Bandy

UPDATED: These maps now have all the villages that appear rendered in game in No-Man's-Land (but not on the in-game map), as well as names for most rivers and canals, and a scale and compass rose.
 
This zipped file contains 8 smaller scale, well detailed, easily legible and printable on 8.5" x 11" paper, 'sector' map files for Rise of Flight.
 
To my knowledge these maps are NOW the most up to date and accurate maps based on the in-game map itself, and reflect village, town, and city updates that came with the fall tiles patch.
 
If you wish a copy of the master Photoshop file, see the other download here.
 
Thanks to the developers for such a beautiful flight simulator, and to all the third party contributors. Thanks to Combat Ace, my first flight sim home.

This file is an updated version of the whole Rise of Flight Map in Photoshop format. The original RoF Photoshop map file is available at the official forum, but is out of date for place names etc... Both files are really big, around 1.3 GB, and may crash weaker systems, so beware.
 
I have updated all airfield/village/town/city names and placements according to the in-game map, as well as painstakingly added and named those villages in No-Man's-Land that do not show up on the in-game map.
 
I have also added names for most of the river and canals, as well as a few famous forests involved in WWI such as 'Bois de Ploegsteert' (Battle of Paschendale), and lakes and ponds where it seemed appropriate.
 
Warning: there may be mistakes in exact location or spelling of names. Let me know and I will correct them.
 
And finally, I have made personal changes to the graphical appearance of the map. It may not suit your taste, so simply copy the 'style' of the original map layers, or just copy the updated 'NAMES & AIRFIELDS' layer from my file to the original RoF map file.
 
Many thanks to the developers for releasing the original PS file, and for such a beautiful simulator.
 
Cheers

This is a historical skin (see image insert), although the Nationality is unknown. Online opinions vary; it could be a Russian N17, although the cockade under the upper wing in the B&W photo suggests a red outer circle.

As the title says, here are the historic pilot's notes for the Boultan-Paul Defiant. I uploaded the Spitfire IIa & IIb Pilot's notes much early [http://combatace.com/files/file/4938-historic-pilots-notes-for-spitfire-iia-iib/], and always meant to get around to hitting all the BoB aircraft. Looking forward to CoD... Enjoy!

Read Me for First Eagles Spring, Summer, and Fall modded town and water tiles by Bandy.
 
These tiles only go with Jan Tuma's seasonal terrain tiles mod.
As the title says, these are only for Spring, Summer, and Fall;
winter is a work in progress.
 
Many thanks go to Jan Tuma for creating his FE seasonal town tiles that,
to me at least, have made a huge difference in the feel of the sim.
Thanks to TK and friends, and all 3rd party modders who make this a great community.
 
The town tiles are 1024 x 1024 in order to improve certain textures.
All other non-town tiles in this mod are 512 x 512. Resize as you require.
 
The water tiles replace the "turquoise" shaded water with a darker blue-gray.
If you like turquoise, then let me know and I will render a version with that colour.
I noticed a long time ago that one of the Flanders Town.tod files was mislabelled; a
replacement is provided.
 
To Install:
1) Back up your terrain folder.
2) Unzip this download and drag the corresponding folders into the
/Terrain/seasonal_tiles folder, and the /Terrain/Flanders folder
overwriting the files when prompted.
3) Fly!
 
Caveats:
I could not extensively test these tiles in all seasons and all terrains, I simply do
not have that much free time, so please post any errors or tweaks you think are required.
 
Some trees and buildings do funky things at the tile margins; short story, this is unavoidable.
I would like to have shifted the "statues" or monuments in some of the town squares,
but did not. If you can do this, that would be sincerely appreciated.
 
Dog fighting over towns is really enjoyable!

See the post on the FE forum for more detail...
 
To install these BETA summer season town tiles into Jan Tuma's existing install:
 
Unzip and back up your ...\terrain\seasonal\early summer folder
(the tiles may work in the spring season and others, I have not tried yet...)
 
Drag these .bmp and .tga files into the active sim folder and replace old tiles.
 
Fly in July!
 
If 1024 x 1024 size is too intensive for your system,
resize in a photoediting program to 512 x 512 such as Gimp (shareware that mimicks Photoshop).
 
As mentioned on forum, I plan to tweak colours for each season as time permits,
but am willing to share the Photoshop files should someone be willing to help.
 
Cheers!

Hello!
 
This is a simple touch up job of some tiles from Edward’s Photorealistic tile set for Flanders [http://forum.combatace.com/index.php?app=downloads&showfile=4424], although surprise yourself and definitely try these tiles in Gepard's Vogesen terrain [http://forum.combatace.com/index.php?app=downloads&showfile=5933], and other terrains as well.
 
Thank you Edward and all those who contributed to the Flanders environment and campaigns, TK and those unnamed at Thirdwire, and thank you Mike Dora for your original idea to redo the coastal tiles for consistency and your feedback and encouragement. Apologies if I have inadvertently forgotten to thank somebody, but thank you to all 3rd party moddders.
 
While the new tile sets are certainly welcome (thank you gentlemen!), they come at a cost for some people with old(er) systems. The photorealistic tile set still looks great with the new atmospheric mods and consistently runs superbly. If your system can take the extra load make sure you try Stary’s Flightengine.ini mod to push the horizon out and greatly reduce the ugly gray band. Thank you Stary, those few simple lines of code have rejuvenated FE for me, and I am sure for others as well.
 
Included are two versions of Flanders coastal tiles (redone for consistent sea colour) that have: 1) a subtle turquoise drop shadow to add visual interest and fake depth to the beach, and 2) coastal tiles without drop shadow for those who've seen the channel coast! Also retouched are coast trench tiles, Frairfield tile to blend in more with surroundings, all the river tiles for consistent colour, and miscellaneous touch ups to various ground bmp tiles. Also included are Rhein river photoreal tiles for Vogensen.
 
