Olham

Yes, Lewie. I make me prints from the whole Squadrons pilot roster. Then I number the pilots. Before I go to field, I now note the numbers of all Sqdn members in this sortie. This will bring you closer to the Sqdn members, to your wingmen. Another thing to avoid in claims: don't use semicolons. They make the claim report uncomplete.

Since I had a pilot with 24 Sqdn, RFC, in March 1918 anyway, I made a sortie today with Bletchley's mod. Active area - we were sent to the British advanced front line bend at Cambrai, to fly a ground attack. We loaded Cooper bombs to do some damage. Proceeding to the target area, we sighted high flying German DFW two-seaters, but we had a different mission. Arriving near the front line, we sighted several Albatros coming towards us. This German barrage flight was very effective; these pilots were veterans, if not aces! We could only drop our bombs to be able to fight them. I don't know, who had told us, that the Albatros fighters were obsolete - these pilots were flying absolutely superiour; they kept their altitude advantage, pounced down on a target, and zoomed up again. We could not get to grips with them. And there came more of them! I tried to get at one, but either I did not hit him right, or that craft can take quite some. Helpless, I could only follow my wingman, Douglas Hurst, who was chased by a Hun. He had tried to escape and was too far away, when his craft was hit. I saw the S.E.5 going down, pulling a trail of dark smoke. Then the German turned. He came back to attack me now. I could evade his attack, but got hit by another Hun. My engine didn't run on full power anymore. Now I had to tangle with two of these falcons - in a damaged kite. After many turns, my craft got hit again and caught fire. Fortunately not the tank - I think the right side exhaust pipe got blown away. I switched the engine off immediately, and went into a very steep dive. The Albatros could not follow there, and I really managed to reduce the flames, and to put the craft down near a road. That was a very close shave today! I got driven back to our base by an ambulance truck. No news yet from Douglas - I still refuse to think of him as being dead. The waiting is killing me.

Congrats, Adger - now you will be one of of us! As for HitR: you won't need it desperately, except if you want to fly an American campaign. Apart from new planes (Nieuport 28, DH-5, and the "Flying Razor", the Fokker E.V / D.VIII), it will give you more choice in "Workshops", like "personalised skin" - you'd fly your individual skin alone. (Before HitR, they are shared by your flight). HitR is not yet a must-have, but it may soon become.

Here are some more. Well, not for 10 Dollars, but 15,- the cheapest. http://shop.ebay.com/i.html?_nkw=flying+the+old+planes+&_cqr=true&_nkwusc=Fying+the+old+planes&_rdc=1

Dej's advice contains the safest British craft to score with, and to be able to evade with: The Sopwith Triplane! But it will spoil the other craft for you. The Pup is also agile, but less effectiv. The Camel is agile and effective, but much harder to fly. The only other very good beginner's choice would be the S.E.5a - fast, good climb, solid, effective, and agile enough. Dizzy now?

From under the table: "Raaaaaaaaaaeich mir die Hand, mein Leben! Didumm, didumm, didaaaaa!! Ja, ja!!! Couldya... umph! (Bonk!!) - ouch! - ah, Lou?! Areyouzeresomewhere? Couldyaham'mee senewglassofbeer ... ups! ... beer ... downere? Please?" The man who can fly the heavy Albatros like a ballet dancer is doing the "Dying Swan", needs to get carried to his bunk. He mutters these last words, before he falls unconcious: "I vill nott gettup again, before ziss room stopps turnink!"

Yesssyess, Iknowha'you meannnn - ifff I getholdofthebleederwho'sputtadeadmouse... - deaaad moussse in my beer...! (Fallump!)

Okay, I'll send you this encrypted line - you should know how to read it: http://combatace.com...post__p__315225 Heeeyy!!! Don't buy him any more drinks! The man is already drunk as an ocean!

Update 4 April 2011 - 21:28 h Berlin summer time (= GMT + 2) Shiloh, Massachusetts, added. The maps are in post 1 of this thread

Major Rottenhead, CO: "Lieutenant Adger! Would you please conduct yourself? Don't you see, you make the other rookies nervous? You will meet your first Hun early enough - I'm sure I can promise that to you!"

