CY6! Jet age - Falklands test play

After a shameful amount of time, I finally got my painted jet minis out for a game. At the local game store I was joined by Joel and Tommy for a dust up between 2 harriers and 2 mirage III's.

The barriers to play were my uncertainty about my basing scheme working, and unfamiliarity with the ruleset. Luckily the two suckers brave gentlemen agreed to try the game out.

The bases are indeed leg, and each block represents an altitude level. Jet age tends to use a lot more than the regular ww2 era CY6, as jets have a lot more power.

The mirages race along at high altitude from the sun towards the low flying harriers. The sun is important b/c being 'up sun' from your opponent makes it harder to hit with infrared guided missiles. 

Closing took about 3 turns which gave us a chance to get used to changing altitude, maneuvering and the turn flow.

The harriers struggled to gain altitude without losing too much speed as the mirages raced towards them.

More after the break....






Mis reading the scenario I allowed the harriers to use their afterburners to get a bump of speed in their climb (historically they were running low on fuel in this encounter). This gave Joel, flying the argentinian mirages a perfect chance to lob some missiles down rage. Narrow misses with both.  



With such a high closing speed, the mirages raced by, and both groups began their turns to engage, the harriers still running at relatively low speed, and thus able to conduct much tighter turns. Altitudes are rapidly equalizing.

Minis are by tumbling dice and run about 2 pounds for six models. Needless to say, the big price is in the lego and the game mat. I had dice frames on the bases, but they promptly fell off (secured with white glue), so that needs some work.....

 Some long range fire occurs here with both cannon and missiles being fired by the Brits. We were positive that both cook be cooked off in the same firing turn, but went with it. Once again, it was pretty narrow misses.

At this point the players, suspecting they were going to race past one another, discovered the joys of immelmans and split s turns, allowing crazy elevation changes while barely moving in the horizontal. Joel splits his team, while the Harriers turn tight and have his lead plane in a bad spot.  Cannons, however, miss.

The following turn the Brits get a tail on the lead mirage, and now get more information in his planned moves. Missile fire and cannons finally manage to land a hit and the plan is damaged losing much speed, and compromising climbing ability. 
Both sides are down to a single missile.

While  the damaged mirage attempts to flee, the wingman aggressively moves in to cover. Firing results in the Argentinians running out of ammo on one of their planes.

Poor luck here with both Brits JUST out of firing arc of the tail mirage (left). 

Elevation changes seemed pretty quick. I do suspect I need some opaque markers and/or numbered ones in order to see heights faster. It did get tedious counting all the time. The speed worked reasonably well, but above speed 6 we were using two dice. I'll probably just get different coloured mini dice to reflect high speed.

I also need some markers for damage and afterburners. Missile markers need to be assembled (totally not necessary for the rules and only fun eye candy).

The British finally manage to splash the hurt Mirage, and the players shake hands as we run out of time.


Overall they felt the game took longer than expected. We thought with more planes on the table, it might result in more firing options and kills. They also didn't like how hard it was to hurt a plan even after you hit it. While damage rolls were so-so, it is pretty annoying after requiring pretty high rolls to hit. I'm tempted to bump up one or both of the chances to hit and the chances to damage your target. Definitely one to try again.