Indeed, for the moment, I am very happy with RoF, WoFF and FE2.
The planeset of flying circus does not interest me as I am mostly interested in French vs German air battles
As a side note, I am reading this book :
It is actually a sum of reports of the French Army levels and Army Corps level HQ on the use of air power during "Nivelle Offensive" in April 1917 to Malmaison Battle (September 1917 ?).
Very interesting as it explains that though the French Air Force was not perfect at this time, its main reason for failure was that the offensive preparation started at bad weather with lot of consequences :
- delay in arrival of Fighter Squadrons
- losses and damages by accident
-efficiency of artillery spotting and reconnaissance
It is interesting to read that the German used jamming against artillery spotting missions.
The French air force were ok in terms of fighters (most of them were Spads), but for 2-seaters, they still had Caudron G4 and Farman F40, which were outdated. They also used Salmson Moisneaux, but they were unreliable. The Caudron R4 was very dangerous against potential attackers.
Tactically, the main problem was that the 2-seaters operated singly and at this time, it was rated as very difficult to coordinate escort operations (differences in performances of the planes, lack of communication ...), having 2 two-seaters or more (one performing the mission, the other providing close protection), as did the german was better.
A single plane mission meant that whenever it was involved in combat (and even victorious), the 2 seater had to give up the mission.
Only Army levels missions were given close escort and in this case, they were usually "safe"
The french method of protection was actually similar "sweep" or "cap" : it consisted in having fighters patrolling a sector and attacking any ennemy plane especially those attacking 2 seaters "at work".