Undaunted: Battle of Britain

Product Information

We immediately started to compile research material. We hadn’t actually settled on the scale of the game yet, and our research would help us make that decision. Who were the players in this game? Did they control entire squadrons? And if so, what did each counter on the board represent? Each card? In Undaunted: Battle of Britain you lead RAF or Luftwaffe aircraft and battle over the skies of Britain in the most famous aerial battle in history. In the game you’ll experience dogfights and bombing runs, with British ships trying desperately to escape the Luftwaffe, antiaircraft guns aiding the RAF fighters, and much more. Undaunted: Battle of Britain, the latest board game from Osprey Games, is going in a different direction. It manages to simulate much of the nitty-gritty technical detail of aerial combat in World War II, but it may be a bit hard to parse for those without deeper knowledge of WWII. There’s some great difficult decision making and risk taking here. Do you fire at a distance, hoping you’ll get to move in closer and take another shot before zipping by, or get right up close now for the best chance of hitting, knowing that by doing so you’re putting your own plane in a vulnerable spot?

Undaunted: Battle of Britain | Board Games | Zatu Games UK

Undaunted: Battle of Britain is a standalone game in the Undaunted series, adapting the core gameplay of the previous games to recreate the dynamic dogfighting of aerial combat. Maintain cohesion between your pilots, evade anti-aircraft artillery, and leverage talented aces to win the battle for the skies! The main negative I can say about it is that I can’t imagine bothering with the campaign rules, which are as light as anything. They basically amount to adding up points, with no actual mechanical changes to the gameplay. Still, it’s better to have them than not. I played a number of scenarios from Undaunted: Battle of Britain to get a sense for its gameplay, replayability, and accessibility (particularly in terms of how it compares to previous Undaunted instalments). You can see find out more about our process with this guide to how we test board games and tabletop RPGs.The combatants consist of 11 RAF planes, all fighters – Mk I Spitfires and Hurricanes and Boulton Paul Defiants whilst the Luftwaffe has 15 planes (plus 4 decoys ) fighters Messerschmitt Bf 109 E and 109 F, fighter bomber Messerscmitt Bf 110 C, dive bomber Junkers Ju 87 Stuka and bomber Heinkel He 111. These are all presented on teardrop shaped counters which gives the indication of their facing. There are also red dotted lines showing the direction in which their guns fire. For all of the fighters this is just straight ahead with the exception of the Defiants with their rear gun turret which can fire in any other direction except straight ahead! At times, Undaunted Battle of Britain feels more like a racing game than a war game. That’s because it’s all about positioning and movement. See planes, unlike humans, don’t really have the option to stop and take a breather; that tends to lead to plummeting. In Undaunted, what that means is whenever you play a combat card representing a plane, that plane hasto move as well as any other actions it takes. You don’t get a choice. Undaunted: Battle of Britain (or BOB to his friends) is the latest installment in Osprey Games’ much vaunted World War II series. It covers the period of fighting between the British Royal Air Force (RAF) and the German Luftwaffe in the Spring and Summer of 1940.Like the other games in the Undaunted series, Undaunted: Battle of Britain is not a simulation, it is a tabletop, card and counters based game that intends to invoke the spirit and feel of combat in a playable manner. Strongly encourages forward planning, but the randomness of dice and cards will often force your plans awry At that point, we turned the design over to Filip and Anthony at Osprey Games. They put the game through its paces through the end of 2021 and beginning of 2022. Occasionally they would reach out about specific design intent, strategies, and clarifying questions for various scenarios. But other than minor tweaking, from a gameplay perspective nothing significantly changed between the design Trevor and I delivered and the final game. However, as always, the game benefited immensely from Osprey’s amazing attention to detail when it comes to delivering an amazing, top quality final product.

