Thunderbolt Apache Leader AAR

[JudgeDredd]

Second day of my Campaign - and it went horribly wrong.

2 A-10As have considerable damage but destroyed their target Battalion
2 Apache AH-64As have considerable damage and only manage to reduce their target battalion to 1/2 strength.

Also, both Apache pilots are in a bad way. One is Unfit and the other is Shaken.

I also lost one of my "paid for" scouts!

It leaves me with a pickle of a third day. I'd like to keep an SO or two for weapons - but 2 A-10As are really badly damaged as are both AH-64s - though one of the Apache's is so badly damaged I will have to pay 2VPs to replace it - or not fly it. I suppose I could just go on the third day with 1 A-10 going to one target and the other and an Apache going to the other target....having said that, the SOs required for the 3 remaining airframes are much more than I have. Hard to believe this is an introductory campaign!


A further note on the game itself
I mentioned there being a lack of counters - that is indeed the case. As an example, I had no SOs remaining for my 4th mission - so I loaded my AH-64s with the only weapon available to me (the only weapon that did not have a SO cost) - and there are only 6 counters - I needed 8 counters to load my AH-64s with these weapons. So there are indeed a lack of counters released with the game. I noticed the same with the MK-83s - there were not enough to load my A-10s with them solely - I'd need 14 counters.

Also - and this isn't a criticism - I'm just letting this be known because it's become apparent on day 2 of my campaign - the Loiter times go very quickly. Especially with airframes with a speed rating of 1 (helicopters). So planning your moves and the position of your aircraft after moving to maximise your time on the battlefield is crucial. You only ever start with 5 loiter sessions over the battlefield - this can be increased by fuel tanks or buying scouts - but I had 7 last night and bad initial positioning followed by bad route management over the battlefield means I moved rather quickly and with very little damage done to the target into the Bingo 6+ area - meaning I had to roll for stress on both pilots.

So that's a word of warning to you.

So if you have a battalion with quite a few units all bunched together over a couple or 3 hexes - a couple of AH-64s will see you good. Otherwise, a fast mover is essential.

One particular thing I don't like is the rating of the cannon on the Apache. I don't know specifications of the real equipment, but my understanding was that, whilst not as powerful as the bad boy on the A-10, it was a fairly accurate and powerful cannon. I haven't checked it with the AH-1 or the Ah-64D - so I don't know if it's just the AH-64A...it's only rated 7 (the A-10 is 4 - and works lovely!)

[Keunert]

Sorry to derail this great AAR: did you play U-Boat leader? I am a total noob when it comes to modern planes/helos. ww2 would better fit my knowledge. is this title as good as TA Leader?

[JudgeDredd]

I did play U-Boat Leader. It's a decent enough game, but my love for modern air war keeps me away from it.

Also it's considerably slower paced than Phantom, Hornet, TA. So a good game but it wasn't my genre.

I did an AAR over at Wargamer - this is the link
http://www.wargamer.com/forums/posts.asp?t=582646&h=BOAT+LEADER&pg=1#609497

Unfortunately the links to the pics on Flickr appear to be long gone.

I did say I liked it and I would definitely give it more outings - and whilst that was true, it wasn't long dropped in favour of the faster paced jet action of Phantom/Hornet Leader.

[MikeGER]

THX Judge :)


i am having a blast 8) ... even before i actually fired one shot in anger yet!   ;)

well, i didn't seriously resolved a wargames with dices since... hmm... maybe two decades or so, i got real lazy with all those cosy Computer Aided Wargaming of all tastes. :-[

studying the rulebook (on the smartphone while offside) and printed copy now, setting up my first introducery game... now the situation is set up .... i know what i am against, sitting here with 30 SO points, and the immersing puzzle-solving, the planing starts.... I have to kill two battalions on first 2 day and 2 more on second day... and i know how crippling each one of them would influence the capabilities of the enemy starting to roll on day two (day one they are fixed by scenario card rules) ... waging all those opportunities in my head when  i am actually doing something else and the playtable is out of view... its little like PBEM, but the opponent is not waiting for me, and when i play i will get an immediate result from him ... hell, late eve i watched some Olympics in the background but was actually thinking about my future plane purchases and which strategy i will accomplish with them... great!

