33LIMA

A bit OT, but the Luftwaffe only diverted to the East well after the Battle of Britian EFFECTIVELY ended with the indefinite postponement of Operation Sealion on 17 September 1940. The British officially considered the Battle ended in October, but regardless of what date one picks, later Luftwaffe operations against the UK can't by any stretch be considered part of the Summer 1940 operation; the BoB by definition was the Luftwaffe's effort to pave the way for invasion. Curent thinking seems to be that the LW was almost bound to lose; it just didn't have the resources/industrial base necessary to win a short but high-tempo air campaign in the Summer of 1940, against an extremely effective air defence system backed up by higher fighter production and adequate pilot reserves. The decisive point actually came before the Battle started - Churchill's historic decision, arguably against the UK's national interests, to fight on rather than make peace. The RAF made sure that decision stuck, as was always the most likely outcome; and if the RAF somehow hadn't, the Royal Navy (as Admiral Raeder knew would happen) would have destroyed an invasion force and prevented resupply of any forces (eg paras) that did make it over (the LW's anti-warship capability in 1940 was limited - Stukas and KG26 , few AP bombs - and the RN would have accepted whatever losses necessary). It took the Allies years and massive material and manpower resources, air land and sea, to do the reverse. Adler Angriff/Seelowe would only have worked in 1940 if Britain had been on the verge of collapse militarily or politically/morally, and that was far from the case.

Appreciate the offer! The connection from here's still down; maybe Hansa will upload to CombatAce at some point, if this continues, for the benefit of affected UK fans.

PS the word online is that my ISP - Sky Broadband (UK) - is currently blocking Mediafire, so other Sky customers will be unable to access it either; not sure whether this is permanent or not.

Interesting; most writers, even recent ones, still seem to like to take a swipe at 'Der Dicke'. 'Give a dog a bad name' and all that. If 4 out of 22 is a representative overclaim rate, then it's still high enough, especially if (unlike MvR) Goering doesn't have some unconfirmed but probable kills that were uncredited, to balance out the overclaim. Applying even Killduff's modest 'Goering overclaim rate' to the stats would narrow the gap a bit. On balance, I doubt very much that unconfirmed-but-actual kills balance out the overclaim effect; it's sufficient credit to the German WW1 system that it kept overclaiming down as much as it did. The French had a pretty tight system too, some sources say. I don't think it matters that the RFC didn't (or couldn't because of the tactical situation) operate a really tight kill confirmation system - the British were right in a sense, it wasn't kill tallies that ultimately mattered, it was the results the working planes (2-seaters) achieved. Their losses were the price they paid to get the photos taken, the targets spotted and the guns ranged - which the RFC/RAF did, and kept on doing, even during Bloody April. I'm glad that Peter Hart's recent book on that subject gave due prominence to the 2-seaters; they deserve a lot more attention - and thankfully, provision of 2-seaters, for both sides, is also one of OFF's strengths, due to get even better with P4.

Agree that FEG/FE2 is on balance the best WW1 aircombat sim presently available. OFF has supreme scope with everything integrated out-of-the-box, and RoF, despite some critical 2-seater planeset limitations, has supreme visuals, great maps and a truly excellent flight and dogfight experience. However, FEG/FE2 (even without the mods) also looks and flies pretty well and to me, First Eagles is still the best patrol-leading and dogfighting sim (especially important for WW1), with an adequate planeset, very good AI, well-executed historical content OOB and and a good overall package across the board. A rarely-mentioned but particularly strong feature is that I can play FE/FE2 with all targeting aids turned off; no need at all for target boxes, 2d or 3d icons, or 'radar' - decent longer-range representation of planes, closely-grouped and colour-coded flak bursts and a good view and padlock system all combine to create a very effective and immersive capabiility, superior in most respects to OFF and even RoF. The many great freeware items are very tasty icing on what (with the TW patches) became a nicely-baked good all-round cake. I really like your mini-campaign idea, I'd like to do somerthing similar for a series based around 46 Squadron RFC, reflecting its changing bases and planes (especially now that we have, thanks to Stephen, a great Nieuport 12 to come before the Pup). But I can't find any real FE/SF campaign-building tips tips so it looks like I'll have to explore other people's campaign files to see what is needed and how it works (the stock campaigns seem to have some of their files 'buried' inside cat files so are hard to decipher).

