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Try C;\Documents and Settings\YOUR IDENT\My Documents\CFSWW1 Over Flanders Fields

Revthought, First of all you need to have M$ CFS-3 (Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator 3) patched to version 3.1. If you are unsure of this, don't worry at this stage. When the time comes to provide the necessary files, if they aren't at the required standard, you will be notified by the install wizard. Do a complete uninstall, making sure you look for weird little folders and files that hide around the place. I think there might be an uninstall guide somewhere in the stickies at the top of this page, or maybe on the General discussion page stickies. Got it all out? Good. Here is the complete install procedure ... of course, anyone is welcome to correct me if I'm wrong... Insert your OFF:BHaH DVD. It should start installing automatically. A short time after it begins the install, it will ask you how you wish to provide the required M$ CFS-3 files. If this sim is installed on your hard drive, click on that response, if it is not yet installed, tell the OFF install wizard that you will provide the files on M$ CFS-3 CD. It will then ask you to insert this CD, and will begin reading the necessary files from there. A little later, it will ask you to re-insert the OFF DVD. Do that, and it will continue its installation. When it is complete, it will come up with a message telling you so. What you need to do then is to patch it up to 1.30 version, then patch it up to 1.30C version, then patch it up to 1.31L Version. (Soon, all three patches will be compiled into one super patch, but for now, you need to install all three in the order I mentioned). And there you go! You should be able to fire up OFF now and enjoy it. Keep your eyes on this site on a regular basis. There are many discussions here on how to tweak OFF so that it performs at its best on your particular system, or little tips and hints that are invaluable, and will help you enjoy this great sim all the more. If you need any help at all with anything, please ask here or in the general discussion forum and the very helpful people here will answer you promptly, I'm sure. Read the sticky threads at the top of this Forum, and at the top of the General Discussion Forum. There are answers to Frequently Asked Questions, hints, tips, ideas, fun little discussions on improving your enjoyment of the sim. Well worth a look. Enjoy! Welcome to the world of "Over Flanders Fields"

Absolutely the perfect counter to heat seeking missiles. That would confuse the hell out of them.

Homeboy, Brando and yourself are both inspirations! Like Brando, I was involved in a pretty bad motorcycle accident. Whilst I didn't lose my right arm, I lost the use of it for a good deal of time and was forced to adapt. I really know how difficult all that can be. Whilst I eventually gained some use, I still have no feeling, and that makes for some pretty shoddy flying (LOL at Brando's comments about his "loose formation flying" - I know how he feels [kinda]). You are a truly gifted technician, Mark. Seeing your work in your "laboratory" (available to us all in your signature block link), and your work here helping all with technical questions, tweaking OFF etc. is truly an inspiration to us all. There is nothing you can't overcome with persistance, tenacity, and inspiration. A lesson for us all. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Herr Prop-Wasche, The film mentioned earlier "Crossing the Line" shot with the highest definition camera around, DOES have a good deal of great WW1 aircraft and aerial battle footage, and IS shown on a very large screen at the Australian War Memorial. Would you like a mop for that drool? Oh. and Jim...I have used DVD Shrink before (Of course, just to back up movies I purchased, and were my own property and...AW! who am I tryin' to kid?). Seriously, my DVD player will be able to handle it, I'm sure. I've bought a couple of Pommy DVD's unsure about whether they'd work, and they did.

Well, that plus a REALLY large fan, a set of goggles, and a silk scarf. And get SWAMBO to rattle your chair around

Peter Jackson (a member of our little society, and an avid WW1 aviation enthusiast) does own a fair few WW1 replicas. He is a stickler for detail too, as I'm sure you all know just seeing his other films, so you can bet these are in both excellent detail and excellent condition. He builds static replicas for closeups, mockups to explode and crash, and flying replicas as well. I have seen pics of the warehouse that he uses to store genuine guns and to house the DOZENS of replica guns he gets made up in the adjoining factory. My understanding is that he generally donates or lends the aircraft to Omaka Historical aerodrome (whatever its name is), and will ask for their return when he is ready to use them in a film. He is obviously a whiz at Computer Generated Graphics (or has employed a team of suitably talented gurus), but you can guarantee that it will be of the highest quality available. The film that he has produced "Crossing the Line" is a short film commission by the Australian War Memorial and used as a background to their "Over The Front" permanent exhibition. http://www.awm.gov.au/visit/visit-mustsee-overthefront.asp You can see the screen used in the background of the photographs from the AWM site. Its MASSIVE (something like 70 feet across) and the surround sound is (I was told) deafening. It is easily the high point of a visit to this magnificent Museum. If you plan on going on holidays, cancel your plans, and come to Canberra instead. This will be well worth your visit. The AWM has many other great exhibits to entertain and inform you as well as this one, but I'm sure that for most of us, most of our time will be spent in the ANZAC Hall watching and drooling.

