von Baur

I think I posted these on the old OFF forum, but here are shots of a couple of planes that I did for Richtofen's Skies a few years ago. They're based of the same thing I did for Red Baron before that. I wanted to make the Albatros look like it was more impromptu...you can still see the woodgrain of the fuselage and the original camoflage pattern on the wings' tops through unevenly applied brushstrokes. It's only visible from fairly close, though, at a distance it looks white. The Dr1, coming later when the pilot was more established, has a more professional look to it...complete and even coverage. Hopefully I'll have a chance to do the same for OFF.

I've been wrong before, but not about so much after having said so little. Did I get anything right in that post tttiger? Seriously though, thank you for correcting me. I won't make those mistakes again. (How in the world could I have mistaken Elke Sommer for Ursula Andress?)

I readily concede, JFM, that ultimately von Richtofen 'outflew' Hawker because he survived the battle and Hawker didn't. What I meant was that Hawker, in a lesser machine, denied von Richtofen the killing shot until he finally stopped maneuvering and flew more or less straight in an attempt to get home, thus presenting the Baron with a clean shot. So the story goes, this encounter showed von Richtofen that the pilot was the more significant part of the equation than was the machine. All of the supposition about who was better between Voss and MvR? I agree with you completely. It's like the old joke in which an admiral pointed to a lake and asked a seaman what he would do if the admiral were to sail a battleship up to him in it. The seaman said he'd torpedo the battleship from his submarine. The admiral asked, "And where would you get the submarine?" "The same place you got the battleship, sir!" If you're going to assume that Voss survived and fought to the end of the war, you must, in fairness, assume the same about von Richtofen, as I said before. And anyone who would use camparisons between any of the souls who flew these machines we pretend to fly to belittle one or the other doesn't deserve the time it takes to listen to his arguments, IMO. Every one of them, from top-scoring aces who enjoyed long careers to the unlucky majority who never lived to see 5 hours, let alone 17, deserves an equal share of respect. Because shooting down an airplane doesn't take nerve. But getting into one knowing that today it might be you does. Of course, then you can also debate the term "better". That he flew unstable machines that were as likely to kill their occupants as their enemies for so long without falling victim to their shortcomings as so many others on both sides (even aces...let's not forget that McCudden and Immlemann both died as a result of their own machines failing and not enemy action) did is testament to the indisputable fact that he was more than simply competent as a pilot. And yet he himself seemed not only to accept but almost take pride in saying that he couldn't perform more than rudimentary aerial maneuvers. He wasn't a stunt pilot, he was a combat pilot, as was Voss. And as such all that mattered was putting rounds on target. In that both excelled. BTW, I'll take the story you quoted as support for my contention that von Richtofen's SA was second to none. To immediately recognize a problem, diagnose its probable cause, realize exactly how serious it is and identify "the only landing possibility" takes a level of awareness most don't have. An interesting story, too. I hadn't heard it before. But then Udet is one of the few pilots whose stories I haven't read. When I was in high school (40-some years ago) I devoured all I could find. It wasn't until many years later that I found out many had been ghost-written and most likely sensationalized by the writer. As for MvR being an "overrated coward", I hope you're either quoting an opinion you don't share or kidding. While wartime propaganda may have been able to make him into some kind of superhuman killing machine in an attempt to instill fear into enemy pilots and make them worry each time they saw a German aircraft, "Is that him?", I doubt so much good would have been said after the war and by such distinguished aviators as Udet. The dime novels of the American Old West played up their subjects and made them larger-than-life heroes. But time has revealed the truth, or at least stripped away the romanticized veneer (those who really know the truth are no longer in a position to pass along that knowledge). Time, on the other hand, has done nothing but intensify the legend of the Red Baron, with little to no substantiated negative press. And the fact is that Jasta 11 was going nowhere when von Richtofen took it over and under his leadership it produced several aces. That could not have happened if he was taking credit for others' kills or hiding behind his squadmates' skirts, letting them soften up the targets for Manfred to finish off. Along with the fact that actions like that by the leader wouldn't have garnered the loyalty that von Richtofen's pilots showed him. Obsolete flying coffins, godzilla? It was an FE2 that almost killed von Richtofen in July of 1917. And they didn't get more obsolete than that, at that time. Personally, I'd rather take on three single-seaters in OFF than one two-seater (except of course the BE2c, which must stand for "Bloody Easy 2 chase", since I've yet to have one even take evasive maneuvers, let alone fire back). While a fighter is more maneuverable than a two-seater it can only shoot at you when you're directly in front of it. You're exposed to greater danger from most two-seaters in all but a few positions. And there were several 'ace' two-seater crews, including at least one that won the Pour le Merite (when I find my book on it, I'll edit in the names). As for type and 'quality' of the opponent, these weren't sportsmen playing a game. They were soldiers fighting a war. And observation planes were the most valuable asset in the sky in WWI (the bomber became more important in WWII), while scouts/fighters were the most expendable. From a war effort standpoint, one RE8 was worth a dozen or more scouts.

