Hasse Wind

Lou, it's never too late to learn new languages. It's easiest to do when you're a child, but not at all impossible even much, much later. You don't have to be a linguistic genius to develop a good enough understanding of the German language, for example - reading is always easier than having to speak the foreign language. I can read and understand German quite well, and with the help of a good dictionary even the most obscure of words (and there are many of those in old German books!) are not major obstacles to understanding the text. Speaking the language is always much harder, and sadly my skills have badly deteriorated over the years, due to lack of active use in conversation. Probably the biggest obstacle for people used to the Antiqua or Roman typeface (now the dominant type in the whole world) is the German Fraktur (or Gothic) script quite commonly used in German books and papers as late as the 1940s. It can be really hard to read at first. Hitler actually disliked the Gothic script and ordered it to be replaced completely with the Roman script - this decision hastened the script's demise in the German-speaking world.

I'd love to see this officially supported in P4. A very nice improvement over the original bright and too obvious labels.

It definitely was good propaganda material, and that's what Hitler & pals were very good at using for their own ends.

Yep, it's Hebrew (or more like some obscure Chinese dialect) to me. I'll stick with von Baur's colours. But thanks for the explanation, HPW.

Yeah. Sometimes it's obvious, sometimes you won't even notice it and may accept things the writer tells you without even realizing it's BS. That's why people should read not only one book with a one view, but as many books as possible about a subject, so that a more objective picture can be formed. Usually the "worst" books to read are memoirs, if one is looking for an objective account of what happened back then. For example the Hindenburg memoirs I recently read: he doesn't talk too much about German losses and defeats, only what is enough to explain the events he lived through. Now we all know, and have known for a long time, that Germany was on the brink of complete collapse in November 1918 when the armistice came. Her armies in the west had been beaten and were retreating towards the Reich. It was not a complete rout like in 1945, but they were beaten nevertheless. And the military high command knew it well. General Ludendorff, Hindenburg's right hand man, was actually hospitalized after he suffered a nervous breakdown. Ludendorff just couldn't handle the thought that despite every brilliant operation he had tried, the war was lost. (He also lost his son in battle.) But none of this can be read from the memoirs. Instead you get the idea that cowardly politicians and socialists stabbed the German army in the back and that the soldiers were never defeated. And this is exactly what Hitler and the Nazis kept telling the German people years later. Hindenburg was a civilized man and certainly not a Nazi (he despised Hitler), but even he couldn't admit the facts publically. Therefore one must be very careful when reading memoirs and not let them be the only sources of a person's understanding of history. With this kept in mind, memoirs make for good reading. Except the boring ones of course. My thoughts exactly.

I tried Von Baur's improved label and TAC colours earlier today, and they really do make a difference! I'd never have been able to figure out that kind of stuff all by myself (I'm no PC guru), so thanks for the instructions. I don't need the labels so much, but it's nice to have those "you hit" and "you've been hit" texts much less visible than in the vanilla version. Full DiD flying is very hard and often frustrating, but also very rewarding. But I don't want to do it all the time. There's nothing wrong with having the options to configure the sim just like I want it to be. And it's definitely true that in some ways the full DiD experience is even harder than what real life pilots had to face, because the visibility from our "cockpit" is not at all comparable to what you can actually see from a real airplane. Everybody who's ever been in a real aircraft and looked around knows that you can see much better in reality than in the best of flight sims. TrackIR helps a lot (I can't even imagine how I could play sims so long without it!), but even with it our vision is so restricted that in real life, no pilot with such a poor eyesight would ever have been allowed to fly combat missions, at least no for long. It's almost like being a horse with blinkers. EDIT: Does anybody have a colour code or something for experimenting with the label colours settings? Those number and letter combinations included in the xml file are pretty much like Hebrew to me!

A great find, Lou. There's quite a lot of literature published in Germany between the world wars that was never translated into English, or any other languages, pilot memoirs included. If one can understand German, there are many interesting finds to be made in stores that also sell old books. But one must be careful with the stuff first printed in the Third Reich - their propaganda can sometimes be quite subtle. It's fortunate that Finland maintained such close ties with Germany after WW1. Nowadays people usually learn English as their first foreign language, but back then German was the most important foreign language here (with Swedish). This means that a lot of interesting and old German books are available here. I've been able to make some great purchases at reasonable prices over the years. My latest find was a relatively well-preserved copy of Feldmarschall Hindenburg's (yes, that jolly Prussian of WW1 fame) memoirs, printed in the 1920s. Currently I'm looking for a good and affordable copy of Wilhelm II's memoir.

