I was digging through my games looking for air-to-air combat games and came across an old game from GDW (who did Traveller) called Blue Max. As it's from the 1980s, I played it a ton back in the day. The game uses hexes and each airplane has a single sheet that shows what maneuvers you can pick. Here's an example:



While not as cool as miniatures, having each plane described on a single sheet should make it easier to add new and unusual type craft to the game. Slower, less maneuverable craft could just be given a smaller range of possible movements. In a way this is sort of how X-Wing works.

That's all the air-to-air combat games I have that aren't super complicated. I hope that gives you plenty of options to find a system that works for your own game. If you'd like me to scan all the Blue Max maneuver sheets I have, PM me.

[NOTE] There is a reskin of this game released in the 2010s that uses a slightly different system and only has stats for six planes. So don't buy that one (although the map is much nicer).

Just use an old set of Ace of Aces.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ace_of_Aces_(picture_book_game)

I personally love miniatures games whether they're skirmish groups, whole armies, or in between.  So I also love it when they are combined with RPGs.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on July 12, 2023, 03:20:14 PM
LOL.  I'm about 3/4 the way through the base rules of exactly that, a game designed around modern air combat.  It's generated so much enthusiasm among my home groups ... that I've started modifying the rules for a sci-fi adventure game... .  I have a pretty clear focus and idea of how the game should work, which might not fit what you are going for.  Specifically, I have a TotM w/ diagram for the air combat part, just because I wanted to avoid having to play Battletech in the middle of Mechwarrior.  But I'm happy to share (in general) what I've learn and worked through so far...

Forgive me if I'm a bit cheeky, but wouldn't "Modern air combat" mainly be like... firing a missile at a target a few miles away?

Quote from: Banjo Destructo on July 20, 2023, 03:14:06 PM
Forgive me if I'm a bit cheeky, but wouldn't "Modern air combat" mainly be like... firing a missile at a target a few miles away?

Modern air warfare is... complicated.  The idea of a few aircraft duking it out with high speed aerobatics with modern aircraft is largely a Hollywood invention.  In reality, it's a complex network of sensors, computers, jammers, SAM sites (some mobile, some stationary), a plethora of different types of aircraft with different tactical abilities, and pilots who need to know when to make a snap decision of their own and when to trust the voice in their ear who doesn't have time to explain the situation.  In the end, Lt. "Maverick" Mitchell gets to be the hero because it's his ass in the ejection seat and he still is the guy pulling the trigger to fire the final shot.  Dog fights are started at about 500 miles out and often long before the pilot is in the cockpit.  Air superiority today is more about being able to coordinate airborne and surface anti-air assets to put the fighter pilot in the best place to get off the shot.  This is the easy version.

Sure, sometimes it does come down to the F-15 using the 20mm machine gun and sometimes it's about herding enemy aircraft over a friendly SAM.

In WWI, fighter pilots would literally just jump in an airplane and go look to see if there was something to shoot at.  Frequently, they would go up and not see anything.  Just as frequently, they would discover that they didn't bring enough friends or ammo and ended up running for their lives when things got to hairy.  Also, inter-war air mercenaries were a real thing.  Post WWII, aircraft and air warfare had advanced to such a point that it wasn't feasible for a small mercenary company to maintain all the assets necessary to engage in air superiority combat.

I think that both ways it can make for a great game.  However, they would be radically different in both session focus and campaign scope. 

Quote from: BadApple on July 20, 2023, 03:47:08 PM
Dog fights are started at about 500 miles out and often long before the pilot is in the cockpit. 

That isn't a Dog fight. Just ask ANY fighter pilot.  Actually, if you ask any F-22 pilot they will tell you that if they end up in a dog fight many things have already gone VERY wrong.

Quote from: Scooter on July 20, 2023, 04:01:30 PM
That isn't a Dog fight.

Yes, I know.  But it is a colloquialism most people will understand.   

I keep forgetting most people think Top Gun is how modern air combat works

Quote from: Scooter on July 20, 2023, 04:38:38 PM
I keep forgetting most people think Top Gun is how modern air combat works

That's always the problem when talking about any sizable subject.  Trying to straddle the chasm of being accurate and being understandable while being concise enough for a forum is difficult.  That said, I don't want to put out bad info.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on July 12, 2023, 03:20:14 PM
Specifically, I have a TotM w/ diagram for the air combat part, just because I wanted to avoid having to play Battletech in the middle of Mechwarrior.  But I'm happy to share (in general) what I've learn and worked through so far...

Just for the record, the new Mechwarrior Destiny RPG actually provides a full theater-of-the-mind rules for Mech/vehicle combat.

While they use a lot of "story gaming" sounding terms (it uses "take your narration" in place of "take your turn"), it's actually a bog standard RPG that is basically the old Legionnaire RPG (for Renegade Legion) with Battletech fluff on top.