Do you realize what you're saying, JFM? Who wouldn't like to be compared...and usually favorably...with the person generally considered the best in the field? Do you think Tom Cruise would feel put upon to be compared favorably to Paul Newman or Marlon Brando? How about John Elway being compared to Johnny Unitas? Do you think that Stephen Hawking would take umbrage at being compared favorably to Albert Einstein? However, the more accurate analogy might be Muhammed Ali (Voss) against the pre-Don King Mike Tyson (von Richtofen). Voss was absolutely the more technically skilled and artistically improvisational flyer. And von Richtofen was the deadly stalker who normally didn't expose himself to danger until he had secured a significant advantage. Manfred never made any bones about his lack of flying skill. He openly admitted that even Lothar was a better pilot, but added that he was also much more reckless. Would Voss have taken over the top spot had he survived the war? Who's to say. But if we make the supposition that he lived, shouldn't we also allow von Richtofen to escape his fate out of fairness? Although High Command wanted to take MvR out of active flying so he wouldn't be lost as had Immlemann and Boelcke, I doubt he would have stood for it. Supposedly he had said he would retire at 40 vitories, tieing himself with his mentor. But he stayed on. Later he started talking about 80 being a respectable number, but as he approached it he bagan to say that 100 would be the real mark to achieve. You tell me, does any of that sound like someone who would have been willing to be taken out of the fight? And could Voss have overcome the lead built up by von Richtofen if both had continued adding to their tally? Who's to say? Without doubt Voss was vastly superior to The Red Baron as a pilot. Not only did von Richtofen admit and accept his lack of technical flying skill, he didn't think it was significant. Hawker had essentially outflown him, not allowing him to get a clean shot until Hawker was forced to stop his dancing and try to "escape" (note to Widowmaker, slower DH2 trying to escape a single faster machine...didn't work then, probably wouldn't have for Voss against six SE5's, either). Von Richtofen considered aerobatics largely useless, sticking to what Boelcke had once told him, "Fly close to (your) man, aim well, fire and of course he falls down." And as I said before, even McCudden testified to Voss's skill. Of course, that in itself could have been a sort of propaganda..."The enemy pilot was amazingly skilled, but we're better." Who knows? Certainly von Richtofen was an excellent shot and tactician, but I think his greatest strength, and what kept him alive for so long, was his situational awareness. Not much is said of it, but a few things make me think it must have been remarkable. For one, Udet once said that after a fight von Richtofen would review what happened with all of his pilots and he was always impressed by how the Rittmeister could tell each pilot what they had done and what they could do better. He said it gave him comfort in a fight knowing that von Richtofen would know if he got into trouble and would come to help him out.

Ursula Andress seemed to love appearing nude or semi-nude in films. In "A Shot in the Dark" (Peter Sellers second turn as Inspector Clouseau) she played a maid for whom the silly sleuth falls and shares three or four scenes sans clothing. If I'm not mistaken she and Sellars were husband and wife when the film was shot.

