Wels

Hello Vicsthere, Yes, but you have to still apply the superpatch, and the last small patch that came recently - get 'em here: http://www.overfland...m/Downloads.htm You need to download and install the 1.32 superpatch, and the v1.32f minipatch. I guess since Phase 3 was the first commercial product they labelled it just Version "1.0", so the free phase 1 and 2 were early builds with version numbers 0.1 and 0.2 ;-) edit: oops and welcome ! (sorry ..) Good luck and greetings, Catfish

Hello, ok thanks, just thought it should break during a dive alone at some speed without even pulling out but no major problem , thanks and greetings, Catfish

Hello, reading this post i just remembered i seem not to be able to damage my Albatros D.III in a vertical dive - i seem not to be able to gain enough speed to crack the lower wing, even well above 350 kilometers/h with full throttle in a vertical dive the plane will not acccelerate beyond this speed, i do not lose the wing, and am able to pull out of the dive without damage .. Time is april and Jasta is 11 - well i know they were invincible in this month, but ... Greetings, Catfish

Hello, god, Olham, say YES to Stumpjumper's W4, just YES And there were lots of seaplanes used in the german sea patrols, i have a whole book about the torpedo section of the Marinefliegergeschwader alone as pdf, and there were lots of even very big seaplanes, The late two-seater W29 (i think) was one of those designed by Heinkel, and it was one of the best planes overall. There is a nice story how Heinkel designed it on a beer mat, and how the first test fly developed lol. Greetings, Catfish P.S. Stumpy if you have more than one W4 (hint hint)

Hello Roger555, welcome to the OFF skies ! I also have been playing flight sims since the old DOS days, and i still remember MS's FS and FS2, with it's WW1 "scenery" lol. I also tried to cross the Atlantic in this Ryan bird, and remember having difficulties to even take off in this overladen bird. But i did not have the patience to make it to Paris . But at least i took the challenge from England to Australia, in this DeHavilland Comet. Boy did i have to train to get this bird taxiing on the runway, and land it. In reality it seems the SPAD VII was a better bird than the XIII, i wonder why they never equipped it with two MGs. And the XIII crankshaft and other problems would me make reluctant to have flown it in reality .. never try to out-turn anything german in a XIII Greetings from Germany, Catfish

Hello, since you kept pumping out patches, still improving all kinds of things, despite you said you already work for OFF Phase 4 ... 1. The propellors of some of the inline-engined planes keep turning a bit too long after being switched off (e.g. Alb. D.III). 2. More "action" at aerodromes, like already shown in some older pictures (ladders with mechanics working on plane's engines and the like) 3. Some historical missions, pre-fabricated - like Voss' fight, but generally all kinds of known or reported flights and incidents that happened to aviators. 4. Taking some ideas of the RoF sim: Radiator control and adjustment, overrevving engine damage, maybe even engine problems while flying with a mixture beeing too rich (sooting spark plugs) - generally more exact engine management. Maybe some random failure (?) 4.1 Flapping fabric at higher speeds, or when being damaged, maybe developing more damage if handled roughly. 4.2. Working valve rockers and vibrating planes while engines running with lower revolutions 4.3 Sudden wind gusts, ground loops happening - don't know whether this can be modelled with the OFF engine - whatever engine you might use in Phase 4 ahem 5. More planes of the early war, modeling the early war years - what about the Taube or the Morane (hint hint), the already existing Short seaplane, the Handley-Page 0/400, Vickers Vimy, Gotha, Zeppelin R.IV etc. etc., and certainly airships (!). Maybe an airship career with reconnaissance tasks and raids ! Reach Africa with the L59 !! Ahem. 6. Seaplanes ? Seaplane career ? I am sure i will have more ideas lol :yes: Thanks a lot for this sim, Catfish

Hello, i have been having rudder problems with Logitech joysticks before, however i thought they would have somehow overcome that. So the joystick rudder generally works, but you cannot adjust the rate of input in the control settings ? My Logitech JS regularly gave up its rudder function completely in mid-game, i had to unplug it, and plug it in again to work. The control settings in the controls menu are sometimes a bit hard to set, and are not at all user-friendly or self-explaining - are you sure you defined the right axis for your rudder ? Good luck, Catfish

Hello Olham, good ! Now try to find some trench soldier named Hitler and try to get him via ground attack ... might mean a better future for all Greetings, Catfish