Copy to backup your Flanders and Vogesen terrain folder (to return to if you don’t like, or something ugly happens) and simply overwrite the old tiles. Any problems please PM me here, but remember, in life nothing is perfect...

Fly in a snowy, or spring, or fall Vogesen terrain!!!
 
Contained in this download are 5 folders (plus stock Vogesen FRRhine tiles) containing "seasonal" Rhine River tiles to round out Gepard's excellent Vogesen Terrain. Vogesen.ini already points to the Cambrai terrain folder, so it is simple ini edit as outlined below. Provided are the modded seasonal Rhine River tiles, but if you want to use these Rhine tiles, then you must download other 3rd party tile sets for FE as below, and/or modify stock ..\Terrain\Cambrai\.. 3rd Wire folders as mentioned:
 
"Deep Snow" season (Thanks to Max188 for Verdun winter tiles)
"Snow" (Thanks to Edward for Verdun winter tiles, which I slightly modded for "Replacement Cambrai Snow Tiles" download)
"Spring" (Thanks to flyguy2 for Verdun spring)
"Summer" (rename 3rd Wire's "Spring" Folder to "Summer")
"Fall" (is stock 3rdWire, leave folder alone, many thanks to TK!)
 
If you choose to be conservative, use only the stock seasonal folders in the Cambrai Terrain (though these Rhine winter tiles are not compatible with 3rd Wire Snow tiles at all). Mix and match, or for more variety download all the seasonal tilesets mentioned above, then make/rename seasonal folders within the Cambrai Terrain folder as listed above, add the 3rd party tile sets, as well as the appropriate FRRhine tiles in THIS download to the appropriate season, and then edit the Vogesen.ini as below.
 
Follow these Combat Ace links for additional instructions for making/editing seasonal tile sets [http://forum.combatace.com/index.php?showtopic=33064]
and if you choose tile set consolidation [http://forum.combatace.com/index.php?showtopic=35074]. PM me at CA if any problems.
 
BACK UP ANY FOLDERS or INI's BEFORE YOU MOD...
 
Example TERRAIN.ini edit follows, only replace the portions involving code from [season001] to [season005] or whatever you choose to do.
The dates the 5 seasonal tile sets will show up are changed to discrete months for play testing in single mission; if you reduce the number of seasons, make sure the dates add up, ie: alter the seasonal start-end dates to suit your preference...
 
.
.
.
[season001]
//try Max188's hi-res (512 x 512) winter tiles in this folder.
Directory=..\wwiCambrai\Deep Snow <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Make sure this line is present
StartDate=1/1
EndDate=2/26
ScatteredChance=20
BrokenChance=25
OvercastChance=25
InclementChance=3
 
[season002]
//try flyguy2's Spring tiles...
Directory=..wwi\Cambrai\Spring <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Make sure this line is present
StartDate=02/27
EndDate=05/31
ScatteredChance=40
BrokenChance=25
OvercastChance=10
InclementChance=3
 
[season003]
//Rename 3rdWire's stock Spring folder to Summer, ie: use 3rd Wire "Spring" tiles for "Summer" season
Directory=..wwi\Cambrai\Summer <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Make sure this line is present
StartDate=06/01
EndDate=08/31
ScatteredChance=25
BrokenChance=40
OvercastChance=10
InclementChance=3
 
[season004]
//Retain stock 3rdWire Fall Folder.
Directory=..\wwi\Cambrai\Fall <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Make sure this line is present
StartDate=09/01
EndDate=10/31
ScatteredChance=25
BrokenChance=40
OvercastChance=10
InclementChance=3
 
[season005]
//try "Replacement Cambrai Snow tiles" by me, based on Edward's winter tile set
Directory=..\wwi\Cambrai\Snow <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Make sure this line is present
StartDate=11/01
EndDate=12/31
ScatteredChance=25
BrokenChance=40
OvercastChance=10
InclementChance=3

I do not like the look of the stock "Snow" tiles for Cambrai,
but really liked the earlier efforts of Edward and Max188 to make snow for Verdun.
 
I was inspired by my earlier experiences with Edward's excellent winter tiles,
so I cleaned some of them up, and made the 30+ other tiles required for use in Cambrai.
They are not perfect, to paraphrase, most things in life are not...
 
Here they are, simply backup your stock ..Terrain/Cambrai/Snow folder
and replace it with this one to try it out.
 
They will still also work in Verdun, though some tiles not required.
 
NB:
I also included a WWIVerdun.ini that will make seasonal changes for that terrain.
Follow the directions //commented within the ini itself,
and don't forget to add the fifth season folder "Deep Snow" to the ..Terrain/Verdun folder.
 
Thank you to Edward and other fine modders for the inspiration and your hard work, and of course TK.
PM me here at CA if there are issues.

Original Pilot's Notes for the Spitfire IIA & IIB from the Air Ministry, dated July 1940 on the cusp of the Battle Of Britain.
 
This is like an "owner's manual" for the Spitfire. Section 1 contains sections on the Controls, Engine, Cockpit [including 2 B&W images of the port and starboard side of the pit], Operational Equipment, and Wireless.
 
Section 2 contains "Handling and Flying Notes for Pilot", and has sections on Starting the Engine, Taxying, Taking-Off, Climbing, General Flying, Stalling, Spinning, Diving, Aerobatics, Combat Manoeuvres [sic], Landing, et cetera... Sorry, there are no page numbers on the original.
 
I thought this document important enough to include in the download section, rather than a link in a thread that will be subsequently buried. I hope you all agree. I plan on delving into the excellent library and archives I have access to and provide more gems like this.