Rambler 1-1

As some of you may have noticed (probably not- but "As most of you didn't notice" sounds like a crappy way to start a paragraph) , I was gone for a while after a virus and subsequent hard drive crash that no ammount of backing up could have prevented. However, perserverance prevailed and I got this thing I call a computer back online. No more mods for me, this thing just goes belly-up as soon as I put in anything new. Anyway, I got back on here and I noticed that a few things have changed. First, where the heck is USAFBLT, and who's this "Dave" guy? Second, all these guys who were "junior members" when I last saw them have now graduated to "Elite Members" and the like. They grow up so fast! Third, what's the deal with the new smilies? like who the heck is gonna use or on a regular basis? next, I noticed that somebody finally called themselves "New Guy". Way to go, buddy. Is Baghdad Bob still trying to Jihad us all into oblivion? Also, NO ARROW YET?!?!?! And who here is not running a freaking supercomputer? I could go on... the more I look through here the more questions I have.

I'll just assume that he had a big social life going on and didn't have time for us here, so he deleted his profile so somebody else could use his screen name, and I'll be happily oblivious.

lucky buggers. We have to have a liscence up here (which requires taking a training course) and a permit to use the gun, and we're only allowed to discharge it in an approved area, even with little .22s. The only people allowed to have guns in public are the police, and they only have them for show. They just use tazers, which are getting a bad reputation for killing old farts. However, criminals still have no problem illegally buying high powered hunting rifles and knocking off police with them. How do you enforce a law that says you can't carry firearms if you're not allowed to carry them yourself? Our cops are in a bad position.

waddayameen "left"? did somebody make one too many Canada jokes? Dang, I was hoping to get that east Can map from him.

so, anything else that's changed that I should know about? And still no joy on RunsWithScissors? watabout Sagunay? EDIT: Hey, USAFMTDave, I see you visited my profile on my birthday! I owe you a beer for that one.

What the hell is "Expect Resistance" supposed to mean? "Expect Resistance". Those were the last words out of CAG's mouth after we left the brief. Headwinds? Extra AAA? Jamming airbrakes? I wish he wasn't so damn brief. As I trundled down the runway I was still contemplating the meaning. It was a simple strike mission on some oil tanks just across the line of battle. In over the water at 350 knots, out over friendly land as fast as possible. The MiG bases would see us coming, so in the wake of the scooters was to be a 4-plane escort flight of old F-100s to scare off the inevitable MiG 19s, now tired and battle-worn and likely near the ends of their short operational lives. It was a boring flight in, as usual. The A-4F's quiet engine almost put me to sleep. Number three of the second flight of A-4s had to RTB, his ground crew hadn't armed the bombs. Other than that, the flight was going as planned, with rendevous with the Huns at the planned time. All was looking up untill we were about 8 minutes off target. "Ford lead (me), Watchtower (mission controll). Multiple bandits, 5 O'clock, 7 miles." crap. I nosed over and the two flights of scooters silently followed. The Huns broke off silently as well. I don't see the point of silent defence, if the enemy already knows that they're attacking, but that's not my problem. However, radio silence didn't last long. "HOLY F*CK!" "We're boned" "Jesus! those are -21s!" That's not good. The squads must have been re-equipped. I pushed the throttle into full military, wanting to put as much space between me and those MiGs, and longing for the kick-in-the-butt of afterburners. I told my group to carpet the tanks with their 1000 pounders and then get the hell out, while my wingie and I would clean up after with our rockets. "Roger, lead. Holding bacCRACK" "HOLY s**t! 2'S HAD IT! BREAK! BREAK!" "shutthehellup, three. Slick, you there? do you copy?" "......" "Ford lead, Whatchtower. Multiple bandits, 12 O'clock, 8 miles." I looked back where my wingman should have been. Nothing. Musta been a radar guider. Then I saw them just as my flight unloaded. 8 shiny MiG-21s, coming striaght at us. 12 O'clock high. "Ford flight, break, break! Mig's inbound! drop your load!" "Watchtower, Anvil (the F-100s) lead, requesting assistance!" "watch it! check six, four!" "missile inbound!" "Goin' for guns! hot-" "I GOT 'IM!" "lookout!" "s**t!" "dammit, anvil, get off our channel!" "I'm hit! I'm hit!" "good 'chute" great, two scooters down, an escort flight in trouble and a bomber flight in a hairball. If a scoot runs from a fishbed, the fish will pick it off. What's a scoot's advantage? "Ford flight, engage MiGs in low-speed turning fight." "what?" "low speed, we're lighter. get turning! defensive circle!" The scoots started circling and the fast fishbeds, for the most part, overshot their targets or stalled trying to match them. I switched to 'winders and told my #3 to form up. "Negative, lead, no way I'CRACK......" crap! I called in #4 just as I managed to spot a couple of MiGs in slot formation turing in for another attack. I pulled up and looped over the MiGs, then dove just inside their turn. as I completed my yoyo I slipped in behind the #2 MiG and 'windered him to hell. Just as I did, the lead MiG fired a volley of green tracer that tore apart an A-4. I kicked in rudder and, just as he saw me, fired my MK.12s. The bullets were slow and innacurate, and he had time to try to dodge, but one lucky round cought his rudder and he slipped below the fight, no longer a problem. #4 was now on my wing, but then he broke off. I was busy trying to figure out how I was going to get behind a persistantly looping fishbed when I heard the glorious cry of "I GOT ONE!" over the radio, shortly followed by another from a Hun pilot. The MiGs had the element of suprise at first, but we were fighting back. I was coming head-on with a MiG who was determined to desrtoy me with head-on spray-and-pray volleys. I swooped under him and hauled back, forgetting I was in a scoot. I came up through the top of my loop at full throttle doing barely 180 knots. The nose kicked down pleasantly, though, and I got a visual on my quarry. I dove down as far as I dared to build up speed, and then once again overwhelmed the little skyhawk's deltas. HoOoOoOoOlLlLlLyYyYyY ShHhIiIiTtTtTt! I bumped like crazy through a stall that made my flight instructor back in my hometown wince, but pulled up, got a tone and fired off my last 'winder. It fizzled out not 4 seconds from launch. Oh well, I was in gun range anyway. 6 sequential rounds peppered the shiny fish's body right where the right wing and fuselage meet. Oh yeah. By now the fight had more or less broken up. A flight of F-4Bs coming back from a fighter sweep scared away most of the MiGs, while Anvil flight had got 5 kills, despite 2 losses, and our very own Ford flight had lost three and taken down five. The F-4s valiantly covered our tails while we RTB'd. I had neglected to watch my fuel state, and it's a good thing I landed first because I ran out of gas on the taxiway. I tried to track down the CAG to tell him what really went on in the mission. I got to his desk and found a note in neat handwriting sitting right in the middle. it read "That's what 'Expect Resistance' means".

