von Baur

Wow, HW. The fartest north I ever went (for more than a couple of weeks) was a three-year stint at Elmendorf AFB, Anchorage, Alaska. I think the latitude was in the low 60* range...as was the high temp in the summer, sometimes. I remember the sun finally peeking over the eastern hills at about 9:30 or 10:00 in the morning and it being pitch black again by 3:30 in the afternoon. I worked in a secured facility, meaning no windows, and other than lunch and the occassional errand never saw the sun on weekdays. They told us about sunlamps and vitamind-D at the in-comers briefing. I also remember the reverse when, at the height of summer and with the help of Daylight Savings Time, old Sol would barely dip below the horizon at about 11:00 or 11:30 and be starting to break again by 2:00AM. It never got so dark as to require headlights from early June to mid July.

Thank you for that, Widowmaker. "We Three Kings" is awonderful song and classic guitar only makes it better. Olham, I took German for two years in high school and learned some Christmas Carols then. Knowing that, and that I played guitar a little, the pastor at my church in 1982 (a man of Pennsylvania Dutch[Deutsch] background) offered me the honor for our Chrismas Eve Candlelight Service of recounting the story behind "Stille Nacht" and then playing and singing it as it was first done. I know it's a relatively recent addition to the list of Christmas music, but I'm surprised no one's mentioned Garth Brooks's "Belleau Wood" yet. My favorite, though, is any song my mother is singing. She has a beautiful soprano voice, strong and clear, and when she passes away there will be a lot of angels looking for new jobs.

I've modified the "Gothas Over London" mission to allow for takeoff, flying to target, and flying back. I was set at the right spot on the airfield, facing the right direction, everything perfect. I've even managed to get up airspeed and lift off and over the trees. But it always drops me out of the mission within a minute or two. I've gotten an error message about online/offline stores (I'll try to copy it today and post exact text), but not always. I also noticed that the TAC does not bring up any waypoints. The only thing I did was add <Waypoint Type="takeoff" Speed="0" IsWarpable="n" Lat="N51*4'54.1328"" Lon="E3*38'51.6650"" Alt="21.56"/> before the existing waypoints and <Waypoint Type="landing" Speed="0" IsWarpable="n" Lat="N51*4'54.1328"" Lon="E3*38'51.6650"" Alt="21.56"/> after them. Any ideas, off the tops of your heads?

Well said, Slarti. ps........mmmmmmmm, bacon.

Never mind, I got it working. I don't know how, but it's working.

Thank you for confirming that their careers do progress, Creaghorn. I've rarely made it more than a couple of virtual weeks before taking AA fire on a ground attack mission or colliding with an EA in the middle of scissoring with him, so I've not seen it. That's the essence of my request. I do track the victories of the AI that I fly with and although I've seen the same confirmation message for some of them that you have I have yet to see their numbers actually change. And I account for only maybe about 25%-30% of the aircraft shot down by my flights at best.

I disagree about requiring more memory than most people have, considering 1TB hard drives are now pretty much standard for new computers. However your point about such a thing not fitting on the same disc as the game is well taken. If your concern is having the map available during the mission perhaps it could be broken down into areas as Rabu's map is. Then the only thing that would have to load onto your RAM is the map for your AO. This is an above average simulation of aerial warfare in The Great War, and one into which the developers have put a lot of effort to provide the players with as much immersion as possible. But, for me at least, some of that immersion is lost if I'm the only one who progresses in his career. To paraphrase Willi von Klugermann, I like to have someone pushing me. I like the competition of seeing how I'm doing compared to those around me. And if those around me are stagnant then they are not people, they're furniture with faces..."atmosphere" in filmmaking parlance. And one does not compete with furniture...one simply steps around it. The question posed was "What is the #1 feature you would like to see in P4?". This was my #2. Taken to its extreme, the performance and survival of those you lead into combat is a direct reflection on your leadership ability. And if promotions and/or transfers are incorporated (as others have requested) then all of your skills should be taken into consideration when deciding whether to move you to an elite squadron or maybe drop you into one with less activity. If you were the commanding general, would you give a squadron to someone who can't bring back his wingmen on a regular basis, regardless how many personal kills he's racked up at their expense? You've never had a lone wolf mission? Or one in which you became separated from your wingmen for a time? Not all confirmations had to come from fellow flight members. In fact, I'd guess that indepenent ground confirmation was required, at least by later in the war, to prevent any, "I'll confirm two kills for you today and you confirm one for me tomorrow and one the day after that" scenarios.

