33LIMA

For the 2 battleships outside the harbour, compare the spacing and profile of the funnel and bridge structure to the Royal Oak and the Mayala, inside the harbour. Even allowing for possible foreshortening, the two in the background are not QEs, they're both Royal Sovereign class- aka Revenge class. I think Queen Elizabeth had started reconstruction ('37?) when this pic was taken. Anyway thanks for sharing this magical panorama of an age long gone - I could pour over it for hours!

I love it when we all really 'get into character' here, especially if the characters in question are good old-fashioned 'period stereotypes'! Having read a few recent books of late like Peter Hart's excellent 'Bloody April' and the extravagantly-titled but also rather good 'Fighter Heros of WW1' by Joshua Levine, it's quite a contrast reading Billy Bishop's 'Winged Warfare', the 1918 edition, whose jingo-istic tone (which to be fair, Bishop reportedly regretted, in later life) makes Biggles look the height of 'PC'. Not that I'm one of Bishop's detractors, but I can't help but prefer McCudden's 'Flying Fury' for a contemporary, but more humanistic, account. His tribute to Voss in particular I can't read without a lump coming to the throat, not least as it starts 'As long as I live...' which wasn't that long. Anyway, loved the clips!

The two battleships outside the harbour on the left are 'Woolworths', Royal Sovereign class not Malaya and Barham (which were QE class of course). While the latter pair didn't get the tower bridge conversion of Warspite (and later QE and Valiant) they did get those wide funnels where the previous two were trunked into one. The two in the pic have more slender funnels close abaft the bridge structure, one with a raked funnel cap which also suggests it's a 'Woolworth'. Not all the Royal Sovereigns had the Royal Oak's large tripod mainmast (the class's nameship had a slender mast when transferred to the Soviets in 1944). Oh, for a decent WW2 surface warship simulator, to succeed 'Fighting Steel'! I'm not optimistic about World of Battleships, not into MP anyway, Barham at Valetta in 1936:

Looking at the 2e, you can see why they called that version in particular the Quirk; it looks decidely 'quirky'. The 2c, on the other hand, is a nice old 'bus', with or without the skids and the sump cowling, 'Stability Jane' or not. i'm glad there's one in OFF and there's a better-armed one coming in P4, even if I won't be able to see ahead so well past the observer, who I imagine will spend hardly a minute sitting down, once he's got a proper gun to shoot at the beastly Huns.

Thanks for that HPW; I'd shied away from that approach in case of differences apart from the title that I might miss. Evidently the files (apart from QC1) are identical apart from title (that text comparison tool you mentioned would have shown me that I suppose). I will try first just with .cfg files, as I'm only changing that one value, and the .cfg file only seemed to be enough, for the test I did with the Hannover, albeit in QC where you can fly the thing yourself and be sure of the effect. If that's not enough I'll tackle the .air files then.

I think it's That Time - time to just come out with it, and claim the old champ's title, for once and for all: RED BARON Over Flanders Fields

So far I have not seen the AI with the added weight flying that much differently, damaged or not. The effect is much the same as taking off a few horse power, no big deal, but I need to do more testing to confirm this, especially after finding that this only works in campaign, and seemingly can't work in Quick Combat (where the AI and player seem to use the same plane data, albeit the AI operate at empty weight only). As for damage, Polovski (commenting on the 2-seater arcs of fire) mentioned the AI used the same settings as the player. These settings are in a plane's .bdp files (not the .cfg ones I'm editing for this new mod). As the .bdp files are mainly the plane's damage model, it seems likely the AI and the player take damage the same way, tho the Lead in the A** mod will not affect damage models anyway, and hopefully will not change massively the aI's ability to fly a damaged plane, beyond the legitimate effect of a reduced power-to-weight ratio. I've changed approach from adding a percentage of plane load onto empty weight, to increasing empty weight to the plane's normal loaded weight, LESS a fixed amout, slightly more for 2-seaters, to represent the weight of fuel used up in take off, climb out and transit to the combat area, which is not terribly scientific perhaps but seems the best compromise in the circumstances. I've now got to do a lot of editing (more again if it turns out I really need edited .air files, as well. which i think maybe I won't as i'm just editing this one value) . Then more testing. I don't think I'll need to create .bdp files as well, as HPW's FMs seem to work fine without these - hope so anyway as it's more work and would mean the mod will clash with anything else that supplies new .bdp files, not just .cfg files (like HPW's damage mods and my own arcmod).

