Hasse Wind

Actually, the campaign generator plans missions for all the squadrons in your front, both friend and enemy, and the AI aircraft then try to complete these missions, just like you and your flight are doing. Unlike in the majority of sims, nothing is spawned out of thin air just for you to encounter. It's a living world where everything is not tied to your actions.

Looks like your uniform project was inspired by the red trousers of Nungesser. "Le pantalon rouge, c'est la France!"

The French have always known how to make elegant uniforms.

That is an excellent photo! It shows some of the men who are almost always forgotten when people talk about aviation history. Without their efforts, there wouldn't have been any famous ace pilots, who received all the glory and awards.

Great pics, everybody! I also love to take photos of birds, plants and animals. I don't have the best of cameras, though. The tracks near the stream in my winter pic were made mostly by hares and foxes, I think. Here's a great spotted woodpecker in winter:

This thread needs some snow, I think! A winter landscape. Notice the animal tracks near the stream.

lederhosen, TrackIR for OFF works through CFS3. If you have CFS3 on your list of TrackIR profiles, everything should work fine. I have Win 7 and TrackIR actually works better with it than it used to under XP.

Yes Olham, you need to get rid of the older versions first before installing the new one.

Considering how much more people there are living in Europe now than a century ago, and how much cities and towns have grown during all those decades, it's amazing to still find places that practically haven't changed at all. Many old fields have now disappeared under housing areas, but it seems you are able to find all the ones that haven't!

Good work, HPW! I'll try this one soon.

That looks interesting. Hmm...

I wonder if any of those really big cameras have survived to our modern days? Many smaller ones have, but I don't think I've seen any examples of the big ones. They must have been very expensive equipment.

Good luck and get well soon.

There's also the fact that tanks become pretty much useless when someone else has air superiority. We have come a long way from the days when these beasts rumbled on the battlefields of the Western front:

And let's not forget the financial side of things. Trade relations with Germany were nowhere near as important to the United States as the economic ties to the Entente countries, especially Britain and France. There was some protesting from the US when Britain started to blockade Germany, but nothing particularly serious, because German trade just wasn't all that important to the US. In so many ways, it would have been against American interests to see the Entente powers lose.

I don't think even a decisive German victory could have wiped away the national characteristics of the various European peoples, but it certainly would have created a Europe sharply divided between pro-German and anti-German nations. The latter would have been more or less powerless to do anything, but the feeling of animosity would have been tangible. Not a very healthy atmosphere to live in! It is one of history's great tragedies that anger and bitterness and vindictiviness were the guiding emotions behind the Treaty of Versailles. If the treaty had been much more moderate and sensible and not blamed Germany for absolutely everything, things might have been very different for everybody.

Here's my take on things without American involvement in WW1: Hindenburg and Ludendorff, the German masterminds of the Eastern front, were confident that Russia could be knocked out of the war in 1917. They were right. With the collapse of Russia in 1917, Germany and Austria-Hungary could move large forces to the Western and Italian fronts and prepare for major offensives that could lead to victory for the Central Powers and finally bring the bloody war to an end. France was exhausted after years of brutal offensives and the aggressive defense of Verdun. Britain, the dominant naval power of the day, was still not strong enough on land to alone challenge Germany and her mighty army, arguably the best in the world at the time. Italy, the most important ally of Britain and France, was weak and unpredictable compared to them, and incapable of meeting the threat posed by the combined might of Germany and Austria-Hungary. Without any American support, the British and French armies are unable to stop the German offensives, launched by armies that have received strong reinforcements from the Eastern front. It is by no means an easy and bloodless victory for Germany, but in the end Paris falls, with it the morale of the French army and people collapses, and the remaining British forces are withdrawn from France, to save them from being trapped by the advancing Germans. With French defeat thus becoming a certainty, it is only a matter of time before the war in the West ends in German victory. Thanks to her naval might, Britain is practically untouchable, but now she faces the threat of ever more dangerous German surface and submarine warfare, with Germany having excellent access to the Atlantic from the newly conquered French ports. Then it is Italy's turn to fall. Alone, the Austro-Hungarian army is not strong enough to beat the Italians, but with German help and the political effects of the French collapse, it is not difficult to knock Italy out of the war. The Central Powers are now in a position to dictate harsh peace terms on their defeated opponents. Europe will have to experience the results of a German version of the Treaty of Versailles. The treaty will make sure that France will never again be strong enough to threaten Germany, and Austria-Hungary will rise to a new dominant position in the Balkans and the Mediterranean. Both Germany and Austria-Hungary (and their ally Bulgaria) will reap great economic benefits from the areas annexed in 1918 from greatly weakened Russia. It's very likely that soon the Central Powers will launch a new war in the East, in order to destroy the young Communist state of Lenin and then install a pro-German monarchy to rule weakened Russia. *** Or perhaps the French and British armies were strong enough to stop the German offensive in the West, even without American support, and there was a stalemate leading to a negotiated, not dictated, peace treaty. We will never know!

Hello! Yes, many things have changed, but basically this is still the same passionate OFF community it has always been. And we intend to keep things that way too. 42 is a good age.

That's cool, Lothar! I should have noticed the Amiga style in your screenshots. But I guess I've forgotten most of it. It's been ages since the last time I had the privilege of using an Amiga.

Hi Perth, You'll find the OFF developers from the new official forums: http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/forums/89/1/Over_Flanders_Fields.html I'm not a developer, but I know that P4, which is now known as Wings Over Flanders Fields or WOFF, will be available as a download.

It will be interesting to see how the new B.E. with a gun for the observer is going to work in WOFF. If someone new to the sim wishes to fly two-seaters, I recommend joining a DFW C.V detachment on the German side. It's really a wonderful two-seater; quite easy to fly, climbs quickly and can fly so high that most Entente fighters won't be much of a problem until quite late in the war.

Discretion is the better part of valour. If you are careful, you will not get into situations that require you to be brave.

Having flown through Bloody April in squadrons equipped with either the Fee, the Quirk or the Harry Tate, I dare say it's not that big of a deal in a fighter squadron. Nothing quite compares to the sheer horror of being under attack by red-nosed Albs in a B.E.2.

It's easy.

These are great. I wish I had the originals!