Flew "The "8" Ball" on her first mission tonight.

Everything started out good. I had a successful rendezvous with a Hellcat at Zone 3.

Smooth flight until I encountered a Zero over Iwo Jima. He came at us from 10:30 High. My Forward Upper Gunner made a hit, but only did light damage to the zero. The Green Zero Pilot fires and misses. He returns to base licking his wounds.

The mission was going well until we hit Zone 11 (1 zone from target). We encountered a Ki-44 on our 9:00 High. The Hellcat moves in for the kill, but he misses. Then my Aft Lower Gunner fires and scores a hit. Unfortunately, the damage is light and the Ki-44 keeps coming. He rips 3 shells through our Starboard wing, damaging our Brakes and making the Flap Inoperative. The Ki comes around for another pass. Our Hellcat fighter escort shoots for no effect. Next, my Forward Lower Gunner fires a burst, hitting the Ki again but he keeps coming. Finally, the Aft Lower Gunner blasts the Ki out of the sky.

Experiencing bad weather over the Zone 12 Drop Zone (Akashi Factory), but before we can even think about dropping our bombs, here comes a Ki-84 at 6:00 Low. We had 4 Guns trained on the Ki plus the Hellcat, so I wasn't too worried. Our "8" Ball fired a barrage that no plane could have made it through, but this pesky little Ki survived without a hit on him. The Ki fires with no effect. He comes back around and we give him another barrage, but we miss again. This time, we were not so lucky. The Ki rips 2 shells into our port wing hitting our oil tank. The #2 Engine is on fire! Fire extinguishers ineffective! Must go into a steep dive to try to put out this fire! I order any man who wishes to bail out to do so, but none do. Our B-29 explodes in a giant fireball over Akashi, all crewmen were lost.

This was a lot of fun for a solitaire game. I included some of the advanced rules, such as: Random Events and Fuel Consumption. I will add more advanced rules next time and I hope my team does a better job of shooting.

The hit rolls seem a bit skewed but I might be wrong! It sounds like a fun game!

B-52? How did the KI catch you? Darn those Nazi technology transfers!

Our B-52 explodes in a giant fireball

Are you sure about this?

Woops! I was caught up in my own story. Have edited it.

Out of three practice missions, two of my crews have perished. The one that was successful was kind of boring.

On the last mission, my guys had to bail out in rough seas and none survived. I could have saved them if I had aborted the mission in Zone 2 when our Forward Bomb Doors malfunctioned. I knew that there would not be enough fuel to get home if I could not get them open. Then I made the mistake of opening them 2 zones from the drop site (stupid). You only get two tries, and the first try worked, but the doors were causing drag so I was using up even more fuel. I did get the doors closed again, but then they wouldn't open over the drop site. So, I was using way too much fuel and we bailed out in Zone 8.

Also, this last mission lasted close to 2 hours. I was attacked twice with multiple airplanes. 3 planes the first time and 5 planes the second time. These attacks take a while to resolve, so plan on a few missions taking longer than 30 minutes.

The lesson here is to not be afraid to call an abort. There was a small chance that our mission would succeed, but I pretty much knew that they were dead men. Rest assured that I will not be so careless when actual missions start.