Siggi

I'm doing it manually, I've heard nothing back from Jetlag, and nor has anyone else. To be honest the manual way looks better, the killboard-omatic is purely functional and offers no period ambiance.

No, the patch won't harm your campaign etc. :yes:

The rules page has been updated, all should now be perfectly clear. :yes: Alex, could you make this a sticky please? :)

Just remember chaps that in this sim you are, effectively, already aces compared to the real pilots. It's not that the guns/bullets are doing unrealistic damage, it's that you're able to get onto their tails and put rounds into them at all. The flip-side is that one good burst into your kite will put you out of action almost immediately. The three dogfights I just had in QC were the best and most authentic-feeling I've had yet.

Bloody hell! Now that's more like it! I ran three QCs back-to-back, nme in my Camel vs six AlbDVs at 10,000ft. First thing I noticed was the crafty buggers split up into two flights of three before we were anywhere near each other, one flight came head-on while the other went wide to flank me. 2nd) They didn't dive for the deck. This dogfight started high and went down very gradually (naturally). 3rd) Two good bursts puts them down more often than not. 4th) They seemed more aggressive and competant. 5th) I let the last one get on my tail and put a burst into me. S'trewth! That was me finished, went down out of control and hit the ground hard (but didn't die...noticed this again later, has death been disabled in QC? If so, good job). Second or third dogfight, I didn't have to let one get me, I was got anyway. Managed to put down, but it was close. The Albs also seem to fly faster, I wasn't catching them so easily. All in all, first impressions, that was a bloody blast. Edge of the seat stuff. It was fast, furious and dangerous. I will NOT be engaging multiple a/c on my own in Campaign mode anymore. You take one good burst, you are toast now. Excellent work you chaps, seriously impressed. It feels so much more authentic now.

I left a bit out of the report form (now amended) and clarified the DiD rating bit: DiD Combat Reports. Please submit your combat/stat updates to: *** (as it appears on the killboard site) *** Please use the following format and information: In-game date (month and year only). Squad (Eg, RFC54) Forum Nik/Callsign. DiD Rating (Eg DiD/T). Pilot name. Rank. A/C. Number of missions flown. Number of hours flown (rounded down to whole number). Number of claims. Number of confirmed kills. Awards given. Please update the missing bits in your next reports.

Yes, it's in the rules now, you can have W and/or T and/or L or any combination thereof. If you're really hard you can have just DiD. ;)

I have no idea how many people are playing DiD, but for those who are (if any) the following question... Would you like a killboard? I'm currently trying to get hold of my JG boss, who developed an interactive online killboard, but his current whereabouts are unknown (he's gone AWOL effectively). Even if/when I do manage to get hold of him there's no guarantee he'll do the biz, or that I'll be able to configure it myself (I'm no scripting expert, though I know a bit and might be able to do it myself). The alternative, temporary or permanent, would be for me to run one manually (as I have done in the past, and on a much bigger scale). Essentially pilots would email me their results, on a mission-by-mission basis, or cumulatively after a number of missions, and I would update their stats manually. It's nothing more than an added dimension of fun, a central public location where all DiD pilots (and anyone else who's interested) can see their running tallies (missions, hours, claims, kills, medals etc). If enough of you are interested I'll set it up. Otherwise no worries and as you were. :)

It's up: http://www.hetzer.talktalk.net/index.html I've no doubt it could do with a bit of titivating here and there, but apart from that it's ready to go. If anyone sees anything that needs fixing or clarifying (rules) please post here, thanks.

Bless you Alex. No support needed thankyou mate. The manual one should work ok on my cheap-ass ISP's server, and if I ever get my hands on Jetlag's Killboard-omatic again I'll get a hosting package. :yes: I don't want to run both a combined board and four seperate ones, it would double the workload (duplicate entries for all pilots). I recall with fear and trepidation the days when I was manually running my online war (around 200 active pilots at any one time) and that was two solid hours every single morning (killboard and stat updates), plus another hour or so every evening (mission building).

The automatic board has the functions you describe, but I have still heard nothing back from the chap who developed it. So it's going to be manual. I'm going to go with seperate boards for each nationality, with a combined ace board for those who have died or been captured and have a minimum of five kills. Entries on that will be permanent. Entries on the regular boards will be cleared upon death or capture. I've got most of it done now. One unfortunate thing is I've discovered Dreamweaver has done away with forms that submit to an email address and now require server-side handling, involving special code. I'll be hosting this board on a bog-standard ISP server that provides zero specialist functionality (cgi, php, mysql etc), so submissions will be via standard email-to-email. Not a biggie, just it would have been nice to have a proper form on the site. I should have it up sometime tonight. :yes:

I'm pretty sure you can run a campaign pilot at any realism level, then change the settings and his log shows that new rating, regardless of what he was run at before. I've no interest, either way, in running checks. If somebody wants to run at 0% realism, with every aid going, and still claim he's playing DiD, good luck to him. Gous, I may go with your idea. Considering all the hardware issues and personal issues people have it may be the only viable option. DiD = pure DiD. W = Warp T = TAC L = Labels Giving, for example, DiD/T DiD/W DiD/TW and so on, with realism always having to be at least 100%, however it is derived (there are various combinations of settings that give it). I've got four killboards done, one for each nationality, but I'm still undecided which way to go with that, seperate ones for each nationality or a single one with everyone mixed. What are the thoughts on that?

