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My collection of X-Wing dials is huge and takes up a significant amount of space - much more than the single baggie of counters for Aeronautica Imperialis, which will do me for any size of game I foresee ever playing. Since the counters aren't keyed to the ships, I don't need to get ever more just because I've bought more planes. I also find placing a counter takes longer than manipulating a dial. And the counters don't ever get loose and result in the wrong symbol being shown.

YMMV, but I find AI to be a more user-friendly way to do it.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
I find the dials in X-Wing fiddly, they take up a huge amount of space and it makes it hard to see which options a given ship has. If I lose a dial for X-Wing I’m gunned. If I lose a counter, that’s easily resolved.

I'd almost rather have had dials for AI given that you only need three different ones (for low, high, and very high maneuverability). Having to sort through the stack of cardboard tokens seems to take a while.

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
My collection of X-Wing dials is huge and takes up a significant amount of space - much more than the single baggie of counters for Aeronautica Imperialis, which will do me for any size of game I foresee ever playing. Since the counters aren't keyed to the ships, I don't need to get ever more just because I've bought more planes. I also find placing a counter takes longer than manipulating a dial. And the counters don't ever get loose and result in the wrong symbol being shown.

YMMV, but I find AI to be a more user-friendly way to do it.

Fair enough.
Although, five years of XW and ive never had anyone presenting any of those things you mentioned as an issue. No broken/lose dials, no issues storing or transporting them and lost dials can easily be replaced for free or at minimal cost.

No such thing as manoeuvrability classes any more. You just get a number showing the highest rated turn you can use.


I still think I prefer ‘face up behind a screen’ as the fastest and simplest solution to counter-picking.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 AndrewGPaul wrote:
I find the dials in X-Wing fiddly, they take up a huge amount of space and it makes it hard to see which options a given ship has. If I lose a dial for X-Wing I’m gunned. If I lose a counter, that’s easily resolved.

I'd almost rather have had dials for AI given that you only need three different ones (for low, high, and very high maneuverability). Having to sort through the stack of cardboard tokens seems to take a while.

Na you would either need generic ones covering all numbers/maneuvers, or individual ones for each ship as there will likely be ships further on that have like "1-2, 5" or similar maneuvers.
I wouldnt mind either way, generic ones would mean they can sell em separately and anyone can buy/replace whatever whenever or even not at all, individual ones would just be neater and help you not setting maneuvers a craft doesnt have.

In any case, were not ever gonna get individual ones now, but maybe generic ones. There is already someone on etsy making maneuver dials for the game but shipping is stopping me from ordering them right away

This wouldn't be very hard to 3d print something. I'm thinking of a dial with the numbers 1-8, a hole in the middle, and just a rod being held by friction in the middle that points to a number. Rotate the rod to your maneuver, turn face down, done.

Personally, it's probably mostly about my everlasting loathing of hyperspecialised game components in addition to them being fiddlier than placing dice or tokens. Ideally, I'd prefer my wargames to only require a book, some paper for notes and a bunch of normal dice (of varying sizes, sure, but preferably without any bespoke nonsense that FFG games just love). For moving I like to have either straight up zones (squares, hexes, whatever) with borders or a normal ruler for unrestricted moves, games like Fallout and X-Wing drowning you in cardboard bits is very good at instantly killing my interest. Either gamely restricted or properly free, diddling around in-between rarely improves anything.

If we take into account that AI only has like what, eight different maneuvers, of which most planes can only perform the first six or less, you can put your choices in order with normal d6's or d8's behind a screen (like the main game box ) and just lift that when both sides have made their decisions. Rolling sometimes stuck cardboard dials that oftentimes obscure what choices you had while trying to decide, which also might commit the ultimate sin of useful gaming aids by being keyed to a specific model, ehh... logistically bothersome, when there's barely any improvement in the quality of life over basic, universal things that don't just take up space when you decide to do literally anything else in your life. Not the worst thing, no, but also nothing I'd advocate for as something crucial to the game. As a sidenote, why do so many dials only show the chosen value instead of having an arrow pointing to it? Would let you see all possibilities easier.