1.) Detailed printable and briefing room maps that match the roads, rail lines (including stations), rivers (including lakes) and woodlines in the game. The printable map should look like a simple prewar road map made by, say, January 1914, without necessarily incorporating airfields, non-prewar military encampments or the front lines. These were available to both sides and I've read that it's what the German Army used at the outset of the war. The briefing room map could have those features overlaid since it would be logical to have them drawn onto a squadron map used for that purpose. Later in the war the briefing room map could even include 'recon photographs' of the mission objectives. I realize this is a tall order but it is the sigle most significant shortcoming of OFF, in my opinion. 2.) Squadron mates' careers fleshed out as much as the player's. I've had icredible luck, I suppose, with my fellow aviators, losing extremely few and they usually down several aircraft between them, but I never see it reflected in the Duty Room. Their kill numbers stay the same, mission after mission, while mine increase as confirmations come in. I could understand if a given percentage were denied, but I track the kill tallies of each person in my flight and have yet to see any of them increase at all. 3.) (while we're on the subject of kills)Confirmation sources other than squadron mates (i.e. ground witnesses). If the action took place within sight of two or three observation balloons and I can provide the location of one of them (e.g., observation balloon north of Henin-Lietard) it should be safe to assume that they could confirm my kill. The same would be true for friendly encampments, particularly behind the lines. The men there would likely be on relaxation time and their attention would probably be drawn to a dogfight, therefore it could be expected that they could coroborate EA shot down. The confirmation percentage could increase if a player has a unique skin rather than a default or squadron one. And if identifiable markings are taken into account for confirmation percentage then they should only be available to players who have proven themselves as aces (whatever number that country used to establish ace status). 4.) Heavy bombers. I know, they've been confirmed, but it's one of the things I want and am looking forward to.

An added benefit to the suggestions of Elephant and Olham is that each man would be next to his respective aircraft.

Looking forward to P4's heavies. In anticipation I dragged the big-screen down to the computer room, tweaked the "Gotha raid on London" mission (changed the start time to 2:00AM and nixxed all the pesky interceptors), fired up OFF and let 'er rip. Gotta love the Gotha's bombsight...first bomb was on target smack on the Tower Bridge. Turned around and headed east and two and a half hours later I was on the ground deep in Belgium. Hairy landing...gotta come in so shallow I had a dickens of a time picking up the airfield (next tilme I'll position myself on centerline about five miles out and lock the heading into my mind, then descend until I'm at about 300' and take it in from there). Came in diagonally over the corner with all the hangars!!! Nursed it over the hangars just above stall speed, chopped throttle directly over them and settled into a beautiful landing, rolling to a stop less than halfway across the field. But one of the coolest parts was watching the sun rise out of the North Sea on my return trip. Had to take a pic for posting. Enjoy.

"Fergal"?

Gun jams are on, Olham. Normally I don't put more than 3-10 rounds into a burst, even if I'm attacking a relatively stable two-seater such as a BE2c or FE2. Three seconds would be an extreme case on an especially sturdy foe, such as a SPAD. And to be honest I may not have gone that long, I don't count, although I have had some bursts that felt very long at the time. I only threw out three as kind of a maximum. Thanx for directing me to tip #36, al. It reinforced my (personal) lack of desire to read them all (started to back when there were only a handful of them and decided it was a waste of time, IMO). What I've found there mostly are the obvious, the inaccurate and advice on how to make OFF less immersive and interesting. The Obvious: "If you can't hit him, get closer before you Fire". Duh! Boelcke told von Richtofen, "I fly close to my man, I aim carefully, open fire and then he falls down." There was another german squadron commander (I'm sure someone here will know who, I can't recall off the top of my head) who told his pilots to close until they were afraid they would collide with the enemy and then fly closer before opening fire. And it wasn't just the Germans. Pilots of all sides knew that the best way to assure yourself of hitting your opponent in a vital area was to get uncomfortably close. One french pilot (Fonck, maybe?) reportedly one time came back with bits of his victim's head splattered on his airplane and goggles. Ask some of Vasco's Volunteers and they'll tell you that I practice that to an extreme. About the only time I'll take any kind of long shot at all is to try to shake up my target...that is, distract an enemy from attacking one of my squadmates or make a fleeing enemy jink, thus slowing him down and allowing me to overtake him more quickly. My preferred range is when I can see the enemy's head clearly, even to the point that I can identify the goggles strap. The Inaccurate: All that claptrap about the lack of sights, for one thing. Especially on the German machines. I fly with Track IR and so can't speak to the ingame gunsight view, but the only planes I've flown that don't allow you to line up front and rear sights are the Halberstadt and the DFW, and that's because the gun placement is outside the range of available head movement. And many Allied planes have front and rear sights, too, including the Sopwith Pup, and Tripe (haven't flown the Camel enough to remember), the SPAD XIII has the ring and bead, and I believe the N-17 has a front and rear sight on the fuselage-mounted gun. Also, the Fokker Dr1 was introduced in late summer of 1917, not 3/18. And the D-VII wasn't avaliable for front-line duty until late April or early May of 1918, so you can't say that was the plane you were talking about. To be completely fair, some of the information is accurate and useful. You do stress the importance of firing from close range, although you don't define 'close' (if you use the labels try to get under 50 yards, 25-30 would be better...if you don't, a good rule of thumb is the old tried-and-true 'wait until the enemy fills your view'). You also mention 'meat or metal' and you even specify the front third of the fuselage, which is a good general rule. On the other hand, the original question asked was about gun jams, which is not mentioned at all in tip #36.