Waldemar Kurtz, It seems to me that if your aerodrome is being attacked in a scramble mission (or the enemy are approaching) you first priority is survival. I know some pilots here do not fly scramble missions, thinking they are suicide, and run straight to the slit trenches (which is probably Standing Orders). I choose to fly all assigned missions, and therefore, I'll try to get aloft in those circumstances. Like I said, your main objective is to survive intact if possible. When you have fired up your engine, check to see where the attacking aircraft are. Are you able to take off and extend out immediately ahead as they come in from behind you? If so, do this. The attacking aircraft will most likely attack the planes in front of the hangars and the aerodrome buildings (although some may come after you). If they attack the aerodrome, and not you, you can choose to fly away, or wait until they are occupied, and sneak in and attack them. In a two-seater, this probably isn't a good idea. "let's see, the first sortie was a scramble (man, I hate those things!!! ) so I'm getting ready to take off and head to the front with some bombs (I'm trying to pretend we had plans, and got caught by surprise)." "another annoying scramble mission. I run like hell to the lines--hoping to either catch some friendly infantry, or drop some bombs on the British advancing army." It sounds to me that you entered a dogfight with your bombs attached! Ouch! Get rid of those things, man! They weigh you down and adversely affect your performance, not to mention what happens if one of them is hit by a stray bullet, or if your controls are shot away, and you struggle to land with full rudder etc, but come in rough...it's gonna blow you to smithereens! Fly a little bit away from your aerodrome and jettison them in a field. Don't go into a dogfight with ordnance slung below your machine. Survival is your first priority. If you choose to fly and fight, give yourself the best chance of making it back alive.

The witness line should read something like... "John Smith, Peter Jones, Michael O'Brien, pilots and observers of escorted RE8's from XX Sqn RFC, Ground Crew at Ghistelles Aerodrome" Witnesses should be all the surviving members of your flight (and flight 1 if another flight accompanied you and pilots of escorted craft if any). If you don't know who survived because you don't have the labels on, or you landed and ended the mission before they landed, just put all the names of your flight and the other flights. Also remember if the combat occurred on your side of the lines and near an aerodrome, you can also put down the ground crew or personnel at that aerodrome, also the flight that you escorted (if you did - for example - pilots from escorted RFC xx Sqn RE8's). I'm not sure if that helps you get your claims confirmed, it just looks more convincing in your pilot's log. Yes, remove the instructional line that says "First name, last name, no rank" or whatever it says. Remember to write down the names of your flight and accompanying flight before take off in case of claims. If you are successful in downing an opponent, pause the sim, press "Z" to bring up your info panel. Note the time, and maybe the Lat and Long of the combat. Press "Z" again to remove the info. Press "M" to bring up the map. Zoom in or out with the brackets command ( [ ) or ( ] ), then note your rough location (eg 4 miles NW of Arras). There is a map scale at the top left of this map - saying for example "map is 20NM across"

At a guess, it sounds like you enlisted a pilot in CFS3 and flew at least one mission with him. The game then creates data for this pilot's career. Hence when you try to uninstall the game, it asks if you wish to back up this data. A complete uninstall/reinstall should do the trick, but you'll lose this pilot's record. Perhaps if he's someone special to you, you could save it as some unrelated filename (myfavoritepilot.bkp) and place it on your desktop. Then if you wish to take him up again, you can re-insert him. I would suggest that after a successful reinstall of CFS3, with a subsequent install of OFF (with the three required patches), that you won't be flying CFS3 again. OFF will consume your life, as it has done to many happy people here.

Duce, Thanks for the reminder. I haven't seen Aces High, but caught a YouTube clip the other day, and went to Amazon to order a copy. They only had Region 2 DVD's but my player should be able to cope with multiregions. It was in PAL format too, so I'm lucky there. There was all sorts of emboldened and large font warnings that these won't play in most USA DVD players... NOT NTSC FORMAT!! etc. But I'll bet there's been several that have been caught out (there are two USED ones for sale). Whilst I was ordering that, they came up with the old "People who ordered this product also enjoyed..." and there was "Dawn Patrol". So I ordered that too.

