Venator

Walfisch seem to fly defensively quite well, though this was prior to HITR.... I have not encountered one lately.

The alpha channel is simply a mask, another invisible layer between the TGA where the river wave 'texture' is, and where there is land 'paint'. It stops the waves from showing up on the land, where they shouldn't be. Yes, you DEFINITELY need the proper tools: image software that handles layers and the alpha channel. It can't be done any other way (well, that's not exactly true but can't be done easily or be explain quickly), and it takes loads of trial and error, so patience. No brotherhood (that implies religious zeal ), but maybe a guild?:moil: QUESTION: With Jan Tuma labouring on his New Tiles set, aren't you both working independently to improve/replace the same thing? Will your tree mod be compatible in his tiles etc? Not meaning to be a $h_t disturber, as I suppose more choices are always better, so just wondering.

After a VERY narrow escape in which my flight of 5 tripes was decimated by close to a dozen of Jasta 28's finest, but manged to take down 3 Albatri including Ritter Max von Mueller [see here LINK HERE for a detailed combat report] on landing I hit escape, ONLY TO FIND NO CLAIM PROMPT as the game had failed to log anything past my first few rounds of fire. The game log said "6 bullets fired, 2 hit" and that was all folks. One of the most hair raising experiences I've had, one of the best combats ever, and no 'official credit'. Oh well, it lives on in my memory, and prompted me to write it all down before it became muddled with all the other dogfights to come... This has happened to me before, but not with too much frequency. I was wondering if it is a common occurrence for others.

Olham is correct about the review, your flight will be plotted, summarized, and played out moment by moment... However, I was a bit 'miffed' by the whole thing happening, so I simply exited the game and played another WWI sim Instead of a claim screen like I hoped, the OFF manager (?) displayed a simple flight log with minutes and 6 bullets fired, 2 hits, etc. when as I said before I fired several hundred bullets. Some aspect of the game, OFF manager, or CFS, or ??? simply stopped logging. Not sure if this is relevant at all, but I could tell my GPU was getting kinda hot (long story, I usually crank up fans in RivaTuner when flying but forgot this time) but that was much later into the combat than when the log stopped. Glad to know this just ain't me. PS: Olham put me down as Washington D.C. though my heart resides north of the border, i.e. originally from Canada home of many daring, and crazy, Cannuck fliers.

Thanks for reply, but that's not what I meant. I must have shot several hundred rounds, saw 3 of my opponents crash and burn at a friendly airfield, then I landed beside the wrecks. The game failed to log any events past my initial brief opening rounds of fire, though the game played on. Is this a crash of the OFF manager? Is this instability common for other players? Or just my install???

A great image that I distinctly remember from my childhood reading...

Wow indeed! Actual furrows following terrain details. That must be taking you some time indeed, and AFAIK take all the time you need. And thank you...

The pig is the "mixing bowl" between avian (bird) and human strains that allows the recombination of RNA (viruses mostly don't have DNA). This produces variants in the influenza virus protein coat that cannot be recognized precisely because it came from another animal. Most animals have their own viruses that cannot infect humans, BUT when they do cross over, or emerge, they tend to be very nasty with high mortality because there is no natural resistance. I agree the media is a hype-driven monster and will not defend them for that. However, in defense of public health officials this outbreak had every indication early on that it was going to be very serious. An analogy is all those Floridians who were numb to hurricane warnings, then Miami got pounded by Andrew. Anyone who survived through Andrew will always heed hurricane warnings now. Same thing here, perhaps we avoided something because it isn't so virulent, perhaps it didn't spread as fast because of the public warnings and measures. The arm-chair critics likely have never lived through anything remotely approaching a pandemic. I am a historian and anthropologist. History does repeat itself, there is ample evidence of that. There are too many smart people in the WHO and CDC who know more about emerging epidemics than Joe Public and should be listened to.

