Ground Attack

The Next Chapter of the Drake's Dragon's Campaign

The Dragons receive orders to destroy an enemy ground convoy. Drake, Hartley, and Palmer go on the mission, flying Goshawks.

The Mission

With Hartley and Palmer flying cover, Drake makes a pass at the convoy. He misses.

No photo of turn 1.

As Drake pulls up from his attack run, an enemy Cobra appears out of the heavy cloud cover and gets on his tail. Palmer also finds himself tailed. Fortunately, the enemy gunnery is bad. Our heroes are unscathed.

But the Cobra stays on Palmer's tail and damages him. Hartley rushes to help Drake. In the cloud cover, neither Hartley or his target can get a good shot.

Palmer escapes. With a little tricky flying, Drake ends up on his erstwhile pursuer's tail.

Drake damages his foe. Hartley now has a bogie on his tail.

But he shakes him and makes an unsuccessful pass at the convoy.

Pulling up, Hartley is exposed to a Cobra attack. Bullets rattle his Goshawk but do no significant damage. I fished out some yellow tokens to use a rattle markers. Drake unsuccessfully chases his quarry.

By this time, the convoy gets away. Drake orders a return to base.

Aftermath

• Each side had one damaged aircraft. But, the Dragons failed to do any damage to the convoy. Count this as a defeat.
• This means that the Dragons are 1-2 in the campaign.
• I added some rules for cloud cover.
• Roll a D3 for number of clouds.
• Before firing, an attacker needs to roll to see if clouds obscure the shot. Roll greater than the number of clouds to get a clear shot. Otherwise, there is a -1 penalty to the attack.

Winging It

The Next Chapter of the Drake's Dragon's Campaign

The Dragons return to the air. This time, three pilots are on patrol in Goshawk fighters (average quality).

The pilots are veteran Al Hartley, and novices Randy Palmer and Josh Jenkins. Jenkins is brand new to the squadron.

Note: I randomly roll to determine who and how many fly.

Encounter!

While on patrol, they encounter 3 Cobras and an Adder (3 average and 1 obsolete fighters).

Hartley (green 1 - left) gets on the tail of the Adder. His shots rattle the enemy pilot. Meanwhile, 2 Cobras separate Jenkins. Bullets rip into his plane, damaging it. Jenkins flees the fight.

Hartley stays on the Adders tail and shoots it down. Meanwhile, Palmer (green 2) scores a hit.

Palmer finds himself in a bind. Evasive maneuvers! Whew, they missed!

But it gets worse for Palmer while Hartley tracks down another target.

With some nifty flying, Palmer turns the tables. His shots miss. Hartley manages to damage another Cobra.

With 2 planes damaged, the Imperial pilots decide to break off.

Final Tally

• The Dragons damage 2 fighters and destroy another while only having 1 damaged aircraft. They win this scenario.
• The campaign score stands at 1-1.
• Some Dragon milestones:
• Hartley gets his first kill, 
• With his third mission complete, Palmer rises to veteran status.
• Jenkins survives his first mission.

Drake's Dragons

Spurred by the dogfight I posted yesterday, I decided to start an aerial campaign. I resurrected a character and setting from my old blog.

The Lucranian War

The campaign is set in an imaginary world, where a diesel-era evil empire invades the democratic nation of Lucrania.

During this war, Devin Drake leads a squadron of brave aviators fighting against the might of the Empire.

Previously

The Dragons were marginally victorious in their last campaign, but suffered heavy casualties in the last two missions. They pulled out for some rest, but are now back in action.

I actually started a second campaign but it fizzled out. I'm considering that mission a one-off and am now starting a new campaign.

Mission: Intercept!

At the Dragons' airbase, the warning klaxons blare. Incoming air raid!

Only 2 Dragons, the commander Devin Drake and young Dewey Hobbes manage to get in the air.

Drake (green 1) flies a standard Goshawk fighter while Hobbes (green 2) pilots an obsolete Chick fighter. They face 2 Cobra fighters, an old Adder, and 3 Vulture medium bombers.

Using the heavy cloud cover, our heroes get a jump on the bombers. Hobbes damages one.

Then shoots it down. But the enemy fighters converge.

One gets on Drake's tail, damaging him. Hobbes takes damage in a crossfire.

Two fighters gang up on Hobbes and bring him down. Drake escapes into the clouds.

The cloud cover throws off the remaining bombers' aim. They do minimal damage.

They score 1 hit out of 4

The Lucranians are lucky the damage is not worse, but this goes down as a defeat for the Dragons.

Sadly, Hobbes did not survive the crash.

GAME NOTES

• Campaign Score - 0-1
• I determined the sides randomly. I think it was weighted a little heavily against the defenders. I will think about tweaking the randomizer.
• I use fictional planes for my fictional universe. There are 3 classes - obsolete, average, and advanced. I gave names for each class per nation.
• Lucrania - Chick (obsolete), Goshawk, and Peregrine (advanced)
• Empire - Adder, Cobra, and Viper fighters. Condor (light), Vulture (medium), and Buzzard (heavy) bombers.