Fliegenhund 0 Posted July 22, 2009 I am flying the N16 for Esc.38 in Sept. of 1916. I had two Fokker EIII on my last mission that went on my current balloon busting one. I got two more EIII's outside Reims and was seperated from my two wingmen in the furball. I began heading home which is only about 5 miles by my lonesome. As I was climbing and got just south of Argonne, I was jumped by 6 EIII of Jasta 6, 1 of which was an ace, Carl something? I turned and fired my last 20 rounds into my first attacker and began turning for life. My only option was a landing in a small clearing that looked like it was made by trees being split in half by arty. I set down in the field unscathed (amazingly) and am currently being buzzed by 6 angry Fokkers. While sitting in the field praying that they dont strafe me, one buzzed a little low and went into the trees when he tried to turn, it told me I shot it down! lol. Hopefully the cavalry will come or they will leave and I can make the jump home. I feel my landing was an act of desperation, but maybe cowardice? It was certain death if I hadnt landed. Either way this missions immersion was unreal and without a doubt the most I have had in any flight sim. Will let you know if I make it back safe! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rickitycrate 10 Posted July 22, 2009 (edited) It's all about survival. Do what you can or must. That EIII you got credit for was the one that you got few rounds into before you skeedaddled. Good luck! Edited July 22, 2009 by Rickitycrate Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Olham 164 Posted July 22, 2009 ...one buzzed a little low and went into the trees when he tried to turn, it told me I shot it down! lol. Fliegenhund - it might have been the one you shot at. You could have hit the engine or an aileron cable, that finally broke. It happens often to me, that Nupes I hit, crash a little later. If you get a claims report - fill it in I say! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Launchbury 1 Posted July 23, 2009 (edited) If you do any damage to an aircraft that later crashes for any reason you are credited. I do not claim these, however, as without the adviser I would have no idea they did go down. I have put my damaged aircraft down in a shell hole, on a road, in some soft-looking fields, anything to preserve my pilot. Back in WW1, standard practice was to find someone to guard your aircraft, then go find a phone and give your aerodrome a ring. Edited July 23, 2009 by Launchbury Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Bullethead 12 Posted July 23, 2009 It was certain death if I hadnt landed. Join the club . And trust me, it only gets worse until late 1917, maybe early 1918, depending on where you are and what squadron you fly for. But anyway, once you can turn the tables on the Huns after suffering through being on the short end of the stick, it's sweet :). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Fliegenhund 0 Posted July 23, 2009 Had to work the night shift last night and 30 minutes before being due at work the Fokkers hadn't left. My airfield was about 6000k away and I tried to run the gauntlet through some trees and make a speedy getaway. The uneven ground just outside Allied lines was not forgiving. My plane rolled left before take off and that was the end of another promising career. :( I am a bit confused about DiD though. Is it possible to crash land with minor damage and not die? It seems I have had numerous attempts at rough landings that dont appear to be going that badly and the mission just exits and say my pilot died? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Bullethead 12 Posted July 23, 2009 Had to work the night shift last night and 30 minutes before being due at work the Fokkers hadn't left. My airfield was about 6000k away and I tried to run the gauntlet through some trees and make a speedy getaway. The uneven ground just outside Allied lines was not forgiving. My plane rolled left before take off and that was the end of another promising career. :( Wow, that's hardcore. What most folks do when they're forced down is hit ESC once on the ground to bring up the main menu, then hit End Mission. It's assumed that your squadron will send a truck out to disassemble the plane after the enemy leaves . I am a bit confused about DiD though. Is it possible to crash land with minor damage and not die? Yes. It has to be a pretty gentle crash, though, such as dragging a wingtip, or perhaps bellying in after you've lost your landing gear. Stalling and pancaking from more than about 15' up seems to be pretty fatal, though. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Fliegenhund 0 Posted July 23, 2009 Thanks for the reply bullet. I contemplated hitting escape and ending the mission, but thought it would not register as completed? I made a new pilot in the Esc. 38 at the same time though, 4 days into the campaign and 3 claims. Tons of Fokkers in the air makes for interesting, but hairy missions! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
