went out an purchased a bunch of Tumbling Dice 1/600 aircraft for the period. I have the forces of the USAF vs the Communists. However, there is room to expand with the USN/USMC and the British Commonwealth forces for the UN too.
These include some of my favorite planes like the F-80 Shooting Star, F-84 Thunderjet, the F-86 Sabre, and the venerable B-29 Superfortress. On the Communists side we have the much vaunted Mig-15 and various late World War II era prop planes.
As you can see, these models can be relatively tiny. However, that allows you to play a game in a relatively small space. In addition, the rules I am working on actually model and scale agnostic, so you could just as easily use Warlord's Blood Red Skies: Mig Alley minis too.
Above is a B-26 Invader, Mig-15, F-84 Thunderjet, and a T-6 Texan for scale purposes.
I have been testing the rules using paper templates while I get the minis sorted and painted. The main thrust of the rules is to do the following:
1. Simplify flying with an assumption that all pilots know how to fly
2. Quick, easy, decision based mechanics.
3. Pilot skill difference matters
4. Incorporate key ideas like Detection, Altitude, and vertical vs. horizontal combat
5. Gun battles at Jet speeds
You can follow some of the design work Here:
V1 Rules:
Cap in MIG Alley
http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2021/06/battle-report-white-starred-star-cap-in.html
Bomber Intercept
http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2020/08/battle-report-white-star-red-star.html
Bomber Intercept 2
http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2020/07/battle-report-white-starred-star-bomber.html
Intercept at Suwon Airfield
http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2022/01/battle-report-white-starred-star.html
After initial playtesting, I have gone through a major re-vamp of the rules and how Detection, the action economy, and how Wingmen operate. More to come as I continue to develop this game further. Let me know what you think of the progress, and if the game is hitting its design goals.
Thanks.
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/01/10 15:48:44
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2022/01/12 15:30:04
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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To get started, here is a swarm of Mig-15s.....
The nice thing about small scale models is that they paint up really quickly!
Supposedly, the initial Russian fighter units painted their planes with the distinctive red engine coverings. However, this seems suspect considering what lengths the Russians went to try and hide their involvement in the war. Russian pilots had to learn key aviation phrases in Korean, were forbidden to fly over the ocean, and other complex rules of engagement to keep their participation obscured enough for plausible deniability.
In addition to the Russian pilots that were rotated in to fly frontline missions, the Soviets were actively trying to train up Chinese and North Korean pilots to fly the Mig-15. This led to a skill gap in MIg-15 pilots. Many of the Russian pilots were experienced pilots from World War II, with the leading, surviving Russian Ace of the war as the initial unit commander. The North Koreans and Chinese did not have this base of knowledge to draw from.
It is also important to note that the MIG-15s main adversary was NOT the USAF F-86 Sabre. The primary target of the Mig-15 was the B-29 Superfortress. Many cite the kill ratio of Sabres to Migs when talking about the Korean Air War. However, that is a bit of a misconception for two reasons:
1. The Mig's main target was intercepting bombers, and not air-to-air kills vs Sabres. The Mig was better off trying to avoid Sabres to fight another day, and only fight when they had the advantage.
2. Many US plane losses were written off as mechanical failures rather than actual combat losses. This gamesmanship was intended to inflate the kill ratio between the Communist and UN pilots.
These Migs will be a good start to the Communist forces over Korea.
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2022/01/17 15:32:43
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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To oppose my Communist air force, I painted up some USAF early jets as well.
Here, we can see the the F-84 Thunderjet in the left front, the F-80 Shooting Star in the right front, and the famous F-86 Sabre to the rear. The Sabre planes have the distinctive Yellow lines all Sabre models seem to sport in the artwork, models, and many photos. The others I went with red as well based on actual squadron and aircraft pictures I could find from the era.