Hang on for P4 indeed, oh you ARE a tease, Pol. I might, if you would tell us how long we had to hang on for! Thanks for the tips anyhow; I didn't know about looking at the mission file generated after a campaign mission so thanks to HPW for that pointer, too. B***er those .bdp files, I knew you'd best zap the beggars after an .xdp edit but the SDK describes them as a binary format of the .xdp (damage) file which implies there's no particular relation to the FM files. All very confusing. So while I had thought of zapping the .bdp files after FM edits, I'd taken the SDK to mean that wasn't needed. The strange thing is, as a test I upped the empty weight of the Hannover to a whopping 6000 lbs in its QC1 (player-flown) file without either updating the .air file or zapping the .bdp file, and in QC my plane waggled a bit but would not move even at full power. My flightmates waited for me so I can't confirm if they were unaffected. At 4000 lbs she just about got airborne and no more. So I had concluded that for this parameter at least [empty_weight], editing the .cfg file alone was enough, which is what the MS SDK docementation seems to indicate. But I need to be sure that the AI planes take account of increases to empty_weight, not just the player's plane, of which I'm not so sure. The AI still seem able to fly after I increase it to silly levels, which has me thinking either they ignore it and use something else, or they all happen to be flying a version which I have missed editing. Maybe it's not zapping the .bdp's every time that is the problem, there. But I think it's down to the AI using the same FM files as the player in QC (QC1). It looks like to be sure, I'll have to edit the empty weight in the .cfg file; AND apply the same edit to the .air file; AND then zap the .bdp file. HPW, how do YOU create or generate an .air file after a .cfg file edit? The way I'm doing it is to make identical changes to the empty weight in .air files using the AirEd utility, which enables me to locate and change the empty weight there to the same new value as the .cfg. But it is rather tedious, and in one case I got the dreaded 'not a valid plane' message. Is there an easier way, than hand-editing both files, in succession? I think i'm still heading for option (b). It seems clear enough now that such a mod will not work in QC (if as it seems both player and AI use the QC1 files); and in Campaign, it will reduce the 'lightweight effect' only for (i) enemies and (ii) those friendlies not in your own flight (these two groups being the ones who use the AC [=Aces?] and/or SC files, you and your own flight instead using the Sqd files, in Campaign). I think that would be still be a worthwhile result, as levelling the playing field between player and enemies is the big prize here - while I'm hanging on for P4!

The Hood-like ship at sea behind HMS Hood is Repulse I believe. She and Renown were effectively shorter 'Hoods' with no 'X' turret, six 15 inch guns instead of eight. Repulse had more superstructure (mainly hangar I think) around the funnels, which stood prouder on Renown. Repulse did quite well for for such an old and un-modernised ship against the Japanese who sunk her, the episode where her pom-poms shot down two of the vic of 3 'Betty' torpedo-bombers which effectively did for her, was one of the most dramatic episodes of the battle.

Can you clear up one thing for me HPW? From the SDK it seems clear that changes to a plane's .cfg file DO affect its behaviour in game - there's a strong warning about how this could make the plane unflyable/unusable, for one thing. The SDK 'Aircraft Containers' document doesn't say anything much about the .air file tho. So let's say I add the weight to the .cfg file, and leave the .air file alone. What happens? When you next load that plane, does the .air file get updated automatically, from the .cfg file? Or does the sim just use the .cfg and ignore the .air, where different? Or must I manually update both .cfg and .air files? The latter may be the safest bet but I don't want to waste time if it's not strictly needed. I upped the Hannover's weight thru the ceiling (to 6000 lbs, normal loaded weight about 2300 lbs!) in the SQ files to see what happened (it has no AC files, the ones I'm guessing are used for aces skins). BUT in both QC and campaign, it had NO particular effect. I was expecting the AI planes not to be able to get off the ground at that weight. This seems to indicate that EITHER (i) the AI planes in the player's own flight use the SAME plane as the player (QC1 or Sqd); evidence for this is that, if not using a unique skin, your selected skin gets applied to ALL the player's flight; the naming convention strongly suggests that the usage of the OFF plane variants is 'skin-based', first and foremost' (this may also account for the skin loading issues encountered with your FM mod?); OR (ii) adding weight to the .cfg file alone has no effect. I'm inclined to conclude that it's (i) - that edits applied to the .cfg file DO get used in game (even if the .air is not edited in line), BUT that AI planes in your own flight use the same plane as the player, and so will ignore edits to the .cfg (or .air) files for other, AI-flown planes. Pol did say the player flew the QC1 and Sqd variants - that's not the same as saying the AI use ONLY the others and never those two. This is strongly suggested by the fact my AI flightmates seemed only a little held back by extra weight ('confirmation bias' probably accounting for what I thought I saw) but in combat, the AI are reined in a bit. Could be more 'confirmation bias' at work there too, but I'll set up a QC fight against some Nieuports with some really excessive weight. This would mean that my mod will not affect those AI planes that are in the player's flight, only in other flights including enemies. I could (a) give up (b) live with this (which is maybe ok, tho not ideal as it gives your flight mates an advanatge over other AI); or © try to fix it by somehow forcing flight mates to use the other planes, not the player's one (which may not be possible, if it's something 'buried' in Workshop or otherwise not readily configurable). I think I will go for (b) - even if it gives your flightmates an advantage (by retaining their ability to fly at empty weight, while other AI have theirs cut back) this is mainly about improving things for you the player in combat against the AI. In levelling-out the playing field between you and the AI, if it also gives your flightmates a bit of a helping hand, that may be no big disadvantage. And you can put down to your effective mentoring of your own flight and your setting an example of skill, fearlessness and aggression in combat [ambles off into the sunset, humming 'Always look on the bright side of life, de-dum, de-dum de-dum de-dum'].