-question on the TAL rules - (you have many hours of DVG leader-games under your belt, so maybe you can tell)
is it correct, i can only use a plane and its pilot once in a day, and i have to declare my target battalions for the whole day and the flight team i send out against upfront for mission 2 (and 3, 4, 5 ) also?
So i cant wait for the outcome of mission one, and even if all worked very well, i would not be allowed to send a member of the used team against another very week target battalion?
  Maybe its a silly question, because even on a normal mission, a pilot will return sooo stressed and his machine so damaged, that even sending him against some trucks will get him unfit and his plane lost in zero-time, if there is only one tiny little disturbance (like a bad 'on route' card drawn or a super nasty pop-up, or a bad roll, etc) 

-on the weapons counter numbers
IIRC: correctly i ve read somewhere that this is simulating shortage in storage or logistics-chain for the day... and you have to operate with what you got (a full set of counters for every single  mission, but that's it   ...at least cannons don't run dry  ;))                       

-on a side note
the box arrived on Mo. very well wraped (i arrived on Tu and started unboxing yesterday)
... so the shop in Moers is a good source, i would order there again :)   
   

[JudgeDredd]

Glad you got it and even more glad you're thinking what I first thought when I got it...WOW.  ;)

Great little tactical solitaire boardgame.

On the question of pilots - iirc - yes, all pilots/airframes have to be assigned at the start of the day and no - they cannot take part in another mission

As for counters - I just thought he was being a bit of cheapskate ;) Clearly the more counters to make, the more the cost. Maybe the "second edition" will have more counters.

[MikeGER]

Judge, i ve got another one  ???
... which came up while i finally made my choices of planes and pilots  8)

There might be a little gamy exploit in the pilot-adjust-skill-levels rule of TAL.
I can upgrade one pilot for downgrading one other one skill level in the setup-phase,
...but this should be limited to the airframe-class of pilots, IMHO.

Because here is the trick:
in addition to my finished planing (without Cobras), i can spend 2 SO points for a cheap Cobra, which came with two average rated pilots of course.
Now i downgrade both to Newbie-level and gain 4 'promotions levels' to spend on my other real pilots in the squadron... for the price of 2 SO-Points, and never let them fly .... or...
in addition, later on in the days to come...  i just take out the surplus Cobra with me on the easier mission of the day, (let it hover-low in a safe spot of the map, maybe even take out some lonesome weak targets, help with SAR, etc ...)  and let the Cobra pilot earn the XP points ...to hopefully battlefield-promote in a few days... and get even a more and more useful addon to my flock in a longer campaign...

what you think?   

[JudgeDredd]

You know what MikeGer - you and your devious little mind!! If you look at my AAR on page 1 for Pilot selection, you'll see I employed that very same house rule - except it wasn't a house rule...I just took the rule and it never occurred to me that I could make my A-10 pilots the doggies nuts and my Apache pilots as noobs!

What a devious mind some people have!

Anywya - I agree (as you can see from my AAR) that the promotion thing should be in the same airframe and not cross airframes.

Shame on you for thinking it up!  ;)

[MikeGER]

Shame on you for thinking it up!  ;)

... i have to live up to the image of the Evil German Physicist ;) ;) ;)

[JudgeDredd]

That cap looks very familiar....




This was my units dress cap - Royal Corps of Transport

[MikeGER]

 ....found the solitude and leisure to jump into my first real mission last eve  :)
 
here is a femto-AAR:
i chose to attack the 11 A battalion, which is to close for comfort to my airstrip with 'overkill' to play it save (heh, i am a TAL newbee ;-) ) with a flight of:  a fast-piloted F16, a fast-piloted A10 and a slow A10 against: 2 Helis, 2 AAA, 4 Tanks, 2 Mobile Command  ... i had a Scout on the mission which nicely compensated for the bad in-bound Event-Card of -2 loiter-turns...  so i was back at 5 loiter-turns and i also had given one A10 a fuel-tank (so he has 7 turns to maneuver)  ...and ECM-pods for all,  plus a good mixture of range 0-hex, 1-hex and 2-3-hex weapons, like AGM65s, some rocket pods, MK 20 (with that nice roll against all target in the hex bonus) anti-Air and some MK82. i've limited myself to 20 weapon points = 2 SO points for the whole outfit. 


