CaptSopwith

At the moment? About a day and a half....

Son of a... Well, my Jasta 28w pilots just don't seem long for this world. I fired up a second pilot in the same unit and time as his short-lived predecessor and didn't have much luck. We took off on our first patrol, the weather was pretty bad; heavy overcast and gray. We circled the field and climbed to altitude, ready to start a combat air patrol behind friendly lines. We finally started heading out towards our first waypoint when I noticed three dots about 2,000 feet over us. With the amount of flak heading towards the formation, I had a hunch they weren't friendly and decided to climb and investigate. In a few moments I realized I had a flight of 3 British Fe2b's heading towards our home field. Rather than risk them bombing our own aerodrome, I decided to chase after. Ten minutes of tedious and careful climbing and coaxing to get my Alb DII to altitude with the Fe's I closed in to attack. Finally I clamped down on the trigger and blasted the first plane right out of the sky. I'm not sure how, as I just installed the hardcore DM (I'm guessing it's not as hardcore as the DM in P2 was... I've been flying normal this entire time). I put all of the rounds into the engine and gas tank and sent him down with less than fifty rounds fired. Plane number two went in much the same manner; kick rudder right, fire, and down goes my second victim, also on fire. And once more, plane number three proved to be my undoing. Closing range I opened up on him, filling him with at least a hundred-fifty rounds. Only this Fe didn't want to go down. I kept firing and noticed he had suddenly slowed and I was closing on him with alarming speed. I shoved the stick forward as the Fe - originally a few feet over me, started rushing earthward. I think you can see how this is going to end. The Fe slammed into my scout, killing me, destorying the Fe, and sending us both to earth in a broken, bloody, mangled mess. I sat at my desk and face palmed for the second time in two days... There was a time, a lifetime ago, when I used to be really good at this. My German pilots, though, just seem to be a tad klutzy.

Fascinating pictures Olham. Thanks for posting them.

Well... two and a half is more like it. The third was only really downed after being rammed by my plane and sending us both down in a tangled, broken heap. I tell ya, those lead shooting skills from my RB days really help pay the bills. And they're killer in Call of Duty 4 (people still can't figure out how I can lead and kill a target across a map with a G3+red dog sight lol). Ahh Red Baron II, was there anything you couldn't do?

Allow me to second Otto's thumbs up. I approve as well! Man I wish I could skin like that. I remember some of the abominations I made in RBII - I would never dared post them on a forum! lol!

Thanks for the great suggestions gents! I went ahead and set up a campaign pilot for each squadron you plugged. And so far, the results have been deathly! My Jasta 28w pilot, flying in Bloody April, met a rather grisly end on his very first mission, after downing three Sopwith triplanes no less. I was flying a combat air patrol behind friendly lines when we encountered several large flights of British aircraft (I'm still getting used to the notion that I shoot at the roundels, not the crosses!). Three flights - one appearing to be an escort mission with some RE8's, and two other formations flying nearby providing additional cover to the escorts - were filling the skies around our patrol area. Being the flight leader, I decided to take out one of the cover flights, rather than risk being bounced by two escort flights at once if we went for the bombers. The flight attacked beautifully and broke up the formation of British planes in a hurry (do we call them Krumpets on this side? Oh yes, I suppose we do!). I was using the normal DM at the time (I've since installed Hardcore to ramp up the difficulty). It didn't take much to down the first tripe; one good burst was all I needed to send him spiraling out of control. The second tripe ended in much the same way; going into the vertical, stalling slightly, and falling right into my sights. Target number three became a problem. After peppering him several times, I found he was still air worthy and trying to fight. I followed him into a climb, which I had done several times already with great success. As he climbed, his plane yawed to the left and I hosed him with my twin spandaus (It's nice having two guns for a change!). That broke him; fire spewing out, canvas and wood showering everywhere. I tried to kick left rudder to break away but as I did, I stalled and as my Albatros DII hung in mid air, the Triplane rolled and fell right into me, killing us both and bringing an abrupt and embarrassing end to a promising career. So on to the next!...

Great post Olham. I enjoyed reading it while I had my morning coffee. I have some great virtual memories of the N28. I flew it extensively in RBII/3D. It was a solid fighter in both offline and online play and I enjoyed the American campaigns I flew with it. It couldn't turn nearly as fast as the German fighters I came up against, but if I could somehow get them in my sights, I could drop them pretty quickly with those duel Vickers machine guns. I seemed to have better accuracy with the one machine gun mounted off to the side. I never understood why, but I always enjoyed toasting a target with my Nieuport.

Excellent find Creaghorn. Greatly enjoyed it.

Hi chaps! I'm not sure if this has been posted yet or not, but I had to share. The Vintage Aviator has constructed a fully working FE2b from scratch. The website has an entire section devoted to the construction and flight of the new plane, including video. Here's a link. Enjoy! The Vintage Aviator: Fe2b Flight

Oh man, I remember that day. Wasn't pretty...