whups, sorry if I ruined some sort of big tough-guy reputation by calling you by your old name... besides, viggie isn't too bad. It's better than "Ramrod", which is what people called me before "Rambler".

hey, Viggie! long time no see! How's that Prowler intake? Still in Blue squad, I see. And, uhhh... what's NFG stand for? I have a feeling that I either should know by now or that I'm not supposed to know.

still no awnsers for any of my questions.....

compared to my box, the commodore 64 is a supersomputer. At least you have 2.4 GHz... that's 2.4072 times more powerful than mine. X-Wing Alliance? good game. Although why do you need wings in space?

whoa, whoa, whoa. Old timers? I still feel like a n00b, despite that thing over there <--- telling me that I'm "Elite". When did that happen anyway? Also, Help? I know that 'MTL-Up-untill-he-went-into-the-reserves has always lent a hand, but me? All I do is post pictures and grump about things, like my slow computer and the LACK OF AN AVRO ARROW! see?

mama, oooOOOoooo... Didn't mean to make you cry, If I'm not back again this time tomorrow, Carry on, carry on, 'cause nothing really matters....

well well well, if it isn't Pants himself. How's the Airzoo? You know, your signature is supporting what I said about bloody supercomputers.

mama, I just killed a man put a gun against his head, pulled the trigger now he's dead

you still haven't awnsered any of my questions, Dave, if that is your real name. Personally I feel kind of weird calling a person I've never even met by their first name. But Mr. Slavens sounds weird too. And I don't want to have to call anybody "sir" over the internet. It was a lot easier just to say "'MTL".

Tisk Tisk, still giving out personal information over the internet, I see. Hey, what happened to RunsWithScissors, he helped me out back when I was looking for a new video card. And what about that chick who flew the spads? you guys scare her off? the name eludes me.

Eat my shorts! Ay Carumba!

sorry it took me 3 months to reply, It takes place somewhere over the middle east and I'm fighting against the Russian-supported middle easteren empire of Paran (see "burning sands" campaign). It's not during a set period in time, but it's in the desert against the russians.

"On the whole, I think Preperation H feels good." or who could forget: "PLEASE EAT SOME WHAT?!?!?"

bomb run on some fuel tanks in a C-130, low and slow, didn't see the little shilka bugger on the other side. Whoops! All of my wayward bombs missed the tanks, dammit (see signature), but one really flukey boom bucket hit him. He had already taken out my two left engines, though, and I had to ditch.

I take out the targets I'm supposed to, then, as long as I have fuel, I stick around for as long as i can to help everybody else out. I've downed MiG-21s after a bomb run in an A-7! However, I usually run out of fuel on final and just barely make it back, or I get in too big a dogfight for my bomber and I get my tailpipe full of missile or guns.

hey guys, I'm back. Anyway, my computer hasn't gotten any faster, and for a couple of months I had trouble running internet, let alone strike fighters. Now I've finally got this piece of junk running again, and I figured I would try to run SF. I installed it and tried it in it's stock form. It sucked. Lag and general badness ensued. Then I got the service pack from the thirdwire website, installed and tried that. It runs great, no lag and, even though my graphics settings are on "low" for the most part, the resolution and colours are good. I've enjoyed many a dogfight with the stock planes. But here lies my question. I know that when I left, all you modders were making add-ons compatable with WOI and it's more advanced physics engine. I'm looking for some simple planes (MiGs, F-14, F-8, P-40, some Japs to shoot at) that I can add to strike fighters 1.5 here that will work with the now-outdated system. I can substitute sounds, loadouts, weapons, effects and all that, but I'm wondering if HUD or gauges will be missing, or if the way the plane flies will be different.

uhhh... let's see here... Dell Dimension 2100 with intel celeron processor, 996MHz, 512 MB of RAM running Windows XP Home 2002 Service pack 2. Oh, and an ATI Radeon 9250 PCI video card.

Yeah, I'm not even gonna bother trying to get these new HD planes to work, I just downsize the skins to 512x512. Besides, right now I plan on chasing down some MiG-15s with the Cutlass. And I know that I have no right poisioning these forums with complaints from a low preformance computer, but what I have is what I have, and there is no chance at all that anything new computer-wise is in my future, even if it is only a matter of double-digit prices.

WOOO-HOO! I'M OFF TO LOAD UP MY HD! ooh, look! a Eurofighter! how long has that been there for?