It’s clear Forsage Games and the <PERSON> family cares deeply about their games. They are active on the forums and the production showcases a company with a clear vision; relentlessly creative within the very hard constraints of today's wargame market.
Their latest series, Age of Dogfights WWI is clever, packs a ton of gorgeous carefully crafted details into a small package, and totally delivers on the promise of big air battles playable quickly. It’s lovely to look at - in the same way a great train diorama is, or the relief maps at the Musee de le Armee in Paris are - despite not having miniatures!
Yes, it's beautiful
That said, Forsage explicitly markets the game as a “realistic and dynamic simulation” (it’s the game’s tagline) and ... I’m not sure it delivers fully on that promise. There are a number of design choices that make it feel like a game from a bygone era, and which tend to produce battles that, at least to my sensibilities, are more chess-like intellectual exercises than seat-of-the-pants furballs. I found this both in how battles played out on the board, but also in how players approach their choices, and experience the battles - in both falling short of my hopes for dynamic play, and realistic combat.
I am not a combat pilot and have never served in the military. I am only at best an ‘enthusiast’ of air combat and military aviation - yes that’s me a total plane nerd! Your truly, and a few of the games I've chosen to keep
That said, I’ve been reading about, playing board games about, and combat sim-ing, for over three decades, and I have a squadron of a few close friends I fly with regularly in VR in DCS World. I bring a lot of personal expectations about what air combat is like, and to capture different aspects of the reality in different styles of games, and different media from pixels to cardboard. However... I am also no expert at all about aviation during the Great War. Ask me how to cold start an F-14 and I can walk you through the pilot's checklist from memory, but it was curiosity about this period (and an appreciation of the lovely planes in the RAF museum Hangar Two) that motivated me to try this game in the first place.
The components
Opening the box you are greeted with a lot of stuff, (a lot!) and unfortunately, also a lot of assembly. It’s fiddly, somewhat unclear, and seems totally overwhelming. While this part is no fun, it is a result of how many goodies Forsage generously gives you. 304
I bribed my kids into helping and we managed to knock out the assembly in a few hours. I really appreciated the tuck boxes they give you for the planes and the stands! It’s a nice touch, practical and attractive, where most other manufacturers would have just dumped an inadequate number of baggies on you.
The map boards are sturdy and provide a pleasantly muted background for your battles.
The battle takes place on a hex grid. Though it is drawn in inverse fashion than normal, with the edges between points highlighted and which Forsage makes an odd fuss about branding as their ‘triangle system’, it's perfectly serviceable. From a bigger publisher, the marketing hype would be off-putting - here it’s just kind of cute and quaint.
Of course, the most important components are the planes, and they are lovely! Wonderfully illustrated with crisp clear indications. On their translucent stands, they combine the simple clarity of tokens with the pageantry and visual appeal of miniatures. The planes are drawn to scale with each other and it’s just lovely to see a flight of bombers with fighters swirling about them. This is what I was initially attracted to, and boy does the game deliver!
All the information for each airplane is also available on the ‘dashboard sheet’, which are thick sturdy cardboard with pleasant and clear design. Given these I can’t help but wish there would have been an alternate set of ‘art and ID number only’ stickers offered. It could have been an easy and cheap alternative for those of us used to miniature gaming who wanted an even prettier presentation. Ah well... did I mention the planes look pretty great on the board nonetheless?!
Not all the components are great however. The dice feel flimsy and not evenly weighted, with rough seams. The pilot experience overlays and bombing/photo zone/ship markers are ridiculously flimsy. The damage markers - which are placed kind of like tablecloths on the planes - I found to be just too fiddly and ended up placing them by the plane’s dashboard. 336