Bag the Hun Khalkhin Gol Scenario C Playtest

I got round to playing the Scenario C game yesterday and finished it off this morning, as I had to go up to London in the afternoon and couldn't wrap it up in one go. I won't go in to all of the details but it was a very fast paced and enjoyable game, with lots of swirling about all over the place by the outnumbered and inexperienced Soviet pilots, while the more disciplined and battle hardened Japanese attempted to shoot them down. The Soviets actually acquitted themselves quite well, but it was a Japanese victory in the end, albeit a narrow one.

The game ran to twelve turns in total playing solo, at the end of which the Soviets had one I-16 shot down, one crash landing due to engine failure, one with a double gun jam and no ammo flying off and two more with engine trouble just managing to get away, albeit in the nick of time. The Japanese had one KI-27 with critical instrument damage but were otherwise unscathed. I decided that although Captain Shimada's pilots hadn't achieved their victory objective, they had clearly wiped out the Soviets one way or another, with some help from dodgy fuel and poor maintenance.

This result actually matches the real events quite well, which is a good bench mark for a historical scenario, especially if the game itself turns out to be good fun. I made a few clarifications and changes to the scenario set up along the way, however, based on things that popped up during the play test:

1. The Soviets must attempt to spot as individual pilots with spotting not just resolved by the leader.

2. If they have an engine failure on the D6 roll of 6 at the start of a move, they must follow the procedure for engine failure in the rules (13.2.9) thereafter i.e. roll a D6 (-1 for sprogs) requiring a 2+ to pass or the engine is destroyed. They don't need to roll another roll of 6.

3. The Soviet objective is to shoot down one Ki-27, after which all Soviet aircraft must head home.

4. The only other circumstances in which a Soviet flyer can exit the table is due to damage, as instructed in the rules, due to engine failure (see 2 above) or if they run out of ammunition.

5. The Japanese objective is to shoot down three I-16's or force them to crash land due to damage (if they manage to exit the table they do not count toward this total)

I think that wraps up the scenario nice and tight, so I'm ready to play test the next one, which I've decided will be Scenario G from 25th July 1939, which is a classic dogfight between 'Stalin's Eagles' in I-153's and the Ki-27's of the 24th Sentai, 1st Chutai.