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 Albertorius wrote:
Honestly speaking, the starter is...thin. Too thin to really be a standalone game, and too annoying for boardgamers, which should have been one of the main targets.

Things as they are, this will only be of interest to people already invested in GW, I think.

Yeah I agree.

Personally I enjoyed the handful of games I played, but as vyse said above, it feels a bit like an (expensive) beta release.

That said I love me some tiny planes, so I'll probably end up buying every squadron they release, they'll probably sit on my shelf next to my tiny WW2 planes I already have 2 starter sets + destroyers box. The only thing I haven't bought is the ground defences and the area of engagement.

I hope the game develops in to more and people get in to it more. At the 2 GW stores nearby they've said they're selling like hotcakes, but I noticed at the local non-GW store it didn't seem like they were even carrying the game.

 Albertorius wrote:
Honestly speaking, the starter is...thin. Too thin to really be a standalone game, and too annoying for boardgamers, which should have been one of the main targets.

Things as they are, this will only be of interest to people already invested in GW, I think.

not thin, just done wrong.
funny, they did the same errors with AT, seems they dont know how to make 2p boxes for anything but the 3 core games.

yes games tends to be a clusterfeth but that seems to be ork`s fault beeing only short range with high speed to clouse in fast.
allso, i feel board sizes should be bigger then what is reccomended. 3x3 should be for 30-60p, 4x6 for 65-100p and 4x8 for 105p+

The cardboard map is two sided, I wonder if two maps next to one another would work.

I may get the updated models and just use the old rules, but then all my old things are way out of scale..... decisions.

Also, as I consider this can anyone point me to some wargaming mats with 2 inch hexes? I have not found one I like yet.

Thanks!

 Fajita Fan wrote:
The cardboard map is two sided, I wonder if two maps next to one another would work.

Still ends up only 3 feet wide (18 hexes), I think 4 feet is better.

There is a place that sells 6'x4' mouse mat style hex boards, but I'm thinking of getting a double sided one without hexes and spraying the hexes on myself.

Another option I’ve been playing around with is to get a nice satellite image off google, put a hex pattern over it, cut it up in to A4 sheets and get them printed and then glue them to a sign writers board. A4 is a bit annoying to piece together, but it’s by far the cheapest by acreage for colour printing on good quality paper.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Albertorius wrote:
Honestly speaking, the starter is...thin. Too thin to really be a standalone game, and too annoying for boardgamers, which should have been one of the main targets.

Things as they are, this will only be of interest to people already invested in GW, I think.

Yeah I agree.

Personally I enjoyed the handful of games I played, but as vyse said above, it feels a bit like an (expensive) beta release.

That said I love me some tiny planes, so I'll probably end up buying every squadron they release, they'll probably sit on my shelf next to my tiny WW2 planes I already have 2 starter sets + destroyers box. The only thing I haven't bought is the ground defences and the area of engagement.

I hope the game develops in to more and people get in to it more. At the 2 GW stores nearby they've said they're selling like hotcakes, but I noticed at the local non-GW store it didn't seem like they were even carrying the game.

I might use the AI models for Blood Red Skies

Soulless wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Albertorius wrote:
Honestly speaking, the starter is...thin. Too thin to really be a standalone game, and too annoying for boardgamers, which should have been one of the main targets.

Things as they are, this will only be of interest to people already invested in GW, I think.

Yeah I agree.

Personally I enjoyed the handful of games I played, but as vyse said above, it feels a bit like an (expensive) beta release.

That said I love me some tiny planes, so I'll probably end up buying every squadron they release, they'll probably sit on my shelf next to my tiny WW2 planes I already have 2 starter sets + destroyers box. The only thing I haven't bought is the ground defences and the area of engagement.

I hope the game develops in to more and people get in to it more. At the 2 GW stores nearby they've said they're selling like hotcakes, but I noticed at the local non-GW store it didn't seem like they were even carrying the game.

I might use the AI models for Blood Red Skies

I haven’t played blood red skies, from what I’ve read it gets a bit too abstract for my liking.

Someone actually made rules for usin WW2 planes with the original AI rules, I was in the middle of making up some squadrons of 6mm WW2 planes to play original AI

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Fajita Fan wrote:
The cardboard map is two sided, I wonder if two maps next to one another would work.

Still ends up only 3 feet wide (18 hexes), I think 4 feet is better.

There is a place that sells 6'x4' mouse mat style hex boards, but I'm thinking of getting a double sided one without hexes and spraying the hexes on myself.

Another option I’ve been playing around with is to get a nice satellite image off google, put a hex pattern over it, cut it up in to A4 sheets and get them printed and then glue them to a sign writers board. A4 is a bit annoying to piece together, but it’s by far the cheapest by acreage for colour printing on good quality paper.