The high kill-to-loss ratio had also caught my eye but the other factor worth mentioning is that we're not comparing like with like here. We're comparing figures for the SPECIALISTS (fighter pilots, whose speciality is getting kills) and within that again, the BEST (elite units), with figures (in that single speciality) which include ALL SKILL LEVELS and ALL SPECIALITIES (not just 'kill specialists'). We're comparing (reasonably) DEFINITE Jasta losses with CLAIMED allied kills (and while the German system was very good, it was not infallible, with some degree of over-claiming likely, on balance, from what I've read - Goering a case in point, maybe an extreme one) We're comparing (definite) Jasta PILOT casualties with (claimed) Allied AIRCRAFT casualties, excluding from the former any aircraft loss which didn't 'damage or lose' the pilot. When you also take into account all the factors already mentioned - especially the fact the Jastas sensibly fought mostly over their own Lines, with the wind mostly in their favour - the disparity is probably about what would be expected, bit like the Bermuda Triangle, perfectly capable of mundane rational explanation, without the need to invoke any mysterious factor; unlike, for example, the UK's coalition government, the War in Iraq etc etc :)

Thanks Hansa, have just got the DFW and Fokker from CombatAce, but I'm still getting a 404 error from mediafire, regardless of how I try to open it; must be something on my system, or maybe their servers are up and down. Will see if I can get to the bottom of it, keen to get those skinpacks.

Hear, hear! Stephen is a most worthy member of the modding community than helps make First Eagles one of the very best air combat sims available!

Looks good, and tried to d/l them, but is it just me, or are none of those links working? Get a 404 error for all of them, can't find them here at CombatAce, either.

Thanks for this Olham; I tried the 23:13 FOV setting you recommended (Workshop would not accept the more zoomed-in 21:12) and even in the external view, this has zoomed in the view, to the extent that aircraft are definitely more visible when further away, which is great. Have also grabbed your softer labels viewui.xml for use when needs be, tho I have edited the yellow target bracket to 'off' (0) - I use padlock but prefer no bracket - and I increased the virtual cockpit view rotation (panning) rate from 0.9 to 1.5 for a quicker 'check six' when using panning rather than snap views (it's a nuisance you have to break padlock to snap or pan your view; in RoF I like the way you can look around then snap straight back to padlock). I may be imagining things but increasing the ground fire accuracy in Worhshop from easy (=low accuracy?) to normal (=more accurate?) seems to have reduced the previously very wild spread of Archie bursts, thus further helping ID targets. I had applied the lower setting to tone down ground MG fire, after one shot my lovely OFF Bristol F2b out from under me on my second campaign mission. But it seems that reduced Archie accuracy too. With Archie more accurate, and your 'more zoomed in' FOV settings, air combat in OFF is gonna be a whole lot less frustrating. Now all I really need is for P4 (or a P3 mod) to fix the 'lightweight AI', and hopefully the poor flight formation-keeping, too. Thanks again!

