Automated or Manual time / date

[Macklroy 2]

Just wondered what most people set for the 'time advance' option in their campaigns. I just noticed after comming safetly home after a harrowing mission over the front that I had logged my 16th mission. YA!.....and yet here it was the 8th of July and i enlisted on the 2nd of the same month. 16 missions in 6 days!!! Im beat.

 

Im currently using the historical (weather made) mission frequency and have time advance set to automated by the sim. Do most of you fly with those same settings? Do you fly a lighter flight load? Do you advance time manually some times?

 

Just currious about fellow pilots flying habits.

 

S!

[Olham 164]

Flying it like you, Mack, but sometimes I do "manual advance", to see, if I will get some

claims confirmed (which never happened).

But two or three sorties a day was the normal job in those days; sometimes more even.

 

As for the fuel load: I always fill up 150% of what's necessary for the round trip; so when

it's 60 miles, I fill petrol in for 90 miles. But never much more, cause I think, the craft is really

lighter and more agile with, say, a fuel load of 35 % than with a hundred.

[Macklroy 2]

Ya i wondered about the fuel thing. If it really does make your plane lighter I'm all for it. I usually leave it at 60% tank. Get's me everywhere i need to go. I just bypass those exceptionally looooong missions.

 

S!

[Creaghorn 10]

i advance sometimes one mission when coming back from a mission with a very beaten up aircraft. the mechs need time to fix and patch the aircraft again. when my aircraft is destroyed i sometimes advance a complete day. sometimes two. you have to wait for a new aicraft, you have to set the cockpit and guns to your taste. stuff like this.

when my virtual brother didn't return form a dawn patrol (in my current career), i advanced one or two missions because i was sitting and waiting for news.

after 4 month of combat i advanced for about 4 to 5 days, beeing on leave.

 

you have reasons to advance every now and then. adds immersion. have fun

[Hasse Wind 46]

I use manual advance occasionally to give my pilot some leave (my wingman in Jasta 9, Leutnant Hans-Werner Bradowsky, is on leave all the time - so why shouldn't I follow his example? ) and sometimes jump over missions that require me to fly 100 miles behind enemy lines and attack ground targets in the German Jasta campaigns.

[Olham 164]

In case you didn't know, Hasse Wind - you can press "optional flight", when you find, it goes too

deep into enemy heartland. Press it again, until a flight distance appears, that you find suitable.

[Hasse Wind 46]

In case you didn't know, Hasse Wind - you can press "optional flight", when you find, it goes too

deep into enemy heartland. Press it again, until a flight distance appears, that you find suitable.

 

Yes, I usually try that first. But sometimes it just keeps giving me those long range missions, so it's no big deal to advance time one day. The war's not going to end anytime soon in my campaigns in any case...

[Rick Rawlings 138]

I use light campaign mission frequency to simulate the other eventless flights that so often happened during the war and to get to see more of the war (so I fly one mission a day, I assume the other patrols are quiet and eventless.) This seems to keep my kill total believable. I also manual time advance for leaves, when it says "the weather is likely to deteriorate over the next few days" or when I should be in the hospital. (Hospital has not worked for me since sometime around patch 1.28, even after an install. I either die or get completely away. Has anyone actually been in the hospital lately?)

 

RR

[Hasse Wind 46]

(Hospital has not worked for me since sometime around patch 1.28, even after an install. I either die or get completely away. Has anyone actually been in the hospital lately?)

RR

 

I didn't even know there was a possibility to become hospitalized! My pilots either survive without a scratch or die instantly (or occasionally become POWs).

[Canvas Wings 1]

I just recently started to use the Time Advance, occasionally... same rationale. Three missions a day or more might have been the norm, but I imagine most of the missions were uneventful. -And did they have to fly seven days a week? I give my pilots a day off once a week, and a couple of days to recuperate from a crash (assuming the survive) maybe more if they pronged several miles from nowhere. And if any of them ever *survive* 4 months, heck yeah, I'll let them go leave for a week.

[Olham 164]

Three missions a day or more might have been the norm, but I imagine most of the missions were uneventful.

 

Depends on where you are, and when.

We have defensive and offensive Jastas here. Von Richthofen had fights on many sorties, Udet rather on fewer.