Sorry that was a typo, should have been 50 23 not 50 32. Must steer clear of those late parties in the Mess The funny thing is, if you go into Google Streetview in Lallaing at 50 23 N, 11 85 E, this looks from above like ONE of those OFF 'blocks' on its own, and in Streetview the houses with their double-pitched roofs look like they may well date back to that era. It's like the block has been 'cut and pasted' into OFF several times, next to itself. I doubt the area ever looked quite like that, tho.

There's some advice on Win 7 as well as Vista here: http://www.overflandersfields.com/FAQ.htm#Vista_Specific Yes I believe CFS3 and OFF leave behind after installation some of their files. Those outside the main program folder are mostly in [username]/Appdata/Roaming/Microsoft/CFSWW1 Over Flanders Fields, and deleting before re-installing may well help. I seem to recall it is also recommended when troubleshooting to delete (and allow sim regeneration of) the file uisel.xm, located there (the OFF Workshop 'CFS3 reset' option i think does this sort of stuff). There's also screenshots and some minor mission or campaign stuff, stored in '[username]/Documents/CFSWW1/over Flanders Fields.

Yeah, lovely plane, good to see another early warbird in the air, in some shape or form.

It's only in the OFF 3-d game world, that strange rectangular urban area, as far as I can see. There's no sign of it on the CFS3-based OFF map, nor on the RoF map - I even looked at the little set of maps that come with Flying Corps Gold, too, but they just stop about level with Douai. I'd assumed the OFF 3-d world represents the area as it was in WW1 rather than WW2 and wasn't expecting to see any post-1918 development; if that's what it is, it's not there now! Maybe it's a sort of Gallic WW1 version of Brigadoon, that mythical Scottish village that just appears for one day every hundred years. Supposedly that tale is based on the older story of a German village. So, let it not be said that our French friends should not have their version, too, which only shows up in OFF. We should call it Offreville, or something like that :) Still, I think I'll let it have a couple of Cooper bombs next time I'm visiting the locality on behalf of the RFC, just in case.

Looking at the 'balance and Weights' section I THINK the empty weight is centred on the CoG, which is why I think it's relatively safe to add extra weight there, as opposed to trying to be clever and putting it exactly where it should be and then finding i've messed up the FMs. There seem to be at least two other methods that have been used to add extra weight to AI only planes - (i) creating one or more dummy 'pylons', in the .xdp file I believe, and adding the weight to them and (ii) creating or editing 'stations' in the .cfg file and putting it there. Both of these seem to me likely to necessitate a revision of the FM, due to effect on the CoG and/or CoL. So they might be superior on paper to throwing the weight 'dead centre' - but perhaps only marginally so, and not worth having to re-work FMs for such advantage as there may, or may not, be. Have just flown some QCs with single and multiple DV 200HP and Alb DII's against Nieuport 17s, all with the modded AI weights, and all seems well so far. I did see one shot-down Nieuport fall nearly straight down on his belly but i think I've seen some odd crashes like that in stock OFF, too. Also tried a DFW formation flight, with the weight added on top of the plane's correct empty weight, not the much lower OFF one, and the AI DFWs all took off, climbed out and turned just fine, despite having a higher proportion of extra weight due to the low stock figure. I did notice that my player DFW, which I did not modify, could keep its c.2000 metre take-off lead at full throttle, with the AI just able to avoid falling behind. Flying scouts at 80% fuel - that is, somewhat heavier than the AI flightmates - seems to enable them to catch up, but somewhat more slowly than before. I still have not tested enough to be completely satisfied there is any effect at all, but so far my very strong impression is that my Albatrosses, including the DII, can now chase down and generally dominate Nieuport 17s to an extent they could not, before, which is the sort of effect I'm aiming for; hope I'm not imagining it! It all depends on the assumption that weight added to the .cfg files 'empty_weight' value is taken into account at all. I think I will try an extreme weight addition to one plane, just to confirm this.