The F-84 and F-80 proved to be inadequate platforms for dealing with the Mig-15 threat. However, the F-84 went on to be the leading strike aircraft of the USAF during the war. It went through various design changes, and saw a long service life with Air National Guard units. There was even a swept wing design called the Thunderstreak, but it never saw service in Korea.
The F-80 was somewhat less successful. The interceptor squadrons were swapped out to other aircraft in 1951. However, it still operated as a ground attack aircraft. At the start of the war, the F-80 was the primary jet interceptor versus the older, prop powered North Korean forces, and it did fine work against such opponents. However, the F-80 was the first jet shot down by a MIg-15, and the F-80 struggled to protect the B-29's from this new threat. By the end of the war, the only F-80s still in service over Korea were photo recon birds.
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2022/01/21 16:33:48
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Next up, I needed to build up the American Bomber force for White Star/Red Star since strategic bombing from B-29's and A-26s was a key UN strategy. The MIg-15's main job was to stop the B-29s from getting through. In this job, they were very successful and forced the cessation of daylight bombing. However, the bombing campaign continued with night raids.
The B-29 is in the back with the A-26 Invaders in the front. The Invaders are in an actual paint scheme I found photos of for night attacks.
The B-29 tried to attack infrastructure, but it was soon learned that North Korea had only a handful of key infrastructure items. Meanwhile, the Invaders were attacking more tactical targets such as troop concentrations, logistical cross roads, etc. Most of these bombers were based out of Japan, and had to travel long distances in order to launch their attacks.
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2022/01/28 15:20:26
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Next, I turned to the Communists air forces again. This time the North Korean's in the early war will be the focus.
Here we can see the late WWII model aircraft used by the North Koreans. Their air forces was small and mostly focused on ground attack and support. However, it was supplemented by a few interceptors.
To the left is the La-9 (or La-11 in a pinch) with the red cowlings. The right has the Yak-9 with the red nose cones. In front of them is the Yak-19 Maxx which was primarily used as a night-time, nuisance bomber, recon aircraft, and trainer.
The La-9 and Yak-9's would lead the effort in the Air Battle for South Korea in the first month or two of the war. The planes and pilots performed effectively, but were no match for the much larger, better trained, and better supported UN air forces that arrived. The North Koreans lost the Air Battle of South Korea decisively and allowed the USAF almost unfettered control of the air over Korea.
However, the arrival of the Soviet MIG-15 would change the air war yet again.
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2022/02/02 17:23:35
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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I have a playtest of a V2 set of White Star/Red Star up on my blog. V2 I made some significant changes to the rules to see what happens on the table!
http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2022/01/battle-report-white-starred-star-cap-in.html
Sadly, this was completed BEFORE I painted up all my fun new models. Paper templates ahoy!
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2022/02/16 15:36:45
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Work continues on the 1/600 Tumbling Dice aircraft for the Korean War. Here is the "Old school" USAF with F-51 Mustangs, F-82 Twin Mustangs, and a couple of A-6 Texans/Mosquitos.
In addition, I have a play test battle report with most likely the "final version" of the rules for White Star/Red Star on the blog here:
http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2022/02/battle-report-white-starred-star-combat.html
The next battle report will have fully painted aircraft in it!
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2022/02/22 15:55:17
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Welp, the game is out in the wild on the Wargame Vault now. You can find it here:
https://www.wargamevault.com/browse.php?keywords=blood+and+spectacles&x=0&y=0&author=&artist=&pfrom=&pto=
So far, it is number 6 in the top sellers category! I hope it lasts!
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2022/09/06 14:32:59
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Greetings All,
I have put up some Designer's Notes on the blog for my Korean Air War game called White Star/Red Star. Hopefully, they will give you insight into my design process for the game, and you can see if it is something that may interest you.
You can find the blog post here:
http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2022/08/wargame-design-white-starred-star.html
These were the core design goals, so take a look and see how I managed to achieve these goals in the rules.
