What's on your table right now?

[BanzaiCat]

^ Interested to see what you think of A Wing and a Prayer. First version I saw was an endless dice fest...dice over kill.
Cyrano and I tried to help David with shortening that aspect at Origins 2016.

I just turned in an unboxing article earlier today, so that should be coming to the (Front Page) at some point. I'm definitely going to get it to my table soon. I did a lot of looking at other playthrough videos and reviews of the game and I couldn't find a bad thing mentioned about this game.

There's only two d6s in the box, and from what I've seen it plays very simply, so your feedback probably worked!

[BanzaiCat]

Just started trying A Wing and a Prayer. I'll have to wait before giving my full opinion, but the basic impressions are:

• The manual is not great - but understand whom this comment is coming from (a tech writer). The person that wrote it doesn't understand how to use commas, nor semicolons, and structures sentences in a way where you HAVE to use semicolons. I'll get over it as I work my way through it, maybe, but in more than a few places his lack of using commas makes for some confusing reading and a few WTF moments.


• The handouts are not organized well. I keep comparing it to B-17: QotS, which was VERY well-organized and it was easy to find tables. Some of the tables are a little confusing. Again, it will take some gameplay to work my way through it to give my ultimate impression and get used to them.


• There's some oddities in the design around escorts. I'm not an expert in the air war over Europe, but it seems your bomber squadron gets way too many escorts, or has too many chances to 'refill' them. I believe this was a gameplay decision but it really takes you out of immersion.


• Flak is not that dangerous when you're in a relatively large formation. The only way flak will damage your bomber (if it hits in the first place) is if you roll two 6s, and if you roll relatively high on the 2d6 follow-up roll. That's an early report from a first mission, so this mileage may vary in future turns.


• Interceptions by German fighters seems to only occur during a possible random event. Logically, the random events have more of a chance of occurring the further out from your base you are, but if an event does happen, there's no guarantee it's actually German interceptors. It therefore has a totally different feel to it than B-17, where you saw many more fighters. Again, though, that's maybe part of the design. I'm not sure I'm a fan of this mechanism quite yet - time will tell.


• The game has some spelling issues, which they're aware of, and David takes full blame for. I know shite happens in production, but the number of them is pretty bad (at least four places on the map are misspelled - e.g., "Sutgart" instead of "Stuttgart"  ::) ).

On the plus side, the production values are fantastic; the manual's print is nice and large-ish, there's plenty of color examples, the counters are huge (but the font on them is somewhat hard to read, at least for me, unless I have them close) and pretty, the cards are decent, and overall the game LOOKS nice. It has some rough edges under the hood, though, which hopefully will clear out the more I play it.

[BanzaiCat]

On another note, I have a copy of Doolittle's Raid from GMT on the way (my own copy, not review). SDR, do you have this one too?

[Barthheart]

I seem to remember that B-17 Queen of the Skies was criticise back in the day because there were too many German fighters. The gunners on your B-17 could become aces in just a few missions. Made for more exciting missions but weighted too heavily in that direction.

[BanzaiCat]

I seem to remember that B-17 Queen of the Skies was criticise back in the day because there were too many German fighters. The gunners on your B-17 could become aces in just a few missions. Made for more exciting missions but weighted too heavily in that direction.

That's exactly what I was thinking...but I couldn't remember if I was remembering it right, lol. Thanks for that heads-up.

I should note that anything I post above should be taken with a heavy grain of salt; I've only just got it to my table tonight and tried my first mission. We were intercepted on our way back to base, about halfway there. Two Fw-190s jumped our formation of nine bombers; we had four P-47s escorting, one of which had an Ace pilot. The Germans didn't have any Aces. The result was, both 190s shot down (good die rolls, admittedly), with one P-47 damaged. Somewhat interesting results considering the pairing. That one Ace really helped the P-47s a LOT, though.

[Silent Disapproval Robot]

On another note, I have a copy of Doolittle's Raid from GMT on the way (my own copy, not review). SDR, do you have this one too?

Yup.  Still working my way through the rules.  I've played a few of the basic attack scenarios and the one that starts with the emergency launch from the USS Hornet but I haven't tried the naval aspect or the grand campaign with the planning yet. 

