AA50 Optional rule question: Fighter interception SBR


  • @squirecam:

    Fighter Escort rule worked very well at Origins. Some bombing was still done, but it wasnt the overall “strategy” it is without the rule.

    Well put. It’s only logical that fighters should be able to defend against SBRs and it fixes a problem that needs fixing. The fighter interceptors rule, or a variation of it, should be made standard in my opinion.

    That said, I feel the official fighter interceptors rule may deter SBRs a little too much. Say for example the Allies conduct an SBR over Germany with 2 escort fighters and 2 bombers and the Germans send up 2 fighters to intercept. Under the official optional rules the Germans would have 4 rolls at 1, and 2 rolls at 2 or less against the Allied planes. Chances are decent the Germans are going to score a hit costing the Allies 10 IPCs (the cost of one fighter). Meanwhile the chances are not so good the Allies are going to do 10 IPCs worth of damage to the Germans with 2 SBR dice rolls and 2 escort fighter rolls at 1. Thus, in this particular example the SBR becomes too unattractive for the Allies!

    A slightly more balanced variation (perhaps) of the fighter escort rule I prefer is as follows:

    1. Defending fighters intercept incoming bombers and escort fighters. Escorts have an attack value of 1* and interceptors have a defense value of 2. Bombers cannot fire. One round only. Remove casualties.
    2. AA fires at the remaining bombers only, not on the fighter-escorts**. Remove casualties.
    3. If any bomber is left, conduct strategic bombing.

    • Jet fighters have an attack value of 2.
      ** In the event that escorts are present and the defender chooses not to send up interceptors then the AA fires at both bombers and escorts.

    The logic behind this is that if interceptors are present they are going to engage the enemy before they get to the target while AA guns engage the enemy only when they’re directly over the target. In this scenario the escorts engage the interceptors before actually making over to the target and therefore should not be subject to AA fire. If no interceptors are present the escorts must protect the bombers all the way to the target (due to uncertainty of potential interception as Krieghund stated) and are therefore subject to AA fire.

    My variation is a tad more complex but I think it’s more balanced.


  • @WOPR:

    @squirecam:

    Fighter Escort rule worked very well at Origins. Some bombing was still done, but it wasnt the overall “strategy” it is without the rule.

    Well put. It’s only logical that fighters should be able to defend against SBRs and it fixes a problem that needs fixing. The fighter escort rule, or a variation of it, should be made standard in my opinion.

    That said, I feel the official fighter escort rule may deter SBRs a little too much. Say for example the Allies conduct an SBR over Germany with 2 escort fighters and 2 bombers and the Germans send up 2 fighters to intercept. Under the official optional rules the Germans would have 4 rolls at 1, and 2 rolls at 2 or less against the Allied planes. Chances are decent the Germans are going to score a hit costing the Allies 10 IPCs (the cost of one fighter). Meanwhile the chances are not so good the Allies are going to do 10 IPCs worth of damage to the Germans with 2 SBR dice rolls and 2 escort fighter rolls at 1. Thus, in this example the SBR becomes too unattractive for the Allies!

    A more balanced variation of the fighter escort rule I prefer is as follows:

    1. Defending fighters intercept incoming bombers and escort fighters. Escorts have an attack value of 1* and interceptors have a defense value of 2. Bombers cannot fire. One round only. Remove casualties.
    2. AA fires at the remaining bombers only, not on the fighter-escorts**. Remove casualties.
    3. If any bomber is left, conduct strategic bombing.

    • Jet fighters have an attack value of 2.
      ** In the event that escorts are present and the defender chooses not to send up interceptors then the AA fires at both bombers and escorts. The logic behind this is that if interceptors are present they are going to engage the enemy before they get to the target while AA guns engage the enemy only when they’re directly over the target. In this scenario the escorts engage the interceptors before actually making over to the target and therefore should not be subject to AA fire. If no interceptors are present the escorts must protect the bombers all the way to the target (due to uncertainty of potential interception) and are therefore subject to AA fire.

    My variation is a tad more complex but I think it’s more balanced.

    WOPR, I can understand where you are coming from.  However, with the escort rule in effect you must choose the right time to do your SBR’s.  If you are closing in and you really need to limit production then losing a fighter just might be well worth it.

    Your variation would work well as a house rule but not an oob rule because, as you stated above, it is more complex.  I bit too complex for an oob rule IMO.


  • @Captain:

    WOPR, I can understand where you are coming from.  However, with the escort rule in effect you must choose the right time to do your SBR’s.  If you are closing in and you really need to limit production then losing a fighter just might be well worth it.

    Well I think the existing interceptor rule is better than none so if that’s what it’s going to be, I vote it should be standard. What I’m saying is that I think the interceptor rule can be better. Right now, I feel it marginalizes SBRs a little too much. Without the interceptor rule SBRs are too effective and with the interceptor rule (in it’s current form) SBRs are a little too ineffective.

    @Captain:

    Your variation would work well as a house rule but not an oob rule because, as you stated above, it is more complex.  I bit too complex for an oob rule IMO.

    You think so? The way I explained the logic is a little confusing maybe but my variation itself is not too far off the official rule. Certainly it’s not as complex as China’s rules are and we can handle those.


  • @WOPR:

    You think so? The way I explained the logic is a little confusing maybe but my variation itself is not too far off the official rule. It just switches the order of the steps and adds one exception. Certainly it’s not as complex as China’s rules are and we can handle those.