Regarding the token placement, a box wide enough to stand on its own and tall enough to hide the chits from the other player could work well, especially if the possible maneuvers were printed on both sides so the players would always have the choices in front of them while thinking. If one uses the data cards, a written list or something, just place them on the table, put the box between them, place your order markers down and start revealing.

Could you use a little rack like the types you put Scrabble letter tiles on? That wouldn't take up as much room as a box.

 Sherrypie wrote:
Personally, it's probably mostly about my everlasting loathing of hyperspecialised game components in addition to them being fiddlier than placing dice or tokens. Ideally, I'd prefer my wargames to only require a book, some paper for notes and a bunch of normal dice (of varying sizes, sure, but preferably without any bespoke nonsense that FFG games just love). For moving I like to have either straight up zones (squares, hexes, whatever) with borders or a normal ruler for unrestricted moves, games like Fallout and X-Wing drowning you in cardboard bits is very good at instantly killing my interest. Either gamely restricted or properly free, diddling around in-between rarely improves anything.

If we take into account that AI only has like what, eight different maneuvers, of which most planes can only perform the first six or less, you can put your choices in order with normal d6's or d8's behind a screen (like the main game box ) and just lift that when both sides have made their decisions. Rolling sometimes stuck cardboard dials that oftentimes obscure what choices you had while trying to decide, which also might commit the ultimate sin of useful gaming aids by being keyed to a specific model, ehh... logistically bothersome, when there's barely any improvement in the quality of life over basic, universal things that don't just take up space when you decide to do literally anything else in your life. Not the worst thing, no, but also nothing I'd advocate for as something crucial to the game. As a sidenote, why do so many dials only show the chosen value instead of having an arrow pointing to it? Would let you see all possibilities easier.

Regarding the token placement, a box wide enough to stand on its own and tall enough to hide the chits from the other player could work well, especially if the possible maneuvers were printed on both sides so the players would always have the choices in front of them while thinking. If one uses the data cards, a written list or something, just place them on the table, put the box between them, place your order markers down and start revealing.

Appreciate the response, while I dont agree with much of it I at least see where youre coming from.
Dials combine all the functions needed for this mechanic into a single component, reducing the amount of "stuff" required to play the game. That, to me, makes it quicker and easier to handle and manage.

My opinion of course, to each their own.

Question for those who’ve bought Rynn’s World.

For someone that bought Wings of Vengeance, do I have a particularly pressing need to obtain Rynn’s World?

I mean, I’m gonna get it eventually, but does it add enough that it should be considered a priority purchase, or do you think I can pootle along without it for a month or two, whilst I Git Gud?

@Soulless: yeah, I can see combining stuff as being nice, but when one dabbles with miniatures, board games, multiple active role playing campaigns and what nots... there's a real risk of accruing bespoke gubbins that are forever useless should a project die out after the initial surge of interest as they don't serve any (obvious) purpose beyond gathering dust.

Maybe it's a defensive mechanism, staying away saves space for more grey plastic mountains of shame in the den

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Question for those who’ve bought Rynn’s World.

For someone that bought Wings of Vengeance, do I have a particularly pressing need to obtain Rynn’s World?

I mean, I’m gonna get it eventually, but does it add enough that it should be considered a priority purchase, or do you think I can pootle along without it for a month or two, whilst I Git Gud?

Rynn’s World has the five additional missions the rules for ground attacks and ground targets, the ‘full’ force lists (including both Eavy Bommers variants and the Marauder Destroyer) and the campaign experience system for pilots.
It’s kinda hard to say really.
I mean you can ignore the campaign stuff but the scenarios are really the “full” game - just dogfights will not develop real skill as an Air Commodore. I’d say give it a couple of weeks, see if you actually like the game (of course you will) then get it.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Question for those who’ve bought Rynn’s World.

For someone that bought Wings of Vengeance, do I have a particularly pressing need to obtain Rynn’s World?

I mean, I’m gonna get it eventually, but does it add enough that it should be considered a priority purchase, or do you think I can pootle along without it for a month or two, whilst I Git Gud?

Not played it but watched a few playthroughs. It seems the map included with WOV is good for just the contents of that set, but if you've got additional aircraft on top of that then yeah, get the Rynns board.

