Game: Richthofen's War

Thread: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-10-19T13:36:49+00:00

I'd sort of stepped away from this for a while just out of frustration but I have one more idea I'd like to try.

It will use the 5-second game turn rules.

Now, the previous problem I had with those rules were that while it settled the problem of some planes being able to fly "all over the place", it resulted in some of the less capable planes not being able to do much at all.

One option was to "re-scale" things so as to get around this problem.

But one option I thought of was this:

Roll for initiative!

Instead of keeping the fixed turn sequence, I propose the following two initiative systems:

1) In case of a 1 vs. 1 dogfight, each side rolls 1d6 for initiative. The plane with the better maneuvering schedule gets +1 and an ACE flying the plane also gets +1. ALL planes move first and then all planes (if they are able and their pilots wish to) fire. Planes move in reverse order of initiative (with ties being broken by maneuvering schedule, and then ace status, and then "home field advantage" (if flying over German territory, the Germans win the tie, etc.). Planes fire in order of initiative.

2) In case of a 1 vs. many dogfight, or a many vs. many dogfight, each side rolls 1d6 for initiative. The side with the numerical advantage gets +1. And that's it. In this case, only fighters count toward numerical advantage, i.e. reconnaissance planes do not count towards numerical advantage. During the course of the dogfight, if it boils down to a 1 vs. 1 dogfight, shift over to the initiative rules used above!

And that's it!

I haven't tested this out yet, but I believe they're workable.

As for testing for gun jams, you do so if someone fires two turns in a row.

Thread: Pilot in fatal crash identified at Old Rheinbeck Aerodrome

papahoth — 2008-08-24T20:34:28+00:00

What follows is one of the news articles. The plane that did not crash in the dogfight is the Fokker DRI shown on the cover of Richthofen's War:
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I have been to the shows there twice and if you look on my profile images, you will see some of the planes that the Aerodrome owns. Great place to visit.

By Greg Marano and Christine Pizzuti
Poughkeepsie Journal

RHINEBECK — The pilot killed in a plane crash Sunday has been identified as Vincent Nasta, a teacher at Riverhead High School on Long Island.

The Dutchess County Sheriff's Office identified Nasta, 46, this afternoon.

Nasta, known as Vinny to his friends and coworkers, made his home in the Long Island Community of Wading River, with his wife, Kathleen. He was a teacher at Riverhead High School for more than 20 years, and an illustrator of children’s books.

"It's tragic for us," Riverhead schools superintendent Diane B. Scricca said in a phone interview. She said he would often fly organs to people awaiting transplants.

"This is just a wonderful human being who gave his time for the good of others," she said. "This is a great loss, not only to our district, but I really believe to greater humanity."

Funeral arrangements have not yet been finalized, according to a statement from David Zimbler, principal of Riverhead High School.

"The students, faculty, and staff of this district admired and respected Vinny Nasta," Zimbler said. "He was truly one in a million. Everything he did was for the benefit of the students of this school. He loved his job and worked everyday to see the students of this school succeed. He will be missed by us all."

The crash occurred around 3:45 p.m. Sunday, toward the end of an air show at the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome.

An FAA spokeswoman said the investigation is being conducted jointly with the National Transportation Safety Board. She said the plane was destroyed by fire, but at this stage officials cannot determine whether the fire started before or after impact.

Nasta was flying a replica 1917 Nieuport 24 biplane in a mock dog-fight with the DR1 Fokker tri-plane in the final event of the air show at the aerodrome in Red Hook when he crashed into the wooded area southeast of the airport, Dutchess County Sheriff's Sgt. Mark Femenella said.

The land where the plane landed is owned by the Town of Rhinebeck.

There were no passengers.

The Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome released an e-mail statement Monday morning.

Nasta "had experience flying both restored originals and replica Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome airplanes like the Nieuport," Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome Air Shows President Hugh Schoelzel said in the release. "He was a great pilot who flew in air shows throughout the region and he was a certified commercial flight instructor in addition to his work with Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome. The loss of this fine man is devastating for his family and to his extended family at the Aerodrome."

A baseball game at Stone Church Ballfields was interrupted when players saw the plane fly over and crash into the woods.

Jim Rushmore, 30, who was among the players, said, "The plane went across the field and the engine died and we saw it nosedive. It was a huge crash. In a few minutes, we smelled the burning field and saw smoke in the woods."

The crash caused a fire, which was put out by the Rhinebeck Fire Department. The sheriff's office is leading the preliminary investigation, though the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board were notified.

According to FAA registration information, the plane was manufactured in 1997 and last re-certified for airworthiness in May. The Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome was the registered owner of the plane.

According to information on the aerodrome web site, the plane had a gross weight of 1,300 pounds, a 26'9" wingspan and a 19-foot length.

Crashes involving planes from the aerodrome have occurred over the years, most recently in August 2005, when the engine of a 1915 Nieuport 11 biplane replica flown by a Madison County man lost power during takeoff. The pilot suffered minor injuries.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

papahoth — 2008-08-24T20:30:16+00:00

What all of this and the original game that I played 100's of times are still missing is that what made Richthofen great was that he was a deadly hunter. It was stated that he could squeeze the trigger and riddle your heart and leave everything else undamaged. Then you have Voss who could fly like a man from another world. However, in order to really simulate something like this, I say welcome to Wii. Perhaps something that builds on the maneuver cards like approach is the best way of handling things? The Sopwith Triplane needs to be able to shoot down Albatros D3's with its C guns and look like the superior plane that it was. Just some rambling thoughts.

By the way, the picture comes from the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome which lost a Nieuport 24 in mock combat last Saturday, killing the pilot. Will post that here.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-07-01T03:14:58+00:00

I'm thinking of adding a roll for initiative in the 5 second turn variant. My rationale is as follows:

With a 10 second turn, some of the more maneuverable planes (Camel and DR. I) can turn all over the place. Maneuvering becomes a moot point and you really don't get the sense of jockeying for position to get a shot.

With a 5 second turn, some of the less maneuverable planes basically end up totally helpless if they end up in a bad position; one may argue that this is realistic but my reading of accounts of air-to-air combat in this era leads me to disagree; even the supposedly helpless Be2c could put up a good fight given skillful handling.

