The Eagle Of The Aegean

Rudolf Von Eschwege was a young German pilot who, when commissioned an officer, was sent to the Macedonian Front. There, on the fringes of WW1, an air force of Turks, Germans, and Bulgarians were up against a vastly numerically superior French and Franco-Serbian foe. In fact Eschwege was covering a nearly 100 mile front with one Albatros scout, assisting three two-seater reconnaissance planes. Opposing him were over 200 enemy aircraft, including four British squadrons. Despite this he achieved 18 kills. The latter of these were balloons, and that was how he died; the British sent up a dummy balloon with explosives in the basket and detonated them when he flew within range to attack it.

Anyway, as long-term reader know, I have used scenarios and plane stats from GDW's 'Aces High' as a source for a lot of information when developing 'Spandau & Lewis', and they have an Eschwege scenario. So I had a go at adapting it yesterday.

In the scenario Eschwege must prevent a RFC two-seater from directing artillery on a town. The two-seater is protected by some BE12s. Eschwege is flying an Albatros DIII.

For the my first run I had Eschwege set up on his edge with a town towards the centre of the board. In front of him the two-seater was close to the town, heading towards it to start its mission. Two BE12s could be placed anywhere to cover it. I gave the British novice pilots but they could upgrade one plane to experienced. Eschwege was rated as an ace.

The planes are as follows:

Eschwege - Albatros DIII - Speed: 5, Agility B, Hits 8, Power 3 - 2 x Forward Guns

BE12 - Speed 5, Agility C, Hits 7, Power 0 - 1 x Forward Gun
Farman MF11 bis - Speed 3, Agility B, Hits 7, Power 0 - 1 x Forward Gun (pivot covering the whole front-arc)

(The Farman Shorthorn is an odd aircraft, having a ridiculously low speed, but a surprisingly good agility for something that resembles the unholy offspring of a box-kite and a bathtub)

The Farman crew were rated as experienced. They headed towards the town to do some spotting. The BE12s were facing Eschwege.

Here's Rudolf, ready for action.

The objectives are for Eschwege to prevent the Farman ranging in the artillery and escape. The British must either range in the artillery or shoot down Eschwege.

The fighters came at each other head-on, which was a bad move for the British. A few hits were exchanged before the aircraft passed, but now the ponderous BE12s had to turn around whilst Eschwege just had to fly straight forward to take on the Farman.

(The BE12 is an amazingly bad aircraft. It was born of the idea that it would be great to take the slow, unagile BE2 and create a fighter-plane version. It was as good as you'd expect it to be. Nevertheless one pilot became an ace in one. God knows how.)

The Farman started directing artillery, aware that Eschwege was coming up fast.

More ranging shots (the markers on the town) and Eschwege is closer now.

The Farman turns as Eschwege comes into range. It takes some damage.

Keeping his cool under fire the observer on the Farman chose to direct artillery and got another ranging shot on the target. A BE12 was coming back into the fight

As Eschwege turned to chase down the damaged Farman the BE12 came into range. The observer on the Farman directed another shot ...

... and it was ranged in correctly. The artillery bombardment began.

Eschwege had lost, but the British could gain extra street-cred for shooting him down. However he deftly evaded the BE12s and escaped.

The heroes of the game - the crew of the Farman who kept focused on their mission despite being shot at.

(The model is a Farman F20. The MF11 has a square tail structure rather than a triangular one. Also the scenario assumes it's RFC, but mine is painted with French markings.)

I tried it again twice in the evening, and set it up differently as I felt the British had had it too easy in terms of doing the observation. I had the Farman have to travel from its own board edge to the target. However I also gave the British an extra BE12. And they rolled for their crews (with a roll of ace counting as experienced). All crews ended up as experienced. The BE12s could set up anywhere but Eschwege could set up after seeing where the British planes were deployed.

In the first game Eschwege and the Farman arrived at the objective together. Eschwege fired and hit the Farman, doing some light damage. The Farman's observer fired one burst which hit Eschwege's engine, causing it to burst into flames, destroying him and his plane. Game over.

For the second run Eschwege (top right) and the Farman arrived at the target together.

Eschwege fired a long-range burst that killed the observer on the Farman and wounded the pilot. So the observation mission was thwarted. However Eschwege had to escape alive as well.

He turned from home but found a BE12 in front of him. Being bold he chased it.

BOOM! The BE12 went down in flames.

As he ran for home he had a chance at a second BE12, badly damaging it.

He got it down to its last hit, but since his home edge was close I decided that rather than chase after it and risk getting attacked by the third BE12, he'd let it be and head for home. He'd prevented the mission and got another kill, so it had been a good day's work.

I forgot to add that in the two later scenarios I rated Eschwege as a marksman, a trait I'd not tried out a great deal. A marksman gets a higher chance of scoring criticals, and this was obvious in the second game, with the Farman suffering a critical as well as the downed BE12. I'm thinking that the trait is maybe a little too good and may dial it back a bit.

Artillery observation uses the following rules:

If the observing plane ends its move within 3" of the target at a speed of 3 or less then it can direct artillery. 
Roll 2D6 and take the highest score. If that score is equal to or less than the number of ranging shots on the target, then the artillery is ranged in and the mission is a success.

If the score is higher, or there are no ranging shots on the target, add a ranging shot.

If spotting doesn't happen on a turn, remove a ranging shot.

Earlier this week I played my Australians in Sinai scenario with Catherine. She took the Australians, with their BE2 and Martinsyde G100, whilst I took the two Turkish Fokkers.

Owing to bad manouevre dice we blundered around not really getting into contact with each other, but eventually I latched onto the BE2.

A couple of good bursts shot it down, but I ran out of time before I could exit a Fokker off the Australian edge for final victory. So the game was a draw.