Battle of Britain Campaign – Game 8

I thought it was time to return to my Battle of Britain campaign this week. It feels like it has been quite a while since I had last played a game. Looking back through my blog posts, I found the last game (Game 7) had actually taken place way back in July!

Time for an air wargame after a break of some months and weeks. Drawing courtesy of ChatGPT using one of my game photographs.

Fortunately, the campaign is an easy one to pick up again. Everything is tracked on a single page, and the bombing missions for each campaign week are randomly determined by dice rolls.

The campaign map and tracker.

For a reminder of the campaign setup, see here. The games use Warlord Games' Blood Red Skies rules from Airfix's Battle of Britain boxed set.

Background

During the week of 2nd–8th September, the Luftwaffe have returned to bombing London after spending the previous three weeks (12th August–1st September) targeting RAF airfields and RDF (Radio Direction Finding) installations. These earlier raids had only achieved partial success, but enough to give the Luftwaffe an advantage in this game with RAF aircraft having to start the game at low altitude.

The weather was clear, with just one cloud in the sky. The target is protected by a couple of barrage balloons and flak.

Forces

Luftwaffe:

1 × Heinkel He 111

1 × Dornier Do 17

3 × Messerschmitt Me 109

All the Luftwaffe pilots are rated as regular.

RAF:

2 × Spitfires

2 × Hurricanes

Both Hurricane pilots are regular, while the two Spitfire pilots are novices.

The Game

The game began with the RAF fighters scrambling to gain altitude quickly to engage the incoming Luftwaffe bombers. The Me 109s swept forward to intercept the attacking Spitfires with no success. While the Hurricanes took advantage of the solitary cloud, using it for cover.

The German bombers heading to their target.

The bomber escorts engage the RAF fighters.

Having survived the Me 109 escorts, the Spitfires managed to land some early hits on the He 111, with vapour appearing from one of its engines. The German fighters soon returned, shooting down one of the Spitfires and its novice pilot before the RAF could inflict any further damage on the bomber.

A Spitfire is shot down.

Emerging from the cloud, the Hurricanes launched an attack on the Do 17, damaging its engine. The bomber began losing altitude and would eventually crash.

The Dornier descends with both engines lost.

Once again, the Me 109s turned their attention to the Hurricanes, piling on the Boom tokens. In the rules these tokens represent the accumulated effects of light damage, pilot stress, dwindling ammunition and the breakdown of squadron cohesion during a dogfight. With the RAF fighters steadily accumulating tokens, it looked increasingly likely that they would be forced to break off their attack, leaving the remaining He 111 free to attack its target with just barrage balloons and flak for defence.

However, the RAF fighters regrouped for one final attempt to bring down the He 111. First, they had to run the gauntlet of the Me 109 escorts, but all three fighters successfully dodged the attacks and pressed home their own attacks against the bomber in quick succession.

RAF fighters swarm on the remaining German bomber.

The first attack forced the He 111 to lose altitude, leaving it vulnerable to the next fighter, and the attack proved decisive, bringing down the bomber before it could reach its target.

Wrap up

A successful defence of London with the RAF managing to disrupt the Luftwaffe raid, destroying both bombers despite losing a Spitfire early in the game.

For a while it looked as though the German escorts would succeed in driving off the RAF fighters. Fortunately, the RAF fighters were successful at evading the attacking Me 109s and delivered a decisive final attack.

Another ChatGPT drawing derived from a photograph of the game.

With such a gap between games, I may well play another game or two and make some good progress in the second half of the campaign.