Thanks for continuing to improve you already excellent DM mod. Too bad about your job - I hope your new one brings you enough money so that you won't have to give up anything important.

Just a small correction: JG 1 stands for Jagdgeschwader, not Jagdgruppe. Germans also had Jagdgruppen, which had the acronym JGr. These Gruppen were smaller and not as independent as the JG's, and were used more locally than the bigger JG's that moved a lot in response to the situation at the front. The French had their Groupes, which were formations of several Escadrilles, and the British their wings and brigades. It would be great if in the future versions of OFF we'd actually see these formations in action over the front, supporting each other and fighting together.

I was reading my copy of the first volume of the seven volume official history of the RAF in WW1 (The War in the Air, by Sir Walter Raleigh and H. A. Jones) and came across an interesting description of the method the RFC used for directing artillery fire. The RFC had experimented with wireless (radio) equipment already for a couple of years before the war, and they had some wireless-equipped two-seaters with one of the four squadrons they first sent into France with the BEF in August 1914. Already in September a couple of such aircraft with wireless were used to help the British artillery, and as the war progressed into the year 1915, more and more observation planes came into service and the methods were quickly improved. This is what Sir Walter writes on the subject (first volume, page 341): "They [the wireless messages -HW] consisted of code letters. The clock code for signalling the results of artillery fire was first used in 1915 and afterwards generally throughout the war. The target was taken as the centre of the clock and imaginary lines were circumscribed around it at distances of 10, 25, 50, 100, 200, 300, 400 and 500 yards. These lines were lettered Y, Z, A, B, C, D, E, F, respectively. Twelve o'clock was always taken as true north from the target and the remaining hours accordingly. An observer noted the fall of the rounds with reference to the imaginary circles and clock-hours and signalled the result, for instance, as Y 4, or C 6. A direct hit was O.K, and there were other signals. [unfortunately Raleigh doesn't describe them. -HW] Messages from the battery or any other ground stations were signalled to the observer in the aeroplane by means of white strips which were laid out on the ground to form the letters of a code." Maybe something like this will one day be possible in OFF, too, possibly in simplified form? Would definitely make the 2-seater careers a lot more interesting!

Yes, the books are an extremely valuable source about the history of RFC/RNAS/RAF. Sadly I don't own the originals, merely reprints. But at least I got them cheaply, compared to the hundreds one must pay for the original set in good condition. And don't you dare to ruin my day by telling me that you got yours for a few bucks from some eBay idiot who didn't know what kind of a treasure he had in his hands! Compared to the British Army official history of the war (there must be like a million books in that series), The War in the Air is well-written and not at all dry. John Keegan, the famous military historian, said about the Army history: "the compilers... have achieved the remarkable feat of writing an exhaustive account of one of the world's greatest tragedies without the display of any emotion at all."

Sorry, I'm not interested in MP. And if I were, I'd rather play RoF than OFF, which is not based on a decade-old engine. The excellent single player career mode is the only reason why I like OFF so much. But whatever I may think about MP, it shouldn't be enough to make you guys angry. It's only a game, right? Good to know you MP guys also want more two-seaters. It should make everybody happy if/when OBD decides to increase their numbers in P4.

It's going to be interesting to see with what kind of a selection of planes P4 will be released. Will we be getting all the planes we currently have in P3 + HitR, or will it be something different? It's good that there seems to be a consensus among OFFers here that the sim really needs more 2-seaters. The lack of two-seaters is the most obvious historical omission in P3. That's why I'm willing to accept even two-seaters that are not flyable by humans at first, if it will make the development process faster. If not, then obviously there's no reason to wish for such AI-only aircraft. Instead of adding planes like the Snipe and the Siemens-Schuckert in the "vanilla" P4, the resources would be better spend in a couple of common two-seaters that saw considerable use during the war. While those late war fighters are fun to have and fly, their importance from the point of view of the single player campaign mode is really insignificant. What's the use of a plane that saw use only for a few weeks in a war that lasted over four years? For MP, which is not the strong side of OFF, things are of course different, because you won't be playing a long career mode but single combat against other humans, and a good selection of fighter planes will be the most important factor.