I disagree that he had any "chance to escape", Widowmaker. The Dr1 was considerably slower and didn't have the ceiling or the range of the SE5, meaning they could go where he could and they could get there faster and wait for him. His only chance for 'escape' was to make the 56 Squadron pilots want to escape from him. To do that he had to combine offensive and defensive flying, which he did as possibly only he and the Dr1 could. By the accounts of both McCudden and Rhys-Davis he was a ghost, filling their sights one moment and gone the next. I don't think it was an accident...I think he knew exactly what he was doing. He was trying to get them to fire and, hopefully, run out of ammunition. McCudden also remarked that Voss had put holes in all of their machines. Try taking a Dr1 against six veteran AI SE5's in QC someitme. You may hit a few, but to hit all of them you have to fire from impossible angles at times when it wouldn't be expected. And to do that you have to know how to make your aircraft do things that your opponents don't believe can be done. Stunning pilot? Yeah, I'll agree 1000% (not a typo, I meant to say 1000%) with you on that one.

I've downloaded tha Zepp and Gotha missions and they're fun diversions. Or they would be if not for some wierd visual problems. Both my plane and enemy planes disappear. It starts when I start shooting, but it also happens when I'm not. Also in the Zepp mission I don't see any textures on the defending Albatrosses and the rockets show up as white diamonds and two of them just hung in midair at the point they would have impacted the Zeppelin. The airship didn't explode but did start a crash dive. I've run some of the stock missions and they're behaving themselves. Anybody else having similar problems of have any suggestions?

Dan, I just noticed your signature. Another Blackadder fan, I see. I think my favorite exchange in that episode began, "Do you have any idea what it feel like to have the wind in your hair?" :lmaosmiley:

Dan, I certainly didn't mean to ignore the Eurofighter, and I'm sorry if it seemed that way. But in a way you prove my point of the necessity of getting planes like the F-22 and F-35 into the USAF inventory. The F-15 is an excellent plane and has an unmatched (and unbeatable) kill ratio, considering that none has ever been destroyed by air-to-air action. But it's yesterday's news, and to keep relying on it would be as foolish as Hitler's saying that the Me-109 and FW-190 were good enough and not developing the Me-262 into a pure fighter-interceptor from the start. And to all you F-15 fanatics out there, don't take offense at the "yesterday's news" thing. It can still play an important role as an interceptor and ground attack aircraft, but it needs to step aside and give the air superiority job to the new generation of fighters. After all, you wouldn't want to take an E-III up against a N-17, let alone a Camel or SPAD, would you?

To Bullethead: Bubba, if my life is on the line I want that. And I'm glad to see it'll be my countrymen who have it and not someone else's. Let's just pray that true prudence and excellent judgement is exercised before unleashing that dog. It brings to mind a program I saw on the Military Channel about Top Ten fighter planes. They were discussing the F-22 and this one "expert" said that it costs too much money and the F-15 is already on inventory and has shown itself to be the deadliest fighter plane in history. My response is, "The F-15 is now the second deadliest fighter plane in history (maybe third, after seeing this )." In 5-on-1 matchups of F-15's to a lone F-22 the F-22 always came out on top, usually killing all five Eagles before any could even find the Raptor. Why should the US invest the money in these systems, the 'expert' asked? Because if we don't, someone else will. To Hasse Wind: With all these sensors to provide SA info, the need for human eyes onsite is growing less. This could be the final step needed to achieve remotely-piloted fighter aircraft on the battlefield. That means that our children (or grandchildren, in my case) may well fight any future wars (and I sincerely hope they aren't necessary) sitting at a console or a cockpit mockup in a protected bunker hundreds or thousands of miles from where the aircraft they are controlling are waging war. And playing these games may be excellent training for a career as a military pilot. Of course, all technological advancement comes with potential risks. Rain had no effect on bows and arrows or clubs and swords, but when armies began relying too heavily on black powder weapons it became a major factor. The US built several fighter types without guns because modern air-to-air missile technology made upclose dogfighting "obsolete" . Soldiers who are too dependant on GPS may struggle with maps and compasses if technology fails or is taken out by an intelligent enemy unless they keep their skills sharp. And likewise I hope that anyone who pilots this machine spends lots of time flying with all the gadgets turned off, just in case.