1. Simplify flying and assume that all pilots know how to fly, the player do not have to
2. Use action economy to differentiate pilot skill
3. Make detection a key component of the game
4. Finish games quick while including critical player decision making
5. Represent the key tactical challenges and aircraft of the Korean Air War
6. Scale and Model agnostic
White Star/Red Staris currently up on the Blood and Spectacles page on the Wargame Vault.
https://www.wargamevault.com/browse.php?keywords=blood+and+spectacles&x=0&y=0&author=&artist=&pfrom=&pto=
Thanks for looking.
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2022/09/08 14:34:19
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Warlord has been getting into this space with various Blood Red Skies sized sculpts. They used to have a boxed set called MiG Alley, but I did not see it on the site at the moment.....
However, they do have these nice early jets for sale.....
and my favorite.....
If they expand the range with a few more Communist craft I will be tempted to pick some up!
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2022/09/09 05:21:01
Subject: Re:White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Perfect Shot Ultramarine Predator Pilot
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TBH I'm not really convinced on your design principles. You claim to want to "take the flying out of it" and focus on higher-level strategy, assuming the pilots know how to fly their planes appropriately, but then you go straight into micromanaging arcs and turn angles. It ends up being an awkward combination of too simplified and too complicated, with too much micromanaging and player error to be a true high-level strategy game but too little depth of flying mechanics to be an engaging pilot-level game. You want to pick one or the other and commit to it, not try to do both simultaneously.
Also, as a smaller issue, triggering the disengagement turn because one plane disengages is a bad mechanic. You shouldn't be able to unilaterally end the fight by flying a plane off the edge, disengaging should require you to actually get away from the enemy and if the enemy wants to pursue the game should continue. Same thing with running out of ammo. It shouldn't matter if you want to break off with empty guns if the enemy still has ammunition and wants to kill you. And I'm really confused as to why the Soviet player in your battle report decided to "get to safety" and "break contact by climbing to High Altitude" when the only surviving enemy planes were out of ammunition and no threat. Are you playtesting with people who understand the rules? Or are you assuming the game is played as a narrative thing where players make choices from the point of view of what the real pilot would do rather than what makes sense within the rules?
(Granted, I didn't buy the game so I'm going purely by the battle reports you posted.)
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This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2022/09/09 05:32:08
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2022/09/12 14:28:21
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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A fair critique, but also a misunderstanding of how traditionally flying games have played. In a traditional flying game such as "Blue Max", Wings of War, etc. you spend a lot of time pre-determining you plane moves, executing maneuvers, altitude adjustments, speed adjustments, etc. in an attempt to get into position AND not crash.
I wanted to remove the "flying" and focus on position and tactical elements. If you completely remove the tactical element, you have a board game pushing chits around a hex map; which could be fun but not what I am looking for. I still want a reason to put miniature planes on the board, so some level of on-board decision making is still needed to make a tactical game.
As for disengaging when you leave the board; in real air battle you have infinity sky; but not infinite time, fuel, ammo, etc. Most gamers do not have space for infinite tables, so some abstraction is needed. It is assumed in the game that if you make it off the board, that is good enough to be assumed to break contact.
Do you see where compromises needed to be made in the game design? That is the essence of game design, deciding when and where you are going to make compromises and abstractions.
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July 19th, 1950 the USAF sought to establish air superiority against the invading communist forces. This was know as the Air Battle of Korea. At this stage in the war, the USAF was using a combination of piston and jet engine aircraft for this mission. The primary opponents were the North Korean air force using propeller driven late WWII era aircraft.
On July 19th, F-80's from the 5th air force took on advanced elements of the North Korean Air Force. They engaged in a dogfight near Taejon. In the engagement, the F-80s managed to down 3 enemy Yaks.
I am super excited to get my Tumbling Dice miniatures out on the table to see how they look and feel on the table!
Mission:
We used the rules from the book to determine the Sortie for today and came up with a Combat Air Patrol in clear weather. This is a simple scenario to kill the other sides planes.
