Re: (TFT) Magic Carpets and Brooms

[Jay Carlisle <maou.tsaou@gmail.com>]

1d6 per ammo pt expended

1 no effect (16.66%)

2 no effect (16.66%)

3 wing hit -1mp (16.66%)

4 rudder hit -1 turn radius grade (16.66%)

5 engine hit -2mp (16.66%)

6 special hit (16.66%)


 Special hit

1 gun jam (16.66%)

2/4 critical hit (50%)

5/6 casualty (33.33%)


 Critical hit

1 controls damaged; spin (16.66%)

2 engine dies; glide (16.66%)

3 gun malfunction (16.66%)

4 engine damage; -3mp (16.66%)

5/6 on fire (33.33%)


 Casualty

1/2 observer wounded (33.33%)

3/4 pilot wounded (33.33%)

5 observer killed (16.66%)

6 pilot killed (16.66%)


 Wounded results

1 revives (16.66%)

2/5 no change (66.66%)

6 faints (16.66%)


 Fire results

1 fire goes out (16.66%)

2/5 fire burns -1mp (66.66%)

6 plane explodes (16.66%)




 1d6 any face (16.66%)


 2d6 4 or less (16.66%)

6 or less (41.66%)

8 or less (72.22%)


 3d6 7 or less (~16.66%)

9 or less (37.5%)

11 or less (62.5%)


 4d6 10 or less (~16.66%)

12 or less (33.565%)

15 or less (66.435%)


 5d6 13 or less (~16.66%)

15 or less (30.517%)

19 or less (69.483%)




 Sopwith F.1 Camel

Length 18' 9'' (~4.5 Melee-hexes)

Wingspan 26' 11'' (~6.25 Melee-hexes)

Height 8' 6'' (~2 hex-heights)

Max Speed ~115 mph (~196 MA)

Stall Speed ~50 mph (~85.25 MA)

Ceiling 21,000 feet (4883.72. hex-heights)

Rate of Climb 21 hex-heights (~90 feet) per TFT turn


 Fokker Dr. I

Length 18' 11'' (~4.5 Melee-hexes [1 scale-square difference from Sopwith])

Wingspan 23' 7'' (~5.5 Melee-hexes)

Height 9' 8'' (~2.25 hex-heights)

Max Speed ~115 mph (~196 MA)

Stall Speed ~45 mph (~76.75 MA)

Ceiling 20,000 feet (~4,650 hex-heights)

Rate of Climb 22 hex-heights (~95 feet) per TFT turn




 Rolling from bank to bank.

Smooth flying of these types require coordination of the aileron and rudder
pressures when banking the airplane.

This maneuver in its simplest form consists of holding the planes nose on
the horizon while applying a constant aileron pressure to one side until
the desired degree of bank is reached then equal pressure is applied in the
opposite direction until the bank degree is matched.

There are many variations to this maneuver depending on pilot skill and
aircraft performance from gentle banks of 30 degrees through steep banks
approaching 70 degrees with a 45 degree bank held through a turn of 180
degrees and then reversed describing an S Turn.


 Chandelles

Basically a 180 degree steep, climbing, turn gaining as much altitude as
possible without stalling the plane.

Following a line at right angles to the wind drop the nose below cruising
position and gain about 30 mph of speed.

Bank into the wind at about 30 degrees while pulling back gently on the
stick without aileron or rudder pressure until the airplane is in a
vertical bank through a turn of 90 degrees.

Apply aileron and rudder pressure to gradually decrease the bank, timed so
that an additional 90 degrees of turn has been completed by the point the
wings are level.

Again there are many variations to the basic Chandelles such as moving
straight into another Chandelle preforming a Lazy 8 (not to be confused
with Figure 8's which describe a ground path like the S Turn).


 The Loop

Nose down until the airplane gains about 2.5 times its landing speed
reducing the throttle to maintain rated rpm's as the airplane gains
momentum.

(my 1942 reference gives 120 mph as a safe speed for standard Army trainer
which was still a biplane)

At necessary speed begin pulling back on the stick pulling the nose up and
increasing the throttle as airspeed decreases.

As the stick reaches the full-back position and the throttle is wide open
the pilot is on their back with the nose pointed straight up.

As the plane rounds the top of the loop and the nose again begins to drop
below the horizon forward stick pressure is slowly applied and the engine
is again throttled back as speed increases finishing with the nose again in
cruising position and the stick in neutral.

This is very much a matter of timing with the stick often resulting in a
stall if the timing is off.

Variations include the Cuban 8.


 Banking and Turns

So if I know the distance and altitude from a given point (like a
hex-center) I have a good idea of the angle of the bank.

If I call ~60 degrees of bank to be near the limits of these types then I
get that at a ratio of around twice the height of the distance from the
hex-center.

The '42 book recommends practice for stalls, spins, and snaps above 2000
feet in altitude (~465 hex-heights).

To circle a hex-center from 2000 feet at a 60 degree bank requires a radius
of 232.5 hexes or a bit more than 23 pages (n/s) from the center to
complete a circle about 1460.5 hexes in circumference in about 8 turns near
max speed for the above examples or about 45 degrees of plane turn per game
turn for the described circle.