My thinking on initiative is as follows:

To keep things simple, initiative will be BY SIDES rather than by plane. Klunky, I know, but one of the strengths of a relatively simple system like Richthofen's War is that it can handle a relatively large number of aircraft.

Initiative will be handled differently depending on the situation:

1) In a 1 vs. 1 dogfight, each side rolls 1d6 and get bonuses based on the maneuverability of their aircraft, the "ace status" of their pilot, and maybe some other factors (speed? altitude?).

2) In dogfight involving more than two aircraft, each side rolls 1d6 and the side with the numerical advantage (2-seater reconnaissance planes count as 1/2 a plane) gain a +1` advantage. IF the dogfight breaks down into a 1 vs. 1 dogfight, use the initiative rules in case 1).

The winner of the iniative moves LAST but fires FIRST.

Thread: Re: Richthofen's War -- past its prime

Windopaene — 2008-06-18T06:21:15+00:00

Well, even soon after it came out, the IGO-UGO nature of the beast made it feel very odd. Hence the "Unexpected Manuevers" cards that AH put out after a really well designed General article/variant. This was the first wargame I had that had this scale, (individual aircraft), that all had such wildly different capabilities. That made it cool enough.

Thread: Re: Richthofen's War -- past its prime

KirkH — 2008-06-18T03:51:41+00:00

I agree. Back in the early 70's Richthofen's War was my introduction to wargaming. It was simple enough to be easily playable, with one on one games only taking a few minutes. My friends and I spend many hours picking planes and blasting each other out of the sky. I dare say if it weren't for Richthofen's War I may not have been able to nurture my love affair with wargames that I enjoy today. Granted by todays standards it's not the greatest game, but today we have the benefit of hindsight. Back in the early 70's it was a colorful, fun way to learn about those stringbags of WWI.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

Tom Jensen — 2008-06-06T20:25:39+00:00

I was tinkering around with the Advanced Richthofen's rules (17m/hex) this morning, trying to keep the game simple enough so that an eleven year old would enjoy it. (No altitude adjustments at all!) This led to a couple of ideas that might be helpful.

First of all, I thought the multiple combat tables were too complex so I decided that I'd use the orignal table. But I'd use the number of "sighted" hexes as a range reduction. Example: if my move had three "sighted" hexes, I reduced the range downward from the seven maximum range. 7-3=4 and I'd roll the result from the four range column. It simplifies the system considerably.

Next, a new Critical Hit table would have to be created. Many of the results involved lowering the turns per hex down to one per side. But since this variant compels everyone to one side/hex, there was no real penalty. So it should be revised in some way. And if the one-on-one fights are too stalemated, let the critical hit table add that random element that will break the stalemate. Perhaps have a "Pilot rattled" result in which he is forced to fly straight ahead the next turn or use a die to randomly determine his move.

Thread: Re: Richtofen's War rulebook

dingo262 — 2008-04-01T00:51:54+00:00

It's located on the first link on the main RW page

Thread: Re: Richtofen's War rulebook

Joek — 2008-03-31T23:31:23+00:00

Thanks. Not sure where that is located.

Thread: Re: Richtofen's War rulebook

loquitur — 2008-03-30T20:03:00+00:00

There's a series of rulebook images in the RW Yahoo group database.

Thread: Richtofen's War rulebook

Joek — 2008-03-30T14:47:59+00:00

My brother recently dropped off a copy of Richtofen's War that was in our house when I was younger. I never played it because the rulebook was missing. Does anyone know how I can get my hands on a copy (PDF or otherwise)?

Thanks.

Image

Osprey — 2008-03-29T05:39:01+00:00

Composite Components

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Osprey — 2008-03-29T05:37:25+00:00

Game Board

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Bluelamneth2112 — 2008-03-08T19:22:20+00:00

I was beaten by a 5-year-old.

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Bluelamneth2112 — 2008-03-08T19:20:03+00:00

He loves this game!

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-02-23T03:46:12+00:00

The 17-meter hex variant is giving me headaches trying to incorporate vertical maneuvering into the mix (which would necessitate having alt increases and decreases in units of 17 meters).

I'm leaning toward the 5-second turn variant with the new vertical maneuvering rules; I also shuffled around the maneuvering schedules of the planes - I think in the game out of the box, the schedules were a reflection of over-all maneuverability of the planes since the game didn't really incorporate maneuvering in the vertical; since my variants are trying to address vertical maneuvering, I felt I should de-couple horizontal and vertical maneuvering.

I'll test out how it goes tomorrow.

I'm gonna try the following combos:

DH/2 vs. Alb. DII - the way I shuffled around the schedules, the DH/2 can out-turn in the Alb. DII in the horizontal plane (man. schedule D vs. man. schedule B) but the Alb. DII has better vertical capabilities.

SOP/CAM vs. FOK. DR.I - to test if the variant suffers from the "trading shots syndrome".

SPAD XIII vs. FOK. DR. I - to further test if the variant suffers from the "trading shots syndrome". I also downgraded the SPAD XIII's maneuverability to B (anecdotal evidence indicates that it was less maneuverable that the SPAD VII). I also want to see if the SPAC XIII can use it's greater speed and dive to "outmaneuver" the DR. I.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-02-15T01:27:01+00:00

I was actually leaning toward using the 5-second rule variant and employing something similar to your energy burn rules (but making it dependant on turning schedule...so higher turning schedule planes would generally burn less energy).

Regardless, it would force planes to lose altitude whilst turning.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

dingo262 — 2008-02-14T22:24:03+00:00

How about this for energy management idea...

Leave the game scale in place, but penalize the energy of the aircraft if turning is involved.

For example...

- 1 hexside turn - 1 speed loss for next turn
- 2 hexside turn - 2 speed loss for next turn
- 3 hexside turn - 3 speed loss for next turn

At least the speed would bleed off with all those high energy turns. Also will force slow turns at slow speed. Note: I have not tried this modification yet, but I have a feeling it will turn the tide on the hummingbird effect.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-02-05T22:10:31+00:00

I just realized the dive/climb rules in my variant are pooched. Ugh...this just illustrates one of the dangers of making house rules to fix things - you fix one thing and you may end up breaking something else. I wanna stick a fork in my eye right now.

