Hauksbee

Bingo! That was it. Thanks, HomeBoy.

Left button/double click, or, right button/single click...this is what comes up. But no UI.

It's looking like that's the way to go.

Let's hear it for QC! As for ROF...since I discovered the sliders in CFS3 Config., the OFF world looks every bit as good, and that was what ROF had going for it. I'm holding off until the on-line requirement goes away, and then, if I can find a used copy on e-Bay...

I may have missed something here. I thought RoF was bought, downloaded, and played on-line. Do they give you a disc?

ah, y' have a way with the words...

A few quick queries: [1] Anybody know why the paint used on airplanes was called 'dope', as in 'doping the wings'? I can remember being able to buy little bottles of model airplane dope [10 cents a bottle] when I was a kid making stick and paper airplanes. I'm posting a composite of Albatros D.II pics. I'm morphing my D.V model into the D.II. The end result will be to put together another poster/illustration about the day Boelcke and Bohme brushed each other. Using the skin for Erwin Bohme for reference, I lifted the fuselage and rudder textures to save time. [2] If the skinner who did Bohme's Albatros reads this, I would like to get permission for a one-time use of those textures. Also, if anyone sees any mistakes or oversights, let me know. Since this one really happened, I've got to get it right.

You should have a EDIT button as shown here.

Looks really great!

It is indeed. But I don't see Little's name anywhere in the dispatch.

It certainly will. I have a system built from components. I do 3D modeling and some animation. I asked my tech. guys to design an optimum system. They went to NewEgg and assembled a wish list that included Vista 64 and 8 Gb RAM. Shortly after it got set up, OFF announced BH&H. OFF plays beautifully. It never stuttered unless I was doing full-frame FRAPS captures. As soon as I dropped the frame size, it smoothed out. This weekend, after discovering how to change cloud and scenery resolution, I jacked them up a few notches, and OFF has not noticed.

Nice entry, SirMike. Particularly the 'full-loop-to-clear-your-six" maneuver. I remember back when I first started with flying games on Apple II's. There were many times when I had my plane up on one wingtip, banking as tight as she would go, and I could never shake [or even see] my attacker. Then I twigged to the loop. When you come over the top, you'll almost always see your guy

What wonderful things we find when we start poking around in our parents past. Good to have you back, Olham.

Olham? BacK?

Excenent question. I saw a great explanation for Agincourt. The longbow had little to do with either the English victory, or the French defeat. It involved a bit of replicating, but went this way: Two anthropologists/historians went to the battlefield. They were heartened by the fact that the French countryside, and the villages that bordered the battlefield hadn't changed all that much. At least the battlefield wasn't under three condos and a strip mall. With a metal detector, they started combing the ground. After a day or so, they had a small collection of metal bits, and one or two of them were corroded arrowheads. It was then acertained that the steel was a common, rather soft variety, and ubiqutious at the time. The style of arrowhead was a 'Bodkin Point'. It was square in cross-section, like a stretched-out pyramid and had a socket in the base to press-fit the shaft into. Then off to a museum to measure and build a longbow, then a high-speed camera to record the velocity of the arrow at release, and then calculate the force of impact. Then test against a typical piece of armor steel . Two issues popped up: First, the arrow steel was comparitively soft [these arrow heads were a gov't contract, hammered out fast for commoners use] and Second, the French armor was very good, as their steel had a much higher carbon content. [Armor was a personal investment by aristos.] Once the pieces were in place, the arrow steel was evaluated with a drop-test. In every test, the tip bent, the sample steel plate was never penetrated. So it appears as though the Lawrence Olivier version of Agincourt, [mounted knights dying by the hundreds]never took place. So what did? When the authors looked at the Order of Battle, as recorded by the French, the attack called for a cavalry charge, then when they had done, and returned, Italian cross-bow men were to unleash a few volleys [which could be pretty nasty] and then the main body was to move forward. However; the main body consisted of dismounted knights. In the event, the cavalry charged, once. Then as the cross-bow men were getting ready, they were shouldered aside by the impatient knighthood and the battle was on. The French declined to attack on a broad front, each knight pressed to the center to come to grips with Henry and his Paladins. That's where the glory was. And the money. You got glory for mighty feats of arms, not for bashing serfs. And the point of knightly combat was not to kill your opponents, but to defeat, capture and ransom them. So now there's this huge mass of knighthood, packed together to the point where it was virtually impossible to raise your arms, slipping, sliding in the gooey, clay mud. [it had rained heavily] If you fell, you were trod upon. Then it got really bad. The bowmen, and men-at-arms on the flanks [behind the sharpened stakes] folded in on the knights and enveloped them. These men were not interested in ransom [or even permitted to ransom] Each carried an all-purpose knife [more like a small sword/machete] for cutting and sharpening stakes, cooking, etc., and heavy mallets for driving stakes. [like a six-pound sledgehammer] The mallets crushed helmets and skulls and knights that went down had blades slipped 'tween armor plates. The packed-in knights never had a chance. But the longbow sat on the sidelines and watched.