Forces:
We have decided to use the North Koreans and USAF lists.
USAF
3 F-80 Shooting Stars
- Experienced pilots
North Koreans
4 Yak - 9 Franks
- 3 Rookie Pilot
- 1 Experienced Pilot
[img]
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZaGuALSfjnK00yOP7PsysofS_i3O95McWDx5qz_7HGTSb5rpB0afuO71xqGBi6_svttl_YaGTgLSpmuK9HK_KOSw5K_sLQ1ENgfNj3ING7YGiryzyRgYgrTYWxpFWqiDvhymyMmd9QRAthBtLR5EmL6NCIdwjJNiWBQmle845ZTgxDl4AmnCAYvsV/w596-h640/IMG_2485.HEIC[/img]
Set-up:
This games starts off with both players undetected. There is also no need for terrain, but we added some for the look.
The game is taking place on a 86 x 86 MU board. 1 MU is equal to 1/2 and inch.
Two of the Yaks are connected as wing-men. Everyone else is individuals in this furball.
For reference, if a plane has no stand, it is at low altitude, stand is combat, and on top of a dice on a stand it is High altitude.
You can read the full report on the Blood and Spectacles blog here:
http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2022/09/battle-report-white-starred-star-cap.html
The rules are from the Wargame Vault:
https://www.wargamevault.com/browse.php?keywords=blood+and+spectacles&x=0&y=0&author=&artist=&pfrom=&pto=
Enjoy!
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2022/09/13 00:12:15
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Perfect Shot Ultramarine Predator Pilot
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Easy E wrote:A fair critique, but also a misunderstanding of how traditionally flying games have played. In a traditional flying game such as "Blue Max", Wings of War, etc. you spend a lot of time pre-determining you plane moves, executing maneuvers, altitude adjustments, speed adjustments, etc. in an attempt to get into position AND not crash.
I wanted to remove the "flying" and focus on position and tactical elements. If you completely remove the tactical element, you have a board game pushing chits around a hex map; which could be fun but not what I am looking for. I still want a reason to put miniature planes on the board, so some level of on-board decision making is still needed to make a tactical game.
Yes, I get how traditional air combat games work. My point is that your claim is to want to focus on the tactical element and assume that the pilot knows how to fly the plane but then you put the micromanagement stuff right back in. You (rightfully) assume that the pilot knows how to avoid stalling or hitting the ground but why don't you make the same assumption about other things? In the real world if a plane is approaching a target too quickly the pilot will know to slow down, s-turn to increase their travel distance without slowing down, or simply open fire a moment sooner. But in your game if you screw up the micromanagement and a plane's fixed movement distance causes it to overshoot the target in the movement step that's it, you don't get to shoot. Instead of being a higher-level commander the player is right there in the pilot's seat and their slight mistake in approach speed is the pilot's mistake.
And of course this would be fine in a traditional air combat game where the player is in that pilot's seat. But the issue is that by trying to make your game a higher-level approximation you've stripped out too much depth from the flying mechanics for it to be an interesting or realistic pilot-level game. Having only three altitude levels, being unable to climb/dive and turn at the same time (a pilot 101 skill), etc, makes the flying mechanics shallow and unrealistic. So you end up caught in the awkward middle ground where by trying to do both you don't have a good pilot-level game and you don't have a good high-level game.
As for disengaging when you leave the board; in real air battle you have infinity sky; but not infinite time, fuel, ammo, etc. Most gamers do not have space for infinite tables, so some abstraction is needed. It is assumed in the game that if you make it off the board, that is good enough to be assumed to break contact.