In case y'all are wondering what's pooched in my dive/climb rules - when diving, you can dive your maximum dive rate but once you reach your maximum dive speed, the rate at which you can dive drops to 100 m...thus defying the very laws of physics (and not to mention common sense).

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-02-05T06:15:45+00:00

Tried out the above variant in another one vs. one dogfight (Nieuport 11 vs. Halberstadt D. III). The fight followed the following pattern - both planes started off at 3,000 m and as they merged, they both gained altitude...after the merge, both planes would circle and it was pretty much a stalemate and both planes lost altitude as they traded altitude for speed and used that to try to get a firing solution on the other...oddly enough, the most damage was done while both planes were CLIMBING and were at their stalling speed (minimum speed). The Halberstadt did most of the damage during this "stall fight" and the fight ended with the Nieuport diving for the deck. The Nieuport managed to escape off the north edge of the map.

The adjustments I described in my previous post that allowed for more diving seemed to work quite well. I'm not sure how realistic they are but at least they allow a plane to dive continuously.

One troubling thing I noticed is that in a one vs. one fight, it's pretty easy for a stalemate to develop, which can be annoying. When I got started on this, I wanted a variant that could handle a one vs. one fight and keep things interesting yet still scale nicely for multiple plane engagements. A lot of air games I've seen seem to work well for one scale (one vs. one or multiple plane) but badly at the other. For one vs. one fights, I'm toying with the idea of having players roll for initiative to bring up the possibility of a player moving TWICE in a row. However, with that being said, a one vs. one dogfight between similar aircraft probably should result in a bit of statemate so maybe that's not such a bad thing? And I'll also have to see how this variant works with later war planes.

One nice thing I noticed in the fight between the Nieuport and the Halberstadt - both planes are pretty similar except the Halberstadt has better dive characteristic; this enabled it to "zoom climb" by diving and then using the speed built up in the dive to out-climb the Nieuport.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-02-04T21:08:07+00:00

Okay - thought of a way to "fix" the diving problem.

The "sequence of play goes like this":

1) If the speed of an airplane is ABOVE its maximum speed, its speed automatically decelerates by 1.

2) Acceleration/Decceleration due to "throttling" is handled (+1 or -1 to speed with the proviso that you can't accelerate a plane to a speed faster than its max speed by throttling, only via diving).

3) Changes in speed due to climbing and diving are then handled.

4) Changes in speed due to turns are still handled at the END of the turn.

I'm also going to temporarily ditch the whole "dividing climb and dive rates by three in order to put things in line with each hex being 17 m" thing - after some thought, I realized that climb and dive rates will be somewhat "normalized" because using these movement rules, AVERAGE climb and dive rates are going to be lower than in the game out of the box since planes can't climb their maximum climb rate indefinitely nor can they dive their maximum dive rate indefinitely - eventually, they'll reach a point where they can only climb 50 m or dive 100 m (assuming, off course, that they don't hit their service ceiling or the ground).

I AM still going to "scale" the maximum vertical separation at which one can fire on an enemy air-craft due to the fact that this variant assumes all gunfire is at closer range anyway. I don't have the rules in front of me but I believe the maximum separation is 250 m, which, when divided by three is a little more than 80 m...so, round it up to 100 m and say that's the maximum vertical separation at which you can shoot someone.

I'm looking forward to trying these out tonight after work.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-02-04T18:49:08+00:00

I'm going to play around with this a bit more. I wasn't very happy about the way you could reach your maximum speed when in a dive and thus not be able to dive anymore and I've been pondering on how to solve this simply while still trying to keep things vaguely "realistic".

Once I fiddle a bit with the diving, the next thing I'll probably tackle is the whole "two tables needed to resolve gunfire" problem. I'm pretty sure that the table can be collapsed into one or maybe it can be done away with completely and something simpler used in its place.

I DO like the way you can only turn one hex side per hex MAXIMUM in this variant. It just FEELS right.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

Yaboo — 2008-02-04T18:35:46+00:00

I am very curious how this effort turns out. I just bought the game again from a used game bin for next to nothing. Played it a lot when I was a kid and want to give it a shot again.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...

castiglione — 2008-02-04T06:22:30+00:00

Did some fiddling around with the 17 m hex variant and posted up a session which promptly disappeared into the ether.

The variant was the 17 m hex game with the following additions:

1) I cleaned up the rules concerning altitude gain/loss - basically, each plane now has a minimum speed, a maximum HORIZONTAL speed and a maximum dive speed (which is the number of hexes it can travel while diving in turn, which is its "official" dive speed + 1 hex for each 50 m of dive rate the plane has). The way things work is that you lose you lose and gain speed in hexes when you climb or dive, respectively.

2) You now lose speed points for turning. The number of speed points you lose corresponds to the maximum number of movement points you spent in a turn to turn one hex-side. You take that number and then consider the next lowest number on your plane's schedule and that's how many speed points your lose. For example, if you're flying a B-schedule plane and you spend 3 MP's to turn one hex-side, you would lose 2 speed, if you spend 2 MP's to turn one hex-side, you would lose 1 speed and if you spend 1 MP, you would lose 0 speed.

The speed modifications are applied in this order - if you're flying horizontally this turn and your current speed is greater than the maximum allowable horizontal speed, your speed is reduced by one. You can then modify your speed by -1 or 1. You then apply any speed changes due to altitude changes. At the end of your turn, after you've finished moving, you further change your speed due to turns. Of course, you can not move in such a way that your speed drops to less than your minimum speed. I may cobble together some rules for stalling and spins but for now, I want to keep things simple.

I like this variant. I like how it gets rid of that trading shots problem and I like how it makes you want to balance turning tightly (to get your guns on your enemy) with wanting to turn a wide/large circle in order to get your guns on your enemy for as long as possible.

The only thing I don't like about it is its fire resolution table. Having to consult TWO tables to resolve fire is just crazy. You basically have to cross-reference the number of hexes you have the enemy in your sights before you fire with your current speed and then use the number you get from THAT chart with another chart where you cross-reference that number with your air-craft type and the result of 2D6 (with or without modifiers) to get a final result. Ugh. There's gotta be a way to subsume those two tables into one.