I'm digging it so far but it's a lot of work.  You'll need a lot of containers for all the different draw piles as you work your way through.  The attack runs in this one aren't nearly as detailed or as tense as those in the Dambusters game but that kind of makes sense as pinpoint accuracy isn't required here.  As the manual says, when the target is Japan itself, every bomb dropped is going to be a hit.  The tension in this one comes from the run up to the attack itself and then the escape to China or the USSR.  I've not tried the naval part of the game yet (probably will this evening) but it looks like a very well designed system.  Are you going to be able to link up with Nimitz and the Enterprise TF or will you be stuck going it alone with a defenseless carrier?  Tension is built by seeing how close you can get to Japan before launching the raid.  Pressing your luck increases the odds that the Japanese will discover the task force and launch a strike against it.  Even if they don't locate the task force, there's an increasing chance that they'll get wind that something's in the offing and increase their alert level.  Your decisions along the way all influence the secrecy/alert tracks.   

Once you do launch the raid, you'll have to contend with possible accidents while trying to get B-25s off the carrier, adverse weather, contrary winds, and Japanese defences.  The tension here comes mainly from trying to husband your fuel to give you enough time over Japan to find and bomb decent targets and then still have enough juice to make it to China and land.  There (or Vladivostok if you used too much fuel), you'll have to worry about whether or not you can find landing strips.  Whether Stilwell and Chiang Kai Shek were able to coordinate well enough to have the strips stocked with fuel and groundcrew as well as landing beacons, and whether or not any of these strips were located and overrun by the Japanese.

The grand campaign looks stellar.  You plan the raid right from its inception.  Lots of stuff going on there from diplomacy with the Russians, the Chinese, and the Army and Navy to aircraft selection and modifications, crew training and morale, security, and raid assembly.  Then you're on to the raid itself and finally to the denouement.  The denouement book itself is huge!  More pages in just this one booklet than many games have in their core rulebooks. 

This game isn't as intimately focused on the planes and crews as the Dambusters game but there's a lot more going on.  I'm really pleased with this one.

[BanzaiCat]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on it. I fell for it when I saw an overview video and loved the production quality. I also have Enemy Coast Ahead but admittedly have not had a chance to get it to the table yet. It was between Doolittle and possibly Nemo's War (2nd Edition), but this one looked like it would be better overall.

[BanzaiCat]

Played the second mission of A Wing And A Prayer, and it's growing on me bit by bit.

The first mission was one of the furthest targets in France, just past Paris. It was a cakewalk.

The second mission, not so much. We were jumped by no less than six Me-110s, three of whom were Aces (I rolled baaaaad), and we had no escorts. Two rounds of fighting and they damaged four out of six bombers. One had to drop out of formation but fortunately they made it back to base.

[BanzaiCat]

Played my first-ever game of Ogre a bit ago. Did the intro scenario in the base game (6th ed.) with a Mk III Ogre vs. lots of tanks and infantry. The Ogre kicked all their asses handily. It seems you gotta focus on the treads or the damn thing will have your lunch. I'll have to play it a few more times because I don't think I played it right.

[BanzaiCat]

I've got a copy of First Martians: Adventures on the Red Planet coming tomorrow.

Thought it would be funny if, in an AAR of this game, some GH forum members were put on Mars and see how long it takes before they accidentally vent the habitation module. :)

[bayonetbrant]

before they accidentally vent the habitation module. :)

and with which appendage

[mirth]

Goats in Spaaaaaaace!!!

[BanzaiCat]

You're both signed up for the expedition to Mars.

How you don't turn the sterile environment inside the ship into a petri dish is going to be a fascinating study, but one unfortunately not covered by this game.

Maybe Star should be in on that, too? ;)

[BanzaiCat]

The First Martians game comes with four astronaut cards.

The dev has a link (http://portalgames.pl/en/first-martian-card-generator/) where you can upload a pic and then generate your own astronaut.

Photoshop would be a boon here. I wouldn't put your real likenesses in there, but an astronaut goat might be funny. ;D

[Barthheart]

Here's my pic....