I took some snaps during a test flight for the 'Lead in the A**' Mod from my Albatros after seeing off a couple of Nieuports, but after all that excitement, I must have left the virtual lens cap on the camera as the pics didn't come out; seem to have forgotten all that observer training Anyway I did note the latitude & longitude and comparing to Google Earth, OFF's Douai is exactly where I thought it was and as it should be, identifiable from the Rabu map, at 50 deg 21 min N, 3 deg 4 min E. The strange rectangular sprawl is just a few Km to the ENE at at 50 32N, 3 8 E, which is mostly fields in Google Earth, just West of Lallaing. The 'rectangular sprawl' consists of 4 closely-spaced near-rectangles of grid-pattern streets, each like a large trailer or caravan park, plus another 2 such squares offset slightly to the NW. Lallaing does have one similar block of streets but it's further East and the rest of the town is more like the usual 'spider web' pattern. Strange.

Thanks HPW; however, cross-checking the OFF .cfg 'empty_weight' values against my sources, with a few notable exceptions where the value is just weird (eg Alb DII, DFW are both very low) this value is the historical plane's weight in pounds without fuel/oil, as well as less pilot and ammo/'military load'. And while the CFS3 SDK 'Aircraft Container' document says the .cfg file's GROSS weight isn't used by the sim (only by the FSEdit utility) it does say that 'empty_weight' is used, except where blank, in which case the .air file value is used instead. Putting this together, I've concluded i need to add weight for pilot, ammo and (at least some) fuel. The AI-only Nieuport 17s were quite sprightly, even with 75% of the gap between empty and max weights added in; to the extent I've upped the figure to 80%, since pilot and ammo account for a high proportion of the total. So basically, I'm replacing the .cfg file's empty_weight value with the plane's loaded weight (having checked this against my sources) LESS about 100 lbs (2-seaters will lose a bit more), to represent fuel consumed en route to the point action is joined - a somewhat arbitrary compromose to be sure, but better than all the fuel weight, on top of those of crew and ammo, being ignored completely. In general, this equates to roughly 40% of fuel load being taken out, leaving something around 60%. I've now done this for about a quarter of the OFF planes, and am going to test to see if there are any obvious problems. Early days yet; time will tell if this is a blind alley or a practicable approach.

He'd have popped him off. Re 'chivalry', MvR's 33rd victory was over a Strutter on 2 April 1917. Pilot 2Lt AP Warren reported gunner Sgt D Reuel was mortally wounded in the stomach in MvR's first attack, but he (Warren) manged to force land, helping his observer, who mumbled 'Think I'm done' from the rear cockpit. MvR continued to fire after the Strutter's engine stopped, on the way down. After they had force landed, MvR strafed the plane and crew, saying this killed the observer, claiming (in 'his combat report) that he did so because they fired at him from the ground. It's not clear whether this was a misunderstanding (eg stray rounds) or a post-facto excuse for deliberate ruthlessness (or the blood being up, unlikely for MvR?). What does seem clear is that Warren and Reuel did not fire at MvR during or after the forced-landing. Firing a few rounds to deter the crew from burning the plane might have been a legitimate reason, but it's not what he said. On another occasion in Die Rote Kampfflieger - can't find it at the moment - MvR records attacking a (different) British machine which he evidently realised was severely damaged and trying to make a force landing, but he uses a phrase like 'by then, I knew no mercy' (maybe it loses - or gains! - something in the translation) and he attacks again till his target breaks up, killing the crew. Granted his 'autobiography' is what it is and there are other examples (like Lt AF Bird, kill # 61 in Sept 1917 where he behaved differently - when the shooting was over, in that case). And even 'his' book has many respectful references to the qualities of his enemies. But at best, I doubt VERY much if MvR would EVER have deliberately let a kill get away like Guynemer MAY have done with Udet, or even take the slightest chance that it might, if he could readily prevent it.MvR is on record as being very clear that air combat was not, like 'the English' affected to treat it sometimes, a sport, and he would not have let notions of chivalry stand in the way, including taking advantage of an opponent's weakness. That was the norm anyway, like a US pilot said 'If the other fellow's gun jammed, you popped him off, if you could'. Any man in MY unit who let someone get away, who could and would have killed some of us next time, would have a lot to answer for. I don't believe MvR would have lightly tolerated such a thing, or done it himself. Nor I think would Lanoe Hawker, and just right, too. Edit - the 'knew no mercy' ref came from kill #49 on 29 April, Lt R Applin, one of the flight of three 19 Sqdn SPADs led by Harvey-Kelly to 'deal with' Jasta 11. In 'his' book MvR says ''My opponent was the first to fall, after I had shot his engine to pieces. In any case, he decided to land near us. I no longer knew clemency, so I attacked him a second time, whereupon the plane fell to pieces in my stream of bullets. The wings fell separately like pieces of paper, and the fuselage dropped like a burning stone. The pilot fell into a marsh. We could not dig him out.' In 'under the guns of the Red Baron' it's recorded that Lt Applin's body was never recovered and he is commemorated on the Arras Memorial to the missing.