Hello, well the problem is flying itself, not to stall, lose your engine, go into an unrecoverable spin, and generally stay alive against enemy Flak/Archie, ground machine guns and winged adversaries that are somehow much better than in other WW1 sims i have played. As well looking at the scenery is really nice, and i tend to oversee enemies often ... It just depends on how hard you want to play - if you play "dead is dead" you will have a hard time to survive even 17 hours of flying time. If you want to play as hard as it gets this means no exterior view of your plane, no padlock view towards the enemy or vice versa (you will have a hard time to even recognize an enemy plane by its national markings in time), navigating via maps, no radar etc. etc., and your only help would be TrackIR. As you asked about RoF and OFF - i do not have RoF yet, but intend to buy it when i can buy the box in a store here in Germany. The flight mechanics and physics itself in RoF seem to be indeed more modern/refined, but again for what i have read the flight models of the individual planes and their differences do not really reflect reality - however - i will wait and see. From the landscape and feel of the situation of a war i doubt RoF is better - from the Youtube vids and screenshots it looks like a model railroad landscape, sunny, shiny and clean. Hard to describe when you never played OFF. Anyway i think you will like OFF, just be aware you need CFS3 for playing OFF - if you still have the choice go for the CFS3 UBI DVD, with that you will not even need to install CFS3 - just insert the disk during the OFF installation when asked, for a few seconds, and that's it. If you certainly like to try out CFS3 you can install it, there are some nice WW2 mods around, but i guess you will be spoiled by IL2 and its successors - much better in my opinion. P.S. You have air brakes in the Sopwith 1 1/2 strutter or so i think. As well you can trim your plane if you ahve an SE5a, but not so in other planes of the time. You CAN adjust trim in the others, but this is considered as cheating ahem .. Good luck and have fun, Catfish

Hello, after "demanding" this and that, criticizing all the time back in the P1 and 2 days, and generally ranting about each and every nitpick that i thought should be implemented, and getting those answers like "we need more time", it is a "hardware thing, cannot change it", "gawd it's free why do you bother", which i did not want to hear and just ranted on, i hope no one will call me a fanboy, at least i am sure not the OFF team will . But this sim in its 3rd iteration has developed in a kind of "thing" and overall experience of WW1 that was unthinkable still in P2, and nobody expected it would once make it to the present state, which is more in a lot of aspects, than i hoped to see some day. There are still some "issues", but they are relatively small, probably due to the internal CFS3 engine, but maybe the OFF team will even tweak this. So i was very disturbed to hear that the team will stop the development of OFF phase 3 - until i read this is because of beginning to work on phase 4 . What can i say .. GREAT !! I already have some ideas what you could implement ... hrrrm. Thanks to the OFF team, keep up the good work ! Greetings, Catfish

Hello, i must say i like the changes very much, am currently flying with Jasta 11 in april 1917 (certainly a good time and place to fly an Albatros lol), but the perception of what happens around "our" aerodrome has drastically changed. The 'drome is near the front and you do now really feel that, unbelievable MG and cannon fire, almost made me jump short after i started the engine. God you really begin to fear for your precious pilot's life with these hammering going on around you .. The Albatros D.III has changed its behaviour and flight model a bit, it is now a more forgiving bird and easier to roll (at the right speed, that is, and with rudder - yesss!), and it wants to raise the nose so you constantly have to push the js a bit forward at lower altitude - it just feels right. I even shot away the upper wing of a tripe from RNAS-1 - poor fellow, really felt sorry. Meanwhile i let enemy AI pilots get away when they are obviously shot-up and flee for the trenches .. Did you also change the lighting and reflection of the celloned fabric - it looks a bit brighter than before, and when changing from shadow into lighted areas, which is a good thing ! I do especially like the start screen with the Albatros , is it from Mr. Dietz ? Looks great, and adds to the feeling. The aerodromes are now populated or so it seems, all those crates, props and whatnot standing around - so apart from what i did not see yet, i like this very much ! Thanks and greetings, Catfish