There’s a company who sells a clear plastic hex map that you can use to overlay any game mat.

 FrozenDwarf wrote:

 Albertorius wrote:
Honestly speaking, the starter is...thin. Too thin to really be a standalone game, and too annoying for boardgamers, which should have been one of the main targets.

Things as they are, this will only be of interest to people already invested in GW, I think.

not thin, just done wrong.

I mean to be an actual boardgame to appeal to actual boardgamers. Having to assemble the stuff is one thing, but not having stuff like the fighter cards inside the box will pretty much kill any interest.

yes games tends to be a clusterfeth but that seems to be ork`s fault beeing only short range with high speed to clouse in fast.
allso, i feel board sizes should be bigger then what is reccomended. 3x3 should be for 30-60p, 4x6 for 65-100p and 4x8 for 105p+

Or maybe hexes should be one inch and the minis half the size. That would probably make the game better at a sensible sized game space.

Pretty sure GW purposely avoided 1 inch hexes since there is a lot of third party options out there for such.

 ikeulhu wrote:
Pretty sure GW purposely avoided 1 inch hexes since there is a lot of third party options out there for such.

And made the game worse for it, because it's pretty clear that the scale of the minis and the boards is too small in number of hexes, but too big real state wise.

No argument there. Personally, I think 1 inch may have been a little two small, but 1.5 inch probably would have been the sweet spot of allowing both decent sized models and some actual air space for the models to play in.

Not the cheapest solution, and at one point they were known for slow delivery of orders, but http://hotzmats.com will do 2 inch hexes on their mats for you.

I don't own any of their stuff, but have seen it and it does look nice. I would prefer mouse pad to the heavy felt they use though.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ikeulhu wrote:
No argument there. Personally, I think 1 inch may have been a little two small, but 1.5 inch probably would have been the sweet spot of allowing both decent sized models and some actual air space for the models to play in.

And, I think Battletech maps are 1.5 inches. That would be nice...

 ikeulhu wrote:
No argument there. Personally, I think 1 inch may have been a little two small, but 1.5 inch probably would have been the sweet spot of allowing both decent sized models and some actual air space for the models to play in.

The original AI had 1.5 inch bases, so if they’d kept the old scale 1.5 would have been the natural choice for hex size.

I assume they upped the scale so that they could do plastic models with more detail, but for the most part it’s not beneficial.

I posted these size comparisons over in the news thread...

 Togusa wrote:
First, what the hell is with the hit/dmg system? Why don't the planes have different BS? Having everything hit on a 6+ is just stupid. For 6 turns we just sat there throwing dice at each other and accomplishing nothing.

First, statistically speaking, changing the number of dice thrown can be used to vary the result just as well as the target number.

Second, I've not been having the same difficulty in getting to the same altitude, and thus keeping the 5+, which you correctly point out is key to not wiffing on shots.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 ikeulhu wrote:
No argument there. Personally, I think 1 inch may have been a little two small, but 1.5 inch probably would have been the sweet spot of allowing both decent sized models and some actual air space for the models to play in.

The original AI had 1.5 inch bases, so if they’d kept the old scale 1.5 would have been the natural choice for hex size.

I assume they upped the scale so that they could do plastic models with more detail, but for the most part it’s not beneficial.

The planes are lovely and the detail is astonishing... but even with 2'' hexes the big ones are unwieldy the moment they get near one another.

So yeah, I'm pretty sure the scale change is not beneficial, but here we are. I'm seriously thinking about just build and print my planes for the shelve and actually play with regular Battletech boards and smaller, 3d printed ones. I'm quite sure it will work better with more real state.

 Breotan wrote:

If we see a third faction anytime before next September, I'll be very surprised. We've still got the Avenger and Lightning from the Imperial Navy not to mention the Fighta, Wazbom Blastajet, Burna-Bommer, and Blitza-Bommer for the Orks (I expect the Burna and Blitza will be a combo kit).

When a third faction does get released, it will either be Guard or a new set with two new factions such as Guard and Chaos.

I have been pondering how the designers will combine the old and new aircraft. the 40k-scale aircraft kits tend to cover several roles out of one basic airframe where the FW planes were more specialised.

I'm pretty sure the Dakkajet *is* the Fighta - the softback rulebook even uses refreshed lineart of the old AI Fighta on the dakkajet page. I don't have my old books in front of me but I think the stats are a straight port. Wazom, blitza and burna would seem to be represented by the Fighta-Bommer and if they come in to the game, it'll be via weapons and upgrade sprues like with AT.

My personal suspicion is that the november release is due to some sort of manufacturing or design slippage. It's painfully obvious when you look at a store shelf that there was supposed to be 3 kits per faction at launch, so the bommer is just completing what was supposed to be out already and shouldnt; be taken as any indication of release frequency.