BigJim 0 Posted July 23, 2009 (edited) Had to work the night shift last night and 30 minutes before being due at work the Fokkers hadn't left. My airfield was about 6000k away and I tried to run the gauntlet through some trees and make a speedy getaway. The uneven ground just outside Allied lines was not forgiving. My plane rolled left before take off and that was the end of another promising career. :( I am a bit confused about DiD though. Is it possible to crash land with minor damage and not die? It seems I have had numerous attempts at rough landings that dont appear to be going that badly and the mission just exits and say my pilot died? If you were not behind enemy lines I think choosing "end the flight" or whatever might have been the best choice, but obviously you had met the AI trigger of "kill him now" which is typical of AI type games. The game can kill you anytime it wishes i.e. "I was jumped by 6 EIII's with only 20 rounds left", this not a rant on OFF's AI it is just typical of every AI game I have ever played on the computer, which why I prefer online human opponets vs offline AI I like OFF very much and think the programmers have done an amazing job, so don't think I am ranting about the AI, just an observation after years of computer game playing Edited July 23, 2009 by BigJim Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Bullethead 12 Posted July 23, 2009 If you were not behind enemy lines I think choosing "end the flight" or whatever might have been the best choice, but obviously you had met the AI trigger of "kill him now" which is typical of AI type games. I'm not sure I understand what you're talking about here. AFAIK, you die from suffering fatal injuries, either from enemy fire or hitting the ground too hard. There's nothing in the game that just kills you for no good reason. When you run into enemy flights, it's because that's where they were destined to be. All the AI squadrons based all over the map are carrying out their missions same as your squadron is, so there's a good chance you'll run into 1 or more of them as you fly around. However, what you meet is a combination of many factors: Where your mission takes you and the time of your flight. How much you deviate from your planned path due to combat or avoiding bad situations. Where the AI squadrons are set to go that day and the times of their flights. How much the AI squadrons deviate from their itenerary due to combat. Thus, sometimes you meet little or no enemy activity, sometimes it seems like the whole enemy airforce is deliberately hunting you. That's the fortunes of war. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Olham 164 Posted July 23, 2009 Fliegenhund - would you PM me your hometown and state, so I could add you to the OFF Pilots map? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
BigJim 0 Posted July 23, 2009 I'm not sure I understand what you're talking about here. AFAIK, you die from suffering fatal injuries, either from enemy fire or hitting the ground too hard. There's nothing in the game that just kills you for no good reason. When you run into enemy flights, it's because that's where they were destined to be. All the AI squadrons based all over the map are carrying out their missions same as your squadron is, so there's a good chance you'll run into 1 or more of them as you fly around. However, what you meet is a combination of many factors: Where your mission takes you and the time of your flight. How much you deviate from your planned path due to combat or avoiding bad situations. Where the AI squadrons are set to go that day and the times of their flights. How much the AI squadrons deviate from their itenerary due to combat. Thus, sometimes you meet little or no enemy activity, sometimes it seems like the whole enemy airforce is deliberately hunting you. That's the fortunes of war. Well the way I read his post he was sitting on the ground for sometime just trying to outwait the AI then he had to go to work so tried to takeoff again and died to a crash that he didn't think should have been fatal therefore my post refers to his attempted takeoff at the end. All the rest of your post is IMHO "feel good" rational, from what I have seen once you hit the "trigger" of x many hours you have to be VERY careful because the AI will use ANY excuse to kill your pilot, especially if you have set it to "dead is dead" Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
+Polovski 460 Posted July 24, 2009 No one is "interfering" with what you do, there is no script to kill people when they are doing well, or extra code to "get one over on the player" No code that says hey AI that guy is going to "win" turn on "kill mode" and go get him so we can win. AI do what they do, we don't force anything. If you crash into a tree you crashed we didn't make it happen by moving the tree 6 feet ;) If you got jumped by 6 EIIIs and you were low on ammo, that's exactly what just happened, we didn't create them specially for you, they were already there doing their own mission and you didn't notice. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Olham 164 Posted July 24, 2009 (edited) Hey, that would be a great "secret weapon", borrowed from "Lord of the Rings" - Killer Trees! They could pick low flying crates out of the sky! Lol!!! Edited July 24, 2009 by Olham Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
