What would cause you to withdraw from the table?

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James C
Posts: 37
Joined: Mon Apr 15, 2019 6:18 pm

What would cause you to withdraw from the table?

Post by James C »

I’m working on a table that I might turn into an article. Obviously we’ve been bagging a lot of Hun solo these days, although I must confess that’s often how I played beforehand. At any rate, inspired with talks of solo gaming on the Odd Cast, I’m trying to build a table for an opposing force that would cause them to leave the table.

I’m thinking of a solo Squadron Forward campaign setting where you are using the same squadron from mission to mission. If you had a squadron of 8-10 pilots with 6-8 on the table (plus bombers and enemy), what might cause you to withdraw your squadron from the table? So far I’ve got the following:

Two of my pilots shot down
One of my pilots gets a double kill and I want him off the board to get the credit
All of my formations are broken up and I’m not likely to get any bonus cards
I’m outnumbered by 3 enemy fighters

What do you guys think? What would cause you to retreat from the skies of battle?

I’ll compile a list and attempt to turn it into a table, perhaps for the next Lardy Special.

/r
James
Archdukek
Posts: 5741
Joined: Tue Sep 03, 2013 11:49 pm
Location: Linlithgow, West Lothian, UK

Re: What would cause you to withdraw from the table?

Post by Archdukek »

Good idea, James.

Not sure about the “double kill“ option. That sounds too much like a player reaction for in campaign game benefit, not something the section or flight commander would immediately consider with a mission to complete. Preservation of his pilots might have more impact on a squadron commander‘s thinking I suppose.

Being unlikely to gain bonus cards also seems an unlikely reason for a commander to break off though a player might be tempted to.

The others seem reasonable though “Two of my planes shot down” might be better expressed as a proportion of the force’s starting size. Two planes out of a 4 plane Schwarm would be more of an impact than 2 out of a 12 plane squadron I’d suggest.

Something related to the number of planes damaged perhaps as well as shot down?

John
James C
Posts: 37
Joined: Mon Apr 15, 2019 6:18 pm

Re: What would cause you to withdraw from the table?

Post by James C »

I like some of your thoughts. I was trying to make it more like another "player" was across from me than a real world enemy commander, but maybe I should re-think that. Perhaps I should do two separate tables, one for a table top "player" and one for a real world commander & see which one works best.

How about everyone else? What would make you run for the board edge?
Munin
Posts: 1319
Joined: Tue Apr 19, 2016 7:49 pm

Re: What would cause you to withdraw from the table?

Post by Munin »

It would depend on which side I'm playing and the circumstances of the scenario. If I'm escorting bombers, I might disengage once they were safely away - especially if they had dropped their bomb loads. Similarly, if I were trying to lessen the number of enemy bombers, I might break off once I'd killed off the enemy bombers. On a pure fighter vs fighter engagement, how far am I operating from base and how much fuel do I have?

Playing through a campaign where you have limited resources that you have to preserve definitely changes the calculus for when to engage/disengage. But modeling those resources I think takes some real effort to get the right flavor of determination/desperation, and a "fair" campaign end condition needs to be kept in mind (i.e. "Hold out 10 missions while limiting the number of successful enemy bombing attacks to N, at which point reinforcements arrive and put an end to the enemy air campaign" or something similar).
James C
Posts: 37
Joined: Mon Apr 15, 2019 6:18 pm

Re: What would cause you to withdraw from the table?

Post by James C »

That's why I like CoC At The Sharp End so much and would like to emulate it for BTH. That saving something for the next mission really changes the flavor. The only problem is I usually Bag The Hun solo, so I'm trying to come up with a bot/auto opponent to help decide when to leave the table. And I don't want to run an Allied and Axis squadron simultaneously. I'll keep working on it.
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