Battle of Britain Campaign #4

Another dogfight in the campaign playtesting. It was Dan's first game and his British pilots started the campaign keen as mustard, but inexperienced. Dan and his pilots faced an uphill battle, quite literally, as his Spitfires scrambled for height against the incoming Stuka dive-bombing attack. My German Messerschmitts had crossed the coast down on the deck and were scrambling for height, but at least the pilots were veterans of Poland and France.

The fight turned out to be unexpectedly one-sided and in favour of the German Luftwaffe!

The British Spitfires start the game straining for height. No clever manoeuvring, just climbing hard away from their airfield.

My Messerschmitts climb hard as the Stukas they are supposed to be escorting drone along above them. My top pilot is flying the leading Me 109 single-engined fighter. His number two is flying the leading Me 110 twin-engined fighter on the other side of the Stukas. Their wingmen are less experienced, but nonetheless as good as the best the British can field today.

One lesson from today, I started the mission with the sides too far apart. Dan's British are still climbing in another uneventful turn. The Spitfires have reached the same height as the German Stuka dive bombers.

Not wanting to give the British an easy head-on pass, the Messerschmitt 109s drift off to the right a little, ready to swing onto the British flank. The twin-engined 110s quite like the prospect of a head-on pass where their heavy nose armament can come to bear, so they also swing right.

Seeing this, the right-hand Spitfires break right out of the line of fire.

While the left-hand Spitfires break left outside the Me 109s.

My Me 110 tracks back to the left, scoring a few hits on the lead Spitfire, but nothing serious enough to bring it down.

Dan's Spitfires break right again, setting up a head-on pass where the combined firepower of their close-trail formation should prevail over the more flexible German formation. They score a few hits, but my leader comes through the hail of bullets unscathed. At least he's leaving the Stukas alone as they drone ever closer to the airfield.

On the other flank, Dan's flight leader pours bullets into the leading Me 110, but again to no avail.

Back to my turn, and there's something wrong with the cannon on my twin-engined Me 110, but the machine-guns make up for it in spades, doing enough to bring the Spitfire down twice over. First blood to the Germans.

My leader scores a few ineffective hits on the lead Spitfire as it flashes past, then pulls around hard to get on their six. His wingman scores a few hits as well, but the Spitfires are still coming.

And then the Spitfires show what they can do. While the section leader (out of frame off to the right) couldn't hit the side of a barn, the young sprog flying number two in the section brought down two Stukas in one pass. Not a bad performance for a pilot just out of training!

That's half of my Stuka dive bombers down in a matter of seconds. What was looking like a favourable fight has just taken a very wrong turn!

Determined to punish such impudence, my leader swings onto his tail and opens fire, hitting with both cannon and both machine guns in a relatively easy tail shot. Needing a 5 or six to make an Airframe Save for each shot, Dan pulls out all the stops and saves every hit. This pilot has a tin bum!

Even my wingman can't touch him!

Meanwhile, the big Me 110s in the background make a lumbering turn, looking for the Spitfires that whizzed past.

While KL B, flown by the second section leader, makes a pass on the Stukas the two novices both pull beautiful Immelmann turns and line up for another pass.

The young one got a little too cocky though, and my leader boring straight in, cannon spitting fire, scored decisive hits, taking a second Spitfire out of the fight.

Surviving a pass by my wingman, the British section leader fell to an incredibly lucky shot by the rear gunner of one of the Stuka dive bombers. That's another big reversal, with three out of four Spitfires down.

The last Spitfire bravely pressed home his attack against the Stukas, scoring hits but unable to bring another down. Unfortunately, in the excitement, I forgot to take more photos! The battle ended in my next turn as a concerted attack shot down the last Spitfire as the Stukas began their dive on the target.