BigJim 0 Posted July 25, 2009 Hey, that would be a great "secret weapon", borrowed from "Lord of the Rings" - Killer Trees!They could pick low flying crates out of the sky! Lol!!! LOL well I was thinking it was more like "If this than this" or "if time < x then this", probably just a coincidence that those 6 EIII's showed up in the flight path Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
+Winder 32 Posted July 25, 2009 LOL well I was thinking it was more like "If this than this" or "if time < x then this", probably just a coincidence that those 6 EIII's showed up in the flight path No, OFF has a pretty unique approach to air activity - there are no random spawns - there are up to 256 craft flying from real squads based at real bases on real missions in your area of operations.... These squads are all historically correct right down to location, craft, and historical ace complement... Moreover the air activity and aggressiveness of the opposing sides changes over time as it did during the war over the period of 1915 - 1918 - in addition the air activity also varies on your location - Alsace being the quietest region... HTH WM Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
BigJim 0 Posted July 25, 2009 (edited) No, OFF has a pretty unique approach to air activity - there are no random spawns - there are up to 256 craft flying from real squads based at real bases on real missions in your area of operations....These squads are all historically correct right down to location, craft, and historical ace complement... Moreover the air activity and aggressiveness of the opposing sides changes over time as it did during the war over the period of 1915 - 1918 - in addition the air activity also varies on your location - Alsace being the quietest region... HTH WM WOW that is impressive, I will quietly slip away now Thanks for the insight Winder, that makes me feel alot better, I was going down a tangent from experience with some "other" games and stand corrected. Edited July 25, 2009 by BigJim Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Bullethead 12 Posted July 25, 2009 Hey, that would be a great "secret weapon", borrowed from "Lord of the Rings" - Killer Trees! They could pick low flying crates out of the sky! Lol!!! Where I live, there's a tree that has grabbed and destroyed several low-flying cars, ISYN! One of the busiest roads (LA 10) around here has 2 lanes with no shoulders at all, just steep drop-offs into the deep ditch on either side. That area can flood so the road is built up on a high bed and the dirt for that came from the ditches. It's like 10 feet from the level of the road to the bottom of the ditches, which are about 5 feet below the surrounding ground level. This road makes a fairly hard curve to the left just where a similar but less-busy road (LA 965) Ts into it from the right. This is out in the country so there are no street lights and most of the reflective paint has worn off the pavement. What happens is, idiots (usually drunk) driving too fast at night go off the curve of LA 10 and down into the ditch. The ditch is not only deep but pretty wide and U-shaped on the bottom. If it's rained a little, the grass in the ditch is very slick, so it functions like a bobsled chute, not slowing the car down at all. The car therefore follows curve of the road down in the ditch doing 60-80mph until reaches the LA 965's high bed. This roadbed is sloped about 45^ and the car goes up it like a ski jump ramp, catching BIG air. The car-eating tree is a large pine directly in the flightpath of the cars. It's about 50 feet on the other side of LA 965, which fans out at the intersection to about twice its normal width so cars can make turns easier. Thus, from where the cars go airborne on the near side of LA 965 until they hit the tree, it's about 100 feet. The cars impact about 20 feet above ground level, where the tree is about 3 feet thick, and then crash to earth. It's a "Dukes of Hazard" scene gone horribly wrong . The tree has a barkless patch about 8 feet tall, and its slightly bent there, but otherwise is unscathed after repeated impacts. The surrounding ground is littered with the rusting bones of all the cars that it's eaten: hoods, bumpers, doors, dashboards, broken windshields, etc. Back when I was a firefighter, I spent about 1 night every couple of years dealing with such wrecks. The worst part was that the car would go to pieces and the idiots would be tossed in all directions, sometimes being stuck in neighboring trees. Of course, those that survived were in no condition to tell us how many people had been in the car, so we'd have to spend hours combing around with flashlights looking for other victims, until we were about to get a count from the victims' families. Then we'd go back in daylight and take pictures and measurements, always somewhat amazed by it all. You can actually see this tree on Google Earth. I've attached a kmz of it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