 Sherrypie wrote:
Personally, it's probably mostly about my everlasting loathing of hyperspecialised game components in addition to them being fiddlier than placing dice or tokens. Ideally, I'd prefer my wargames to only require a book, some paper for notes and a bunch of normal dice (of varying sizes, sure, but preferably without any bespoke nonsense that FFG games just love). For moving I like to have either straight up zones (squares, hexes, whatever) with borders or a normal ruler for unrestricted moves, games like Fallout and X-Wing drowning you in cardboard bits is very good at instantly killing my interest. Either gamely restricted or properly free, diddling around in-between rarely improves anything.

If we take into account that AI only has like what, eight different maneuvers, of which most planes can only perform the first six or less, you can put your choices in order with normal d6's or d8's behind a screen (like the main game box ) and just lift that when both sides have made their decisions. Rolling sometimes stuck cardboard dials that oftentimes obscure what choices you had while trying to decide, which also might commit the ultimate sin of useful gaming aids by being keyed to a specific model, ehh... logistically bothersome, when there's barely any improvement in the quality of life over basic, universal things that don't just take up space when you decide to do literally anything else in your life. Not the worst thing, no, but also nothing I'd advocate for as something crucial to the game. As a sidenote, why do so many dials only show the chosen value instead of having an arrow pointing to it? Would let you see all possibilities easier.

Regarding the token placement, a box wide enough to stand on its own and tall enough to hide the chits from the other player could work well, especially if the possible maneuvers were printed on both sides so the players would always have the choices in front of them while thinking. If one uses the data cards, a written list or something, just place them on the table, put the box between them, place your order markers down and start revealing.

The existence of bespoke tokens doesn’t mean you aren’t allowed to use a pen and paper or dice or the existing counters if you prefer.

I don’t know what the xwing dials are like, I was just going to stack 3 circles of plasticard, one with numbers, the other two with a hole so only one number is visible, and a central hole for a pin. The reason for 3 being that I can use a pin with a head to hold it together securely without needing a tight friction fit.

I wouldn’t bother making specialised ones for different planes. Just ones with all the numbers and leave it to the player to know what manoeuvrability their planes are.

Strong magnets have enough friction to keep a little dial in place.

If you’ve got Wings of Vengeance, I’d wait until you’ve painted the models and played a few games. You can quite happily play with just the contents of the box for a while until you have the rules down.

As soon as you want to add Marauder Destroyers or ‘Eavy Bommers, or want to do something other than a straight dogfight you’ll want Rynn’s War, but it’s not a compulsory purchase right away.

By the way, looking over the mat from Wings of Vengeance, the he bottom right of the rural side of it is the J’Migan Bridge feature table from Warhammer World. The wrecked Warlord and Baneblade are also from other WW tables.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Question for those who’ve bought Rynn’s World.

For someone that bought Wings of Vengeance, do I have a particularly pressing need to obtain Rynn’s World?

I mean, I’m gonna get it eventually, but does it add enough that it should be considered a priority purchase, or do you think I can pootle along without it for a month or two, whilst I Git Gud?

Play a few games and see how you go. I got the starter set but I think I'll be getting Rynn's World pretty soon because it has the scenarios and rules for other models.

The starter set gives you bombers, but the scenarios related to bombing missions is in Rynn's World rather than the starter set.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

SamusDrake wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Question for those who’ve bought Rynn’s World.

For someone that bought Wings of Vengeance, do I have a particularly pressing need to obtain Rynn’s World?

I mean, I’m gonna get it eventually, but does it add enough that it should be considered a priority purchase, or do you think I can pootle along without it for a month or two, whilst I Git Gud?

Not played it but watched a few playthroughs. It seems the map included with WOV is good for just the contents of that set, but if you've got additional aircraft on top of that then yeah, get the Rynns board.

I think even the Rynn's board is going to be a little small. I'm thinking of just going straight for something like this...

https://www.tinywargames.co.uk/online-store/Team-Yankee-With-2-inch-hex-6x4-feet-p68981081

Or maybe getting a hex dot stencil so I can spray paint a hex pattern on a different board, like this (though wondering if I can make my own rather than buying one).

https://litko.net/products/stencil-2-inch-hex-grid-dot-pattern

Thanks for the thinks guys

Really enjoying building these kits, and think I’m hooked just on the build quality alone.