At last, I found this photo (right) of a German face mask. The pilot and observer in the left pic are also Germans. (So, who said, Germans always looked sleek in their military dresses?) Damn, you can almost see the cold they have been preparing for!

Again, you managed to explain the situation in that part of the war with great detail, without being wordy. Very well done, Bletchley. Looks like I must create another pilot again - my existing ones may not last long enough to get there.

Never seen this one before, Lewie. Looks like he had to crawl through over the tanks, under the main wing, to get to the forward or rear position? But in the "crow's nest", he could at least put his feet on the engine. And: Italy is never as cold as northern France. Great profile, JFM - another one I have never seen before.

Welcome to the OFF Forum, Shiloh! Your avatar makes it clear, what you are gonna fly, once you had some training. So let me hand you on to our Camel expert, RAF_Louvert - he'll tell you all the tricks. He will also say this: New lad buys the drinks - so I say the same. I'll have a virtual Warsteiner. You will find, that you can make easier settings, but I would rather recommend to do some good training in "Free flight" without opponents, on the craft you want to fly. There are some easy to fly crates, like the Sopwith Pup, the Nieuports, or the Albatrosses. You will find out soon: it is NOT a game. Do you have TrackIR Pro view device? If not, and if you really want to pilot your kite with an overall view, as it should be - get it! It isn't cheap, but for a WW1 sim, it is a "must have" device. Can you tell me, what "Shiloh" is? On German TV, we once had an American western series: "The People from the Shiloh Ranch" Is it an area or a landscape in the US? Last point: if you write to me your twon and state, I will add you to our "OFF Pilots Forum Maps", which you can find in the stickies above.

Good info there; thank you, JFM! It wasn't only the low temperature, that was nasty for your extremities, but also the huge difference in air pressure. Arthur Gould Lee wrote in his book "No Parachute!", how you had painfully pinches in the extremities, when you went down from 18.000 feet to zero. They made it as constant and equal a descent as possible, but it must have felt very nasty, and only disappeared some time after touch down. We don't think about that, cause we travel in pressurized cabin today. But I have heard, that in the early days of jet planes, a tooth filling could explode out of the tooth, when it was made badly and had a little air encapsuled below it. This would expand in the lower pressure at very high altitude.

The photo on the right was really named "Hannibal" in Rosebud's website. He must be a late war observer - I believe that bright thick line is for his electrical-warmed mask. Those conditions - nowadays' young men would just refuse to go up, I bet.

Damn! It sounded too good to be true!

PS: here are two pics from Rosebud's great website. The guy in the tree is a German pilot, who got stuck there, and was captured. The other is a Heinecke parachute, in Lozenge camo, as used by the Austrians.

UncleAl, I don't know anything about the testing phase for German parachutes. But I know, that they were introduced in ca. mid-1918. As far as I know, the pilot was sitting on the packed parachute. Ernst Udet jumped from his Fokker with a parachute.

UncleAl, the JSGME - JoneSoft Generic Mod Enabler is a little free program. I have installed it in the CFSWW1 Over Flanders Fields folder. When you installed it, you create a folder called "mods" in the same above folder. You can then move any mods for OFF into this "mods" folder. Then you start JSGME, and should now see your mods in the left window. If you mark a mod and click the arrow right, it will move into the right window and is now activated. To remove it, you just go the opposite direction.

Oh, good you remind me, tranquillo. A virtual Warsteiner for me, stefnuts.

Next will be Bullethead, recommending his famous BH-5 - arhm - DH-5, I meant.

"Vott???"

Tch! Rookies!! The Roland is fine! A great two-seat fighter she is!

Yo, Alsace or Marne regions are quieter, and very beautiful. If you have a mission to do, don't ever turn for bogies, until they catch up with you and you must fight. And as for the Flak: never fly straight for more than 10 seconds. Zigzag your way through it!