I also voted for OK. I find the sim nicely balanced - though I wouldn't mind slightly less accurate ground fire. They were using highly inaccurate weapons at the time. Otherwise, I think it's excellent! The guys at Treyarch could learn a lesson from the OFF developers. Their game, Call of Duty World at War, once featured tanks on their online hardcore maps. Apparently, some kids started complaining that the game was too hard and just like that, out of nowhere, the tanks just disappeared one day. No announcements, no asking, no polling, just poof - no tanks. A decision passed down from a heavy-handed dev who obviously didn't care what the others thought. If only all developers could adopt the flexiable, democratic, and open-minded approach of OFF.

I had gotten so used to clicking the 20-24 bracket and alas... I am 27. Moving on up... You older chaps can commence with the traditional "throwing of the rotton fruit".

I'll add in my thoughts from research I've done on the various types of WWI fighters. I don't have figures on Rate of Climb but I can offer some insight - with a grain of salt of course. The argument that the Dr1 could out climb the SE5a is dependent on one thing - that the Fokker would be unassailed long enough to climb without having to turn back into the fight to defend itself. If engaged with a fast boom and zoom fighter like the SE5a, this would be hard to do, I imagine. And, if attacking superior numbers, like in the case of Werner Voss - I would say that the opportunity to disengage is nearly impossible. Could the Fokker climb faster? Let's argue that it can. So Voss has to disengage not by diving out of the fight, which would give him tremendous speed (if he was flying a scout like the Fokker D7), or even out run the SE5 (which was one of the fastest scouts of the war), he can only try to climb away. And while being shot at, this, in my honest opinion, is the least successful method for getting out of a scrap. I hold the following view. The Sopwith Camel and Fokker Dr1 were both excellent dogfighters if used by gifted aviators. No doubt Voss had a God-given talent with that plane to hold a half dozen SE5a's flown by experienced, gifted British pilots to a stand still. Likewise, the Sopwith Camel could outturn nearly every other fighter of the war. The problem you face as a WWI aviator is that you do not want to dogfight. A dogfight signifies that you have gotten yourself into a mess and the only way out is to kill or be killed. As a World War I pilot, the ideal way to end a fight is to assail your opponent from behind, out of the sun, and to kill him before he ever knows you're there. Hit hard, fast, and get out. Lingering in a furball only increases your chances of being killed. Disengaging then becomes of paramount importance to whatever plane your flying. And neither of these planes could really disengage - they were far too slow. Meaning if you were fighting a Fokker D7 in a Camel, you had to shoot him down. Barring that or the German leaving you be, there was no way out. In a Fokker, you were faced with the same problems if you were jumped by a flight of SE5's. Either you shot them all down - or enough of them that the rest fled - which they actually could with their aircraft - or you died. It was that simple. I think we as historians get caught up about the "on paper" stats of an individual plane. This type can climb 100 feet higher at a faster rate than the other plane. The inherent problem is that these climb rates are achieved under ideal conditions - something I wouldn't call being shot at while engaged over enemy lines. On paper I think the Fokker Dr1 has some useful traits in a dogfight. But in reality? The plane is crippled by drag and a complete lack of speed. You could strap on a 1000 hp engine to the front of a Fokker Dr1, and it's not going to go any faster. If you cannot disengage from a dogfight, you are piloting your own casket.

I remember the original HASP readme file had a dedication to her - something about "time for pizza" or something to that effect. Time really goes by in a hurry.

Wow, sounds good to me Catfish. All of my early PC games (save Wolfenstein 3D, but who didn't have that??) were sims. F1, flying, sub sim (Seawolf), etc. It'll be nice to get a few more sims to compliment OFF on my new PC. I'll see if I can pick it up.

One of my all time favourite Python skits! Right up there with the Cheese Shop.

Quite welcome Mate. Now there's a load screen I remember quite well! I looked at that one for quite some time! I can't remember which version that is... as I started flying the Resurrection patch exclusively in HASP for the last year or so that it was on my old computer. I would still fire up RB3D every now and again but on my Vista gaming rig it just runs very unevenly. If I roll my aircraft, I zip up to warp speed as soon as sky is visible and back into the 30fps range once I'm looking at land. Padlocking also seems to speed things up irregularly. I can't seem to control it. It's not a steady increase - it's very erratic. Oh well, OFF beckons and as I've said, it feels very much like the grand old days of RBII to me - but only so much more than I ever imagined it could be!

I certainly do! Especially if I'm driving with the sun at my back - never know what might jump you from there!

I should hasten to add that my 6 hour GTR2 stint was back during my days of being very, very single. I have since found a girlfriend who actually likes OFF and have started to make a full recovery ;)

That's... disturbing, but not that surprising. I once tried to do a 24 hour stint in GTR2's 24 Hours of Spa - unsuccessfully I should add. I crashed out in hour six from exhaustion. Oops. Looks like SH3 is quite a good sim. Not to get too far off topic but, does it run under Vista? I might need to add this to my collection.

I'm resisting the urge to make another CaptSopwith: Any Landing sig pic out of that one...

Ever take your wrist watch and sync it with the time in the sim? Then check your waypoints by your watch, rather than the sim? Yeah, we're both long gone, but in good company.

Rabu, I used your 4-Seasons terrain set in every patch I used - from WFP to HASP to my "classic collection" from Beery, WingStrut, and Baron von Benz. A very big Salute to you, sir.

Remarkable, remarkable collection. Now you're just leaving my jaw on the desk.

Yikes! That is a harsh ending!