Just hoping a majority of players don’t get fully hung up on WYSIWYG for this one.

Under wing weapons for instance. Most of the time, we can’t actually seem them all that clearly. So if I’ve modelled for I think looks cool, it shouldn’t make a huge difference whether their Air to Air missiles, or Air to Ground, provides my list is clear.

Ditto the models, come to think of it. These are of course significantly bigger than the original metal Epic models, and I understand the same for the original Aeronautica stuff. But given its all measured hex-to-hex, should the actual dimensions of the model matter a jot? So long as your stand-ins are consistent, what’s the difference?

There is no difference, playing with the old stuff works just fine.

Soulless wrote:
So...Rules question here.

During the end phase a stalling aircraft will try to avoid the stall going into a spin by rolling against its Handling.
If the roll is successful the aircraft speed is reduced by 1 (within the aircraft limits) and altitude is set to the aircraft maximum.

Isnt this completely the opposite of what would be happening?
If anything, recovering from a stall should be increasing speed and reducing altitude, right?

I think what they're trying to show is an uneventful stall, where an aircraft attempts to climb too much but just levels out a bit instead of dramatically falling out of the sky. So if the stall is caused by going too slow, you just set it to it's minimum speed, and if it's caused by going over the max altitude you just set it to max altitude.

A stall in combat will generally occur while the plane is near maximum throttle and for a fighter plane producing a lot of thrust it can regain energy quickly, so a careful adjustment may be enough to stop the plane just falling out of the sky (rather than dramatically falling out of the sky and having to dive and regain speed to recover from the stall).

But the way it's worded is odd, it makes it sound like you should adjust to the max altitude even if you stalled at low altitude, I think what they mean is increase the altitude by 1 (as the aircraft was attempting to climb) unless you're at your max in which case set it to max, but that's not really how it's worded.

Also I don't really like how stalling makes you harder to hit and thus can be used as an evasive tactic. Stalling in combat is almost always a horrible idea because the time you're just hanging in the air you're a sitting duck, unable to manoeuvre out of the way of enemy guns.

Play a combat flight simulator, if you can get the enemy plane to stall they become such an easy target, hovering there unable to jink out of the way.

The only time I can think it's beneficial to stall is when you know you have more energy and/or power than a plane which is on your tail, you can climb rapidly knowing that the plane on your tail will stall before you, position your plane for a fast stall recovery and if you get lucky the positions will be reversed when you've both recovered from the stall you'll be on their tail. I'm sure I've read of a real life WW2 dogfight that went down that way and allowed an outnumbered pilot to get a kill and escape. If you misjudge and stall before the plane on your tail does, you'll be blown out of the sky.

But that's not really a scenario that can be recreated in AI.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sherrypie wrote:
There is no difference, playing with the old stuff works just fine.

It's not going to affect the gameplay, but if you play with old and new models on the table it's going to look a bit odd as the old ones are quite a bit smaller.

Sure, I meant there's no difference in gameplay. Rest is aesthetics, for some it works and some find it jarring.

 Fajita Fan wrote:
Strong magnets have enough friction to keep a little dial in place.

Yeah, this is what I'm going to use:

https://art-of-war-studios-ltd.myshopify.com/collections/compatible-with-warhammer-40-000/products/warhammer-40-000-compatible-small-dials

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Soulless wrote:
I wish GW would have used dials instead of tokens to select maneuvers...Just as XW, there should have been a dial for each ship, with only the maneuvers that ship can select.

This token system feels so last second...

The old method for AI used to be just to record it on a piece of paper, which I think works better than the counters. During a game I played in store before release, I wasted so much time just trying to find the counter that matched the manoeuvre I wanted.

I might see if I can make up some dial counters for manoeuvres rather than trying to use the cardboard ones.

Is there any particular reason why we couldn't just write down the maneuver number on a sheet like the 1st Edition AI roster sheet instead of fiddling with counters? I have to go to the store to pick up my copy today.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Soulless wrote:
So...Rules question here.

During the end phase a stalling aircraft will try to avoid the stall going into a spin by rolling against its Handling.
If the roll is successful the aircraft speed is reduced by 1 (within the aircraft limits) and altitude is set to the aircraft maximum.