OvS 8 Posted July 25, 2009 Where I live, there's a tree that has grabbed and destroyed several low-flying cars, ISYN! One of the busiest roads (LA 10) around here has 2 lanes with no shoulders at all, just steep drop-offs into the deep ditch on either side. That area can flood so the road is built up on a high bed and the dirt for that came from the ditches. It's like 10 feet from the level of the road to the bottom of the ditches, which are about 5 feet below the surrounding ground level. This road makes a fairly hard curve to the left just where a similar but less-busy road (LA 965) Ts into it from the right. This is out in the country so there are no street lights and most of the reflective paint has worn off the pavement. What happens is, idiots (usually drunk) driving too fast at night go off the curve of LA 10 and down into the ditch. The ditch is not only deep but pretty wide and U-shaped on the bottom. If it's rained a little, the grass in the ditch is very slick, so it functions like a bobsled chute, not slowing the car down at all. The car therefore follows curve of the road down in the ditch doing 60-80mph until reaches the LA 965's high bed. This roadbed is sloped about 45^ and the car goes up it like a ski jump ramp, catching BIG air. The car-eating tree is a large pine directly in the flightpath of the cars. It's about 50 feet on the other side of LA 965, which fans out at the intersection to about twice its normal width so cars can make turns easier. Thus, from where the cars go airborne on the near side of LA 965 until they hit the tree, it's about 100 feet. The cars impact about 20 feet above ground level, where the tree is about 3 feet thick, and then crash to earth. It's a "Dukes of Hazard" scene gone horribly wrong . The tree has a barkless patch about 8 feet tall, and its slightly bent there, but otherwise is unscathed after repeated impacts. The surrounding ground is littered with the rusting bones of all the cars that it's eaten: hoods, bumpers, doors, dashboards, broken windshields, etc. Back when I was a firefighter, I spent about 1 night every couple of years dealing with such wrecks. The worst part was that the car would go to pieces and the idiots would be tossed in all directions, sometimes being stuck in neighboring trees. Of course, those that survived were in no condition to tell us how many people had been in the car, so we'd have to spend hours combing around with flashlights looking for other victims, until we were about to get a count from the victims' families. Then we'd go back in daylight and take pictures and measurements, always somewhat amazed by it all. You can actually see this tree on Google Earth. I've attached a kmz of it. Out here in Long Island, we have 2 major Teenager Killing roads... The Northern State and Southern State Parkways. They are notorious killers because neither road is flat, is full of straightaways, leading into crowned turns, and twists, and hills. They were originally designed by Robert Moses as 'Parkways', meaning, you are driving slowly, through a nice winding road, full of trees and park like settings. Well, 70 years later, modenrization and overpopulation, we have the twin killers. Two years ago, some idiot in his HS Graduation gift, a brand spanking new BMW 750 series from Mom and Dad out of the showroom, vaporized himself, and 3 friends doing well over 120 MPH on a tight turn on the Northern State. He went off the road, and the car completely let go. The papers said they had to bring in Forensic scientists to tell the body part (that were left) from each victim. One year we had a 70's style Corvette gain air on a hill, flip on it's nose and pancake into the top-end of a 13ft Max height Over-pass. The speed was suggested to have been 150 MPH. The back half of the car that made it over the top was recovered about 1/2 mile up the road, the other half (the nose) with the driver in it, exploded on impact... nothing left. It was horrible. The Rice-Rocket scenario is another whole story in itself. At leat 1 dies a month, especially in the summer months. These idiots just never learn. Well, write it off to population control. At least the stupid ones can't pro-create. OvS Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
+Polovski 460 Posted July 25, 2009 ah yes candidates for the Darwin Awards.. http://www.darwinawards.com/ "Darwin Awards The Darwin Awards salute the improvement of the human genome by honoring those who accidentally remove themselves from it..." Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
