Okay, so they are mostly not in the Imperial Guard, but I wonder if there is room in peoples hearts for a Fighter Ace game.

Like you mentioned, the pilots of Lightnings, Thunderbolts, Marauders, even Valkyries- most are from the Imperial Navy, not the Imperial Guard. Also, I'd rather they no use space in the core rulebook on aircraft beyond the Valkyrie and maybe the Vulture or on dogfighting rules. HOWEVER, I would love to see an Aeronautica Imperialis supplement for Only War for running a fighter squadron game. On the other hand, including Imperial Navy personnel wouldn't be the first announcement of non-Imperial Guardsmen in Only War (Commissar, Enginseer, Ministorum Priest, (kinda) Storm Trooper, arguably Sanctioned Psyker).

How about this one?

+++++HOWEVER, I would love to see an Aeronautica Imperialis supplement for Only War for running a fighter squadron game.+++++

Oh aye, I'd see it as supplement fodder rather than something to put in the main book. They could even do a supplement focusing on several different war based experiences - so a book containing one aircraft based adventure, one tank based adventure and one submarine based adventure (Das Boot or The Hunt for Red October).

+++++How about this one?+++++

Awesome! Will they be doing an Epic scale version?

Gaire said:

Well it does make sense that they're from the Navy not the Army. It's bad enough giving army hi-tech weapons without having their grubby fingers all over expensive aircraft.

I think that whilst true air and space assets do fall under the auspices of the Imperial Navy, any transport is directly attached to the Imperial Guard. In the main instance this will be Chimeras and Valkyries, though other more niche vehicles exist.

The Imperial Guard and the Imperial Navy exist as two separate entities so that no single-authority has the ability to raise, equip AND transport troops from system to system to wage war at their singular decision. As such there are often bitter rivalries between 'ground-pounders' and 'navy jockeys'. The instance already mentioned of the Phantine, an Imperial Guard regiment raised on a planet that necessitates air travel for all and as such their 'Guard' are in fact pilots, is an exception that proves the rule - Imperial Navy hates not having direct control over them, and while the Guard enjoy having air assets at their command they often don't know how to use them properly.

Overall i'd hope that Only War only briefly covers transport fliers enough for the Valkyrie and maybe some FFG created content to be included, as any more would detract from an already broad setting and would also start to contravene existing canon sources.

While you're right on the Chimera, the Valkyrie is actually an Imperial Navy vehicle, crewed by Naval pilots, and under the Naval command structure.

While I would love an OW Aeronautica supplement, it does raise the question. So what do you do all the time? From an Rp perspective I find it rather limiting. Normal grunts (even in tanks) have to travel to their objective and do all sorts of missions once there. As Aerojock you sit in your barracks, scramble up and engage the enemy only to return back to base. I can see a couple of scenarios that can be played out, but compared to what you can do with standard grunts this is not much. Of course, you could bring them out of their aeroplanes and let them be grunts. But that is a waste of resources and rather silly.

Top Gun. Tuskegee Airmen. (*sigh*) Pearl Harbor. Red Tails. All... decent movies about fighter pilots that involve more than just "they jump in their planes, fight, and sit in their barracks". Given, as far as combat goes, they're going to prefer being in their planes, which is a whole different kind of fighting than grunt work, but that doesn't mean that each session is just "you get scrambled, fight off some Ork fighta-bommas, and go home to get drunk". Close air support. Combat air patrols. Dogfighting. Recon. Surgical strikes. Strategic bombing. Escort duty, for both ground and air forces. If you have to, make them multipurpose airmen, able to fly a Lightning or a Thunderbolt in air-to-air combat, land, jump in a Valkyrie, carry troops into the fray, return to base, and board a Marauder to bomb some poor SOBs back to the stone age. And aside from the Lightning and the T-Bolt, those are all multi-station aircraft. Weapon officer, bombardier, copilot, gunner, radio operator/navigator- all roles you can fill on a larger bird. I think you're underestimating the versatility of a group of PC pilots.

+++++I can see a couple of scenarios that can be played out+++++

So just do those scenarios!

My own preference would likely be to run aeroplane adventures as one offs, at most lasting a couple of sessions. Not every game has to be a campaign lasting years of real time.