Can anyone tell me where to find in CFS3/OFF the files that control how labels and the TAC/radar are displayed? What I want to do is, make it so that labels display as follows: Bogey - white 'X' (maybe black, if that proves too hard to see against both sky and ground) Friendly aircraft - blue 'X' Enemy aircraft - red 'X' ...and preferably also... Everything else eg ground units, smoke, airfields etc - nothing! (I know there are CFS3 commands which can fine-tune the label content but they don't do the above) Also the TAC/radar: - remove the 'clock code' markings - change the font of the range and target type markings from red to grey. The aim of the labels mod would be: - to replicate/approximate the very effective system in Rise of Flight whereby planes are marked with an X (or an H on its side) - until they are close anyway - which is a good way of representing an aircraft (besides which 'bogey' is WW2-speak) - remove the immersion-killing effect of the skies being full of flying labels (even with the 'greyed-out label mod' I find these truly horrible, and can very happily live without having pilot identity, aircraft type - or even range - visible) - most importantly, to compensate effectively for the current limitations of aircraft visibility, but to do so relatively inconspicuously, WITHOUT resorting to 'flying labels' The aim of the TAC/radar mod would be to make it less conspicuous, when used (the clock code is a neat touch but IMHO of no use in a radio-less sim, and the red font is too visible). A quick look thru the OFF files and a Google online haven't located the necessary files. I know both the labels and the TAC have been modded so maybe someone could point me in the right direction and save me a lot of digging. I realise some value using the labels to ID aces and the range readout is helpful (if not entirely realistic) but for me, at any rate, the above mods would be a significant improvement in realism and if I manage to make them I'll upload them for anyone else of a like mind. TIA!!!

Danke schoen, will give it a whirl. As you say it may not help the external view - dang how I hate that CFS3 fisheye lens effect, with the plane zoom-able but the background, not. Have again checked the CFS3 forums too, and found nothing, apart from more CFS3 fisheye lens haters like me, none of whom had a solution.

Cheers Olham. I think flying from the cockpit is your secret to seeing the specks when I see nothing! The fisheye, zoomed-out CFS3 external view from which I fly, not only gives a distorted view of the player's aircraft, it also makes the 'background', and anything in it like planes, look further away, and zooming in or out in spotview only zooms your plane not the background. So zooming's fine if you're in the cockpit but no help in the external view. I won't give up my 'movie' external views as I want a better view of my plane - AND what's going on around it. I would hate Silent Hunter 3 if it had no external view of my U-Boat (as with the original SH) and I play all my sims like Op Flashpoint in external/3rd person view, pre-combat, as I think this (a) looks much better and (b) provides better situational awareness, compensating for flying and/or fighting like your head is inside a box with a flap cut out the front. Of course I go cockpit/1st person for combat, I'm no arcade flyer! As for TrackIR, I can manage ok with hatswitch, tried FacetrackNoir but even if TrackIR is steadier I don't think I'd get to like head-trackers, makes me giddy and I find turn my my head one way while keeping my eyes frontal, is counter-intuitive. I can manage all my other sims like this, no head-tracker and no rudder pedals either, including First Eagles and now also Rise of Flight. CFS3 was fine too, tho as a fighterbomber/medium bomber sim, never liked CFS3 for dogfighting, especially due to the 'lightweight' AI that OFF has inherited, frustrating rather than challenging, I find it. But I digress... The best solution to the reduced visibility problem caused by the CFS3 'fisheye lens' external view, would be to find a way for the spotview background to be more zoomed in - eg to the same 'focal length' as the cockpit view (default cockpit zoom would be ok, variable would be better). You will remember from your days over the Pacific that CFS TWO let us zoom the external view in or out (background, not just the player aircraft), tho it zoomed in fixed steps and not a 'smooth' continuous zoom. My monitor's native res is 1600x900 so if you can suggest some options for a more zoomed-in view of the background, I'd be most grateful. I did try some different FOV settings based on your helpful FOV guide but maybe I got it wrong, because even at the max zoom Workshop would accept, it was still too zoomed-out. If that doesn't work I will return to trying to mod the labels, tho I don't see any label settings in viewui.xml except label colours, and it's the text string that is displayed, that I would need to change.

Yes in OFF Archie is helpful to a degree but the bursts are scattered so widely (especially in the vertical plane) that it is very hard to estimate the 'mean point of impact' and get eyes on the enemy. First Eagles is a lot better in that respect, and probably more accurate (historically as well as regards gunnery). 'Archibald, certainly not!' and all that; plus I know that at high velocities a small variation in projectile flight time can produce a fair degree of spread, downrange, and that barrel wear can produce variations between guns in the same battery. But I very much doubt if WW1 clockwork fuses and fuse setters - especially German-made ones - would produce anything like the routinely-extreme vertical spread that they do, in OFF. Must see if there's a setting I can hand-edit, to tighten that up, maybe reducing lethality to compensate. Don't remember vanilla CFS3 having such a big spread.

