KotS at the Club

A big multiplayer game of the Wessex Wargamers Winchester house rules for World War One air warfare, Knights of the Sky, at the club this evening organised by Ian. This was a tactical bombing set up with both sides attempting to knock out fuel and ammunition dumps at either end of the table. I was flying for La France in a Breguet XIV but didn't have much luck in either the bombing department or shooting things down. It was good fun as always and reminded me of some of the games I have Ru in the past, albeit quite a while ago and when I had more time to get up to the club on a regular basis. 

Albatros D.Va Flieger Abteilung 304b

                

I'm taking a short break from the Algy Flies Down Under project to focus on my Death in the Dark Continent Nyamwezi army, but I've been continuing my background research and reading up on the Albatros D.Va equipped German units in the Palestine campaign. One of these was Flieger Abteilung 304b, commanded by Hauptmann Franz Walz, whose airstrip was over run by the Australian Light Horse in September 1918. The diggers captured the lot including the CO who had just landed in his distinctive Albatros D.Va marked with a horizontal black and white stripe and red swastika. It's a great story and the various photos taken afterwards are very useful painting reference. The RAF repainted at least one of the German aircraft and flew it once all the shooting had fizzled out!

Nyamwezi Skirmisher Spearmen

I already have a couple of units of figures based up for my Nyamwezi Death in the Dark Continent army, but here's the first of the new batch of units. These are all Copplestone figures and based as a skirmishing spearmen, for a grand total of 24 points. I have another unit of these ready to base but need a third to form the core of the army, which is based on List 1: Generic Villagers. Time to crack on!

Algy Flies Down Under Scenario Shortlist

After a couple of weeks of scribbling I've now got the scenario shortlist sorted for Algy Flies Down Under, with a total of five chronological scenarios ready to write up and a sixth bonus scenario* to tack on to the end, if I'm feeling like it. 

Here's a brief summary, complete with the aircraft required for each game:

A) 11/11/16.  

Beersheba. 

1 x Martinsyde G100

1 x BE2c

2 x Fokker E.III

B) 08/07/17

Gaza.

1 x Martinsyde G100

1 x BE2c

1 x BE12a

1 x Albatros D.III

1 x Rumpler C.I

C) 03/01/18

Mejdel.

1 x F2B Bristol Fighter 

1 x RE8

2 x Albatros D.III 

D) 28/04/18

Nablus.

2 x F2B Bristol Fighters 

4 x Albatros D.Va

E) 28/06/18

Amman.

2 x F2B Bristol Fighters 

6 x Albatros D.Va 

F)* 06/08/18

Jordan Valley.

2 x Albatros D.Va 

2 x F2B Bristol Fighters 

1 x Caquot Observation Balloon

Return to Darkest Africa

For various reasons my plan to do a solo skirmish small Footprint  2' x 2' project has hit the buffers, so I've had a rethink. Instead of starting something new as a rule I've had more success revisiting old projects that have been trundling along or fallen of the rails in the past. One of these is 'Darkest Africa', which I've had various dips into over the years and which even features in the very first post on the blog. This has gone through a variety of incarnations, the most recent being for Death in the Dark Continent, with a Nyamwezi or Tuta army as the most recent focus. 

I have already based a couple of units for this and have loads of figures prepared, so I'm going to get more basing completed and actually start painting some units next month. This will still be a solo project but may well end up being something I can take up to the club next year, especially as I have some fantastic modular terrain to deploy. I'm actually looking forward to a project in 28mm as well, which is a big shift up in gear compared to my usual workbench modelling and painting. 

Jasta 55 Pilot Roster

 

I've been on the hunt for pilots to populate the scenarios I've been devising for the Palestine campaign. This has been relatively straightforward for Flieger Abteilung 300, for which I have quite detailed lists, but less so for Jasta 55 / Jasta 1F and the other squadrons assigned to the theatre in 1918. The records for these units are very sketchy, no doubt due to the collapse of the front in the summer of 1918, when the relevant documents were probably lost or destroyed.