Thread: Customizing this old chestnut...cont'd

castiglione — 2008-02-04T05:41:04+00:00

Okay - this is a "playtest" involving my trying to customize RW so get rid of that annoying "trading shots syndrome" and also to get more of a "flying feel", i.e. energy management into the game whilst trying to keep things as simple as possible.

The variant I played involved 17 m hexes (as published in The General magazine). This wasn't stated in the magazine article but I also divided dive and climb rates by three (since it's implied that each turn is now 1/3 as long as before)...however, the effect of climbing and diving (subtracting and taking away one hex per each "unit" of climb/dive) doesn't change...so, in the "big picture", there's probably no point in doing this since the only way this effects play is in how soon planes get to ground level or how fast they hit their ceiling altitude. I'll have to play with this further to see how important this is.

I also messed around a bit with the climb/dive rules. Maximum horizontal speed is as stated in the plane states. Maximum dive speed is the max dive speed as stated in the plane states + the as given dive rate divided by 50; this represents the maximum speed that a plane can attain in a dive. I should've used the over-dive rules as well but left them out initially for reasons I'll explain later.

Turn sequence was as follows - planes could accelerate or deccelerate their current speed by ONE hex - if a plane was traveling without gaining/losing altitude this turn and its current speed was greater than its maximum horizontal speed, it decelerated by ONE hex (so it's possible, temporarily, to fly faster than your maximum horizontal speed right after you've come off a dive). For each 17 m you climb, you lose 1 hex of speed. For each 17 m you dive, you gain 1 hex of speed but you can never travel faster than your maximum dive speed! At the end of your turn, you can lose speed for turning - basically, you consider the maximum number of movement points you spent in turning one hex-side and you lose the number of speed points corresponding to the NEXT LOWEST NUMBER OF MP'S you would've spent, i.e. say you're a flying a B-schedule plane and you spent 2 MP's turning one hex-side...the next lowest amount of MP's you can spend in turning a B-schedule plane is 1, so you lose one MP; if you had spend 3 MP's turning one hex-side, you'd lose 2 MP's. It's possible for you to lose NO speed points in certain situations, i.e. for the above B-schedule plane, if I only spent 1 MP turning one hex-side, I'd lose no speed points. So, making tight turns costs you speed points. Obviously, you can't make turns that make your speed drop down to less than your minimum speed (I might cobble together rules for stalling and spins later but for now, I'm gonna keep those things out of this).

The planes I chose to battle it out were a Nieuport 11 and a Halberstadt D. III. My plan is to test this variant out on two early war planes and then two late war planes to make sure it works for all the planes in the plane set. I want to avoid a situation where you can't really maneuver at all with the early war planes (because of their bad turning schedules and their slow speeds) and where you end up trading shots all the time with the later war planes (because of their good turning schedules and their high speeds).

I started off with the planes at 3000 m, heading right toward each other. The variant worked pretty well. There were no problems with trading shots. Most of the shots that were taken were short "snap" deflection shots. One problem arose...since planes could rapidly reach their maximum diving speed after ONE turn diving, it meant they could no longer dive after one turn! This obviously had a huge impact on how much vertical maneuvering took place. I'm obviousl going to have to play out this scenario again while using the over-dive rules (the reason I initially left them out because when I calculated the maximum over-dive speed using the same formula as for the maximum dive speed, I had planes having ridiculously high over-dive speeds, i.e. 14 hexes for the Nieuport 11 alone! So I shied away from using over-dive for fear of re-introducing the whole trading shots problem again...this was probably ill-founded since, a) the plane has a 1/3 chance of breaking up when over-diving so it'd probably not be used a great deal and 2) over-diving would probably increase the altitude difference between the two planes so much that the over-diving plane probably wouldn't be in range to fire anyway.

Anyway, where was I...yes, the duel worked well. No trading shots but not much jockeying in the vertical. One thing I liked was that you HAD to manage your speed or else you could over-shoot your enemy and end up in a bad position. I also liked how this variant forces you to want to turn tightly...but at the same time, to also want to make large, wide turns since they're necessary in order to get a good burst on an enemy plane (the more hexes you have an enemy plane in your sights, the more accurate/deadly your fire). And it was a relief having fire occur at ANY point during the turn instead of at the end of it which works fine in land based wargames but which turn air -based wargames with tightly defined fields of fire into strange hex-counting exercises with odd maneuvers being done to get your plane into firing position.

Most of the shots fired between the planes were deflection shots which didn't really do a lot of damage. The fight ended up drifting at around 3,000 m (like I said, there wasn't much vertical maneuvering due to how my variant handled dives) but the fight ended up drifting to the east. The Nieuport 11 scored several short bursts on the Halby but was running out of ammunition so turned to run back to the west. The Halby sprung on the Nieuport and began slowly gaining on it whilst firing away...the Nieuport escaped off the N edge of the map (near the W side) so I considered the fight a draw (I guess the Halby pilot would've scored "one enemy driven away").

I like this variant. I'll have to try it again with over-dive rules to encourage more vertical maneuvering or at least change the diving rules so players can continue to dive after they've hit their maximum dive speed - it just not feel right for the planes to hit their maximum dive speed...and then not be able to dive.

One complaint I had about this was how much more complex fire combat was to resolve. You basically had to count how many hexes the enemy plane was in your sights, then compare that to how many hexes you could move each turn and you get a number out of that, then you compare that to your plane and then compare that to a 2D6 roll which may or may not be subject to modifiers depending on range to target, whether its a deflection shot or not, etc.

I may just attempt to subsume those two tables into one if I can work out the maths. I _LIKE_ how it works out and it's all logical (the longer you hold an enemy plane in your sights, the more effective your fire, but the faster you're going, the less effective your fire since you presumably have less time to aim) but having to refer to two tables to resolve fire is horribly tedious.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...

gjdad — 2008-02-04T01:58:56+00:00

I have just started teaching my son this game. My son has play other board games even risk but this is his first hex and counter wargame. Now he will play any time I suggest a chance to play. Just another reason to have kids, built in gamers! LOL

Thread: Re: Richthofen´s War rules

dingo262 — 2008-01-26T00:13:40+00:00

Actually, all the rules are there. You just have to put two images together to get the full image.