Wasn't trying to throw cold water on it, OvS. In fact I said it was cool. I was responding to the misperceptions of Rooster "Thats awesome that all those guys from around the world can play together while still being in thier home towns." and TSmoke, "Pretty cool actually, try doing that 20 years ago, seems even the internet can get it right once in a blue moon.". And don't feel bad about not catching that, guys. I made the same mistake the first time. It wasn't until I showed it to my wife that I noticed the discrepancy. It's not a wonder of the modern internet. It's simple film editing that's been done since before the birds we pretend to fly ever really took to the air.

Cornell, are you talking about a head mounted display? If so, no I haven't, but I've wanted to try one coupled with some sort of head tracking system since I first started playing Red Baron 3D almost ten years ago (before Track IR existed, AFIK). If the tracker could follow the player's head through its entire range of motion you could set it to a 1-1 ratio. Then with the HMD keeping the center of the screen directly in front of the player's eyes it would be almost perfect. Add one screen for each eye and parallax (sp?) compensating software and you'd have true depth perception. (I've been told that the depth perception has caused dizzyness and nausea when it was tested in HMD's. Something to do with the brain trying to make sense of the eye focussing on something near while the parallax angles are telling you that it's far away.) If I were designing it, I'd want each screen to cover at least 90 degrees at normal magnification with the center of view being 20 degrees in from one side (left side for the right screen, right side for the left screen). That would give the player an overall field of view of 160 degrees with 40 degrees of depth perception. 160 degrees should be enough peripheral vision to satisfy even the most demanding gamer, and more than most people are normally conscious of. Unfortunately, the last time I checked (at least three years ago) they were going for several thousand dollars (US), and the resolution (800x600 max...and over $10,000) and sreen size (they wouldn't give fov in degrees, just some mumbo-jumbo about 'comparable to a X-size TV viewed from Y distance) were somewhat less than reassuring. Now if I hit the Powerball.........I'll let you know how it works.

Very cool, but they were not playing simutaneously connected over the internet. Daytime in Moscow, Amsterdam, South Africa and the United States but nighttime in Toulouse, France? Someone explain that to me, please. The electronic and sound equipment probably just was for recording and playback so everyone would be on the same key and beat and then the individual performances were cut together. Next time they need to hire a continuity checker.

I posted this after having not flown for a few weeks. I would, and still, swear that the shortest range on the TAC was 2nm and that the labled distance for aircraft entering the inner circle was about 1800, give or take 50 or so. I have since done some flights and my statements in the previous post are incorrect. In fact, the shortest range on the TAC is 1 nautical mile and the labled distance to objects at its limit is about 2000. That would be make it closer to, and within the margin of error for, yards. That is my final answer, Regis. And, tttiger, I would be happy to have a member of the dev team provide us with a definitive answer. Until then I'm going with yards. I'm sorry if I misled anyone.

Back to the original topic Firing distances Most aerial gunners preferred to get as close as possible before opening fire. When a raw von Richtofen asked Boelcke at a chance meeting on a train (according to the legend) how he managed to shoot down so many enemy aircraft the master's answer was, "I fly close to my man, aim well, fire and, of course, he falls down." I read somewhere that one ace (I want to say McCudden, but at the same time I don't think that's right) would tell younger pilots to fly until they were just about to collide with their opponent, and then get closer. In von Richotfen's autobiography, when he describes his being shot down I believe he says that the gunner of the English Vickers opened fire at 300 meters or more, which caused him to laugh at the foolish wasting of ammunition...until that magic BB almost removed the controversy of whether he was killed by fire from the air or from the ground. Certainly, the man who nearly killed The Red Baron wasn't the only one to fire from long range. And we'll likely never know if that was a rare action on his part or if he did it regularly to try to discourage enemy aircraft from coming too close to him and his pilot. But given the limited accuracy (yes, I know that machine gunners in the trenches were accurate up to 1000 yards, but those guns were mounted on tripods that were sitting on the ground often with sandbags on their legs to make them even more steady, not on a highly flexible mount that was bolted to an airplane that was jinking around to present a difficult target to the enemies trying to shoot it down) and the adrenaline that would have to be flooding the veins of the gunner, I doubt they were nearly as effective as our AI opponents tend to be at long distances. And with that in mind, I further doubt they would risk the vulnerability of running out of ammo by wasting any firing at unlikely distances.

