The Objective
Having initially thought about building an airfield in 1/600, further deliberation suggested that this would look a little flat on the table at that scale. I therefore decided to build an airship and shed. Again this was going to be 1/600, but a bit of ‘scale creep’ came in and it ended up 1/300-ish.
The design of the airship was based loosely on L70 and the shed was based on several pictures in Ray Rimell’s book “Air War over Great Britain 194-18.
Objective Construction
The airship was made from a length of Perspex tube with a wooden egg from a craft shop stuck in one end and faired into the tube. The tail is a polystyrene cone with styrene sheet fins attached. I added lengths of 1mm masking tape to represent the ribs, and used 1/72 scale bombs for the engine pods. The command car is from scrap plastic. A hook was glued into the top so that the airship would appear to be being brought out of the shed at the time of the raid.
This was then sprayed in acrylic black and the top half, engines and command car painted with Vallejo paints.
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The airship shed was entirely scratch built using plain, ribbed and brick pattern styrene sheet, and styrene girder sections. The windows were from a sheet of lattice from an architectural model shop.
The shed was sprayed with dark green, then dry-brushed with several shades of lighter grey and finished off with a dry brush of gunmetal. The base is styrene sheet painted and dry-brushed, with the addition of grass flock.
The aeroplane tents were from card. The 1/300 aircraft are Skytrex and scratchbuilt. These were all made over 20 years ago, when Skytrex had only introduced the range so scratchbuilding was necessary to fill the gaps. (At the time we were using Hugh Walter’s Aerial Dogfight rules, which while long out of print still provide a detailed yet simple game).
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Mission Briefing
Day trip to Brussels
Briefings (given separately to each side)
British Briefing
1. Mission
What-ho chaps! The Intelligence Johnnies report that weather conditions over Western Europe tonight will be good enough to enable the bally Hun to mount airship raids over Blighty. Therefore the brass at GHQ have ordered a number of surprise attacks on airship sheds in Belgium to disrupt Jerry’s plans, The raids will be timed to take place just before - or as - the jolly old gasbags are being prepared.
Your mission is to raid the airship sheds at Evere, just North of Brussels and severely damage or destroy the sheds and any airships there. Be warned, it could be frightfully tiresome as Evere is known to house several Boche fighter squadrons and is heavily defended by ack-ack units. GHQ needs proof of the success of the raid, so after bombing the Harry Tate will bring back photographs of your handiwork.
The following sketch-map was made by some Belgian peasant-chappy employed on the airfield, and was smuggled across the lines by one of our gallant spy-types, code-named Bumblie.
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2. Raiding Force
Bombing force of 5 DH4s from 25 Squadron RFC and an RE8 (which will photograph the damage as well) from 7 Squadron, escorted by two Sopwith Camels of 54 Squadron.
3. Crew Roster
25 Squadron, RFC
DH4 – Lieutenant Hugh Jarce, Airman Wayne Coat (Phil H)
DH4 – Lieutenant Duncan Biscett, Sergeant Rick Ottercheese (Phil H)
DH4 – Sergeant Roger Wilco, Sergeant Dan Gerous (Phil H)
DH4 – 2nd Lieutenant Oscar Foxtrot, Sergeant Warren Peece (Paul W)
DH4 – Sergeant Gerry Attrick, Airman Russell Sprout (Paul W)
7 Squadron, RFC
RE8 – 2nd Lieutenant Edmund Blackadder, Airman S Baldrick (Graham W)
54 Squadron, RFC
Sopwith Camel – Captain Robert ‘Cromwell’ Kyte (Raymon A)
Sopwith Camel – Lieutenant The Honourable Darcy Spiffington-Smythe (Raymon A)
DH4s, RE8 and Camels start at Level 4 at the West end of the table.
4. Victory Conditions
It takes 15 points of damage to destroy the airship and 15 points for shed. If airship is destroyed, shed is also destroyed in the ensuing explosion, and vice versa. If explosion card is drawn for airship, there is a very big bang and it’s game over.
Minor victory: 12 points of damage scored on shed or airship
Significant victory: Destruction of the airship/shed
Major victory: Destruction of the airship/shed and successful photo run over shed and exit from table by RE8
5. Note on bombing
All bombing aircraft can drop their bombloads in two drops (1 damage card per drop) or all together (2 damage cards). Bombing can take place at Level 2 or lower.
Good luck men!
German Briefing
1. Mission
Ach du leiber, ze vetter ist sehr gutt mit keine rain und fluffy bits. Ze glorious airship fleet vill take to ze skies tonight und strike fear und terror into ze verdammt Englander.
Luftschiffe L99 vill be prepared for take-off at five of ze clock ziss evening. It is possible zat Tommy vill take ze opportunity to pay us a visit, und zo to ensure zat all goes to plan, Jasta 81 (“Die Schwarzen Pinguine”) vill be patrolling ze airfield at level 3. Jasta 19 vill be ready fur ze take-off at fünf minuten notice, mit zwei of zere liddle Fokkers.