Thread: Re: Richthofen's War -- past its prime

dingo262 — 2008-01-26T00:10:32+00:00

I agree with Seth about the game being outdated. There are a number of publishers offering the WWI flight genre, and from what I hear, almost all having better mechanics. If you want a game that models what it was really like in the WWI flying corps, I am guessing you can do much better than RW.

That being said, I must counter that there are more gamers than just people looking for good simulation games - the "Beer and Pretzel" crowd. I would maintain that Richthofen's War is a good game as an introduction to wargaming in general, and is much cheaper than some of the newer offerings.

After just two solo outings (one balloon busting, the other taking out the "Bugs"), my boys wanted to play Richthofen's War so they can shoot me down. They don't seem to care if the mechanics are not perfect. They liked the easily learned rules and the "fun" in believing they are buzzing around the skies with those oldtime stringbags. If I would have strapped them down with a larger, more accurate ruleset, they would have been long gone. Once we get past the introductory stage, I'm sure they will find the holes just like many others have, and move onto something more realistic. However, the hook has been set.

Watching my kids see the "Fun Factor" in Richthofen's War, I see value in my $8.00 purchase from the late 70s. OK, so my kids don't drink beer, but they love pretzels. They are also learning that boardgaming doesn't have to be "Bored" gaming. Richthofen has the speed of play and the ease of rules that targets the younger. Outdated in one aspect doesn't mean the game should be shelved.

Time to get off the soapbox before I get tomatoed
Jim

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...

dingo262 — 2008-01-25T23:19:19+00:00

I remember in high school always playing with the 17m hexes and modified TDT (though we didn't call them that) Unfortunately, never did get to do a full campaign. Usually didn't play fast enough and we forgot about it in the middle. Kids those days.....

I still have Richthofen's War sitting beside Puerto Rico in our family room. I try to get it down at least twice a month. The kids seem to like it as it's easier for them to follow than ASL - not to mention they love shooting down their dad.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...

alcazar — 2008-01-25T21:55:51+00:00

I'm with Ron on this one, the campaign game was well worth playing.

I still have a copy of R-War sitting on my bookshelf - it was the cover art that first lured me into the hobby!

The 17m variant sounds quite interesting. I'm not sure I'd want to alter the combat or ammo though - I'd be tempted to figure a burst is a burst, and leave it at that. But I'll be interested to hear you get on with the variants, Roland.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...

RaDiKal — 2008-01-24T02:51:51+00:00

I found playing the campaign game rather than just individual missions added quite a bit of flavor to the game. Managing your pilot and aircraft pool against the mission demands really add to the WWI air warfare feel.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...

castiglione — 2008-01-24T01:34:52+00:00

I think I'll try out two customized variants:

1) One will be a variation of the 5-second turn variant. However, I'm going to play around with the length of a turn between 5 and 10 seconds in order to address the issue of early war planes not being able to maneuver very well. To address the issue of the later war planes maneuvering TOO well (which leads to the trading shots syndrome), I'm going to try out some "energy burn" rules by which planes lose energy the more they turn. I'm also going to attempt to add in some simple spotting rules.

2) The other is going to be a variation of the 17 meter hex variant. However, I'm not too keen on the firing tables as-is...they don't take range into account at all! Plus, it's unworkable for rear-firing guns! I'm going to play around with the old firing table while still keeping the concept of more hits being scored the longer the player "aims" with his plane. I'm also going to put in some "energy burn" and spotting rules as well.

In both versions, I'm also going to try to clean up the vertical maneuvering rules so that a player's plane decelerates/accelerates when it climbs/dives - the way things work right now is just a bit too clumsy.

Thread: Re: Customizing this old chestnut...

castiglione — 2008-01-23T21:59:21+00:00

I've been thinking some more about customizing this old classic.

From my readings on the war in the air during WWI, the most important factors in air-to-air combat were, in this order:

1) Situational awareness
2) Marksmanship
3) Piloting

Every game addresses #3. Most relegate #2 to the roll of the dice although one could argue that marksmanship is "folded into" #3. #1 is scarcely addressed at all and when it is, it is, again, relegated to the roll of the dice. This is a bit odd considering how important #1 was to a pilot's survivability.

And RW doesn't even address #3 that well. Basically, in an air combat game with some kind of ugo-igo structure, you want the movement rates of the planes to be such that you can actually maneuver your planes...but not so great that they can zip all over the board like a bunch of hummingbirds on crack. Too many of the late war planes in RW's can fly around like hummingbirds on crack.

I think SOME of the "hummingbirds on crack" syndrome can be corrected using some sort of "energy burn" rule. After all, #3 in air-to-air combat is nothing more than an exercise in resource management; you need to manage your speed and altitude in order to get a firing solution on your enemy. As it stands, such resource management does not exist, per se, in RW.

Thread: Customizing this old chestnut...

castiglione — 2008-01-23T06:01:30+00:00

RW hasn't aged very well IMHO - but I still have a fascination with it.

Maybe it's the beautiful photo of the Fokker Dr. I on the box. Maybe it's the Spartan old-school counters. Maybe it's beautiful, hard-mounted map or the little booklet with the line drawings and brief descriptions of all the planes in the game. I don't know - but something about the game speaks to me.

I was rummaging through some old issues of the General to see if one could customize something with a better handle of basic physics than the original game. In essence, I was thinking of using the game and its components as a "kit" to custom-built almost a new game.

One option I looked into was the 5-second turn rule. In the original game, the turn was 10 seconds. By cutting movement points in half, it was hoped to get rid of the whole "trading shots" syndrome. One problem with this is that early war planes can't move that well now.

Another option that looks interesting are the "advanced rule" in the Jan/Feb '82 issue of the General. In this version, each hex is now 17 meters instead of 50 so there's no more turning 180 degrees in one hex. Now, 180 degree turns require 3 hexes. The firing rules were also changed so that the player could fire at any point during his movement (so no more counting hexes so you end up in a good firing position at the end of your movement) - however, the more hexes that the player moves while having the target plane in his field of fire, the more effective his gunfire; the end result is that turns are wider and players are encouraged to making bigger turns in order to make long gunnery passes at their targets.