The DiD rules for OFF will be posted on the site, and will be strictly defined such as to remove all and any ambiguity. :yes: I would like to attempt to reach a consensus on some aspects. What do you chaps want to be the main thrust of your DiD experience? Survivability? Missions flown? Hours flown? Or kills made? On first inspection this question may seem redundant. It's all about the kills, yes? Or how was it in reality, for a real pilot...? With the TAC off, combat will be the exception rather than the rule. With the TAC on, combat will be the rule rather than the exception. TAC on aids navigation if you are flight-leader. TAC off doesn't matter re navigation if you are flight-follower. Should the DiD rule be that you have to be flight-follower? Does the sim work well enough now to allow that as a reliable function? If it does I suspect TAC off will still result in more combats than if you go TAC off as flight-leader. What I'm getting at here is do you want kills to be rarer and thus of more value achievement-wise, and go for hours as the greater yardstick of success, or do you want it a bit more full-on and focus on claims/kills? I know I've mentioned "consensus", but that's pie-in-the-sky probably. Given all the possible combinations of options everyone is going to end up with something that isn't quite perfectly to their liking. The solution to that would be as it has been in the past, for me to just say "this is the most overall realistic solution and this is how it's going to be, like it or lump it..." But, if at least a consensus on "hours or kills" can be reached I can configure the rules accordingly. Please give me your thoughts.

Not me, I do mainly cures for throatache. :nyam:

Well, one can't. It's a matter of trust and honour. The only person being cheated, really, is the person who cheats.

Our new banner is a work of art, personally I wouldn't want it swapped for anything now we have it. :)

Since around 11am this morning the CA site was down for me, got various "page not found" type errors. I assumed it was a temporary outage. But finally, after checking other forums for possible queries, and seeing none, I thought something odd was up. I cleared all my CA cookies and other such files and CA now works again. Upon getting back in I see no new posts since this morning and suspect it's not just me who's had the problem? Anyone reading this?

Woh, server carpet-bombing. :D

If anyone is ever likely to need a host, for their website or whatever, avoid these crooks. I've had at least two domain packages with them in the past, both terminated after the initial term (paid for for two years each, up front). I still own one of the domain names and I thought I'd set up a new package with them, using the same domain. Apparently, according to them, I never cancelled the last one at the end of the two-year term (I did in fact) and they continued to try and bill my card. I was actually completely unaware they were one of those companies that tried to pull that particular scam, but they now tell me it was "in the terms and conditions". Yeah, and we all know about that little wheeze, don't we. ;) So, they tell me I'm £109 in arrears, they won't set me up with a new package or release the domain (not bothered about that) unless I pay it and would rather lose the new business I was going to put their way (£160's worth). The first chap I was speaking to refused to let me speak to the manager, got arsey, and hung up on me when I informed him I was recording the call. The second chap basically admitted something had been screwed up when I terminated the account at the end of the two years but said there was nothing they could do now to sort it out. The basic point is this, they'll take your money up front for the initial term (one or two years), and then bill you without your authority at the end of that term, citing they have the right because it's (hidden) in the "terms & conditions". Avoid them. Not only do they engage in that fraudulent practice, they are rude on the phone and incapable of sorting any of it out to the customer's satisfaction. I'm still laughing at how they'd rather throw new business down the pan AND suffer bad word-of-mouth. Anyway, need a new host...any good unlimited-bandwidth UK hosts who charge an upfront annual fee? Streamline were at least good at that.

A failed attempt to reach a site can sometimes generate a corrupt cookie or other file (where the initial failure was caused by something up with the site), which renders all subsequent attempts failures too.

I posted about it only because of the timing. I've been trying on and off all day but it only worked again immediately after I'd cleared all the cookies. Could be purely coincidental of course, but in case not I figured the cure (if it was such) would be worth posting. :)

It is truly superb!

I've posted in the CFS3 forum at SoH, just in case.

Testing... name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src=" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="445" height="364"></embed></object>"> name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src=" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="445" height="364"></embed></object>" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="425" height="350"> Yay! :) Never worked for me at SoH.

Wow! Forum as art. Seriously quality work mate.