Flying the same circle at half the altitude results in a bank of about 45
degrees.


 From what I can tell official top speeds were from actual time runs by the
airplanes so are likely pretty close to True Air Speeds for specific types.

This should let me adjust for wind conditions using existing formula like
Max Drift.

10 knots is roughly 12 mph.

A wind speed of about 10 knots on the beam (broadside) results in about 5
degrees of Max Drift.

The rough 'watch' method applies max drift to winds blowing from 90 to 60
degrees across the flight track, 3/4ths Max Drift at 45 degrees across
track, half-drift at 30 degrees across track and one quarter at 15 degrees.

This matches pretty well with the hex-grid at 60 degrees between
hex-side-center to hex-side-center.

When allowing plane turns to hex-vertices this is roughly 30 degrees from
hex-vertex to hex-side-center.

When moving along a track off of a hex-vertex the pattern is hex-vertex to
hex-side-center equaling 1 hex of hex-center to hex-center movement.

2 hexes of hex-center to hex-center movement along a hex-vertex track would
be from hex-center to hex-vertex to hex-side-center (1) to hex-vertex to
hex-center (2).


 As it takes 30 kt winds on the beam to cause a Max Drift of ~15 degrees
and a tropical cyclone upgrades from a depression to a storm between 33 and
34 kts most wind effects in normal flying conditions look to be modifiers
to the actual 'handling class' of the vehicle in maneuvers against the wind
rather than tactical map effects.


 4 by 5 pages (10'' by 8'') is a 40 by 40 1 inch square-hex grid that lays
out roughly 3.5 feet across.

FF MA ranges from 8 to 14 with both examples having an MA of 11 (assuming
most common Clerget config for the Camel).

If each square-hex is considered to represent a full page of Melee-hexes
the resulting 400 by 400 hex-grid could be crossed by either aircraft in 2
TFT turns at top speed.

Jump an order of magnitude to 1 square-hex represents 10 pages and the
planes only move 2 hexes per turn at top speed.

So to come in on a table-top (4 by 4 feet) with MA's close to the figures
Mr. Nicole, Ward, et. al. reached it looks like my translation scale is
going to be around 1 square-hex equals 2 pages of Melee-hexes giving the
examples MA's of 10 taking 4 turns to cross the map at top speed.

At this scale the examples are roughly one quarter of the square-hex in
length (about 5 hexes or half a page) which is roughly proportional to a
Joe Average Figure in a Melee-hex.

When looked at compared to the Humberside 6 by 4 foot 'traveling' map of 3
inch squares at 2 MA per square forward this should be adequate for basic
play.


 Adding the peculiarities of a given airplane is really interesting and I'm
starting to get an idea of why the Turn Radius stuff is set the way it is
with mentions of rotary vs. inline engines and similar considerations.

The '42 reference is neat to consider here too.

One point they make about acrobatics and precision flight is that
controlled maneuvers involving stalls, spins, and snaps are best preformed
above 2000 feet for safety purposes.

Part of this is simply more time to react but the author also mentions;

Recovery from a spin is not difficult. -In fact, before an aircraft will
be certified as airworthy by the CAA, the manufacturer must show by
demonstrations that it can come out of a spin of its own accord with the
pilot off the controls entirely. Failure to recover from a spin is due to
the pilot's applying pressures to the controls that prevent the airplane
from recovering.

>From what little I know of the Camel I don't think she could do this.

She killed more trainees than fell in combat with her and the urgencies of
war probably didn't allow pilot safety to the very top of the list in
design considerations.

I actually really like this as it implies a level of personal customization
for individual planes and even particular setups for a given plane like
with a backup engine installed or air to air rockets, much like varying
horse statistics across a human-like range for 'personalization'.

Mechanicians rejoice!


 So one more thing from the book.

In many respects this phase of flying (acrobatics) closely resembles golf
or tennis or any other competitive sports in which the player is always
trying to improve his game and become a little better than his competitor.

This suggest to me that a particular 'maneuver' can be viewed much like
what is used in Car Wars with the Control Table, allowing a 'Talented'
pilot to push an aircraft to its limits more successfully than a novice.


 Melding these systems into a battlefield environment with infantry charges
supported by well known literary figures driving ambulances while planes
fly overhead and it all works together in a pretty simple format that can
be expanded according to the groups interests is something I'm trying to
describe so I can tell my stories so to speak.

This is a particularly interesting amalgamation as we're looking at 1d6,
2d6 and 3d6 systems at heart, at least from the randomization standpoint
ergo my concern with dice at the start.

A number of other games I use fall into this metric like Pirates! for
sailing ships (in space rockets are like sails while a space engine starts
like FF and works more like Car Wars at sea) or Ogre for future tanks etc
(both 1d6 systems).

Even a Cuban 8 on a broom (or underwater while 'swimming') ought to be
basically the same movement system expanded for the extra boosts from
technology or development.

Individual player Figures get to roll many dice to attempt heroic Actions
in fractions of a second if the situation requires but the Units can be
handled with a single die on a CRT.

MP3d6 compression...?
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