2. Defending force
4 Albatros, 2 Fokker DR.1s.
3. Pilot Roster
Jasta 81 (“Die Schwarzen Pinguine”)
Albatros – Oberleutnant Klaus Shave (John M)
Albatros – Leutnant Hans Nees (John M)
Albatros – Leutnant Max Hite (Seamus B)
Albatros – Leutnant Hertz von Rental (Seamus B)
Jasta 19
Dr.1 – Hauptman Manfred von Strudel (Bill R)
Dr.1 – Oberleutnant Willie Katchus (Bill R)
Albatros’ will start (in pairs) at Level 3 at randomly selected points around table edge
Fokkers will be activated on die roll of 6 per aircraft (thrown at beginning of each turn) and will start at Level 1 from East edge of table.
4. AA Batteries
AA batteries are under the command of the umpire (Steve F)
5. Victory conditions
Minor victory: Prevent the destruction of the airship and hangar.
Major victory: Prevent the destruction of the airship and hangar and bring down at least 50% of the raiding force.
Gott Strafe England!
Optional rules in play
• Altitude rules
• Tailing rules
• AA rules
• Bombing rules
• Special damage rules – however - use explosion damage card for aircraft only if hit by AA.
• Only special damage rule used against airship and shed is explosion rule.
After Action Report (See diagram at end)
A Day Trip to Brussels
The objective of the game was for a British bomber force consisting of 5 DH4s and an RE8 escorted by two Camels, to bomb the airship shed and/or the airship. Victory conditions were set as a victory if the shed (and thus the airship) was destroyed and a major victory if the RE8 could manage to photograph the damage as proof and live to tell the tale. A German victory would be if the airship survived, and a major victory if the airship survived and 50% of the attacking force was shot down.
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At the start of the game the British bomber force were lined up against the Western edge of the table at Level 4.
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Start points for the two pairs of German Albatros’s were diced for, one pair coming on from the North-East corner and the other pair from half-way along the Southern edge, both at Level 3. The latter pair were perceived as the most immediate threat to the bombers, however this turned out not to be the case.
The first move phase of the first game turn, for reasons only known to the controlling player, both Camels immediately did a Starboard turn and continued to circle for the following two moves.
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The bombers following orders, went straight up the table opening a gap between them and their escort, the RE8 taking a slightly more Southern route. It now seemed that the Albatros’s coming from the Southern edge of the table were going to have an easy time attacking the bombers. Instead, in the next turn they ignored the bombers and went for the Camels, and a dogfight developed that continued for the rest of the game, effectively preventing the Camels from protecting the bombers, but keeping away two of the German fighters.
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This might have not been so important to the German side if the Fokker Triplanes had been activated early enough to take effect, but a series of poor die rolls meant this was not the case.
Not believing their luck the players controlling the bombers ploughed on, veering to Starboard towards the airship shed and trying to put a bit of distance between themselves and the Albatros’s that started in the North-East corner. By turn 3 they were in range of the first line of anti-aircraft batteries which let rip.
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And it is here the British had their only real piece of bad luck of the day, with one of the DH4s getting a direct hit and drawing an explosion card.
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Turn 4 and the remaining bombers were losing altitude and lining up for their bomb run, and now being harried by the two Albatros’s and Archie. Both scored only minor damage on the attacking force, with the exception of a special card which drilled one of DH4 observers between the eyes. The rear gunners only managed to score a few points of damage on the attackers.
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Turn 6 and the bombers commenced their bomb run.
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All aircraft had elected to drop all their bombs in one go. The RE8 went in first but the bombs overshot and landed between the shed and the aircraft park, shredding a few of the aircraft tents and some mechanics. The DH4s however all scored direct hits on the airship shed by coming in along the length of the shed, so giving themselves a larger target.
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At this point the bombers were more of a danger to themselves as they had all converged at one end of the shed from slightly different angles and were desperately trying to drop their bombs while not being in the same piece of air as another DH4 at the same time, while simultaneously trying to avoid the Albatros's.
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The turn after the bombing took place, the German players finally managed to throw a six and activate one of the Fokker Triplanes, which went after the bombers but achieved no real material damage.
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The maximum damage for the airship shed was set at 15, and the bombing had caused 12 points of damage, a respectable total and a decent victory but not enough for the intrepid aviators. Around they went again, the Germans being sold a dummy as they expected all the bombers to exit the Eastern edge of the board immediately and choosing manoeuvre cards accordingly. The DH4s then attacked the shed with machine gun fire (the umpire, neglecting to anticipate this turn of events, considerately agreed a total of another 12 points of damage sufficient to finish the job). The DH4s scored 13 points of damage between them – job done.
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The Germans were still trying to down a bomber before they exited the table, and neglected the RE8 that had been stooging about dodging the ack-ack, and now overflew the shed on a photographic run completing the final requisite of a major victory.
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Final losses were one DH4 destroyed, the remainder having varying amounts of minor damage, one airship and shed destroyed, and one Albatros seriously shot about with the others with minor damage.
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