Exploring the Dora....

FW190 'Dora' featuring the paint scheme adopted by those units charged with defending Me 262 airfields - the so-called "Papageien Staffel" (Parrot squadron)

Dora, when she is exploring....

Yesterday evening at the club saw Mr Fox revealing many of his new goodies from the first expansion to the Axis and Allies collectible WW2 aerial miniatures game called Bandits High. The starter set for this expansion is very Pacific orientated but there are also a good selection of additional European types - and it was with these that we took to the skies. The game we chose to fight consisted of a pair of FW190 Ds (see FW 190) piloted by a veteran and a rookie against a P38J ( P-38) with an ace and a P51D (P-51) with a veteran. It was very much an 'up and down on full power and then some' type of affair with most aircraft flat out for most of the night. It was quite a rare game in that at one point every model had some damage despite what must have been collectively the worst display of d6 rolling I have have seen! The best example of this was one hex shot on the tail of a P38 - 7 x D6 needing 4, 5 or 6. I rolled nothing above a 3.... Eventually, after much high speed jinking about,  the Luftwaffe prevailed and both the US planes were crippled (reduced to a single hit point) and then finished off for a clean sweep of the skies over the Fatherland.

The game was very interesting for a number of reasons - the main one being the sheer 'grunt' of the aircraft involved. Once the US aircraft were crippled the task of finishing them off was easy, simply because their speed was greatly reduced and the Germans were able to manoeuvre at leisure into optimum firing positions.

All of the types present were well armed and so being in an adjacent hex when firing is usually not a good idea (for the record the planes rolled an average of 7 or so d6 at range 1) - however, as mentioned the dice rolling was uniformly bad which made for a longer and more absorbing game.

For me though, the action really showed up the difference between the early and late war types - essentially this is one of horsepower over manoeuvrability.

I have always been fond of the FW190 although usually I preferred the A series. However, after last night I may just soften this stance a tad....;-)

As ever, many thanks to Mr Fox for bringing the toys out - next week's festivities will see a return to the Eastern front.