So everyone plays a crewman on a Marauder doing a bombing mission over the war-world Reich III (potentially a dambusting mission with bouncing bombs -

AluminiumWolf said:

You actually touched on another facet of an Aviation game that would be very interesting: You and your copilot Goosius are hit and forced to Eject over enemy territory. What now? When you ejected out of your mighty Fury interceptor you had the following Wargear: A voidsuit, a Gravchute (Expended upon touchdown!), a flak vest, a Las Pistol, a knife and a basic survival kit ( A few items useful for survival like matches, medpac etc.). Hopefully your base or carrier will dispatch a rescue craft but until then you must link up with your crew and survive! If rescue is not forthcoming you may have to find your own way home!

BTW: While only war Focuses on the IG I don't think anyone said it was exclusively guard members. Any Tech priest will tell you that they are most certainly NOT part of the guard as would most ministorium Priests (Both explicitely stated as available character classes.)

Sure, there are some great ideas to play out. But almost any mission is of neccesity a short one. Because you are out of ammo and fuel after you have fullfilled the mission objective. So, I really am affraid that it would grow repetitive rather quick. Mind you, I would still love to play one, but I doubt that this gamevariant would have much longevity.

Or a B.A.T. 21 game; one's the downed pilot, the other are back at base, trying to keep the downed pilot alive and sane with only un-secure vox frequency as life line.

I would run the game much like what eas suggested for SM's on another thread. The Squadron's missions would interweave with other "flashpoints" including possibly Sm's! I would probably try to keep together by useing the "ground war" rules from the Battlefleet Koronus sup. (Unless of course, OW has better large scale [army lvl] rules!

Sister Callidia said:

And I am okay with that!

Warhammer has a rich tradition of short fiction, and there are things you can do in a one shot adventure that you can't easily do in a campaign. Kill off PCs at a rapid rate of knots (or end on a TPK) or extensive intra-party conflict for instance. (In a 40k context you can probably only do the unremitting bleakness of a lot of the early fiction in a one off - you might even be able to get away with the Inquisition executing anyone who survives the mission because they have dangerous knowledge!)

Call off Cthulhu in particular has many scenarios intended for one off play rather than as part of a campaign. As well as fitting the horror format well, it allows people to experiment with non-standard parties. There are scenarios where you play Nazis on an archaeological dig in africa, scenarios where you play US navy personnel observing early nuclear tests, scenarios where you play Romans or Crusaders.

So accepting that we may not be playing a game for long, we might be able to try some unusual character types - you could play manufactorium workers trying to survive an Ork invasion, or Titan crewmen, or an Adeptus Mechanicus audit team checking that a researcher hasn't descended in to Tech Heresy.

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And now for some pictures of Spitfires.

Great pictures mr Wolf.

And you are right, it would be great for a couple of one shot scenarios.

More aeroplanes above, Dutch ones this time.:

I could do you a spitfire XIV flown by 322 squadron, an all Dutch RAF squadron.

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One game I have played at a con involved taking the parts of officials and revolutionaries in a banana republic. So you had El Presidente, the generals of the army, the finance minister, sundry rebels etc. I was a general, and when I nipped off for a quick toilet break I came back to discover I had been deposed by a rival faction and took to the hills to become a rebel.

For 40k, you could have players take the role of the planetary governor and his top bods, and the revolutionaries and heretics who oppose them. When a run of bad harvests mean the world falls behind on its tithe quota, can the Imperial Commander screw enough productivity out of his already destitute populace to make up the shortfall or will the Tau back revolutionary leader be able to take advantage of the situtation to spark open revolt? Can the PDF suppress the riots or will they be forced to seek outside help and suffer the consequences of their failure? And through it all, how much wealth can everyone involved divert to their own personal off planet bank accounts?

Pelgrane press have just put out Flying Coffins, a scenario for Trail of Cthulhu where you play pilots flying on the western front at the end of the first world war.

http://www.pelgranepress.com/?p=7808

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And now for more pictures of Spitfires.

Love it.

I'm sure when I reading the original description of OW, when it was DH source book, it said it was going to more Military arms than just the IG so shoul have gone into the Navy too. Although I can see that they might not be able to for space reasons now. Hopefully the vehicle rules are going to good enough to cover that part.

Those Dystopian Wars things are interesting, in Apostles Creed (from the Sabbat worlds anthology) they mention mass carriers like it was nothing. Haven't read double eagle so don't if it comes up there but's good target to hit or home base setting.