We played a game of Flightwing, 225 points!
Six ground assets for each side, sort of randomly placed. Buildings are either light (8 armor, 10 damage) or medium (10 armor, 15 damage).
Turn 1
PHR wins initiative, and elects to take out a ground asset with the Artemis, immediately using up the close call to prevent a crash on the very first action of the game. Scourge ground assets have +2 evasion, and so going with a dive bomb feels almost mandatory for taking them out.
Scourge attempts to knock it out with a Brigand, but rolls low on damage.
An Athena is next, and rips apart the medium building in the center of the board.
Scourge activates the Corsair squad next, and spreads out to soften up multiple ground assets, but only manages to ding one.
The second Athena comes on and takes out a Brigand while finishing off the center building!
Not looking good for Scourge, but a dramatic turn for the second Brigand as the chain lightning effect obliterates both the Artemis and the nearby Athena, leaving PHR with only a single unit.
End of turn 1: PHR 4, Scourge 2
Turn 2
PHR wins initiative, and goes for a repeat of the double strike, taking out a Corsair and heavily damaging a light building, using up the second cruise missile in the process. Evasive maneuvers are pulled, anticipating heavy fire.
Brigand attempts a breakneck turn and crashes!
In an error, we completely forgot to remove the Corsair that got shot down at the start of the turn. So pretend reinforcements flew in! Or it’s a ghost ship! Who knows!
Lots of movement this turn as two ships and potentially a ghost ship flip around the table. Corsair guns are rather awful at AA, with just 1 shot on a 6+ to hit, and on top of that have a 5+ passive save to get through, so they decide to try and take out ground assets instead, nabbing 1 VP.
End of turn 2: PHR 4, Scourge 3
Turn 3
Scourge wins initiative. The ghost ship vanishes into the mist, having accomplished nothing, and so the universe righted an error. The other two gamble on shooting down the Athena before it scores the 3 VP for the building, hoping to tie with PHR and get 1 more VP for a ground asset kill on turn 4 for a win. Instead, they miss.
PHR loops around and takes dangerous maneuvers damage, then finishes off the building.
End of turn 3: PHR 7, Scourge 3
Turn 4
Scourge wins initiative, and although the game has already been decided, wants blood. They get blood, but not in the fashion intended.
The Athena flies off into the sunset the victor! Final score: PHR 7, Scourge 3.
Some thoughts on the game; I expected Athenas to be good at demolition, but didn’t realize how good they’d be. The bonus damage on cruise missiles and the fact that criticals double damage unlike Dropzone makes buildings go down fast. Might want to try having the table be largely medium and heavy buildings instead of light and mediums.
Corsairs are garbage at AA, and focusing down ground assets might have been the better plan. A Brigand demands you respect spacing of your craft! I realized writing this up the two Corsairs at the end should have done a single dangerous maneuvers test and only lost one of the two, but the double six crash landing was funny and the game was settled at that point anyway.
One thing we never did was go down to low level. The dangerous maneuvers test just made it feel too risky. Perhaps bumping the point level of the game so a few more ace pilot/close calls could be added would make things more interesting? Overall, had fun with it as it’s nice to play on the table with something that doesn’t have a big time commitment but still gives enough engagement to be interesting!