Siggi

I've been snarfing pics off the net for a few years, they're part of my extensive collection. I'm a con...cono...collector, innit.

This sim continues to blow me away. We were tasked with bombing an enemy airfield. Three of us in B1s with three 1 1/2 Strutters as escort, got the field in sight and were engaged by a large group of Halbs. There were planes all over the place. I managed to get my bombs away and then made for the lines, keeping an eye on my tail. Then I made out a plane coming right at me and right at the moment I applied full aileron and kicked the rudder he opened up on me. I was genuinely bricking it as I watched the smoke-trails come at me and then flash past where my left wings had just been. Got onto his tail and got a couple of bursts into him before I pulled up. The next five minutes were nerve-wracking as I tried to regain height and get back over the lines, all the while with aircraft dog-fighting around, above and below. Got over the lines ok at about 5000ft and noticed archie going off in the distance. Put my glasses towards it and spotted four Rolands at about 2000ft heading left to right. At this point I'm thinking "I'm on a bombing mission, I'm not obliged to go after them..." But a perverse sense of virtual duty came over me. I really didn't want to engage them, because I know how it usually ends. But I turned and put the nose down, both my flight with me. By the time we reached them they were turning themselves and I slotted into the wake of the nearest and started shooting from about 300 yards. Then they started shooting back and I could hear the occasional 'twangs' as rounds went through my kite. I was laying it on thick myself, pretty much willing the belt to run dry so I could call it a day and get out of it. Most of my rounds were going wide but I could see a few puffs of dust coming off him. I got to within about fifty yards of him, praying I'd hit his gunner. Then my gun ran out of ammo and I broke off. Motor still running! Miracle! Two of these buggers then followed us all the way back to our field, smoking one of our escort about two miles behind us. They actually strafed me after I'd landed! I didn't think I'd got a kill, but the claim-form came up, much to my suprise, so I claimed the Roland. But neither he nor the Halb had looked to be in trouble after I'd shot at them. The Roland got the worst of it though, and I can only assume I forced him down with damage. There were some genuinely stressful moments in that mission, and as an organic whole of an experience it was truly superb. Bloody trains running along, the barrages on the front, the sound, the visuals, the action. This is, to date (since 1994), the best PC game I have owned.

This weekend gone, the first of the DiD campaign, was put underway with a magnificent showing from all involved. And casualties were suprisingly light, with only one death and one capture.

Commiserations old chap. But, looking on the bright side, better a young sprog with only a couple of hours under his belt. It still hurts, but not as bad as an old vet with a couple of hundred.

Sub Flt Lt Sidney Williams 2 RNAS St Pol sur Mer 29th October 1916 08.15hrs Enemy planes over the field, took off with flight to engage. Long bursts into two Albatross scouts which went down into woods near Capelle le Grande. 11.30hrs Enemy planes reported near the field, took off with flight to engage but could find nothing at our low altitude, returned without incident. ______________________________________________________________ 30th October 1916 15.20hrs Arty Obbo. Our flight engaged by at least five Fokker Eindeckers at 6000ft, approx five miles west of Lille. We were escorted by DH2 scouts. During the fight over our obbo station I fired into three EIIIs and drove them down. I did not follow, prefering to maintain the safety of my altitude. Three of my chaps reported seeing an EIII I had fired into going into the ground, but without knowing if they'd all seen one or seperately saw three I can make only one claim in good conscience. The fight lasted at least ten minutes with both my chaps and the DH2s wheeling around ever lower with the EIIIs. Half an hour later I spotted two trying to close with us at 5000ft as we left our station to return home but they gave up when we outran them. Our flight returned safely without losses. ___________________________________________________________________ 1st November 1916 10.00hrs Recce flight. Engaged by a flight of Alb DII a good 20 miles on our side of the lines. One got through our escort and tried to engage me, I turned into him and got on his tail and drove him down from 6000ft to 5000ft with a number of bursts. Large pieces came off him but nobody saw what happened to him after that. Climbed back to height and made our way to our station over the lines and took notes for 20 minutes or so. On the return flight, at almost the exact same position as our outward leg, a lone DII engaged us. I got onto his tail and chased him down to 3000ft with multiple bursts and observed him crash into the ground. Diary note. Today was my second trip over the lines. The noise of the barrage is frightful, even at 6000ft. There is a pall of smoke and the smell! Then the stress of constantly having to look out for enemy machines, it does tire one. We were escorted by our latest type, four Sopwith Pups. A very good looking machine. They kept the DIIs off our backs and we lost sight of them before arriving over the lines, but shortly thereafter a single one reappeared and stayed with us for a while. I do hope the others were ok. I now have four claims pending, two Eindeckers and two DIIs. None I've encountered so far have put up much of a show, they all appear to have been flown by novice pilots. Long may that continue, I have no illusions about my own skills. ______________________________________________________________ 2nd November 1916. 09.18hrs. Airfield Bombing. three-plane flight, three-plane escort. Intercepted by Halbs over the enemy field. Got the bombs away ok but unable to watch for effect as had to engage the Halbs. Drove one down 1000ft with a few bursts. Upon return leg engaged flight of four Roland two-seaters at 2000ft behind our lines, emptied belt into one who was observed shortly thereafter to crashland in no-mans land. _________________________________________________________________ 3rd November 1916. 14.06hrs. Preparing for takeoff when our field was attacked by enemy scouts. Some of the chaps got up but I never got my motor started and made for cover (slit-trench). Our chaps brought down four of the bastards. Max Cutter got two and ended up in the drink. _________________________________________________________________ 4th November 1916. 09.27hrs. Recce over the lines at 5000ft, no air contact, all returned safely. Escort by Fe2s who were barely able to keep up with us. _________________________________________________________________ 5th November 1916. 09.08hrs. Field hit by strafers at take-off, aborted and ran to trenches. 12.29hrs. Received new planes today, two-seater Strutters, along with new personnel to man the rear guns. After re-fueling them we were straight out on a strike against an enemy airfield at Longavesnes. We were attacked by Halbs on two occasions, the second directly over the target (which I missed with my bombs from 5000ft), but in both cases they made only one pass before hanging around out of range for a while and then making off. We took no evasive action, I kept our flight of four straight and level so as to concentrate our defensive fire and not split the flight into easy individual targets. Our escort was conspicuous by it's absence until we'd left the target, the planes shadowing us from behind about two miles out turned out not to be Halbs as we'd originally thought but the Be2s supposedly escorting us. We all returned safely but the strike was a bit of a dud I'm afraid. _________________________________________________________________ 6th November 1916. 09.57hrs. Arty obbo at 5000ft over Festubert. Driving rain. Three-plane flight. Uneventful, not even much of a show from archie. Brought fire down on a bosche battery. __________________________________________________________________ 7th November 1916. 14.53hrs. Went up under an umbrella of strafing Halbs and put down in a nearby field two minutes later with a bullet in a cylinder. _________________________________________________________________ 8th November 1916. 10.17hrs. Arty obbo. Two wingmen, three N16 escort. Engaged over the lines at 5000ft by Halbs with red wheel-covers. I got into a fight with one which went down to about 2000ft until I hit the pilot. He went down in a shallow glide into no-man's land. All returned safely.