Here's that nessage, Duck.

I agree. I'm sure your screenie of the field is the right one. Who would code a flamming disaster like mine? See you 'round 7:00.

Breathtaking screen shot, Duck. What are you running...a 54" flatscreen? That's absolutely panoramic. My arrival at field is ALL animation and no field. From the moment the screen appears, the airplane is in Tail-chase view, dives as though performing an outside loop, flies inverted for a few seconds, and then crashes into the ground with all red damage warnings. After a few seconds, the red text goes away. Then I click on Multi-Player, and proceed from there. The last of the three screens is where I was last night when it locked up and went trembly. To make this composite, I launched OFF 3 times. Each time, as I was backing out after getting the screenie, when I got to the two medal screen, the animation plays again! Then I clicked back to Main Menu. Last night, when I first mentioned this, the plane was a Nieuport in camo colors, and appeared to be out over fields and trees. Not over the field. As we tweaked, it became an SE-5 and I can see some tents at the edge of the field briefly. It seems I can launch OFF with no discs in the trays, but if I want to go Multi-Player, I have to have Disc#1 in. My disc works fine...as far as I can tell. We'll see tonight. Will I be using the same TeamSpeak address to talk to Ras? Will you be there?

What a find! Question, though: why no white in the rondels? I've seen blue and red, with a thin gold outside rim on Spitfires, but never where the khaki shows through.

...and what game could match it?

I did a little Photoshop work, and here's what the Flickering Screen looked like. [the gray block represents the pilots looking over their shoulders at you.] I was in the process of backing out of the "Join Game' level screen. I got back the the field [with the two medals] clicked the 'Hangar' drop-down menu, clicked Officers Mess and as it came up, I immediately clicked "Yes' to leave. That's when it locked up. Suddenly I had the two medals back as multiple ghost images. This was the only part of the screen that flickers. 'Trembled' might be a better description. I still had the Officers Mess image and the 'Hangar' tab in the top right and a solid black background. At the time it seemed to be a normal sort of response to my hastily clicking on options as they appeared and figured that I was running ahead of OFF's ability to process 1's and 0's. Can I play BH&H with my CD? Which CD? CFS3, or OFF? I can launch BH&H with the CFS3 CD in, or not in. I cannot launch from the OFF CD at all. It just wants to re-install OFF.

As soon as I get all the details sorted out, I'm for it. I have beau coup time to host games.

This is a bit 'Off Topic' for an 'Off Topic' thread, but, a day or so ago, while poking around on amazon.com [in the Video Games sec.] I discovered a 'Flyboys Squadron' game. Never heard of it. Even in these pages. I wondered if it was every bit as good as the movie, and passed on it. Has anyone ever essayed this game? Talked to someone who...?

Damn!...and it seemed like you were having so much fun

Yesterday [sunday] I flew about six times in QC...as always...so far. And twice so far today. In every case, the weather has been solid cloud and rain. Absolutely vile. Visibility zero...until I point the nose at the ground, and then, at about 5000', it finally clears enough to see which way is up. The thing that's odd is that the weather won't change even if I change the season. I would think that a leap of three months, would give me new cloud conditions. When the same thing happened this morning, I began to wonder. Is this normal for QC?