I was thinking about doing a "mission generator" based on the "rhubarb" patrols shortly after the Battle of Britain, but I'm having trouble finding much information on the patrols themselves.
What I do know is that after the Battle of Britain, Fighter Command was keen to keep Luftwaffe fighter assets tied up so they couldn't be used in other theatres. One of the ways this was done was with the "rhubarb" patrols ("on a rhubarb" being RAF slang for searching for targets of opportunity). In bad weather, small groups of fighters would sweep over German territory and attack any ground targets they saw, with the priority being to entice German fighters to fight them. Historically, these patrols weren't very effective (I remember reading a pilot recall how all they did one sortie was strafe a water tower!) and out of 149 patrols (336 sorties) only 7 German planes were shot down (and 8 British planes were shot down too).
Ideally I'd find some rules to simulate the bad weather (aside from just the cloud layer rules) and have the patrols be based on some sort of random generation for encounters. Perhaps players would choose a sector to patrol, and roll on a table to see what sort of trouble they find (whether it be ground targets, enemy fighters, or not much at all).
However, any extra information on the "rhubarb" patrols (and any other advice you might have) would help to draw up what sort of "encounters" should be on a table, and how often they should happen. Thanks in advance!
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