A: There were gun jams in Red Baron AFM. They would unjam a few seconds after you hit "U", not automatically. B: I remember reading, many many years ago, that the SPAD had a wooden mallet in the cockpit to be used to whack the cocking levers if the guns jammed. Hollywood, and more particularly 'Flyboys', copied reality. However the point about short bursts is very accurate. Stay below three seconds and not only will you pretty much eliminate any jams (never suffered one, myself), but you won't run out of ammo as fast.

A couple of weeks ago we finally made the move to large HD TV's, including a 37-incher designated for the bedroom. The computer room is just inside our door, and somehow that one (which happens to have a VGA port ) got lost and stopped in there before making it to the bedroom...I had nothing to do with it, HONEST !!! It turns out that it won't display a 16:9 image from the VGA input, although it did stretch the 4:3 to fill the screen. WOW!!! It was . Even though everything was distorted, the effect of the larger image was fantastic. Even at maximum zoom out I was able to pick up planes and ground features much more easily, feeling almost like what I'd expect from being there, and as a former skydiver I've had some experience at viewing things from the air. Unfortunately my video card doesn't have an HDMI port which would allow me to return things to their original shape and at the same time take advantage of some expanded peripheral vision. But for the paltry sum of $14.78 (including shipping) the good folks at TigerDirect have agreed to let me have a DVI-HDMI adapter which, by coincidence, has been released for delivery as of 5:22 this very morning. So, after I move my TIR camera a little higher....GUESS WHAT I'LL BE DOING.

I'm going to remove the hutch from the computer desk. Then I can push the tv (when I use it...it's still meant for the bedroom) back about a foot (~30 cm). I don't really want it too far away or I'll lose the advantage it gives of making objects easier to spot. But sitting as close as I am I get a headache if I fly too much . The TV we bought for the living room is 50". I felt that 42 would have been plenty, but my wife held out for the larger one. I'm glad she did. Watching movies now has a 'theater' feel that smaller screens can't match:ok: . I'm looking forward to popping "The Blue Max" into the old DVD player.

After some tweaking (video sttings, Track IR sensitivity...to accomodate a greater range of head movement) the results are in: Me like. I have to admit, it's not that good for regular computer use, though. You have to turn your head from side to side to read what you used to simply scan with your eyes. I'll reserve the TV-as-monitor for when I'm planning an afternoon or a day of flying and nothing else.

I've recently started having problems accessing some websites. Most of the time I'll get a message that says "Internet Explorer cannot display the page" and gives me a button that says "Diagnose Connection Problems" (which didn't really help). But sometimes I get a page that says "Domain blocked" and tells me to email my network administrator...I am the network adminitrator. I've noticed that this page comes from something called OpenDNS. Does anyone have any info on this? Is this some kind of hijacker or other evil? If so does anyone know how to get rid of it? I've tried a system restore but it didn't help. And it's even affecting sites such innocuous as Yahoo, The Weather Channel and the site where I check lottery numbers.

Thanx for the replies, folks. Parky got me there, sort of. When I right-clicked my connection there was a 'repair' option. I figured, "Why the heck not?", clicked it and when it was done, presto, I was able to go to any site I've tried so far.

Got the DVD. In fact I made this little .gif from it, which I used as my avatar on the Wings of Valor forum.

Danke, Herr Olham, my voice has been added.

Lou, your throttle would technically be the joystick slider, but I like your set-up. The only reason I haven't copied it is because I can imagine my wife's reaction the first time she used the computer after it's installation. For the censor's sake, I won't repeat it here. Olham, would you consider modifying your tracker type choices to include Track IR 3 w/Vector (which is what I use)? The basic TIR3 was only 2dof, but could be transformed to 6dof with the Vector adaptor addon. TIR4 was the first that had native 6dof capability.

I can only say....d'oh!!!

The first half of that is airing on American television.

IIRC all of the Baron's official victims were members of the British Empire. Further, I recall reading that he had only two uncredited claims and both of those came early in his career, on the Eastern Front. I don't believe he was ever across the lines from an American unit.

I don't belive that's OFF, gaw. Reflection of clouds in the water and the map in the lower left are two other fieatures you won't find here. Guessing Knights of the Sky or Rise of Flight.