    That is exactly the point, ‘we can handle those’ because we are already familiar with the game as it is.  New comers to the game trying to decipher all the rules and exceptions could make it very stressful to learn.  Otional rule in the game for SBR is interceptor……attacking fighters do this, defending fighters do this, but if fighters don’t defend then they do this, bombers can’t do this…and so on and so on.  Larry has made the optional rule very easy to understand and implement.  You also have to remember that a power would have to leave fighters close enough to home in order to defend against the SBR.  This means they are not in a battle elsewhere.  It is not all bad.


  • @Captain:

    @WOPR:

    You think so? The way I explained the logic is a little confusing maybe but my variation itself is not too far off the official rule. It just switches the order of the steps and adds one exception. Certainly it’s not as complex as China’s rules are and we can handle those.

    That is exactly the point, ‘we can handle those’ because we are already familiar with the game as it is.  New comers to the game trying to decipher all the rules and exceptions could make it very stressful to learn.  Otional rule in the game for SBR is interceptor……attacking fighters do this, defending fighters do this, but if fighters don’t defend then they do this, bombers can’t do this…and so on and so on.  Larry has made the optional rule very easy to understand and implement.  You also have to remember that a power would have to leave fighters close enough to home in order to defend against the SBR.  This means they are not in a battle elsewhere.  It is not all bad.

    I agree, it’s not all bad. Like I said, I think the existing intercept rule is better than nothing. It can be better in terms of balance however.

    Perhaps a simpler but slightly less balanced variation than the one I already proposed would be this: AA guns fire at both escorts and bombers if interceptors are sent up. If no interceptors are sent up, AA guns fire at bombers only. That’s the same as it is now only that AA guns don’t fire at escorts if the defender chooses not to send up interceptors.


  • @WOPR:

    @Captain:

    @WOPR:

    You think so? The way I explained the logic is a little confusing maybe but my variation itself is not too far off the official rule. It just switches the order of the steps and adds one exception. Certainly it’s not as complex as China’s rules are and we can handle those.

    That is exactly the point, ‘we can handle those’ because we are already familiar with the game as it is.  New comers to the game trying to decipher all the rules and exceptions could make it very stressful to learn.  Otional rule in the game for SBR is interceptor……attacking fighters do this, defending fighters do this, but if fighters don’t defend then they do this, bombers can’t do this…and so on and so on.  Larry has made the optional rule very easy to understand and implement.  You also have to remember that a power would have to leave fighters close enough to home in order to defend against the SBR.  This means they are not in a battle elsewhere.  It is not all bad.

    Now that sounds better, and I could agree with that.

    I agree, it’s not all bad. Like I said, I think the existing intercept rule is better than nothing. It can be better in terms of balance however.

    Perhaps, simpler but slightly less balanced variation than the one I already proposed would be this: AA guns fire at both escorts and bombers if interceptors are sent up. If no interceptors are sent up, AA guns fire at bombers only. That’s the same as it is now only that AA guns don’t fire at escorts if the defender chooses not to send up interceptors.


  • Perhaps, simpler but slightly less balanced variation than the one I already proposed would be this: AA guns fire at both escorts and bombers if interceptors are sent up. If no interceptors are sent up, AA guns fire at bombers only. That’s the same as it is now only that AA guns don’t fire at escorts if the defender chooses not to send up interceptors.

    I could go for that.

    Here is another simple way to do this optional rule.

    1. Attacker chooses escorting fighters.
    2. Defending fighters add 1 die each to the aa fire.
    3. Roll AA.
    4. If any 1’s are rolled, then the hits are assigned to the escorting fighters (if any) instead of the bombers.
    5. Surviving bombers then roll their SBR dice.


  • @allboxcars:

    @creeping-deth87:

    I’m confused… I’m new here, but in the A&A50 rule book there’s no mention of allowing you to use escorting fighters or to use fighters around your I.C. to defend against incoming bombers. It clearly just says ‘after resolving any anti-aircraft fire, surviving bombers each roll one die’.

    It’s an Official optional rule.

    You can find it here.

    http://www.harrisgamedesign.com/bb2/viewtopic.php?t=1759

    (and if that doesn’t post as a link, my apologies)

    updating the link
    http://harrisgamedesign.com/pdf/A&A_Anniversary_FAQ.pdf


  • You could also dictate that defending fighters are forced to intercept strategic bombardment. Avoiding this thing with AA-fire at fighters who don’t fight and also making the placement of defending fighters a bit more important, while at the same time speeding up play. Historically it would also make sense. It wasn’t as if Germany could ignore the Allied bombing campaign, German fighters were attacked on the ground by Allied air forces. You could also include the bombing of oil resources as something that makes ignoring strategic bombing impossible, the defender’s air force is just as targeted if their oil supplies are destroyed.


  • After further consideration I no longer feel the fighter escort/interceptor rule needs any fine tuning. In my previous posts I expressed the view that the rule nerfed strategic bombing too much but I’ve since changed my mind. After all, bombing raids over inland German targets without escorts was near suicidal, especially during the daylight. It wasn’t until the Allies had deployed long range escort fighters and had outnumbered the defending Luftwaffe aircraft, that the Allies were able to conduct bombing missions without terrible loses. The same is true with the fighter escort/interceptor rule as it stands now and it should stay that way.

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