Yes I've seen the AI flightmates lag below many times, while AI enemies in combat seem able to stay above you and 'keep their energy' better, even if you're in the more powerful plane; unless they decide to lose altitude. I'll keep testing the AI N.17s with extra weight. I have increased their empty weight from 825lb to 1166lb, by adding 75% of the difference between the empty weight and the gross weight of 1280lb. I opted for 75% not just to help ensure the effect showed up. Most scouts seem to have about 400-500lbs of useful load, covering bacically pilot, ammo and fuel. If, as seems generally accepted, the AI ignores this weight, no wonder they behave like they have superior power-to-weight ratios - they do!!! My figures (Profile Publications #49) for the N.17 give 143lb for fuel and oil; and 264lb for 'pilot and military load'. So allowing for some fuel consumption before joining combat, I think adding on just 75% of this is not an excessive figure by any means, and might go a bit higher. so far the effect of this extra weight on the AI appears - 'subtle' is a good word for it; I'm just hoping it's not 'nil'. Will post the results, and hopefully a beta set of modded .cfg files for the complete planeset, if it looks workable.

I'll get latitude and longitude next time I'm there, I'd say within 10 Km of Douai. I'm fairly sure the town is Douai not the urban rectangles - if they weren't so big I'd say they look like a massive military encampment. Must fling a few bombs at it next time I'm passing by in my RE8, just in case that's what it is, and use labels to see if anything shows up there.

Daft tho this will sound the only thing I can think of is that the date you chose for your pilot's 'squad' when you created him, might be outside the service life of those planes eg the Alb DV only came in about July 1917 and the Nieuport 11 had gone long before then. Likewise the SE5a only comes in about April 1917 (although it should strictly be the less powerful SE5 for the first few months - it's coming with Phase 4 I think - not the SE5a). Try selecting them in Quick Combat, German types for a German pilot and vice-versa obviously. You should be able to select any plane from your pilot's nationality I think, regardless of date. Also look inside the aircraft folder, and check the planes are all still there. If they are then are you sure your pilot's effective date is not too soon, or too late, for the 'missing' planes?

Yes I know those map, like the 'Jasta 6'; map, which Ive printed out and use most as it's actually easier to read that the very finely-printed RoF one. They're very good. Lens is NW of Douai not NE tho - so I'm still at a loss as to what that rectangular urban area is, in OFF.

Cheers HPW. My 'cunning plan' is just to add the extra weight - I think 75% of the difference between empty and max gross, assuming the latter is not unrealistically high - to the empty weight in the .cfg file, rather than worrying about where to put it. I've now done this for the Nieuport 17 AI planes and am testing, player Nieuport compared to AI N.17 wingmen, and 1-on-1 player DIII early vs AI N.17. Seems to make the AI lag a bit as wingmen and be a bit easier to stay with and/or run down as enemy, a subtle difference and too soon to say if it's wishful thinking rather than real! At least the AI with the extra empty weight aren't doing anything silly so far. Early days. Critical assumption is that adding the extra weight to empty weight has some effect, in the first place. If that's correct, and I think it SEEMS to work after a bit more testing, I'll do all the planes - it's an easy edit - and release it as a complete beta mod, for people to try out, methinks. Enjoy the game and the popcorn!

Yeah BH&H is Phase 3. FWIW when you get it, take the time to find out which Workshop settings suit you best, especially those for all the different gun settings, thay can make a big difference. Easier settings are probably best to start with and I would avoid playing either dead is dead or letting the game do a die roll to decide if you die, and just ticking 'pilot never dies' and deciding for yourself if you want to take the hit. Good luck!

Thanks olham I've got all those, but what I think's needed is a map which correspinds closely with the features seen in the CFS3 gameworldf. For example, OFF has a strange urban area which consists of about 4-5 rectangles side by side, just NE of the town I take to be Douai; this urban area doesn't seem to correspond with any town on the map. So I suppose I'm looking for a better map of the OFF game world rather than a map of the real one.