Flying Mice games had a couple air combat rpgs.  Wild Blue was the modern mercenary jet fighter game.  Area 88 the rpg really.  The group got a budget to buy their planes and support infrastructure.  It runs on the Star Cluster 2 engine.

Quote from: Banjo Destructo on July 20, 2023, 03:14:06 PM

Quote from: Eirikrautha on July 12, 2023, 03:20:14 PM
LOL.  I'm about 3/4 the way through the base rules of exactly that, a game designed around modern air combat.  It's generated so much enthusiasm among my home groups ... that I've started modifying the rules for a sci-fi adventure game... .  I have a pretty clear focus and idea of how the game should work, which might not fit what you are going for.  Specifically, I have a TotM w/ diagram for the air combat part, just because I wanted to avoid having to play Battletech in the middle of Mechwarrior.  But I'm happy to share (in general) what I've learn and worked through so far...

Forgive me if I'm a bit cheeky, but wouldn't "Modern air combat" mainly be like... firing a missile at a target a few miles away?

Well, not quite.  To me, what makes an RPG interesting is a wide variety of choices and challenges.  These could be mental, physical, or a combination of both.  When you look at modern air combat (and by "modern" I mean from ~1970 to the present), there are a lot more challenges and choices than you would think.  As someone who was not a military aviator, but who is highly invested in study-level military simulations, you would be surprised at how complicated even the act of identifying and locking a target can be.  Now, complication can also be a serious negative for an RPG, especially when there is little payoff, so you have to be careful with what is worth simulating in your game.  Let me give you an example of what I mean:

So, you are flying in your aircraft (let's say a fourth generation fighter like an F-16) at 10,000 ft.  You have AWACS (Airborne Warning And Control System; another aircraft with a powerful radar) that can give you basic information about other aircraft in the area, but nothing too detailed.  So, your AWACS declares that you have an inbound radar return 120 nautical miles away at 20,000 ft altitude, possible hostile.  So now your choices begin.  The bogie is too far away for your radar to pick them up, so you need to close the distance.  Do you climb, reducing the energy advantage the bogie has by being higher than you, or do you stay lower and hope to confuse the bogie's radar by blending in with ground clutter?  At 80 nautical miles, the bogie's radar registers on your RWR (Radar Warning Receiver).  It's some variant of an SU-27 Flanker, definitely hostile, but you don't know which version and what it's carrying.  Now you are 40 nm away.  Your radar has pick up the "bandit" (now that we know it's hostile, it's not a bogie).  Should you lock on with a single-target track, letting the bandit know you are about to fire?  Or should you keep a "soft lock", which doesn't warn the enemy when the missile is in the air, but isn't as likely to hit?  At 30 nm, you get launch authorization for the weapon (say an AIM-120 Amraam active radar missile), but do you fire, or try to get closer and increase your probability of kill?  The bandit still has you soft locked, so is he getting closer to shoot, or did he already launch and you're flying right into his missile face first?  At 20 nm you shoot.  Now, do you "crank" and turn away from the bandit but still keep him in the cone of you radar to help guide the missile in flight (and increase its accuracy)?  Or do you defend, turning completely away, because you want to be sure that you can escape any missile he shot?  Now your RWR signals that an enemy missile is close and has turn on its internal radar!  You turn completely away from it and fly away as fast as you can!  But for how long?  If you turn back too soon, the missile might still hit you.  If you wait too long, the defending bandit might turn back towards you and now be chasing you.  And, since you turned away, you don't have them on radar, so you need to find them again!  Your AWACs declares "Merged!"  That means you and the bandit are just a mile or two away!  So you now stare out of the canopy, trying to see him before he sees you.  The dogfight has started!

So, as you see, there are a lot of decisions with serious consequences as to how the fight plays out.  The trick is to abstract them to the point where the game is smooth and fun to play, even for the non-specialist, but still retains the choices that make the combat exciting.  Plus, there are a lot of concerns in air combat that are not usually mechanics for traditional RPGs.  For example, getting information about your enemy.  Most RPGs basically handwave this concern.  You can see the orc, you know where he is, you attack.  If the orc goes invisible, you get a penalty to your attack.  That's all that's needed for most fantasy RPGs.  But in air combat, information management needs to be a whole different set of mechanics.  Actually seeing the enemy, whether electronically or with eyes, is far more difficult.  Then, how much information can you gather in the moment before you must make a decision?  Can you see their heading (aspect)?  Their speed/energy state?  What is normally just assumed in a normal RPG becomes something you need to have smooth, but interesting, mechanics for.

So, there's a whole host of interesting choices and challenges in modern air combat.  The trick is making them accessible, clear, fun to play, mechanically sound, and engaging.  Oh, and not too complex.  No big task, eh?

