Some vehicles fly, some high enough to ignore the clutter on the ground that us pedestrians would call buildings and trees. If a vehicle can do that, we are counting it as a flying vehicle. Be it a drone, jet fighter, helicopter or ornithopter, they all come under Aircraft in these rules. Here we deal with Aircraft.
6.0 – Aircraft & Airmobile
We classify all flying vehicles as aircraft. If it is a ‘hover’ vehicle that cannot fly over buildings, thats just a hovering vehicle, not an aircraft. We break them down into two broad categories, Airstrike and Aircraft.
6.0.1 – Aircraft
Any flying vehicle not operating at such speeds to count as an Airstrike counts as a Aircraft. Helicopter Gunships, Fixed-Wing Drones and suchlike. this also includes Airmobile Platoons on Helicopters and other such types.
6.1 – Anti-Aircraft Fire
‘Somebody shoot that flying bastard!!’, a not uncommon cry from the modern battlefield. Some twat in a plane is strafing you and you want him stopped, well, this is how we do that. Or, if you are really, really lucky, your Rupert’s have stopped drinking the sherry long enough to assigned you a dedicated AA asset, then those twats buzzing overhead are about to get a fright…
There are two types of Anti-Aircraft fire in these rules, Reactive and Dedicated. Reactive is when a formation takes pot shots at an aircraft as it passes, Dedicated is only from specific Anti-Aircraft units with weaponry (and training) dedicated to keeping the skies clear of these pests.
6.2.1 – Reactive
Pay attention, this is a little more complex than normal, but there is no other reasonable way of doing this.
As the Aircraft moves, any formation that has not already acted, and is in range and can see the target, may sacrifice its order to take Reactive fire on the aircraft. ONLY heavy weapons may fire, and any unit issued an Assault Order may not declare Reactive fire. you MAY only Reactive fire once per turn.
6.2.2 – Dedicated
As the Aircraft moves, any unit with the Anti-Aircraft designation MAY choose to fire at the aircraft.
They MAY fire multiple times per turn, but only ONCE per aircraft (advanced rules of rights of aircraft may change this).
This does not affect the formations Orders in ANY way.
They MAY choose Firefight OR Heavy Weapons to fire, and in this case the Firefight WILL damage vehicles (this represents specialised AA weapons)
6.3 – Orders
Only Aircraft formations are issued Orders, Airstrike Aircraft are so such more limited in scope and do not require Orders to be issued in the normal manner
As with Infantry and Vehicles, you can give your Flights some orders (1 per Flight) at the start of your turn.
You may also issue no order if you wish. (optional, ONE no order may become an Advance order?)
Your choices are as follows
Advance
You may move you Flight in any direction, maintaining Flight coherency and fire at any eligible Non-Friendly formation. This is the standard ‘move and shoot’ order, you may NOT shoot and move, but you need not move OR shoot if you do not wish to under an Advance order.
Fall-Back
You MUST move your Flight in towards your table edge with a plus 20cm movement bonus, maintaining Flight coherency and fire at your ‘reduced’ rating at any eligible enemy Formations.
Engage
You MUST move your Flight it’s indicated minimum move. You MUST fire at any eligible non-friendly formation, and deduct 1 from your base target number for Heavy Weapon (NOT Firefight). You may NOT choose not to fire when an Engage order is issued, you MUST use all your Heavy Weapons points.
Reform
You MUST move your Flight it’s indicated minimum mov + D10cm. You may NOT fire. You may remove the ‘damaged’ status from one Vehicle, and check the others to remove the ‘damaged’ status (See under Shooting 2.5.4 – Repair)
6.4 – Movement
Now Aircraft have a lots less issues to deal with when it comes to movement than ground vehicles. To a point, they must always be aware of their surrounding and that they are exposed to fire from all angles, and retain enough manoeuvrability to avoid incoming fire. That said, the move a LOT faster than their ground borne cousins.
Our basic principle is that a Formation moves it’s movement statistic, plus 2D10 cm.
6.5 – Embarking and Disembarking
Well, if you thought getting on and off normal ground based vehicles was hard, aircraft are even more hilarious. Powerful engines normally keep these thing in the air, and no-one will turn them off just so you can have an easy time collecting your kit and sauntering away, and if they can get away with it, the pilot bastards will not even touch the ground, they expect you to jump, even carrying a 20 kilo mortar tube on top of your normal 30 kilo’s of armour, webbing, weapon, food, beer and water.
We will use similar rules to 2.5 – Mounting and Dismounting from vehicles, but as Aircraft are a LOT more expensive than ground vehicles, they tend to be better designed, we represent that in the below rules
We break down the complexity of this task into three grades, Simple, Standard, Complex, these cost 10%, 25% and 50% of the vehicle AND the passengers movement respectively.
In this version of the rules we will only deal with Standard Embarking/Disembarking. To Embark/Disembark a vehicle costs the Passengers 50% and the Vehicle 25% of their movement.
This represents the general agility and better design principles in troop carrying aircraft.
6.6 – Shooting
So, your aircraft have weapons and want to use them?, luckily we have that covered in these rules…
Use the rules defined in 2.6 – Shooting. with the following modifiers
| Description | Modifier | Notes |
| Reactive AA Fire | +2 |
|
Thats it. No other additional rules required, you get shot at and damaged the same as everyone else.
The profile
This is the core of the game, here are determined everything that an element can do, broken down into some attempt at an explanation.
Description – What this element represent, Regular Infantry Squad, a Phalanx Main Battle Tank, a Hellbent IV APC
Type – Infantry, Vehicles and Aircraft
Movement – How far can you move on an Advance order (+2D10 cm) / your suppressed movement / your minimum movement (Aircraft Only)
Firefight – How effective are their Plasma Rifles, Bolt Casters, HV Rifles, Laser Carbines, Sonic Disruptors or whatever personal weapons the grunts are armed with.
Heavy Weapons – How good are their Atomic Destabilisers, Plasma Cannons, Metal Storm Cannons, Chain Guns, Missile Launchers, HMG’s or Laser Gatlings, whenever constitutes Heavy Weapons in your force.
Damage Capacity – How many serious holes can they sink into you before you stop working.
Armour – How good is your hull armour?, Cold Pressed Steel?, PolyCarbide?, Woven Reeds?, A slice of Edam?, this number helps work that out
Notes – Any special abilities go here, none are officially in play yet, but consider Ablative Armour, you ignore your first ‘reduced’ status, others are under consideration. Capacity = how many Infantry Squads can you carry
Points – How many point is this element worth
| Description | Type | Movement | Firefight | Heavy Weapon | Damage Capacity | Armour | Notes | Points |
| Hellbent IV | Aircraft | 40cm/10cm/5cm | 3/1 | 2/1 | 2 | 3 | Capacity (2) | 40 |
| Defender AA APC | Vehicle | 15cm/10cm | 4/1 | 1/1 | 2 | 3 | Anti-Aircraft | 20 |