True that. Whilst many Australians that I researched flew with various RNAS Squadrons, I find that many of my favourite chaps flew in Naval 8. I particularly like seeing Stan Goble's name on screen, but quite unsure how his son would react if I told him I enjoy flying with his dad, so I'll just keep that under my hat for a while. Great to see R A Little, and also your avatar R J O Compston. I think the only time I flew the twin gun type was when I was up for a bit of a jaunt with R P Minifie, Australia's youngest Ace and quite the triplane virtuoso (Naval 1). And R S Dallas. I read that someone was skinning the prototype Tripe "Brown Bread", and Stan had a few hours in that one. I really do like Mr Sopwith's machines.

Mark, I hope to see more training vids as time permits. I appreciated this one in particular, as I was having trouble performing this manoeuvre. Perhaps it was my choice of aircraft (the 1 1/2 strutter wasn't known for its aerobatic qualities as far as I know). Anyway, not achieving much learning with the 1.5 strutter, I have progressed onto the Sopwith Tripe. (What I originally planned was to attempt to go through the entire career [don't we all?] of an RNAS pilot...starting off in the 2 seater 1.5 strutter, going onto Nieuports, then the Pup, Tripe, then Camel. But I thought I'd gain a bit more flying prowess by utilising the slower, brick-like handling qualities of the older craft, and once I could fly those, surely everything else would be "easy"). I really didn't learn much with the strutter. Just straight and level flight on most missions, sticking to my flight leader, though we were forced into combat a few times, we never sought it out. So I "upped the ante" and thought I'd have a bit of fun with the hun in a tripe. (Only using the single gun model at the moment - can you get the dual gun in Campaign, or is that only in QC?). It was a good idea to display the manoeuvre as a military tactic, showing how you turned quickly and re-established a line of attack on the convoy. If I might make a suggestion to all attempting this manoeuvre just messing about in free flight that you find a long road or rail line etc to "line up" on, and see how far out you are at the completion of your manoeuvre. Just good practice, and makes good sense to me. I guess that this manoeuvre will be fairly easy with the Tripe. It might be hard to stop her in the climb...damn those tripes just climb for the sun...might be hard convincing her to return to earth. I'll try later this morning when I get home if I get the time. Oh, and BTW Mark, this was good work. I've seen pilot training vids and training in M$ FSX, and had a flight instructor instruct me in aerobatics (though we didn't do any wingover or hammerheads) and this is exemplary work.

They shall not grow old, as we who are left grow old. Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun, and in the morning... We will remember them. Lest we forget. Rest In Peace, Digger

It may be too late, but you should change the title of this thread. If you really checked the vid out, you'd notice that the groundhog was primarily angry at the WW2 bird the guy on the grass strip was holding. Despite the fact this plane (P-51? Didn't look too closely) was being held by a critter MUCH larger than him, he was still intent on attacking it. When the critter holding the WW2 plane kept walking away as the groundhog advanced, he thought he'd take out his anger on a plane that was relatively unguarded. His bloodlust satiated, (and being kicked in the backside to boot!) he retreated, victorious. Nice one.

CamelJockey, Good Luck. Hope you're back up and running soon. And hope you didn't lose a single byte of data.

Jammy Bleeder! Imagine getting paid to do that.

shredward, Nice collection mate. I have many of the great reference materials you have, but not the collection of "Over the Front", "Cross and Cockade", "Aircraft of the Aces". Nice to see you got an AFC book there too, and the aircraft files, Naval serials, Sopwith aircraft series. "Naval Eight" and "In the Teeth of the Wind" are also two great books on Naval 8. Very nice collection.