I like this rule since it seems you'll use more of the map.

However, there are some oddities in this variant that weren't addressed.

Since each hex is now 17 meters and not 50 but movement points for each plane remains the same, that implies that each turn is now 3.3 seconds, not 10 seconds as in the original game. This would mean that all climb and dive rates should be reduced to 33% of their original values. This also implies that ammunition expended during one turn is now 1/3 what it was in the original - an easy fix is to multiply ammunition by three and the amount of damage a plane can take by three since each turn, a plane can fire off 1/3 the ammo it could in the original game.

Also, the defensive fire rules, as written, are somewhat confusing (I still can't make heads or tails of them).

And there's another thing...the original game (and the variants) never addressed the reduction in speed which should occur during a tight turn. And the original game also did a poor job of depicting maneuvers in the vertical plane. There's still an advantage to be had by gaining altitude, but that mostly comes into play when you dive from that altitude you gained and use the extra MP's gained in the dive to maneuver into a superior position.

Thread: Re: Richthofen´s War rules

cloro — 2008-01-08T12:38:34+00:00

That rules were badly scanned. In each page some text is missing.

Where can i find the RW rules complete?

Thread: Richthofen's War -- past its prime

wargamer55 — 2008-01-07T05:52:44+00:00

Richthofen's War was part of Avalon Hill's rebirth in the early 1970s. After SPI turned into a rising competitor and not just a design house for it, Avalon Hill took steps to rebuild an in-house design staff for the first time since the Roberts era. A key member of that team was Randall Reed and one of his first designs was Richthofen's War.
RW took advantage of AH's printing resources to create a nice-looking design, especially the map, which was very attractive.
The red plane counters for the aircraft flown by the Red Baron, v. Richthofen, were also a nice touch.
The game was Dunnigan-like in its attention to primary sources and had an excellent and informative design booklet. By keeping the focus on v. Richthofen the game narrowed its scope a bit, but the overall design was still flexible and provided plenty of options. Fortunately the Red Baron was active during the most dramatic portion of the war, so it worked out.
Like most aerial wargames it didn't quite capture the physics of flight correctly, but it was serviceable and didn't lead to any really laughable results. It may have been technically incorrect, but it was tactically valid, for the most part.
The game was one of my favorites for a long time. I was even able to get some of my high school buddies to play in the school library. It also saw quite a bit of play in college. The game does seem a bit dated now, even with the addition of the maneuver cards, which is an improvement. Still, most people interested in the topic these days would probably prefer to play Wings of War, so I think RW's time has passed and it's mostly of interest as a collectible or for nostalgic play between grognards.

For other game comment see my blog at http://pawnderings.blogspot.com

Thread: Re: Richthofen´s War rules

loquitur — 2008-01-05T22:39:13+00:00

There's a copy in the file section of the yahoo group.

Thread: Richthofen´s War rules

cloro — 2008-01-05T22:05:55+00:00

I dug out my copy of Richthofen´s War but am distressed to find the rules are missing. Anyone know where I can get a copy of the rules?

Thanks in advance.

Image

malocite — 2007-09-09T21:31:19+00:00

inside of the box

Image

Badgeroonie — 2007-03-20T18:59:31+00:00

Richthofen as pictured in the campaign guide

Image

Badgeroonie — 2007-03-20T18:58:31+00:00

The map of the area covered by the campaign game as given in the campaign booklet

Image

loquitur — 2007-01-31T00:31:10+00:00

Solitaire romp through scenario 7

Thread: Re: User Review

Beery — 2007-01-24T15:07:02+00:00

The trading shots syndrome was a killer for me (although I played the game for a good long while before I gave up on it). I always felt that the alternating moves system combined with the over-long 10 seconds per move made for a very unrealistic simulation, so I switched to the Ace of Aces system which was more realistic but cumbersome when it came to greater than one-on-one scenarios. Because of this I transposed the Ace of Aces manoeuvres to a hex-based boardgame system (which works better when more than two aircraft are involved) and used the Ace of Aces rules and manoeuvres with the Richthofen's War board and counters. For me this was the perfect solution, as it combined a simultaneous movement system with a shorter move period, making it impossible to trade shots and making it feel much more realistic. Plus the Ace of Aces rules were much simpler. All-in-all it combined the best of both systems and removed the worst problems of each system.

Image

GrogGamer — 2007-01-19T19:00:04+00:00

Richthofen's War map and box view

Image

GrogGamer — 2007-01-19T18:59:17+00:00

Richthofen's War counters

Thread: Re: 5-second turn variant and early war planes

castiglione — 2007-01-11T13:54:55+00:00

Eeek - I inadvertantly gave my own session report a thumbs up (clicked on the new feature in curiosity). Oh well...

...I tried playing out the DH/2 vs. Albatros D. II dogfight again last night under the same conditions - 3,000 m head-on merge over the trenches.

The poor DH/2 did not stand a chance as I wasn't careless when it came to flying the Albatros. The Albatros got some snap shots at the DH/2 as they both climbed and swooped...and then managed to get two close range head-on shots at the DH/2 - in the contest between the Albatros's two Spandau guns vs. the DH/2's single Lewis gun, it was a complete mismatch...the DH/2 infliced a few pin-pricks on the Albatros, and the Albatros, again, caused so much damage to the DH/2 that running away was the best course of action...

Initially, the DH/2 pulled away from the Albatros as it dove away (under the 5-second turn variant rules, they both have the same maximum speed but the Albatros has a higher maximum dive speed and a slightly higher dive and this makes a difference) while the Albatros had to turn 180 degrees to pursue.

Sooo...the DH/2 pulled away, the Albatros turned around and started pursuit...and then its higher maximum dive speed began to make the difference as it overtook the DH/2 and shot it down.

Thread: Re: 5-second turn variant and early war planes

CJstratgamer — 2007-01-11T06:58:08+00:00

Great job. I remember when I was in 7th or 8th Grade (yeah I'm showing my age) and I heard of Richtofen's War. Never got it sadly although my local FLGS has a copy of Knights of the Air though. But I like your session report.