That's not the issue I'm talking about. Given the physical component limitations of a finite play area it's fine to have the approximation that leaving the table means successfully disengaging from the fight, as long as the table size is large enough that disengaging isn't trivially easy (as it is for aircraft in 40k, for example). The thing I'm talking about is where a single aircraft leaving the table triggers the disengagement turn and ends the fight for everyone else as well. You shouldn't be able to fly a single plane off the table and end the fight, if you want to disengage and go home you should have to successfully extract your planes from the fight, avoid any pursuit, and reach the table edge intact. It's ridiculous that the winning side sees one plane flee and decides that nope, we're done here too and is forced to also disengage.
(I'm assuming that by "disengagement turn" you mean the standard concept of playing one final turn before the game ends, during which aircraft can flee off the table edge without penalty. If you're using it to mean something else then this criticism may not apply.) Automatically Appended Next Post: To clarify: this is what I'm talking about, from: http://bloodandspectacles.blogspot.com/2022/02/battle-report-white-starred-star-combat.html
Everyone goes straight. This time, Fang #4 manages to disengage, which triggers the disengagement turn.
Despite multiple aircraft still being in an active dogfight the game ends on turn 6 because one plane flew off the edge and escaped.
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This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2022/09/13 00:21:12
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2022/09/13 14:22:29
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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So, what activity and decisions do you propose the player make for a wargame at this scale of game? I am not sure there are many left if I follow the path you are laying out.
Perhaps you are trying to tell me, that there is no good way to abstract the flying out of an air combat game, and those others games did it the way they did for a good reason. I do not inherently disagree with that statement.
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As to your second point, you may have missed the fact that several of the Fangs compatriots had all ready been blown from the sky too! Therefore, when he disengaged the remaining flight of fighters went to less than half of their starting numbers which is what actually triggered the Disengagement turn.
However, by disengaging, the Fang also avoided giving away a "Kill" (or VP) and by doing so, gave his compatriots one turn to try and score again. The Yak was in good position to get Kills, which they did. It was only a shot in the final Ace phase by a Mustang that manages to snag the Yak and give the USAF the win.
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2022/09/13 22:51:18
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Perfect Shot Ultramarine Predator Pilot
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Easy E wrote:So, what activity and decisions do you propose the player make for a wargame at this scale of game? I am not sure there are many left if I follow the path you are laying out.
I would change the scale, because right now you're trapped in an awkward middle ground. I would zoom out further, so rather than representing the scale of a dogfight you'd represent the scale of an entire mission, or even region of the war. The detection system is a good starting point, and I'd add mechanics for selecting appropriate forces for the mission, managing interceptors vs. incoming threats, AA defenses and AA suppression missions, etc. Make it about getting planes into position to complete the mission and assume that once engaged each side will do appropriate things to maximize their chances of winning.
Or, if you want to keep the scale, you could put more depth back into the flying mechanics. More altitude levels, more depth to selecting turns, remove the weird limit on climbing/descending while making a turn, etc.
Perhaps you are trying to tell me, that there is no good way to abstract the flying out of an air combat game, and those others games did it the way they did for a good reason. I do not inherently disagree with that statement.
Partly. There's no good way to abstract the flying out of a dogfight game since dogfighting is all about those flying mechanics. The way to abstract the flying out is to zoom out far enough that strategic factors become more important than worrying about exactly which direction a plane is facing at a given moment.
As to your second point, you may have missed the fact that several of the Fangs compatriots had all ready been blown from the sky too! Therefore, when he disengaged the remaining flight of fighters went to less than half of their starting numbers which is what actually triggered the Disengagement turn.
That's exactly what I'm talking about. It's fine to want to disengage at that point but the game shouldn't automatically end just because one side has suffered losses. If you're down below 50% and want to disengage you should have to succeed in getting away, not just magically end the game at the end of the disengagement turn even though multiple aircraft are still engaged with the enemy. So sure, turn towards the table edge and run as fast as you can, but until you actually make it over the table edge the enemy should be free to continue the pursuit and shoot down more of your force as you retreat.