At about 3:30 this morning, I was on a reconnaissance for the RNAS in a two seater Sopwith 1 1/2 Strutter. A whole bunch of Eindekkers turned to take the three of us on, but we had R A Little and his mates flying Nieuports in Flight 1 looking after us. They took four out, then went home for tea and crumpets, leaving two chasing me and my flight. As usual, I couldn't keep up with my flight leader until a waypoint turn headed them back towards me. So anyway, I'm just chugging along, easily out running these persistant Eindekkers, when a waypoint turn comes up, insisting I turn towards home...and the Eindekkers. I looked up and saw both my flight buddies turn and head towards the Fokkers, and pass over them unconcerned, leaving me who was at their altitude to deal with them. Both the Eindekkers were "named" aces. Oh, great! I turned as hard and as fast as I could back towards home. The Eindekkers blocked my path as they were also heading home, but I thought they were intent on heading home with another victory to talk about in the mess. As I straightened out, I chose the one that was closest to my line of retreat, and gave him a hundred rounds straight into his cowling. He smoked and spluttered, passed me, and just continued on home. The other came around onto my tail. I don't know if he "killed" my observer/gunner, or was able to stay away from the arc of his guns, but it sounded like he didn't fire at all. Eventually, I came around on the tail of this Fokker and latched on, peppering him, backing off on the throttle so I didn't pass him, and repeat. He was going down quickly, smoking from the engine. He missed landing on our side of the trenches by a few feet, luckily, didn't put his wheels down on one side of the trenches and pass over, or he'd flip. He came to rest near a tree (yes, that close to the trenches...perhaps they were communication trenches, reserves, or saps or the like). I turned around to see his fate, and thought for a moment about strafing the poor bugger (as he had "landed" I didn't think I'd get a claim anyway, so I decided not to) when I saw he was on fire from nose to tail. I passed directly overhead and paused the sim, hit "z" so I could do a screenshot to collect the time and geographical data. Then it froze. Completely. Nothing. Zip. Nada. Seems as if at that precise moment, #&$&*$(@ Norton's decided that it was a good time to remind me that it needed an update. Nothing I did could unfreeze my computer, and I had to reboot. All despite insisting on a clean install from the computer guy, just the OS was all I wanted, then I would choose what to install, and control it. Frustrating. Not easy killing a scout with the front guns of a two-seater, both aces (my first). Then that. GRR! Back to the mess, grumbling. Tomorrow. Wait and see.

Homeboy, Mark, all of your work that we have seen so far has been extraordinary. TrackIR guide, Command Key Card, OFF Aircraft Guide, your lefty HOTAS setups etc. I'm sure that it will be excellent as usual when you release it. I for one am really looking forward to it.

It might not match Shredward's bookcase, but most of the books in this bookcase are WW1 aviation related. I got another for WW2 and vietnam, and miscellaneous, and two four drawer filing cabinets of my research into Aussies in the RNAS. A good idea to also look at the bookcases. Shred's looked well-stocked indeed. Looks like a few years' worth of "Cross and Cockade", Windsock Files. Some really nice books there. Jealous!!!!

I saw a magazine today that was detailing the aircraft used in the film "Darling Lili" (called "The Americanization of Lili" in America). Apparently VERY LOOSELY based on Mata Hari. Has anyone seen this film? Apparently a bit of flying involved. Don't know if it is just a bit of aerodrome action or any aerial scenes are involved. They use a few Pfalz replicas built for "Blue Max" and set fire to a couple of mockups on the aerodrome. They also use several "mini SE5a's". I can only assume these are smaller scale replicas. Anyone know anything about them?

"REPORT BY MAJOR R.S. DALLAS Flew over LA BRAYELLE aerodrome and fired on hangars on South Side of aerodrome to attract attention. Dropped a parcel with the following message inside:- "If you won't come up here and fight, herewith one pair of boots for work on the ground, pilot's for the use of". Then flew in the mist till a party of men had collected to examine the parcel, when two bombs were dropped, one burst being observed near target. Opened fire with both guns firing about 100 rounds when troops scattered. General panic ensued. In The Field P.C.O Ridell, Capt. for Major 3/5/18 Commanding No 40 Squadron, R.A.F" This rather humorous exploit has been attributed to many fliers. It appears as if Stan was the man.

Olham, Try putting your times exactly as the duty room board shows them...and like BuB has his...8h16 zulu time (can't actually remember if it mentions zulu time). That might help. I'm sure you intentionally omitted the witnesses, but make sure their names are the same as well. Listen to me! As if I have enough claims under my belt to know. I guarantee Herr Olham writes more claim forms in one evening's play than I have filled out since I got OFF (probably about 6 or 7 in total). But I have been reading up a lot on claims. But I'm mightily impressed with claims like BuB's. These look great in your pilot's log. Mine looks pretty bare by comparison...no claims, just "Offensive patrol - 45 minutes flying time" and so on, and so on.

Homeboy, I do believe you are correct, but I'm in the same boat as you...a few of the lucky ones to have a copy of M$ CFS 3.1 version (but not lucky enough to have a DVD version that runs without the disk inserted). There's another thing you could try Bevington. Install M$ CFS-3 first, check what version it is. If it isn't version 3.1, download and install the patches to bring it to 3.1 version, then attempt installation of OFF.