Recommended Game Setup

Recommended Set-up Steps

1) Decide Battle Type.

2) Roll for Air Superiority

3) Roll for Air Presence - Find out if either side has air assets in the vicinity of the battle.

4) Roll for Air Assets - Outlines which air assets the various nations might be able to request.

5) Roll for Off-board Artillery

6) Roll for Counterbattery fire

7) Roll for Setup Proximity

8) Troop Reaction.

9) Place troops and start game.

Optional (Advanced) Set-up Rules

20) Roll for availability of Defensive Works. Particularly optional; players may want to dispense with or limit presence of any defenses. Another option is to only allow the scenario defender to roll for defensive works.

21) Roll for Fuel Supply

1) Battle Type - Decide what type of battle will be fought: Local Attack, Major Offensive, Stalemated Front or Meeting Engagement. For local attack or major offensive, choose which side is the attacker and which is defender. In case of debate about this, each side roll a die with the high roller deciding who is attacker. The type of battle will help to decide what other resources are available to the respective sides.

2) Air Superiority - Each side rolls 2D6, with the axis player applying the modifiers shown on the table below. The high roller has air superiority and rolls for airstrike resources (if any). A tie results in air parity (neither side having superiority). The die roll modifiers also count for allies of the nations shown (if any). This die roll can be skipped if players are running a scenario based on a main attack for which extra (and possibly precious) aviation assets are being made available. In such conditions, they might declare air superiority for one side and proceed from there. Or, they can still do the competitive die roll, but with a bonus modifier for the side conducting the big attack, see Suggested Modifiers below the table. This is where player agreement and scenario design should be thoroughly established before game play starts.

3) Air Presence- This establishes whether either side has any air assets working in the vicinity of the battle, at least close enough to possibly be contacted via command or forward air controller (period depending, no controller figures are required on-board). The numbered columns on the Air Presence table represent the amount by which the rolling player won or lost the air superiority roll. Hence, the greater air superiority victory results in greater air presence and prospective airstrike availability. The ½D6, 1D6 and 2D6 are the numbers of six sided dice rolled, with the resulting value being the Air Presence score available to that side during the game. Individually listed numbers (5, 6, etc.) are the results required on a six sided dice roll in order for one air presence point to be available to that player. Note that the resulting air assets are a one-time use for game play. Once an air asset (see below) has been used for on-board support strikes, it cannot return again during the course of the current game, remove from game play.

Also note that this means even the player who only slightly lost the air superiority roll or tied, can also roll for an air presence. If airstrikes from both sides are somehow present during the same turn, they will ignore each other and in any case they were not likely sharing the identical airspace at the same time. Even a few minutes time separation is a lot with aircraft.

Use the Air Cover Priority level to help decide the intensity of the aviation presence that players want as part of their scenario. The second table below helps to outline the logic of each case and how it might apply to a game. The two sides of a battle can have different air cover priorities and in fact, it would be more common for them to be very different.

4) Air Assets - Players have some options for what types of air assets their local air presence represents. Players may either allow custom choices, where each sides chooses what air assets are represented, they can roll randomly in advance for what each asset point/chit represents, or they can roll for random assignment at time of arrival on the field. The table below gives some sense of which types of air assets were available at certain times of the war. The list is not exhaustive and players who have detailed insights into these mission types are free to customize the existing table. In some cases, certain air asset/attack types may actually have been available where we do not indicate, but possibly as a rare or less often used method (i.e., Stukas became used less and less as dive bombers, we have to draw the line somewhere).

Note that the strafing and level bombing attack types are available to all nations in all locations, and so are not listed below. If an asset type is available, the box is marked Yes, if not available or we are uncertain, the box is marked with a dash. In some cases, a nation might have aircraft that partially match a type and we will not usually credit that. For the types listed below, we have only shown Yes for obvious and well qualified candidates (i.e., The Russian PE-2 is technically a dive bomber, but not like a Stuka or Dauntless, which is what our "dive bomber" listing refers to).

8) Troop Reaction- The combination of command system and army training and equipment has a great effect on military doctrine and unit behavior. The table below outlines how these values combine to create Troop Reaction Profiles. Troop reaction affects whether and how units operate together (or not) and how they are able to coordinate their fire.

Note that these reaction profiles are considered part of game setup and are not discussed in the main rules text, which covers the primary elements of movement, fire and morale.

20) Defensive Works - The defending side rolls for each category once per 150 total bases present for both sides. The attacking player may roll 2D6 for trenches and 1D6 for minefields.