So, if you want to go over the 17 hour mark, you better choose such a defensive Jasta.

Udet had after a very rough calculation of mine, one kill on about 15 sorties. Still though, he lasted longer than

von Richthofen and made respectable 60 (or was it 62?) kills, surviving the war.

 

Your choice, who you follow. Me, I'm so far definitely closer to Richthofen. At least with dying earlier. (Lol!)

Edited May 7, 2009 by Olham

[Bletchley 8]

If I arrive at the airfield and it is raining or snowing, then I go back to the Mess and advance time - and keep on doing that until the weather improves somewhat.

 

Bletchley

[Creaghorn 10]

I just recently started to use the Time Advance, occasionally... same rationale. Three missions a day or more might have been the norm, but I imagine most of the missions were uneventful. -And did they have to fly seven days a week? I give my pilots a day off once a week, and a couple of days to recuperate from a crash (assuming the survive) maybe more if they pronged several miles from nowhere. And if any of them ever *survive* 4 months, heck yeah, I'll let them go leave for a week.

 

the key to have more uneventful sorties, and to keep it realistic not to fight every sortie, is to reduce AI sight to max 2NM, as i pointed out several times. of course seems to be a helluva job to change for the devs, if possible at all.

what makes me having more uneventful sorties NOW is always beeing the leader and clouds on 5.

if you are not the leader, the AI leader is going to attack everything. if you lead, you should only attack what you actually can see. enemy ai is going to attack you with his bionic eyes, but with more clouds and haze (no loss of recources or FPS, but by far more realistic) he is going to also to miss you more often because ai can't see through clouds.

that works for me. maybe it will work also for you.

[tttiger 0]

The only time I use manual time advance is when I must transfer to a new airfield.

 

For some odd reason, the transfer never is accomplished, even if I complete the mission, land and park the plane. Next mission I'm back at the old field and am told to fly the transfer mission again.

 

Soooo, when a transfer comes up, I just advance by one date and voila! I'm at the new field.

 

Other than that, I just fly what the computer gives me.

 

ttt

[Hasse Wind 46]

what makes me having more uneventful sorties NOW is always beeing the leader and clouds on 5.

 

Being leader helps a lot, but I noticed a considerable drop in fps when I tried to put clouds on 5. I probably need a new PC to be able to use that setting.

 

PC combat flight simulators are always too bloody in my opinion. There just seems to be too much action going on everywhere and the player is almost forced to have a fight in every mission. I don't know if it's even possible to change the bionic eyes of computer pilots into something more realistic in the CFS3 engine...

[Olham 164]

Hi, Hasse Wind

My neighbour and "BHaH wingman" always reports of flights with no events.

He is in Jasta 15, early or mid-17 I think (when Udet and Gontermann where there),

and they are a "defensive" Jasta then.

Also helps to switch TAC and labels "off" - you will pass many enemy flights that way,

helps collecting hours.

[Creaghorn 10]

Also helps to switch TAC and labels "off" - you will pass many enemy flights that way,

helps collecting hours.

 

exactly. the life of a pilot in ww1 had something similar like wildlife of animals.

if you are fresh from flightschool, the chance you'll die is quite big. because of accidents, enemies, no experience, no knowledge of manouvers, getting surprised, beeing last of the formation, undeveloped SA... so your hours might be very low. if you manage to survive couple flights. maybe even survive your baptism under fire, the chance you'll reach quite a number of hours is much greater because you have more and more experience. you don't die because you have dogfights twice a sortie. i think you die very soon, or you have some month or maybe years. like fresh born animals.

and with having fights every couple sorties, often uneventful. reflects just that.

[Hasse Wind 46]

I've never used labels and try to fly without TAC, but I do use it every now and then. It sometimes annoys me the AI pilots seem to have telepathic powers and know exactly what's going on in the chaos of air combat, so using the TAC helps to even the odds. And in my Strutter bomber campaign (a great two seater, by the way!) TAC is very important for seeing and targeting the ground attack objectives.

 

But maybe the aggression rating of a squadron is decisively important in determining the activity of aerial combat? I usually fly in offensive units. It may be even more important than I've ever realized...