Second Campaign book (and/or the organised play rules) and new faction with 2 or 3 kits in march, I reckon. Probably Chaos.

I think my main bugbear so far is that they should ship the bases unassembled. unpainted metallic plastic looks terrible.

Also - rules question- what happens if an aircraft is assigned a maneuver it can't perform? I;m sure there must be a rule but I coudn't find it. instant spin? instant stall?

RFT wrote:

 Breotan wrote:

Also - rules question- what happens if an aircraft is assigned a maneuver it can't perform? I;m sure there must be a rule but I coudn't find it. instant spin? instant stall?

IIRC the aircraft is forced to execute a level flight maneuver (1) at its current speed. Dont have the book beside me so not completely sure.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 ikeulhu wrote:
No argument there. Personally, I think 1 inch may have been a little two small, but 1.5 inch probably would have been the sweet spot of allowing both decent sized models and some actual air space for the models to play in.

The original AI had 1.5 inch bases, so if they’d kept the old scale 1.5 would have been the natural choice for hex size.

I assume they upped the scale so that they could do plastic models with more detail, but for the most part it’s not beneficial.

I posted these size comparisons over in the news thread...

Are those smaller planes the epic models or the AI models?

Those are the original forge world AI ones from I think 2007-ish. The original epic ones from the 90’s were smaller again, they were too small and out of scale with the 6mm scale of epic, when FW remade them for AI they made them proper 6mm scale.

The original (metal) models were almost half as small as the FW resin ones.

I really wanted to like this game, and have many Imp and Chaos planes from the first AI days. I did buy the starter and the campaign book, but reading the base rules left me disappointed.

The planes are nice, but the rules seem a mess, not to mention stuff being in different publications.

I'm going to see if I can use the old AI bases for these new planes (I know they're designed for the ball and socket, but I think the pegs will still work), or use Check Your Six stands. The only question is whether the planes will be too large or unbalanced.

I think I'm going to give up on this until they correct some of the funkiness, and it gets consolidated into an actual rulebook at some point (a year or two?), and see if the reviews have improved. I "might" buy planes, depending. Shame.

 Cruentus wrote:

I'm going to see if I can use the old AI bases for these new planes (I know they're designed for the ball and socket, but I think the pegs will still work), or use Check Your Six stands. The only question is whether the planes will be too large or unbalanced.

pegs are universal.
fighters wont have any issue, but the bombers might be easy to tip over.

Had my first couple of games. New scale Destroyers with old scale Thunderbolts versus Old scale Orks. The hex map made the scale unimportant. Used a GEV map from Steve Jackson's Ogre the hexes fit the old bases perfectly and it seemed a decent size.

In a straight up Dogfight the Destroyers are deadly with the imperials winning both times. Sides were two T'bolts and two Destroyers no upgrades 96 versus 3 Fightas and 2 Fightabommas with all bar one Fighta upgraded with rockets also 96. We used the Orks on round bases with dice to indicate speed and altitude, this actually worked better than the dials as it was easier to see!

Enjoyable game and will play again, probably just use old points and stat lines for stuff that hasn't come out yet.

got my fighta bommerz today, am i alone in thinking that these planes are a multi platform cast?

the wings are way too small at the connection point(about 5mm of the wing is missing it looks like), and there is two guns on the sprue that is not mentioned in the assembly instruction at all.

Uh, no? The original model has that stepped wing root too. Not sure about the extra guns though; are you sure they aren’t the ones for the “open” nose? The two conical noses have the guns sculpted in.

 Mr_Rose wrote:
Uh, no? The original model has that stepped wing root too. Not sure about the extra guns though; are you sure they aren’t the ones for the “open” nose? The two conical noses have the guns sculpted in.

then the wings are an odd design if it is intensional.

after a bit of looking, the extra guns apparently can be glued to the bomb/rocket hardpoints under the wings, even tough the assembly manual do not showcase this.
dunno what kind of rules they would follow tough.

 FrozenDwarf wrote:

 Mr_Rose wrote:
Uh, no? The original model has that stepped wing root too. Not sure about the extra guns though; are you sure they aren’t the ones for the “open” nose? The two conical noses have the guns sculpted in.

then the wings are an odd design if it is intensional.

after a bit of looking, the extra guns apparently can be glued to the bomb/rocket hardpoints under the wings, even tough the assembly manual do not showcase this.
dunno what kind of rules they would follow tough.

They represent the Kustom Big Shootas in the rules.

They are mentioned in the instructions, bottom left of the last page with a cog symbol that means alternate build option.

i guess that is what you get for speed building them planes.

Remember those pilot cards GW was offering if you purchased one of their bundles? Are those just alternate cards of the ones that come in those Aircraft and Aces boxes? Or are they different?