However, by disengaging, the Fang also avoided giving away a "Kill" (or VP) and by doing so, gave his compatriots one turn to try and score again. The Yak was in good position to get Kills, which they did. It was only a shot in the final Ace phase by a Mustang that manages to snag the Yak and give the USAF the win.
And this is why it's a problem. The Soviet player decided that it was to their advantage to end the game at that point and so they triggered the end condition, and there was nothing the USAF player could do to stop it. It doesn't matter if the ace Mustang ends the disengagement turn with another Yak in his sights, in the middle of the table and nowhere near safety, that Yak magically poofs out of existence and teleports back to base because it's the final turn of the game.
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/09/13 22:52:10
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2022/09/14 14:08:18
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Part of the objective was to challenge the "conventional way" of doing air combat. Yet, your advice is to follow the conventional way to do air combat? If I am understanding you right, you disagreed with the design objectives in the first place.
If I understand you correctly, you think my experiment failed. Which is a perfectly valid take on the topic. Thanks for your feedback, and I will take it into consideration when I return to air combat next time.
I always seem to come back to air combat, so I am sure I will be doing something with it again in the next few years.
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2022/09/29 09:58:02
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Perfect Shot Ultramarine Predator Pilot
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Easy E wrote:If I am understanding you right, you disagreed with the design objectives in the first place.
Apparently, if that was your goal. "Different for the sake of being different" is bad design. You should have clear goals in mind for why you want something to be different and how you're improving on convention. In this case you have some ideas but the execution fails because rather than setting a scope and asking how best to translate that into mechanics you seem to have set a goal of making "the standard air combat game, but different" and the good ideas get lost in the mechanics/scale mismatch.
And of course the disengagement turn stuff is just bad design regardless of goals. It shouldn't work that way in any game.
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2022/09/29 15:22:09
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Aecus Decimus wrote: Easy E wrote:If I am understanding you right, you disagreed with the design objectives in the first place.
Apparently, if that was your goal. "Different for the sake of being different" is bad design.
And, do it the way we have always done it is worse design. Why even try to design new games?
The goal was to try to streamline air combat game play be removing the "flying elements" from movement to speed up game play. Your contention is that I did not do so successfully. That is a fair enough assessment, and I appreciate the feedback. I am sure many folks agree with you! As I said, when I return to the topic of air combat again, which I know I will; because I always do.... I will keep this feedback in mind as I rethink it.
Is there some goal you have beyond giving me this feedback so I can re-think it in the future? If there is a different goal, please explain it to me.
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2022/09/29 20:20:19
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Perfect Shot Ultramarine Predator Pilot
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Good question. Usually you design a new game because you have a specific idea for something that hasn't been done before. But part of good game design is recognizing when you're getting into change for the sake of change territory, where the concept has already been done and nothing more needs to be added. And then you don't make that game.
Your contention is that I did not do so successfully.
No, my contention is that the design goal was broken on a fundamental level from the beginning and could not succeed. You started with a premise of having a mismatch between scale and mechanics and ended up with a game that falls victim to that exact problem.
Is there some goal you have beyond giving me this feedback so I can re-think it in the future? If there is a different goal, please explain it to me.
You posted your game in a public discussion forum, I offered my comments, you continue to defend it. If you're tired of the conversation you're always free to stop defending your decisions and let the conversation end.
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2022/09/29 22:15:26
Subject: White Star/Red Star- Korean Air War
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Battlefield Tourist
MN (Currently in WY)
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Fair enough. Thanks for your feedback.
As I said, I will mull it over when I inevitably return to air combat again as these goals are still important to me as a player.
1. Tactical game of planes where pilots and aircraft difference matter. Not a strategic game at all.
2. Reduce the time to play a game. Dogfights last 5-45 seconds, not 2 hours. The game needs to be shorter.
3. Players spending less time worrying about basic flying stuff, and more time on the fighting part.
There is always more than one way to design a game, so I know I will think about your comments when I go back to the white board for the next air combat game.
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