I've had a chance to go back and read some the old memoirs of the great pilots all over again since my youth, and one thing struck me that I wasn't seeing in game. All pilots' memoirs mention using the AAA bursts (white for British/French, black puffs for German) to help them spot opponents at a distance, however, when I was flying on the weekend and was chasing some German bombers on the British side, the bursts were all over the d_mn place, some literally a mile or so away from the formation! And the frequency of shots just wasn't what it should have been. Now, I understand why this was done, because people wanted to tone down death/damage from AAA and I perfectly agree -- there is no more frustration than a senseless virtual death by flak -- it just isn't proper game balance. However, reducing AAA accuracy and rate of fire may not be the best solution given that it WAS such an important aid to historic pilots to spot the enemy. And besides, the bursts can be seen at a greater distance than aircraft and would thus REALLY ameliorate the resolution limitations of LCD screens and spotting planes at a true historic/realistic distance when you just can't due to game/resolution limitations (unless you use the "radar" aid --pasha!). My question for debate: Wouldn't reducing the bite of the bursts--reduce the damage effectiveness of flak shells-- be a better compromise for the game rather than decreased AAA accuracy or ROF? As it stands now, I can fly over the lines and barely be targeted by AAA at all, or when so, it does not supply the Archie burst ambiance that is expected. Ground MG fire DOES supplies the laxative effect it should though! Just a thought, hope it generates a fruitful discussion.

HARDLY REALISTIC???!!! As it stands right now, AAA bursts are going off a mile or more away from my aircraft and the AI enemy aircraft. So tell me uncleal where is the "realism" there??? That seems more arcade than anything... Have you even read the OP? I find your comment to be a rash jump to pass judgement when "ARCADE shooter" has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. This thread isn't about "making it friendly", I could care less about that. I was simply suggesting an alternative to how AAA was toned down in the FIRST place (to satisfy the majority), and by this suggestion IMPROVE upon "realism" (or whatever you want to call it) so that we virtual pilots can spot enemy AC at a historically realistic distance, as opposed to when I can just see aircraft appearing on my screen as a pixel. When a distant aircraft pixel appears on screen and can be resolved by the human eye is not historical accurate, and this has been argued and proven in other WWI sim forums, so don't bother. Under certain conditions real life WWI pilots could see AC from miles away, granted some were better than others, but that is not the issue. In OFF we can only see AC at what distance, maybe a mile or two? That is unrealistic. By having AAA bursts going off around AC at a distance we could spot them further out at the distance that a real WWI pilot would have seen them without the bursts. The bursts just let them see them even further out than that...

Thank you for comment Test Pilot. Perhaps I should have stated the question this way: As it stands in the game currently, can we (virtual pilots) use the AAA bursts to help us spot the enemy at a distance, and thus overcome the resolution limitations of our screens and the game? I say the answer is no, the current AAA does not help us spot enemy at a distance. Can it be fixed by returning AAA accuracy and ROF to where it was before but reduce the damage effectiveness? That is also up to debate, but second to the first question...

Well, correct me if wrong, but I think it is impossible to be a stealthy hunter in game. The AI has always seen me coming regardless of how I approach. The only time the AI has stayed on course was when they were tasked with a bombing run, otherwise they always turn to meet me. Do I run? Only when none of my side is left. I will charge back into the fur-ball to save an AI wingmate, because I have to admit, it just feels SO real the tension trying to reach his opponent before he gets shot down. Sometimes when you do rescue him (or just shoo the bugger off his tail), it makes that victory count for much, much more. Would I survive? Doubt it. I finally made ace officially with one of my pilots, but posthumously. I don't get to fly much, maybe a mission or two on a weekend. It certainly keeps the game fresh though.

Just thought I'd ask. 1.3 was just fine, but 1.3b and I'm getting intermittent hangs requiring hard shut down, also the game mysteriously ends on me at times. Nothing else changed, same drivers etc. but I did just replace my DVD drive under warranty, but it can't be that... Pooched install maybe??? It happens... I hate having to do full re-installs, I barely have time to fly as it is...

Cameljockey: 8800 GTX: 575 MHz core clock / 1.35 GHz shader clock / 1.8 GHz Memory clock 8800 Ultra: 612 MHz / 1.5 GHz / 2.16 GHz But both cards have the same pixels/clock at 128 [data from www.hardwaresecrets.com] Seems factory overclocking here. What are the experiences of people with the 8800 series cards? I may be able to pick one up cheap, but don't know if I should just wait for the current high end cards to come down in price soon. I currently have a 7800 GTX 512 (once a Big card, now last legs), on mid to low settings and get moderate fps. I'm thinking of overclocking this card as well, but have to do much research first... It already has monster spreaders and fans on it.