Thread: 5-second turn variant and early war planes

castiglione — 2007-01-10T05:26:46+00:00

I was wondering how the 5-second turn variant worked with the early war planes since these planes end up having low maximum speeds (typically around 4) and dismal maneuver schedules (typically B).

I solo'ed two 1 vs. 1 dogfights - Nieuport 11 vs. Halberstadt D. III and DH/2 vs. Albatros D. II. Both dogfights started at 3,000 m with both planes approaching each other head-on.

I played out the Nieuport 11 vs. Halberstadt D. III dogfight first. Initial attempts to flat-turn revealed that this is a formula for a stalemate so diving turns were the order of the day. Both planes managed to get in bursts at each other but no major damage was inflicted by either. The dogfight spiraled down from 3,000 m to just under 2,000 m and was decided when the Halberstadt overdived in an attempt to get into firing position - and broke apart for its troubles.

With these early war planes, two-hexside turns can only be used defensively - you can't do such a turn and fire because of the limitations in maximum speed. So one-hexside turns are the only "weapon" one has, which severely limits opportunities to fire.

I next played out the DH/2 vs. Albatros D. II dogfight. During the merge, both planes climbed and then the Albatros ended up in a position where it could get into firing position...by overdiving...this it did and broke up. In retrospect, this was a really stupid gamble to take - the Abatros is tougher than the DH/2, can outclimb and outdive it, has more firepower and more ammunition...so I reset and started over.

Again, both planes climbed on the merge and then began to circle each other, making diving turns in an effort to get into firing position. The DH/2 managed to make a few deflection shots at the Albatros but failed to score any damage because the Albatros managed to maintain a healthy altitude advantage, thus increasing the range of all the DH/2's shots.

Then I did something really stupid with the DH/2 - I began to chandelle (I made climbing turns). The Albatros D. II managed to follow the DH/2 in the turns and got into firing position an hammered away at the DH/2 - resulting in enough damage to cut the DH/2's maximum speed by one (down to 3!) and cut the DH/2's climb rate by 50 m (down to ZERO!). At this point, the DH/2 decided to bravely run away and dove for the deck. The Albatros followed, firing all the way. The DH/2 managed to escape although it was down to two damage points by the time it ran off the edge of the map.

The Nieuport 11 vs. Halberstadt dogfight was pretty evenly matched (both planes end up with the exact same performance stats in the 5-second turn variant - the only difference is that the Halby has better firepower, is tougher and has more ammunition). However, the DH/2 vs. Albatros D. II dogfight ended up being a complete mismatch. The only way for the DH/2 to get into firing position (barring a silly mistake by the Albatros - note, I did make some silly mistakes while "flying" the Albatros) is to climb above it and then make a diving turning attack - however, the Albatros can easily deny the DH/2 this chance simply by climbing over it, which it can do with impunity due to its climb rate being double that of the DH/2. I think the DH/2's only real chance is to take any shot it can get at the Albatros (no matter how dismal the chances of causing damage) and prey for a critical hit or to cause enough damage to reduce the Albatros's speed and climb rate...not the most heartening situation to be in.

Thread: Re: Fixing the "trading shots syndrome"

kmunoz — 2006-10-04T17:00:24+00:00

Windopaene wrote:
Get the "Unexpected Maneuvers" variant article from the old General magazine and make yourself some cards. Helps RW a lot.

Yes, I've seen them, but from the reviews I've read and my quick perusal of the variant, it appears to really break the "physics" of how movement is accomplished. Plus, it adds a significant layer of complexity to an otherwise elegantly simple game mechanic.

Thread: Re: Fixing the "trading shots syndrome"

Windopaene — 2006-10-04T15:52:40+00:00

Get the "Unexpected Maneuvers" variant article from the old General magazine and make yourself some cards. Helps RW a lot.

Thread: Re: Fixing the "trading shots syndrome"

kmunoz — 2006-10-04T11:54:23+00:00

Actually I just realized that a switch to 3-hex sighting forces the trading-shot aircraft to go faster by 2 movement points, not just 1... because it must first double back an extra hex in addition to flying in behind the target for that extra hex. In other words, even a speed 10 aircraft pulling off the maneuver (if it's possible) would have to go speed 12 in order to fulfill the 3-hex requirement... which is impossible under the rules.

Thread: Fixing the "trading shots syndrome"

kmunoz — 2006-10-04T11:51:06+00:00

I was doing some thinking about the problem last night and a solution came to me that was so ridiculously simple that I can't imagine someone else hasn't already thought of it and summarily rejected it. So I'm posting it here in the hope that someone will be able to explain to me if (and why) the solution doesn't work.

I don't like the five-second game variant because it too greatly reduces the differences among the planes. I don't like the maneuver cards variant because it breaks physics.

So here's my idea: any aircraft going at or above speed 10 must sight its target for 3 hexes instead of 2 (as in the tournament rules). This is a reasonable addition because it takes into account the fact that a speed 10 aircraft is going to spend roughly the same slice of the ten-second turn moving 3 hexes as a slighty slower aircraft is going to spend moving 2 hexes. The pilot will need essentially the same amount of time to aim going speed 10 as going speed 8 (for example), so the sighting requirement should be correspondingly larger.

Based on my limited testing of the trading shots syndrome, it looks to me that even the most maneuverable planes can't move from in front of the target to the rear of the target and fulfill the 2-hex sighting requirement with anything less than speed 11. Thus, a sighting requirement of 3 hexes makes such a maneuver impossible, even at the maximum speed allowed in the game. Even if I am wrong and it can be done at speed 10, the 3-hex sighting rule for speeds 10 and up would force the aircraft to go speed 11, just to get that extra hex. If it can be done at speed 9, then just change the rule to 3 hexes at speed 9 and up - forcing the airplane to go at least speed 10 to fulfill the requirement.

I'd appreciate it if someone could tell me whether or not I'm missing some trick of maneuvering that allows the trading-shots syndrome in anything under speed 10!