Quote from: Scooter on July 20, 2023, 04:38:38 PM
I keep forgetting most people think Top Gun is how modern air combat works

Not if you had ever served on a carrier.

Quote from: BadApple on July 20, 2023, 03:47:08 PM

Quote from: Banjo Destructo on July 20, 2023, 03:14:06 PM
Forgive me if I'm a bit cheeky, but wouldn't "Modern air combat" mainly be like... firing a missile at a target a few miles away?

Modern air warfare is... complicated.  The idea of a few aircraft duking it out with high speed aerobatics with modern aircraft is largely a Hollywood invention.  In reality, it's a complex network of sensors, computers, jammers, SAM sites (some mobile, some stationary), a plethora of different types of aircraft with different tactical abilities, and pilots who need to know when to make a snap decision of their own and when to trust the voice in their ear who doesn't have time to explain the situation.  In the end, Lt. "Maverick" Mitchell gets to be the hero because it's his ass in the ejection seat and he still is the guy pulling the trigger to fire the final shot.  Dog fights are started at about 500 miles out and often long before the pilot is in the cockpit.  Air superiority today is more about being able to coordinate airborne and surface anti-air assets to put the fighter pilot in the best place to get off the shot.  This is the easy version.

Sure, sometimes it does come down to the F-15 using the 20mm machine gun and sometimes it's about herding enemy aircraft over a friendly SAM.

In WWI, fighter pilots would literally just jump in an airplane and go look to see if there was something to shoot at.  Frequently, they would go up and not see anything.  Just as frequently, they would discover that they didn't bring enough friends or ammo and ended up running for their lives when things got to hairy.  Also, inter-war air mercenaries were a real thing.  Post WWII, aircraft and air warfare had advanced to such a point that it wasn't feasible for a small mercenary company to maintain all the assets necessary to engage in air superiority combat.

I think that both ways it can make for a great game.  However, they would be radically different in both session focus and campaign scope.

Very cool, sounds like some kind of card game where available assets get used to do point counter-point style things to get the advantage to make sure your asset ends up winning.

Quote from: BadApple on July 20, 2023, 03:47:08 PM

Quote from: Banjo Destructo on July 20, 2023, 03:14:06 PM
Forgive me if I'm a bit cheeky, but wouldn't "Modern air combat" mainly be like... firing a missile at a target a few miles away?

Modern air warfare is... complicated.  The idea of a few aircraft duking it out with high speed aerobatics with modern aircraft is largely a Hollywood invention.  In reality, it's a complex network of sensors, computers, jammers, SAM sites (some mobile, some stationary), a plethora of different types of aircraft with different tactical abilities, and pilots who need to know when to make a snap decision of their own and when to trust the voice in their ear who doesn't have time to explain the situation.  In the end, Lt. "Maverick" Mitchell gets to be the hero because it's his ass in the ejection seat and he still is the guy pulling the trigger to fire the final shot.  Dog fights are started at about 500 miles out and often long before the pilot is in the cockpit.  Air superiority today is more about being able to coordinate airborne and surface anti-air assets to put the fighter pilot in the best place to get off the shot.  This is the easy version.

Sure, sometimes it does come down to the F-15 using the 20mm machine gun and sometimes it's about herding enemy aircraft over a friendly SAM.

In WWI, fighter pilots would literally just jump in an airplane and go look to see if there was something to shoot at.  Frequently, they would go up and not see anything.  Just as frequently, they would discover that they didn't bring enough friends or ammo and ended up running for their lives when things got to hairy.  Also, inter-war air mercenaries were a real thing.  Post WWII, aircraft and air warfare had advanced to such a point that it wasn't feasible for a small mercenary company to maintain all the assets necessary to engage in air superiority combat.

I think that both ways it can make for a great game.  However, they would be radically different in both session focus and campaign scope.

PUHleeez don't take the advice of these people. It's Trash RPG Design 101. Modern air-to-air combat can only be done properly with theater of the mind. You can't scale it with a map that makes any sense unless you're working with 1-second rounds - which could work but that requires additional 1-second tactical options. That adds complexity that the game needs. Nobody plays the current "dogfighting WW2" games because they lack verisimilitude and SUCK for it.

The indie crowd won't buy the game because they can't fk the planes. Most trad gamers won't buy it because they can't kill orcs with it. Target your segment of gamers longing for simulated modern air-to-air combat + the out-of-cockpit RP stuff. A real-ish game for people looking for a "Top Gun" experience.

It won't be "real". Real is carrier catapults breaking and $30m aircraft falling into the ocean. Seen it more than once with my time on a carrier. Plus how "some" pilots get off trying to break a plane and how the films were clearly impossible at points ("Oh, you're flying 100 feet apart? I fly between youz!")

Just do YOUR game - and make it complex enough to be engaging.