McCudden mentions Albatros tracer smoke in 1917. I'm just reading it for the first time, and he didn't mention it earlier, tho absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. IMHO, I think "Flyboys" tracer was more like what one would see in WWII, and just too over the top for WWI. It was likely a corporate decision for the masses, and so Hollywood. Sort of like when Fox put the pink ring and blue tracer on the hockey puck during NHL broadcasts. It was universally hated!!! BUT me thinks I'm off topic...

Hi, Not sure if this has been mentioned, but I noticed that during the flight set up/roster screen (when I write down the pilot names in order to ID my claim witness...), I have a named flight lead (say Jack Johnson) and a named wingman (Roy Reardon), BUT when in game/flying the Flight lead AC is labeled Roy..., and my wingman is labeled Jack... They're switched. This is the case for the few campaigns I've flown as British RNAS in 1916, but not sure if it is the case for all sqdrns/times. ALSO, I like that I can ID the members of my flight now via the in game AC labels, thank you for that patch, but now the labels are really really long by containing the aircraft name, pilot full name, flight lead, etc. Can you please perhaps just use FL1, FL2, and W1, W2 in the AC labels? We are supposed to be writing down the names of our wingmates afterall, so we should know who the first and second flight lead are, and the wingmen 1 and 2 etc. Just a thoughtful suggestion, and would like to hear opinions...

I bet it would have to be saved as an entirely different A/C, say "Nieuport11-Cap" with German affiliation assigned in the code. If you just named it 'Albatros' in order to get by the squadron A/C assignments (thus the same name as the true A/C) it would just overwrite the real Albatros folder. I saw those picts as well in the book "Sharks among the minnows" a good read on the Fokker scourge, and think it is a great idea, but it would require a lot of code change.

F2b is one of the deadliest A/C in WWI Olham, best to tuck your tail between your legs and run... And don't try the, "Oh, I don't care to see them today" approach

In the first few days of OFF3 before all the threads on this topic, I was (sadly) putting in a bare minimum of details, and got a few claims confirmed, others denied. What I would REALLY like to know now is, if I shoot down 2 Fokker EIII's in a mission, do I enter it under one claim line (ie: choose 2 on the number of A/C drop down menu) OR do I enter them separately on 2 claim lines (ie: choose 1 and 1 if they are the same a/c type)??? It seems to me that if claims are confirmed with some element of randomness (and this seems to be the case for me), that version 2 has a better chance of squeaking by at least one of them.

WRT rear fire angles and the FE2b... I noticed early on in the first days of OFF3 that the observer in the FE2b could fire to the rear and below THROUGH the engine! Literally, I saw tracers coming from the engine when I tried a sneaking approached from below in an Alb DII. This definitely ain't right given the pusher arrangement; I could *perhaps* see the tractor config and ring mount shooting down (a la 1.5 strutter), but not FE2b.... I figured this would be solved with a future patch (even think there was an early thread), and I haven't flown for Olham's side for a while, so maybe it hasn't been addressed???

[Went back to edit, but not allowed] This brings up a question since OFF3 came out (and why I had to fly across the channel to take my wife for a spin over London... she's a cheap date ), how does one do the quick tourist flights like you used to be able to do in OFF2? Remember that menu item?

I can vouch for this observation. It's in the Thames estuary, looks like it should've been on a nearby island AFAIK tell. I saw it a while back when I decided to fly across the channel for a pint in my favourite pub one lazy day in the RNAS, but didn't think anyone would care since it was out of the action...

The following technical serials are now available online for the first time. Not all years covered, but the majority are, and the rest they're working on it... (see links below) Annals of Flight Studies in Air and Space Other serials available... Cheers!

The following technical serials are now available online for the first time. Not all years covered, but the majority are, and the rest they're working on it... (links below) Annals of Flight Studies in Air and Space Other serials available... Cheers!

This is from an excellent article in Air & Space Magazine (and more on the DR1 as well). It could be modded perhaps, and there was some interest when I first started a thread on the topic in OFF2 last year (was it that long ago?). But as far as I know, the DR1 acts like it has a fin AND rudder....