... in-bound situation (in the meantime i got me card-sleeves, a game tray,  and bended tweezer seen in the unsharp picture  'to handle the pylons payload')

when i had to chose the start positions, i ordered the F16 to go in high and the two A10 low ... cause i didnt memorized the rules deeply enuf, i suddenly realized that i had to chose to only attack one single target-hex (and all units in it, if possible) but spreading over several hexes would have needed weapons with that "I" indicator... so i had to live through the situation, i had choosen ... my F16 took out one Heli and a AAA (in Hex #1)  but later was target by a hole buch of light (yellow marker) hitting units, lucky now the ECM pod worked two times ...and i barely came away with only 1 Structure-Hit... and let him withdraw to safey...
on other parts of the battlefield i draw a dangerous Heli as PoUp for letting that F16 start high... Arrgh tough luck ...  and i had to rearrange my planing (no battleplan survives first shot ...as usual;-) ) which include to let one A10 to do some ridges ....and he left the map later-on with 5 stress accumulated in zero-time...

the whole fight was way more tense then expected... well, i destroyed that 11A Battalion completely     
getting away with my F16 structure-damaged and slow A10 Pilot "HALO" sitting with 6 stress strees in the chow-hall now  ...and still consider myself lucky after that TAL baptism o fire 8) 

now i start planing on a deep-strike with a lonesome but fast-piloted Apache against a convoy of 4 APCs and 8 truck  (2S Battalion)     
   Lets see how this will  play out ;D
 
still having a blast :)                 

[JudgeDredd]

Nice one.

Yep - Independent weapons required to target outside of your hex as well as dropping ordinance in the hex you are in.

I seldom go high - there are advantages and disadvantages
Advantages:
attacking units in other hexes with long range weapons
better chance of employment of independent weapons
easy movement across battlefield maximising your loiter time on the battlefield
no ridge evasion rolls

Disadvantages:
popups can be dangerous and costly
exposure to other weapons in other hexes on the battlefield

Careful observation of the battlefield at the start along with good initial placement with a clear plan of route for the airframe can mean you don't have to go high...but not always

[JudgeDredd]

I'm on holiday from Saturday and looking forward to taking this with me. I've had so little time to play it - or anything on my computer!

[JudgeDredd]

Man - this game is tough.

I'm stuck on a rule. I know how to and when to move enemy units into cover. But I'm unsure if they can attack once they are in cover.

My initial thought was they can attack, but that they'd come out of cover to do so. But then I thought they wouldn't because they're trying to stay alive...so I left them in cover.

But now I'm stuck as to whether they are allowed to attack or not, and if they do, do they come out of cover...I thought I had read somewhere n the manual that an attacking unit must come out of cover - but I can't seem to find it after scouring the manual again (looking in the expected relevant places!)

So anyone with any clarification?

[Barthheart]

Have you tried the DVG page on CSW? Dan is usually pretty good about answering questions there.

Also hhave you tried the campaign rules that combine TAL with Hornet Leader?
Looks like a cool idea.... just need to get both games.... or either one to start... :P

[MikeGER]

....So anyone with any clarification?

you may mixing up Enemy Helicopters and the Enemy ground units rules ?

from my understanding:

IMHO ground units can attack when in cover and don't move out of the cover ...(the only way to get them out of cover is rolling a "10" in the Roll for cover phase,  which would lead to "Any one hex emerges"  (#Select any 1 Hex. Move all the Units in that Hex out of Cover.) (page 13)

helicopters can move into cover (and then are save from standoff attacks)
but they have to move sometimes, which brings them out of cover again, see below:


#Enemy Helicopters move to Cover like a normal ground Unit.
If you later move a Helicopter that is in Cover, it automatically
emerges from Cover. (page 13)

Use the following rules to determine if and where a Helicopter moves:

#If there are one or more Aircraft within the Helicopter's Attack
range and Line of Sight, the Helicopter does not move.

#If no Aircraft are within the Helicopter's Attack range, but they are within the Helicopter's Line of Sight, move the Helicopter one Hex closer to the closest Aircraft. If there is more than 1 Aircraft equally close, randomly determine which Aircraft it moves toward.

#If there are no Aircraft in the Helicopter's Line of Sight, do not move the Helicopter.

Once you move all Enemy Helicopters, conduct Enemy
Attacks. (page 16)   

-edit-
from an abstract simulation point of view, i think thats ok too.
a AAA unit will fire upon the nearest air target in LOS
(it doesn't has to drive out of the hills into the plains to do so, just a few meters out of a depression onto a local hilltop may be enuf)
if the AAA is in cover (a hilly landscape) the airtarget cant shoot back with stand-off weapons and has to close in to that same hex which is something between 500m and 1500m in diameter (cause the AAA unit may detect the stand-off weapon release and roll into cover, release counter-measurements, or the stand-off weapon sensors simply cant pick it up in the 'noisy background' to lock-on,...)     

-edit- 2
for those on the fence ...and like to see how a string of missions of TAL realy playes out
i found the following videos AARs by "callasmar" on YT instructive:

starts with: 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3QbD3SP10kQ&feature=plcp