From: James Urban Subject: Re: AH Reviews T-V > Tac Air This one's on my top ten list. It's Avalon Hill's rendition of USAF's FEBA game, designed to portray air support/interdiction at the Forward Edge of the Battle Area. As it was designed around the interaction of air power vs. air defense, the ground combat is the more 'obscure' element (as mentioned in the M2 vs armor issue), and air defense/attack takes center stage. Each air counter represents a formation of four(?) aircraft. Combat results vs. aircraft are abort, 1/2 loss, complete loss. Air units are based off map and can only fly every other turn (fly mission turn A, refuel/rearm turn B, fly turn C, etc.) Only full strength units can fly missions, but two 1/2 strength units can combine into 1 full strength unit. The biggest problem lies in the igo/ugo movement which can allow one side's airstrikes to hit targets close to their board edge and escape before the other side's air superiority units can engage. Air defense units range from armored units' visually fired AAMG harrassing fire to ZSUs to HAWKs (sorry, no Patriots - although they might make an interesting add on/variant). Rules include options for electronic warfare, SEAD missions, aerial recon (via umpired games), C3, and more! Despite the slant toward aerial operations, the ground units are more than just targets as many other air games protray them - they are actively engaged in their own struggle for control of the objectives with units ranging from Mech. Cav. to MLRS artillery, each rated for attack and defense. Ground units need to be in range of their HQs and those HQs have HQs of their own. Want to stall an armored attack running amok? Try to take out their highest HQ with air strikes deep into enemy territory. It won't be easy, as that HQ is probably heavily defended by SAMs! This won't stop all units in their tracks, but it certainly put a damper on offensive operations. Some interesting decisions need to be made each turn - Do you only fly half your available aircraft this turn to have the other half avaiable for air cover the next turn, or should you attempt to overwhelm the enemy's air defenses by sending in everyhting? Allocate your strikes to direct support of the front line units, or go after their chain of command? Or their artillery support? Or their supply system? Out of supply SAMs can't reload - effectively neutralizing them without having to attack them directly. Some variant counters were published by AH in one of their Generals which included drones (interdiction targets need to be identified before they can be attacked in the blind/umpired system - drones, besides freeing attack/air superiority aircraft from recon duty are immune from abort combat results), stealth fighters, and some German Tornado and Alpha Jet variants. Great game - lots of flavor - pick up a copy!