One small problem with the BE2 in OFF is that currently only one version is used to represent all of them (somebody please correct me if I'm wrong!), but in reality there were quite a few variants in service throughout the war. I hope in P4 or some other phase/expansion pack we'll get all of them actually modelled in-game. The differences shouldn't be very great - the improvements between the variants weren't really that significant - but it should make the Eindecker's job a bit easier when it encounters one of those truly early BE2's.

If you like two-seaters (and even if you don't, this plane might still surprise you!), give the DFW a try. I've been flying it a lot in our DiD campaign, and have grown to like it like no other plane in OFF. The DFW has excellent characteristics all around, and bombing missions with it are really enjoyable, thanks to its bombsight. An easy plane to fly, and can avoid enemy fighters by outclimbing them. Probably the easiest two-seater to fly is the BE2, but in campaign mode it's really useful only in 1915-1916. After that its terribly slow speed and low ceiling make it a flying death trap. But it has great visibility from the cockpit, and I really like to cruise around the countryside in my early war careers with the Quirk. Things tend to become a bit more dangerous by the Bloody April...

I've never paid that too much attention to this myself, but it seems that some people have more problems with the flight hours than others. In my case, I think the hours shown in my pilot book correspond quite well with the hours I actually flew.

His views can be somewhat annoying or downright bizarre for many people, and he certainly didn't know when to stop with the political stuff, turning many threads into bitter bashing of certain politicians (or should I say a certain politician), but it can't be denied that Al did post many helpful things regarding OFF. If he returns, it would be wise of him to forget the politics and just concentrate in enjoying OFF. I never had any problems with Al.

Yes, the N.11 had a 9 cylinder, 80 hp Le Rhone rotary. The N.17 had a similar engine but with 110 hp.

Have a nice holiday, Widowmaker. Try to spot some snipes while fishing.

That was also useful for reducing RPM. Early rotaries didn't have very good throttles. Some later rotary engines, at least on the Entente side, had switches to control the number of cylinders in use at any one time.

The early Fokker biplane fighters like the D.II were disappointing and not really much better than the Eindecker. The French were able to achieve air superiority at Verdun, because Germans didn't have any real fighters to throw against the N.11. And at the Somme, the British also had air superiority, with German air force keeping a low profile compared to later years. These difficulties inspired Germans to start rapidly developing a true air force with an efficient organisation built around various Staffeln of fighters, bombers and observation planes. Only the introduction of the Halberstadt D.II in the summer of 1916 gave the Germans a fighter that could meet the Entente Nupe 11's and DH.2's with equal chances of victory. Pilots were delighted with the good characteristics of the Halberstadt - it was quite easy to handle, maneuverable and of sturdy construction, even though it looks a bit flimsy. I think this is also well modeled in OFF. But it wasn't until the Albatros D.I and D.II came into service in the newly formed Luftstreitkräfte with its powerful Jagdstaffeln that Germans really started to get an edge in the air war, which quickly brought great results in the early months of 1917. I agree about the overly aggressive behaviour of both AI and human pilots in early war careers. That's why I think it's recommended to use the less aggressive AI setting for those early war careers, and try to avoid flying like it's 1918. Would be nice to see a proper implementation of the early air in OFF some day. It hasn't been done well in any flight sim up to this day, not even modded RB3D.

Lou, this is amazing. I wish I had the time and skills to do something comparable. Just try to keep him alive. With such a story, it would be a shame to see Herr Blum perish quickly.

I would feel absolutely fine with it, if it makes the development process faster and the planes would eventually became flyable for humans too. Nobody is requesting new aircraft to be flyable only by the AI. I'm also pretty sure that OBD is not in the business to ruin anybody's enjoyment of their sim, so worry not.

Repetitio est mater studiorum. More two-seaters and other heavies. Even if only AI controlled at first, but we absolutely need more of them, especially for the French. The Snipe and other planes of minimal importance, planes which saw only very little service or were built in small numbers, can and must wait, if OFF is to be developed in the most historically accurate direction possible. And that means more two-seaters. Lots of them.

Currently the Flanders area is the most well-developed in OFF. If you go any further south, on the Entente side you won't find anything but French fighters, Nupes and SPADs. That's because OFF doesn't yet have any French two-seaters, and only a few 2-seaters for the British and Germans. So stay around the British sector of the front, and you will have more variable encounters. Needless to say, OFF P4 absolutely requires more 2-seaters.