OFF Phase 2 Info Hello, Can we please make this a sticky ? I know OFF Phase 3 is here, but anyone who played Phase 2 will most probably try to get his or her hands on P3 - i'm sure ! This is from older posts (If you have problems due to using the CFS3 DVD instead of the earlier 2 CDs scroll down near the end of this text): First shut off any Antivirus program, and any other running program just to make sure. 1. Install MS's "Combat Flight simulator 3" 2. Install the CFS3 3.1 patch 3. Install the CFS3 3.1a patch 4. Run Combat Flight Simulator 3 once, fly a mission, shoot down some planes or get shot, whatever - and exit CFS3. (This is needed to generate a directory tree for savegames etc. on your harddisk. You do not need to save anything, or start a campaign in CFS3.) Then install OFF (unpacking and installing can take a while, do not interrupt the process - make sure the install goes to the right directory, usually C:\Program files\Microsoft Games\CFSWW1 Over Flanders Fields): 5. Run OverFlandersFieldsPhase2ReleaseV1.0.exe (790 Mb) 6. Run OverFlandersFieldsPhase2SkinsV1.0.exe (1.01 Gb) 7. Run OverFlandersFieldsPhase2VidsV1.0.exe (530 Mb) 8. Run OverFlandersFieldsPhase2UpdateV1.9.exe (168 Mb) 9. Run OverFlandersFieldsPhase2V1.9eFinalHotfix.exe (57 Mb) If you want to play over the internet you can install (optionally): (10.) OverFlandersFieldsPhase2Multiplayer.exe (88kb) (11.) If there is a problem with a "MSSTDFMT.dll" you should unpack and install MSSTDFMT INSTALLER.zip, and register it via the "execute" window that can be found above XP's Start button at the lower left of your screen. Then run the "cfs3config.exe" FROM THE CFSWW1 Over Flanders Fields FOLDER (not the one in the original CFS3 game), and adjust according to the readme, or FAQs from Polovski. Remember to have the second CD in your CD/DVD tray when you play. If you have the DVD version *, it will not have to be in the tray after installing. Now you are ready to take "OFF" * If you have the CFS3 DVD: Copy the "CFS3.exe" from the CSF3 install into the OFF game folder - delete the old "shell.exe" there first, or backup the file with a different name (e.g. Oldshell.exe). Then rename the copied "CFS3.exe" in the OFF folder to "shell.exe". or in other words: 1) Navigate to where you installed your DVD version of CFS3 and locate the main CFS3 folder: (mostly) C:\Program files\Microsoft Games\Combat Flight Simulator 3 2) Copy the main "CFS3.exe" file from C:\Program files\Microsoft Games\Combat Flight Simulator 3 to your main OFF folder, i.e. to: C:\Program files\Microsoft Games\CFSWW1 Over Flanders Fields 3) Delete the OFF file "shell.exe" in : ...\CFSWW1 Over Flanders Fields. 4) Rename the newly copied "CFS3.exe" to "Shell.exe" and you should be good to go! B.T.W. "Over Flanders Fields" Phase 3 "Between Heaven and Hell" takes care of these new DVD versions of CFS3, and all this will not be needed. I hope i got that right, feel free to correct or add anything, thanks and greetings, Catfish/Wels

Hi, no bomb racks: " ... Bombs were dropped by the observer through metal trapdoor shaped like door of a rolltop desk. Observer, using the "oculaire" or eyeball technique, could ease the door back to take pictures or drop 3 slender bombs that were hung on leather straps in the cockpit. A G-4 was sent to the US. for evaluation and possible manufacture here. Was already considered obsolete, de Havilland DH-4 was built instead. ..." from http://www.aviation-history.com/garber/vg-...ron_G4-1_c.html B.t.w. bomb load differs from 100 to 113 kg, depending on source. As well there were two kinds of engines used, 2x80 or 2x100 hp. Caudron G.4A2 was used for reconnaissance, the G.4B2 for bombing, and the G.4E2 for training. 2 MGs: 2xHotchkiss or 2xLewis. Anothe MG mounted at the upper wing for firing backwards remained only shortly in service. Greetings, Catfish

Hello, looks good ! no real info on bomp loads, but .. Caudron history, lots of photos : http://www.ctie.monash.edu.au/hargrave/caudron.html http://www.fl18.de/history/58/ 113 Kilogramm bomb weight capacity - SI units but France alrady had that back then Greetings, Catfish B.t.w. there is a Caudron for MS's FS 9/2004 , i guess it was a free download from AVSIM.com (?), but it is not really fun in FS 2004 ..

