Dogfights- Optional Rules

Optional Rule: Emergency Landings and Bailing Out

When an aircraft’s health reaches zero, it and all its occupants turn into a bullet hole-riddled fireball plummeting to the ground. Crew members must take desperate steps to avoid this ugly end before their craft’s health depletes.

Ordinarily, a pilot lucky or skilled enough to safely reach his airfield after a sortie lands his aircraft without needing to roll but normalcy dries out very quickly in war. Whether because of damage to their aircraft or their person, sometimes a pilot must land in terrible conditions. To attempt an emergency landing, the pilot makes an Aviation + Handling test with a black dice pool based on the landing environment. On landing, the aircraft takes damage equal to the Environment Damage minus the successes of the Aviation + Handling roll.

Environment                     Black Dice           Damage

Roads or fields                    0                              4

Lakes and thickets              3                              6

Open sea or villages           6                              8

Forests                                  9                              10

Cities                                      12                           12

At any time, the occupants of a plane may Bail Out and open their parachute with no roll necessary at the Gamemaster’s discretion. Once out of the plane, the evacuee no longer contributes to the Dogfight, but they may take potshots at other parachutists or make use of other opportunities as they crop up. They reach the ground in 1D6 Dogfight turns and suffer 8 pips of damage from the sudden impact. They may attempt an Athletics test (0 black dice). Each success negates a point of damage.  Those without a parachute need not roll the test; they simply start a new character.

Optional Rule: Crew Damage

The bullets tearing through an aircraft also tear through the aircraft’s crew. If an aircraft looses more health pips than its Armor Value x 2 in a single attack, someone’s been hit! The Gamemaster rolls a die to determine the casualty of a damage (5) hit.

Roll        Result

1-2          The pilot

3-5          A random crew member

6              Vital components (all actions undertaken by the aircraft during the combat phase suffer 3 black dice until the damage gets repaired)

Optional Rule: Weather and Night Fighting

While in the thick of it, pilots worry about wind, rain, and lightning almost as much as enemy bullets. On clear sunny days, Dogfighting actions suffer no penalties for the weather, but flying through a fog, blizzards, hail, or thunderclouds gets messy fast.

Weather Conditions        Black Dice penalty

Cloudy/Raining                   3

Thick fog/Storm                  6

Additionally during dark nights bereft of spotlights or a full moon, all Dogfighting Actions suffer +3 black dice.

Optional Rule: Skip the Squadron Phase

Obviously, the Squadron Phase is meant for massive air sorties with more than 10 aircraft battling through the skies. For smaller more mechanically nuanced fights, remove the Squadron Phase and move directly into the combat phase every round with a few adjustments. Instead of basing their initiative on the Squadron Roll, every pilot rolls their Aviation plus their aircraft’s Handling to determine their aircraft’s initiative. The crew then takes turns performing their actions as they see fit. In case of a disagreement, the aircraft’s pilot decides the order of crew actions.  Instead of the Tactical Action, pilots gain the Spot Action.

I’m very proud of the Dogfighting rules. With a little tweaking and some new Actions for the Combat Phase they could work very well for all sorts of Victoriana mass combats. Now that we have the rules, we just need some planes.