Undaunted: Battle of Britain - Inspirations - Osprey Publishing Undaunted: Battle of Britain - Inspirations - Osprey Publishing

This aircraft was the mount of leading Battle of Britain Spitfire killer Oberleutnant Herbert Ihlefeld, who was promoted from Staffelkapitän of 2.(J)/LG 2 to Gruppen­kommandeur of I.(J)/LG 2 on 30 August 1940. The following month he claimed at least 15 Spitfires destroyed whilst flying this aircraft from Marquise, in the Pas de Calais." Summer, 1940. The German war machine has rolled through the continent in less than a year, crushing all before it. Britain is all that stands in the way of German victory in Europe. Command the pilots of the battle-tested Luftwaffe, looking to extinguish all resistance and pave the way to invasion, or the resourceful and determined RAF opposing them at every turn. Undaunted: Battle of Britain is gorgeously illustrated by the amazing Roland MacDonald. I say this for each Undaunted game in the series, but I really do believe that Undaunted: Battle of Britain is the most beautiful game in the series. It would have been very easy to lose the personal touch that the previous Undaunted titles have had in the shift to an aerial combat game. But the decision to keep the cards focused on the crew, and Roland’s gorgeous art, really helped keep the game feeling personal. When does Apex Legends Season 19: Ignite start? Try a new Legend and unite your accounts with cross progression Along the same line, the aircraft illustration doesn’t do enough to distinguish between the two different sides of the war. The Luftwaffe have a darker token, but it does little to contrast with the RAF. As a comparison, it was very easy to know which units were yours in Stalingrad. Soviets were white, Germans were gray. Here, this is further muddled by units on each side sharing the same letter/number combinations. Did I just move your Y1 plane? Oh, I thought that was my Y1 plane. Now, where were we? Card illustration remains excellent though the card variety isn’t as unique as in other Undaunted sets. Final Thoughts:

Osprey Blog

Corsair Virtuoso Pro review: 'an incredibly natural experience I'm yet to see replicated in another gaming headset' Summer, 1940. The German war machine has rolled across the continent in less than a year, crushing all before it. Britain is all that stands in the way of German victory in Europe. But what about the research and inspirations surrounding the game's historical setting? This is what Undaunted: Battle of Britain co-designer David Thompson had to say about the early design process behind the scenes: While Undaunted: Battle of Britain uses the same core gameplay concepts and play patterns as the rest of the Undaunted series, it is also the most different and unique of the family. The latest board game in the award-winning Undaunted series is here with Battle of Britain , taking to the skies for the first time. Read on to hear all about the historical inspirations behind its creation...

Undaunted – OnTableTop – Home of Beasts of War Undaunted – OnTableTop – Home of Beasts of War

Trevor and I completed our work on Undaunted: Battle of Britain at the end of August 2021, putting us well ahead of Osprey’s request to have the complete game design to them by March 2022. Trevor and I met with Osprey Games in early September to walk them through the design, including providing an overview of the scenarios and all the critical gameplay elements we added. (As an aside, during that same meeting, we brainstormed future titles in the Undaunted series - but that’s secret for now!) Roland MacDonald is a graphic designer, illustrator, and board game designer. With a BFA in Fine Arts and an MA in Game Design, he started working doing 3D modelling for PS2 and PC games. After doing concept art and illustrations for Shogun 2 Total War , he moved on to work primarily on board games, illustrating titles including Stop Thief!, Kaiju Crush, and Battle Line. This supremely clever comms mechanic does an incredible job of simulating the historical challenges of the air war in Europe. Players on both sides of the conflict must constantly choose whether or not they will combine their efforts on high-value targets or break off to cause a wider swath of damage. It flips the script of air combat tabletop gaming, placing the emphasis on teamwork instead of individual exploits — and it does so brilliantly.Codex: Tyranids 10th Edition review - "The wargame takes shape with terrifying Tyranid Detachments"

Undaunted Battle of Britain

Undaunted: Battle of Britain is a standalone game in the Undaunted series, adapting the core gameplay of the previous games to recreate the dynamic dogfighting of aerial combat. Maintain cohesion between your pilots, evade anti-aircraft artillery, and leverage talented aces to win the battle for the skies! Not sure what game to buy next? Buy a premium mystery box for two to four great games to add to your collection! Buy Premium Box »Over the next couple weeks, Trevor and I met often, comparing our research and notes, chatting about what we felt would make for the most engaging game, while also leveraging the core Undaunted system. We knew the game had to feel like Undaunted, but we were also willing to push the system to the extreme. If you’re only interested in receiving the newest games this is the box for you; guaranteeing only the latest games! Buy New Releases Box »