Isnt this completely the opposite of what would be happening?
If anything, recovering from a stall should be increasing speed and reducing altitude, right?

I think what they're trying to show is an uneventful stall, where an aircraft attempts to climb too much but just levels out a bit instead of dramatically falling out of the sky. So if the stall is caused by going too slow, you just set it to it's minimum speed, and if it's caused by going over the max altitude you just set it to max altitude.

A stall in combat will generally occur while the plane is near maximum throttle and for a fighter plane producing a lot of thrust it can regain energy quickly, so a careful adjustment may be enough to stop the plane just falling out of the sky (rather than dramatically falling out of the sky and having to dive and regain speed to recover from the stall).

But the way it's worded is odd, it makes it sound like you should adjust to the max altitude even if you stalled at low altitude, I think what they mean is increase the altitude by 1 (as the aircraft was attempting to climb) unless you're at your max in which case set it to max, but that's not really how it's worded.

Also I don't really like how stalling makes you harder to hit and thus can be used as an evasive tactic. Stalling in combat is almost always a horrible idea because the time you're just hanging in the air you're a sitting duck, unable to manoeuvre out of the way of enemy guns.

Play a combat flight simulator, if you can get the enemy plane to stall they become such an easy target, hovering there unable to jink out of the way.

The only time I can think it's beneficial to stall is when you know you have more energy and/or power than a plane which is on your tail, you can climb rapidly knowing that the plane on your tail will stall before you, position your plane for a fast stall recovery and if you get lucky the positions will be reversed when you've both recovered from the stall you'll be on their tail. I'm sure I've read of a real life WW2 dogfight that went down that way and allowed an outnumbered pilot to get a kill and escape. If you misjudge and stall before the plane on your tail does, you'll be blown out of the sky.

But that's not really a scenario that can be recreated in AI.

That makes a bit more sense I guess. I was also wondering about just that; Why are we setting altitude to maximum if a stall is avoided at low altitude?
If a stall is avoided, the ships should at best stay at the same altitude, the "climb" was already adjusted for previously in the round. And to avoid the stall you wouldnt be climbing anymore.

RFT wrote:

 Fajita Fan wrote:
Strong magnets have enough friction to keep a little dial in place.

Yeah, this is what I'm going to use:

https://art-of-war-studios-ltd.myshopify.com/collections/compatible-with-warhammer-40-000/products/warhammer-40-000-compatible-small-dials

I'll 3d print a dial and a little hand magnetized to it to see how that works. Maybe a lip around the edge so the hand doesn't get affected by turning it over.

Theres another dude at Etsy doing maneuver dials and some other stuff for AI now, this one in europe so now theres at least one in USA and Europe.

I like these, think ill be ordering a few of them!

https://www.etsy.com/se-en/listing/721026238/aeronautica-imperialis-maneuver-dials-v1?ref=shop_home_active_9&frs=1

I quickly mocked this up in TinkerCAD to try printing. The octagon is 40mm tall and wide, the hole in the middle is recessed for a magnet and the little indicator will have a magnet glued to the other side. The lip should keep the indicator from touching the table so friction of the magnet should keep the indicator in position. I'll try printing it tonight to see how it comes out.

It works but at 40mm a side it’s not too much smaller than an AI base. I’ll probably shrink this down tomorrow but the 5mm magnet provides enough friction to keep the indicator in place when it’s turned over. .

got the book yesterday and there is a few things i would like some toughts on.

1: it seems to me that imp, is only viable in large (maybe medium sized game), as they need a large game mat to be able to kite the mid range game and large math apparently means large games. allso does imp favor beeing the defender in moust of the scenarios? thats atleast how i see it.

2: equipment upgrades dont seems like they realy are worth it. it is either 1 time use or only works on a 6. very low odds...

3: beeing 10p below the limit is just fine, but beeing 1-3 points above is not...............
would have just been better if they wrote it as a +/- 5 point tolerance.... aka if you have 100p then you can be from 95 to 105.

but then that would just be a 105 point game. you've just shifted the upper threshold a bit.

If it helps - just think of it as a 95 point game.


Besides, having put some thought in to a list for a pre-arranged game with a preset limit and then your opponent speaks up and say "I'm 5/10/20 points over - is that ok?" Well, no. No it isn't.