Hello, same here, glad it works again. Was almost like drug deprivation lol Greetings, Catfish

Hello, No, action around you is the same or so i think. But if you warp you will be thrown out as soon as enemies or unknown planes are in the vicinity (or you are near the target/waypoint). So without TAC on and without warp (like in reality) you will probably miss more enemies than with warp. HTH, greetings, Catfish

Hello, if the new damage model makes the balloons harder to destroy this is a good idea ! Apart from general thinking those gas bags were very hard to destroy, as well as Zeppelins. A direct hit into a gasbag even with incendiary ammunition would not ignite the hydrogen gas ! If you wanted to down a balloon you had to go in several times, and wait at least a minute before engaging again after the initial strafe. The hydrogen had to mix with air to become explosive, so it took some time to vent the gas from the punctured cotton, and then ignite the mix that would usually build up above the observation balloon. This is why balloon missions were so hard, and only a few pilots did accomplish more than one lucky balloon kill without being shot down by ground mgs or air cover. What is shown in films like the new Red Baron is plain wrong, even a signalling pistol would have been only fired after the balloon had been punctured before. Until now this "go-in-and-kill" followed by instant "get-the-hell-out-of-here" was not realistic, and much too easy .. Greetings, Catfish

Hello, i have asked this before, but it is only that i recently have some money to spend for this unimportant stuff like sims . I have a P5K mainboard with a (not yet overclocked) Intel core2 duo 8400e chip at 3 GHz, 2 x 1 Gb Kingston HyperX DDR2 Ram in dual channel, FSB is at 1366. The bottleneck is the graphic card or so i think, it is an older PCIe Nvidia Gforce 8400 GS with 512 Mb. OFF does not really run good, i have framerates of below 20 over aerodromes, settings are: Overall graphic detail: 4 Aircraft detail: 5 Terrain detail: 3 Scenery detail: 3 Effects quality: 5 Cloud quality: 1 OS is XP SP3 - don't know whether i should get Vista and get more than 2 Gb Ram ? As far as i know XP only uses 2 of it (?) So which Graphic card would you buy, or propose - i am also thinking of buying FSX or RoF sooner or later. I would like to know which is the absolutely best one, and which you would get in terms of "best bang for buck". Thanks and greetings, Catfish

Hello all, thanks a lot, first about the proposals and about the link to Homeboy's instruction - don't know how i managed to not read this yet - i know he did an excellent list of the OFF planes with data for comparison. After reading about the power consumption of those ceards i guess i will need a bigger power supply lol Thanks again and greetings, Catfish

Hello, Hekllshade wrote: " ... Or you can be a CO and sit in your office and stamp "DENIED" on all of the kill claim forms that come across your desk. Either one, the goal is to get the maximum number of pilots calling you a "Bastard". Early reviews say it's very satisfying in a twisted sort of way. ..." Now THAT'S an idea ! I always wanted to do that. But i'll go further: Any OFF-player has to be online all the time, and send his combat reports to ME, and i will promise to put the statistics online, so anyone can see the players' performance, and at which time he was online and played the sim. It will certainly cost you a bit ... per report it's understood. Positive reports will cost around 6.50 $ each And i promise I will not send this information to other companies to make money (crazy laughter) .. Hrrrm.. Back to the original post .. Greetings, Catfish

Hello, good news ! B.t.w. which graphic card do you use, Winder ? Thanks and greetings, Catfish

Hello UncleAl, good avice as always (well mostly lol ) "The Availability Of Any Part Will Be Inversely Proportional To It's Need" How comes you know my car so well ? Thanks and greetings, Catfish

Hello, this fight has been discussed at length in numerous threads at the aerodrome forum, but there is no general opinion why this happened. Some said he had a hangover from last night, where they must have been celebrating and especially drinking a lot, maybe blurring clear decisions, but then the flight took place in the evening of the following day. Then Voss' plane was the Dr.I's predecessor, the "F1", still with the upper wing "problem" and a bigger engine, as well even more agile than the later Dr.I. Some state he would have been able to climb away circling from the SE5as (this is at least how i survived a few times in OFF lol), but i think it would not have worked in reality. 3 SE5s following and 2 more gaining distance and then climbing at speed to follow would have caught up with him sooner or later. As i recently heard McCuddens's SE5 was kind of supercharged and able to fly at 21.000 feet, but then i doubt Voss knew that. One even got as far as to propose that Voss finally flew straight west, a usual action to show surrender and land behind enemy lines, but was merciless shot down. I do not think so, McCudden's and Rhys-Davie's post-combat reports showed nothing but admiration towards this pilot. But it was war after all .. Greetings, Catfish

Hello, thanks for your advice ! The 260 and 280 GTX are unfortunately very expensive in the EU, but i will have a closer look tomorrow .. Thanks and greetings, Catfish

Hello, i bought a very cheap one (9 Euros) ata local Aldi store, and the bass is really impressive. However i still prefer to sit in front of my PC without looking like a Cyborg lol. Ok, TackIR will come next, or at least after a decent graphics card .. But i have never heard of this "buttkicker" before lol Greetings, Catfish