Luckily, I have been able to track down quite a few pilots from Jasta 55 in this book, which has quite extensive lists of claims and losses, including the handful from the Palestine campaign. At least one of these I already know for sure as a casualty but the others can be used to fill out the ranks, even if it is speculative. I only really need to include them as kettle leaders to be honest, so I should have enough plots to go round. 

Tally Ho!

The Eagle of Jericho

Hauptmann Franz Walz.

I bumped into this chap while researching the Jasta pilots in Palestine. Interesting story for a pilot with only a handful of claims (7), none of which were made in the Palestine campaign and mostly when he was flying two seater observation aircraft.

The Iron Cross, a Blue Max and the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern...quite a lot of gongs, primarily for his role as a CO, including commanding Flieger Abteilung 304b. He had been CO of Jasta Boelcke before this but hadn't been very successful, to say the least, so he was packed off to a hotter location.

Apparently, he made a much better fist of this and also flew a lot of sorties. Unfortunately, his was landing at El Affule on 20/09/18 when he was captured by the Australian Light Horse, who had overrun the airfield. They also captured his aircraft intact, a rather splendid Albatros DVa with very distinctive markings.

The Israeli post office has even put him on a stamp, not realising he was a general in the Luftwaffe in WW2. Anyway, I'm going to try to include him in a scenario if I can find an angle and a historical action which he might feasibly have taken part in. 

Watch out Fritz, here come the Brisfits

I've been a bit busy lately and haven't had time to work on the scenarios for Algy Flies Down Under, which is something I need to crack on with. 

On the plus side, the notes for Scenario A, B and C are nailed down, which means the latter scenarios D, E and possibly F, are now in my sights. These will all be in 1918 and so will feature the formidable F2B Bristol Fighter or 'Brisfit' which completely changed the balance of air superiority in the Palestine campaign. 

Not that it was all one way, of course, as the Germans reinforced, reorganised and re-equipped their units in response, with the Albatros DV and Pfalz DIIIa arriving alongside veteran pilots from the Western Front. All very good stuff and excellent for scenarios with a bit more punch. Tally Ho!

One Hour Wargames Small Footprint Solo Options

One of the things that persuaded me to get a 2' x 2' grass terrain cloth is the chance to revive my One Hour Wargames 2mm ECW project, which I tinkered with a year or so ago. This was scuppered by some dodgy basing that I screwed up, which put me off the project for a while, but it's otherwise still something I'm keen to have a go at. I may also try the rules with other periods and scales, up to 6mm or even 10mm, as I have a fair few options that wouldn't require much effort to get sorted, including 2mm Ancients using leftover bits from Strength and Honour. It's potentially the next thing to hit the workbench if the terrain cloth turns out to be too small for the 18mm Wiglaf Miniatures skirmish idea....?

Jasta 300 Albatros D.III conversion

I've nearly finished assembling the 1/600th scale aircraft for play testing the Algy Flies Down Under scenarios, with only four Albatros D.III / D.Va models to get sorted. These are a bit more fiddly than you'd expect as I am adding twin radiators to the upper wing centre section, which were needed for cooling due to the high temperatures of the region. To do this I've sanded down the wing to remove the existing radiator, then glued small rectangles of plastic card in place before sanding them down to the right profile. It's all a bit of a faff but will be worth it in the end?

Small Footprint Solo Skirmish Mid-Saxon Sitrep

A bit of forward momentum with my solo skirmish project today. I've ordered a 2' x 2' grass terrain cloth after hunting about a bit for something that looked just right. This will be used for the first iteration of the project, which at the moment will be a mid-Saxon Eighth century version of Ravenfeast using the 15/18mm Wiglaf Miniatures range, but may well go on to include other things, possibly in 10/12mm or even smaller. I've also received the order of wire spears I need for the Wiglaf West Saxons, so it's a jolly good time to get started on the Ravenfeast figures in order to get the project off the ground. If you are thinking that 2' x 2' is a bit on the small side you may well be right but I'll be switching to cm for movement and missile purposes, so I think it should be feasible. I'll just have to give it a go!