Olham, what you're doing, is exactly what I would want to do, but I have two difficulties: 1. I fly precombat and postcombat in the external ('spot') view (even with the CFS3 fisheye effect I much prefer this, and switch to cockpit immediately precombat). In the spot view I have tried various FOVs for my 1600x900 monitor but aircraft always seem smaller/further away in external view. Last mission I watched some flying labels for a passing flight of Dr1s higher up, against a clear blue sky, and there was no speck, nothing but the flying label, until suddenly at about 2000m, the aircraft silhouettes appeared, clearly enough for me to see the distinctive stubby Fokker triplane outline. One second there were invisible, the next, a clear silhouette. 2. Again in the external view, even when I can see something of a plane, they become practically invisible, if they have the ground as a background. I know a camouflaged plane should not be too easy to see against the ground but unless I'm looking exactly in the right place and stare hard for long enough, they are as near invisible, as makes no difference, until they are quite close - say 1000m, closer if they are head on. As an example, I tend to turn fairly sharply into a right-hand circuit, very soon after takeoff, but looking back the short distance to the airfield, the planes taking off are very hard to see, already. I would love to be able to see the specks of planes at the same time (or even like you before) they show up as a label. That would be ideal. I'm only contemplating mod'ing the labels, because I can't. When you describe being able to see specks before labels, can you do this in the external/spot view? If you can, I need to find out how you manage that! If flying the whole mission (or nearly all) in the cockpit is the way, well that's not for me. I remember you saying your wingmen's Albatrosses did not suddenly 'grow' their undercarriage when they came to within about 230-250m of your plane, which mine do - again in external view. The wheels appear further out when I'm in the cockpit (a function of the CFS3 LOD 3d models, where the LOD # denotes relative distance not actual range, according to the CFS3 SDK). If you can see specks before labels, and you can see your wingmen's undercarriage at over c.240m, AND do both in external/spot view, please tell me so, because I need to find out how! Apart from the lightweight AI, poor formation-keeping and limited 2-seater AI, this limited-visibility-without-aids thing is a great frustration for me with OFF aircombat.

Thanks for the tips, guys. I should have known to start with viewui.xml, I had edited that some time back to reduce TAC size. I had tried the faded labels but want to use the labels instead as a plane 'marker label' in the same colours as the TAC (I realise the label is above the plane not on in, unless i can remove the offset). I don't want the label to give me a long readout of plane type, pilot or even range, as I find these immersion-killing. All I want is the simplest visible single-character marker - bogey, enemy, or friend, no text at all. I want to remove those distracting text strings completely, and replace them with simple markers, in the same colour as the TAC 'blobs', which will compensate for limited plane visibility (which is especailly limited in external view, with planes invisible one moment, then appearing quite distinctly at about 2000m). In effect, the idea is to convert the labels from labels, into a sort of representation in the 3 dimensional world of what you could see, on the TAC. This would have the following advantages (which to me, anyway, are well worth having): - I could leave the TAC permanently off, or set it to 'Ships' and just call it up for a quick nav check, ending its unrealistic use as a sort of 2-dimensional radar sweep; - I would have SCAN VISUALLY to spot other planes, even via the 'label markers', with no reliance on the TAC; - in the critical 'dead zone' between their real-life visibility and when they are visibly rendered on screen, I would be able to spot planes visually, via their 'marker labels'; - the 'marker labels' would use the current 'white-to-blue-or-red' colour code, so giving the same 'Identification Friend from Foe' effect, and providing a pointer in 3 dimensions to where they are, but leaving me to assess range and type, visually (pilot ID would be nice to retain, IF it could be turned on and off separately, or stay completely blank till very close, but failing that I'd rather not have pilot ID at all, just a 'marker label'); - no more staring at widely-scattered Archie, or high and low in the direction of blobs on the TAC, unable to see the enemies until opportunities to position the flight for the attack (or to refuse combat) have been narrowed down too much (unless I turn on the horrible 'flying labels'). I might still fly with the TAC still set to planes (range 1 or 2 miles) and only turn on labels when the TAC showed targets; or keep the TAC always off and labels always on; or fly with both TAC and labels off, and turn one or both on, just when I feel the need. Hence my interest in toning down TAC visibility, too. Anyway thanks for the tips, if I get anywhere I'll report back.