Label distances-feet/yards/meters? I say meters. Why? One nautical mile=1852 meters=2025.4yards. With the TAC at its smallest setting its range is shown as 2nm, meaning that the rim of the inner circle is 1nm from your position. Targets are at about 1850 when they enter the smaller circle (more accurate measurement might be possible if one were to pause the game as a lone target hit 1850 and then one took the time to examine its position within the TAC, although it would be difficult to be 100% precise because exact position on the TAC will always be at least somewhat open to individual interpretation).

When I got BHaH I made it a point to make a pass over the field before landing to check on the windsock. I figured that with winds on in the configuration it might be a good idea to land as directly into them as possible. On my third or fourth mission we were bounced on takeoff and I noticed the smoke from a downed aircraft blowing about 160 degrees off from the windsock. It surprised me, but after that I paid closer attention to the socks and saw that they seemed to point the same direction all the time. I've heard of 'prevailing winds', but that's a bit overboard . It's nice to know that I can use them now. Any thought to standardizing their locations on airfields? Some are near the hangars (makes them easy to find, but IRL they could be somewhat unreliable there due to turbulence caused by the hangars) and some are across the field (clear of the hangars but often near enough to trees to get the same interference).

What is your outcome set to? If it's "Dead is dead" he probably wouldn't have. However, if you have it set to "Roll of the Die" that would explain it. that setting is terribly capricious. Storied abound of surviving crashing uncontrolled from great heughts and I've personally experinced taking no damage during a flight and landing as soft as a feather only to be told "Sadly your pilot died". I recommend going with "Dead is dead" and relying on skill to survive.

I lit up three BE2's at about 8,000 feet on a campaign mission (I assume that won't happen again, now that I've installed 1.3 and the Hardcore dm patch). I was less than 100 feet from the second when it caught fire and the pilot and observer both bailed out, both in that same fetal position. After all three aircraft were dispatched I had occassion to notice one of the aircrew floating in midair, feet down and head up with his arms raised over his head. I realized that the two body positions (fetal on bailout and later stretched straight) were holdovers from CFS3 and this man was descending under an invisible parachute. It was rather amusing. I'm guessing your man was too low for the 'chute' to open and he bounced. The explosion was a bit much, though. Has anyone else seen this effect? And not to be bloodthirsty, but if my assumption about it is correct does this include our own pilots?? Can we bail out and be lowered gently to Mother Earth by an invisible canopy of lifesaving silk? If so, it sounds like it's time for another patch.

Installed both. Will try to link up with you.

The Pfalz bug...right. What about switching? Ingame, or exit required?

I want to add this, (patch download at 13% as I type), but I'm a tad confused. On the web page I see >>OFFICIAL PATCH 1.3<<, and then the "Optional" Hardcore Damage Model and Normal Damage Model. Does this mean that if I install the main patch and want to switch to the normal dm I can't go back to hard? And once the hard damage model is available again will I have to exit the game and run the appropriate patch to change from one to the other or will this be one of the settings in Workshop? (I'll probably add it anyway. As may have been gleaned from my other posts, I play these games for the challenge. Joyriding and looking at pretty scenery is why I have FS9 installed.)

Count me in!! Although, I'm on the same setup as Griphos and it's caused some serious lag and warpage on several of the Richtofen's Skies servers. But if my connection is up to it, so am I. A thought on the format: In RS, one of the players set up team furball matches...kind of a "Last Team Standing" thing. Varying points were awarded for credited kills, forced down, landing safely (i.e. in friendly territory) and returning safely to home base. These were played both with and without labels and with friendly fire turned on and turned off. Murph had a couple of similar rounds with his Misfits squad's "Saturday Night Fights" in Red Baron. An added boost to making it all about skill was to have same-plane matches, in which everyone flew one type. Adnittedly, that would pretty much require using labels if it's a team game, but in an every-man-for-himself furball scenario they could be left off.