Algy's 'Bang On' Bombing Raid Generator

I got round to drafting a basic scenario generator for bombing raids yesterday, based on my existing balloon busting mechanism with some appropriate tweaks. It's got a few typos and needs some tidying up but I think it should work well for pick up games. One thing I may add is a modified 2D6 roll for bombing aircraft with different payloads, as at the moment you just roll a single 2D6 regardless of the size of the aircraft, which seems a bit bonkers?

Algy Flies Down Under - Scenario B

The second scenario in the Lard Mag line up is one that I mentioned  in an earlier post  - The Sportsman - which involves a dogfight between three AFC aircraft on a patrol near Gaza and two aircraft of FA300. Here's a report of the action from the German records:

"Monday, 9.July 1917. To the Sinai Front at the 8.July two hostile airplanes were shot down in aerial combat and both crashed. Details are missing still"

The BE2e of Lieutenant T. Taylor and Lieutenant F.W.F Lukis was on an operation escorted by the Martinsyde of Captain Charles A. Brookes an RFC officer attached to the AFC and a BE12a aircraft flown by Claude H.Vautin. 

The three aircraft were attacked by the Rumpler C.I aircraft of Offstv. Kern and Oberleutnant Kurt Jancke, and the Albatros DIII of Oberleutnant Gerhard Felmy. 

Kern and Jancke attacked the Martinsyde of Brookes and in the ensuing engagement Brookes was shot down out of control, his Martinsyde's wings collapsing in a spin before crashing. 

Vautin was chased to Beit Hanun before being forced to land. Vautin was the third confirmed victory for Felmy (although other sources suggest it may actually have been his fifth).

This is a cracking little dogfight and should make for a relatively straightforward but challenging scenario, especially for the Australian pilots in their assorted obsolescent aircraft. The Germans will definitely have the edge but I can balance things out with some careful design, especially in the objectives and special rules I can build in to the write up.

Talky Ho!

Ravenfeast Mid-Saxon Army List

I've been tinkering with the army lists in the Ravenfeast rules to put together a variant for the mid-Saxon period, specifically for the West Second and Mercians. This is actually pretty straightforward,  the old Warhammer Historical Age of Arthur contains a lot of useful and relevant information. I've had a go at a crossover based on both the Viking list and the late Saxon list but will probably mash them together to make up the variant, with some additional rules tweaks to cover period specifics e.g. no shield wall rule. I should have something workable later this week.

1/600th DFW C.V conversion

The next conversion job is a DFW C.V observation machine, based on the Tumbling Dice Albatros C.II model with a little bit of sanding and shaping on the fuselage, a new top wing and a modified tail. It's not very accurate, being a bit too short, but it will do the job, as I need one for a 1918 scenario in the Algy Lard Mag project. Next in the production line will be the Albatros D.III / D.V scouts with added twin radiators for tropical conditions.

Aussie Brisfits

Wrapping up the Australian Flying Corps contingent of the Algy Flies Down Under project, here are the four F2B Bristol Fighters that I'll need for the later scenarios. These are all Tumbling Dice models with added twin Lewis gun armament, minus the ammunition drums as I couldn't get them to fit without looking over scale. The twin Lewis gun load out was the standard for the Aussie Brisfits, giving them some additional punch and also the ability to strafe more effectively. No wonder they were able to gain air superiority in the latter half of the campaign!

1/600th AEG C.IV Conversion

 

I needed a couple of C Type observation aircraft for the Algy Flies Down Under project, but Tumbling Dice only make an Albatross C.II, so I've had to have a go at some model bashing instead. Here's my attempt at an AEG C.IV using the fuselage of a Hannover CL.III with top wing and tail from the aforementioned Albatross. It's not exactly accurate to say the least, but it's also not too far off to be ridiculous, so I'm happy with the end result.