Sorry, duplicate post!

Have to confess I've never actually seen more than the odd clip from that film, it always sounded and looked pretty bad, compared to Blue Max or Aces High (which latter has grown me despite the many historical liberites taken eg SE -vs- Eindekker, as have Red Baron and Flyboys, tho still not a patch on Blue Max, universal lozenge fabric and grey Irish skies notwithstanding). Is Von R and Brown really worth watching?

Many thanks Grinseed, I'll give that a try - maybe only when I'm flying N.12s, tho, and not when I'm hunting them :)

Just flew my first mission in the N.12, in FE2, an armed recce which was pursued coming off the target by some Halberstadts. Managed to bag two of them with the upper-wing Lewis, once I'd worked out what to use as a sight picture (got them just below the upper rim of the windshield) and before I ran out of rounds. My observer didn't help much; we got shot up a fair bit but I jinked away and made a run for it at treetop height, after flying level for a bit but finding my gunner was tracking the vengeful third Halberstadt that was attacking from behind, but not opening fire at it. After getting out of the Halberstadt's line of fire and levelling out, the rudder fell off (not under fire at that moment) and then as I tried to keep her level for a forced landing the left lower wing fell off too and in we went. Quite a mission! She manouuvres ok tho takeoff and climb are both very sluggish (flying on Hard FM) which is maybe right for a twin-gun 2-seater with 130HP. Loved the transparent Cellon effect in the centre-section and the ribs showing through, also the stance of the observer with one hand on the pistol grip and the other on the gun ring, he certainly looks like he means business! Great little plane, she is! Thanks again Stephen - great work!

Have just posted on the SimHQ thread to ensure OFF at least gets Mentioned In Despatches. Seriously, selective polls like that are worse than useless but at least we can put in a word for OFF in the thread. So, the rest of you lot, what are you standing there staring at, GET FELL IN!!!

Brilliant - just brilliant - an excellent model of a very useful addition to the FE/FE2 skies! Bravo!!!

Re RoF, it can be more economical to buy any extra planes you're interested in, than an ICE upgrade which may or may not have the flyables you want, and as Malibu probably already knows, you can turn off the complex engine management stuff and just spin the prop and go. I got the free-to-play 2-plane version and was so impressed I bought most of the current planes in the recent sale. Just flying them around is an absolute treat for both eyes and ears and dogfighting is an experience just not equalled in any other sim I've played. FE/FE2 is about the next best dogfighter, fairly close behind RoF on balance, plus it has some advantages of its own, including bigger formations and furballs and somewhat more active skies. Thanks to the modders it covers all eras without RoF's dearth of 2-seaters, with no early-war ones at all, yet. OFF has supreme breadth and depth out-of-the-box of course, tho critically for a WW1 sim, I have found it hard to get enthusiastic about the CFS3-based dogfighting and patrolling (where FE excels) what with very poor formation keeping, poor plane visibility without resorting to radar/labels (not helped by Archie patterns that spread all over the sky), indifferent 2-seater AI and AI pilots that fly at their plane's unladen weight (the latter at least is reported fixed with P4). But I digress. I have both FE and FE2, both modded much the same. FE2 runs a bit better on Vista and I like the persistent plane wrecks but miss somewhat the changing seasonal terrain. Effects last longer in FE2 and the horizon can be a fair bit further out, which helps the immersion, especially in better weather or at greater height. I seemed to notice the FE2 AI was a bit sharper, certainly seemed to notice 'something' different when I started with FE2. Probably it's a marginal upgrade for you.

Wow! lovely work there!

Great stuff, off to grab it now, many thanks!!!