There's some excellent stuff in there, looking forward to getting it.

The first collision with it seriously impaired your short-term memory I take it.

Red Dog, are you aware the campaign in which you're flying has this: http://www.hetzer.talktalk.net/ ?

I don't want it, it's just on offer for those who wish to make use of it.

What beverage is that? Never mind, I found it: http://www.thedrinkshop.com/products/nlpdetail.php?prodid=751

I second that.

Probably. I believe the Saitek FFB drivers are generic and mine certainly don't work in W7.

Please be aware, the game's campaign may miss Oct 31st. I don't know if this was just my campaign missing a day because of bad weather or something, or it's an engine/OFF-campaign limitation, but either way there may be no DiD flying available for saturday (certainly isn't for me at least).

1) Only if one jams. 2) I've seen troops only marching on roads and at airfields manning AA. There are also trucks, tanks and trains. If you fly low over any enemy territory you will be engaged by any MGs and rifles within range. 3) Yes, all and any crew can be killed.

I'm using the latest, the 191.07s. I'm a bit leery of going back to anything earlier in case it makes things worse.

Try high-lighting everything in the file, right-click and save it, then paste that into a brand-new notepad page. Delete the one in the game (that you just copied from) and save the new one you just made (with the date modded) into the game with correct file-name (same name as the original you just deleted). That should get you around whatever glitch it is you're experiencing. Maybe better than deleting the original, just remove it to some other location, just in case.

When you get to the fighters it's as much as when they add your name to their killboard it's for what you score with them. Your total stats are kept back at HQ (my DiD site), so to speak.

It's not a race or competition chaps. Imagine you are filtering into the squadron/Jasta over a period of days, you're not all obliged or expected to start on the exact same one. If you don't arrive at your unit until 1st nov (or later) that's ok.

From which company did you order it? I've had controllers come with european connectors, but they always had a UK adapter supplied with them.

Yes, I agree, what's up with our famous Flash Braveheart? Too many young fillies on the go, not enough time to fly I'd wager.

Oops. Ahem. Bit of a cock-up. It would appear the RNAS-2 bombers are single-seater Strutters until nov 5th. I had assumed, while testing in QC for 29th oct, that the planes to choose from in the list were the Strutter and Strutter-B1 (early Strutter 2-seater and late Strutter 1 1/2 2-seater). I chose the Strutter, thinking the B1 was the 1 1/2. Turns out the B1 is a 1-seater bomber. So first mission, it's a scramble. I take off and get clear, look over my shoulder to check my tail and..."WTB?! Where's my bally gunner?! " Major consternation, I'm flying a barge in the middle of a hornet's nest and have no rear defence. Sorry chaps, if you choose to fly from now you might find it a bit hairier than it should have been until nov 5th. Fog of war and all that though, pip pip! I did get two claims in however.

Apart from a few people who haven't yet submitted their persona names, which can be done with their first live combat-report anyway, I believe everything is done and ready to go. So I can see no reason why this can't go live right now and in good time for this weekend. For those who have already set their campaigns up to start from nov 5th, Creaghorn has outlined earlier in this thread (PAGE 10) the simple method of editing a text-file to input a different date (a 30-second job). The RNAS, up to nov 4th, are flying the earlier-model Strutter but it's pretty much the exact same plane as the 1 1/2-Strutter. So chaps, from this day of our lord Oct 29th 1916/2009, sync your game-date with today's and have at it.

Here's where I got my Knights Cross a few years ago, solid-silver frame on an iron core, made on one of the genuine WW2 jigs apparently: http://www.nicholasmorigi.com Put pour le merite into their search engine (page-link doesn't work, sorry), they have a few. The solid-silver one costs a fortune but I'm not impressed with it's enamel-work, looks a bit rough.

Personal markings/colour-schemes are the C.O.s' business.

No, nope, nein, nix, niet, nada, nish-nippori.