Thread: Re: Info need for Ketterling Aerial Torpedo ASP

dingo262 — 2006-04-12T21:39:10+00:00

Hi Jim,
The "ASP", if you could call it one, is located in a text box on the last page of the article. Took me a couple of passes to find it myself. There are no tracks on it, just the entry hex/bug altitude tables and some altitude rules. Probably should have been called a players aid instead of an ASP.
FWIW,
Jim

Thread: Re: User Review

castiglione — 2005-10-23T01:14:00+00:00

Addendum to my assessment of Richthofen's War - using some of the variant rules published in The General intended to address the issue of the "trading shots syndrome" (I especially recommend the 5-second turn variant), it becomes a lot of fun.

As an advantage over Blue Max - it's playable solitaire and has a much larger variety of aircraft, covering almost the entire war, as opposed to the 1917-1918 plane set of Blue Max.

Thread: Re: Variants...

castiglione — 2005-10-20T16:38:01+00:00

No problemo.

I particularly like the 5-second turn variant since it fixes the trading shots problem...it's such an obvious fix that I find it surprising it took that long for someone to think of it (I think the issue of The General in which it was published came out more than a decade after the release of the original game).

Thread: Re: Variants...

peacmyer — 2005-10-19T20:07:48+00:00

Thanks!

Thread: Re: Variants...

castiglione — 2005-10-19T18:54:37+00:00

Hiya - I'm quoting this from memory (of the articles in The General) but it should be "mostly" correct.

Cut minimum speed in half, rounding down.

Cut maximum speed in half, rounding up.

Cut climb rate in half, rounding down.

Cut dive rate in half, rounding up.

NOTE: I may have the rounding up/down reversed for some of the pairs, i.e. the variant as published in The General may have stipulated that minimum speed halved should be rounded up and maximum speed halved should be rounded down.

The FIRST hex of each turn that an aircraft enters MUST be the one in front of it - THEN it can turn.

Double the amount of damage that each plane can take.

Double the amount of ammunition each plane carries.

If a critical hit is rolled, roll 1D6...on a 1-3, the type of critical hit is rolled as usual...on a 4-6, there is no critical hit.

Combine this with the following - at the beginning of each turn, each player SECRETLY selects whether he will turn left, turn right, go straight and climb, dive or fly level. This results in nine possible combinations, i.e. turn left and dive, turn left and fly level, turn left and climb, etc. When turns are resolved, the player MUST climb or dive or fly level if that option was chosen...if a go straight option was chosen, ALL the player's movement points must be expended flying straight...if a turn option was chosen, the FIRST turn that the player's plane makes MUST be a turn in that direction (if the player has movement point's left after the first turn, he can if he chooses, make a turn in the opposite direction).

This basically adds nothing to the complexity of the original game (which was low to begin with and was one of its pluses) while getting rid of the craziness that could turn the game into nothing more than a crap shoot rather than a game of maneuver. The selection of the left, right, straight, etc. in the beginning of each turn provides a little bit of uncertainly into what happens - if you are tailing someone and you think he's going to turn right and you select a right turn but he actually goes left (or straight), he may (or may not) succeed in shaking you off his tail (depending on how the maneuvers are selected and played out). This variant also retains the ugo-igo structure which keeps things simple and relatively solitaire and PBEM friendly.

Thread: Re: Variants...

peacmyer — 2005-10-19T18:08:34+00:00

Thanks, Roland, could you spell out your preferred variant in detail? I'm looking for reasons to keep this game on my shelf other than nostalgia!

Thread: Re: Variants...

castiglione — 2005-10-19T17:42:26+00:00

Addendum - IMHO, the "best" (this is subjective, I know) variant of Richthofen's War is that using a combination of variants #2 and #3.

Variant #1 (unexpected maneuver cards) is "broken" written as is...making the unexpected maneuvers "bonus moves" results in some unphysical and strange things happening. I worked out an alternative to make things more physical but in doing so, resulted in rules which resulted in a game that wasn't as fast and simple as the original Richthofen's War rules.

Variant #2 is good...but results in planes with poor maneuverability and speed being completely unable to shake off a pursuer...granted, planes that are slow and clumsy should have a hard time shaking someone off their six...but a 100% failure rate IMHO is not realistic.

Variant #3 is good...BUT since some of the planes can turn around and get on the tail of a pursuer regardless of what they do, deciding whether your plane goes right, left, etc. before movement is done on the board becomes moot...UNLESS movement rates are lower (as in variant #2)...deciding whether you go left, right, etc. beforehand also "cures" the problem with variant #2 (slow and clumsy planes always being screwed) - sure, they'll still have a hard time of it if someone gets behind them...but they have a chance if the other guy chooses to zig instead of zag and maybe give the player in the slow and clumsy plane a chance to run for the hills and fight another day.

Thread: Variants...

castiglione — 2005-10-18T14:44:29+00:00

There were three "official" variants that I know of.

One was the unexpected maneuver card variant. That appears to be the most "popular".

The other two were also published in The General and both had the same goal as the above - to eliminate the "trading shots syndrome" that occurred, i.e. one plane that is being tailed and shot at would turn around and get on the tail of the plane shooting it, etc.

In one variant, the time-scale for each turn was cut in half. To put this into effect, movement allowances were cut in half as were climb and dive rates. Since each turn was half as long, guns could only fire half as much ammo at each other...instead of cutting the amount of damage caused by planes in half (which would've been a bit clumsy), the amount of damage a plane could take was doubled as was the amount of ammo it carried - critical hits only occurred 50% of the time as before, i.e. if a critical hit was rolled, another die roll was made to see if it "really" occurred.

The other variant borrowed a leaf from Flight Leader. Basically, at the start of each turn, each player secretly would record using counters whether they would turn left, right, go straight and dive, climb or fly level. Then they resolved their movement as one normally does but following these restrictions, i.e. if you chose a left turn, the FIRST turn your plane made HAD to be left - it could subsequently make a right turn in that turn assuming you had enough movement points left but the FIRST turn had to be left. If you chose straight, you had to expend all your movement points going straight. And so forth.

Neither of these variants complicated or slowed the game down to any degree and with these rules in place, it still retained much of what made it appealing in the first place - its simplicity.